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"What she doin coming back here in dem overhalls? Can't she find no dress to put on? Where's dat blue satin dress she left here in? Where all dat money her husband took and died and left her?—What dat ole forty year ole 'oman doin' wid her hair swingin' down her back lak some young gal?— " Page 2

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The great clap of laughter that they have been holding in, bursts out. Sam never cracks a smile. "Yeah, Matt, dat mule so skinny till de women is usin' his rib bones fuh uh rub-board, and hangin' things out on his hock-bones tuh dry." Page 52

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The mule represents Janie and Joe's relationship, and the weak, strained mule is slowly dying.

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On the train the next day, Joe didn't make many speeches with rhymes to her, but he bought her the best things the butcher had, like apples and a glass lantern full of candies. Page 34

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She had been getting ready for her great journey to the horizons in search of people; it was important to all the world that she should find them and they find her. But she had been whipped like a cur dog, and run off down a back road after things. Page 89

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Janie wants to live a life of excitement, wanting to find people to get her that excitement. However, through her life experiences, it seems like whenever she finds a person to get her excitement they always have to leave (in any type of way).

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Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board. For some they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the horizon, never out of sight, never landing until the Watcher turns his eyes away in resignation, his dreams mocked to death by Time. That is the life of men. Page 1

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"So Ah'm back home agin and Ah'm satisfied tuh be heah. Ah done been tuh de horizon and back and now Ah kin set heah in mah house and live by comparisons. Dis house ain't so absent of things lak it used tuh be befo' Tea Cake come along. It's full uh thoughts, 'specially dat bedroom." Page 191

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She could only ache and wait. Maybe it was some big tease and when He saw it had gone far enough He'd give her a sign. She looked hard for something up there to move for a sign. A star in the daytime, maybe, or the sun to shout, or even a mutter of thunder. Her arms went up in a desperate supplication for a minute. It wasn't exactly pleading, it was asking questions. The sky stayed hard looking and quiet so she went inside the house. God would do less than He had in His heart. Page 178

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So he didn't kill the dog with one stroke as he had intended. But the dog couldn't free himself either. They fought and somehow he managed to bite Tea Cake high up on his cheek-bone once. Then Tea Cake finished him and sent him to the bottom to stay there. Page 166

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Tea Cake is trying to fight the dog but the dog ended up biting him, and quickly after Tea Cake got the dog under control.

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These sitters had been tongueless, earless, eyeless conveniences all day long. Mules and other brutes had occupied their skins. But now, the sun and the bossman were gone, so the skins felt powerful and human.  Page 1

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"Going to high ground. Saw-grass bloom. Hurricane coming."
Everybody was talking about it that night. But nobody was worried. The fire dance kept up till nearly dawn. The next day,
more Indians moved east, unhurried but steady. Still a blue sky
and fair weather. Beans running fine and prices good, so the Indians
could be, must be, wrong. You couldn't have a hurricane
when you're making seven and eight dollars a day picking beans.
Indians are dumb anyhow, always were. Page 155

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Janie questions whether God wanted to give this to her, or any type of sign at all for the fate of Tea Cake.

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But Mrs. Turner's shape and features were entirely approved by Mrs. Turner. Her nose was slightly pointed and she was proud. Her thin lips were an ever delight to her eyes. Even her buttocks in basrelief were a source of pride. To her way of thinking all these things set her aside from Negroes. That was why she sought out Janie to friend with. Janie's coffee-and-cream complexion and her luxurious hair made Mrs. Turner forgive her for wearing overalls like the other women who worked in the fields. She didn't forgive her for marrying a man as dark as Tea Cake, but she felt that she could remedy that.
Page 140

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"Naw, Ah never gazes at 'em in de lookin' glass. If anybody else gits any pleasure out of 'em Ah ain't been told about it." "See dat? You'se got de world in uh jug and make out you don't know it. But Ah'm glad tuh be de one tuh tell yuh." Page 104

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Tea Cake is glad to tell Janie her eyes are beautiful. She doesn't see the beauty in her eyes, since no one has ever told her.

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"Tea Cake! So you sweet as all dat?" She laughed and he gave her a little cut-eye look to get her meaning. "Ah may be guilty. You better try me and see." She did something halfway between a laugh and a frown and he set his hat on straight. Page 97

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This business of the head-rag irked her endlessly. But Jody was set on it. Her hair was NOT going to show in the store. It didn't seem sensible at all. That was because Joe never told Janie how jealous he was. He never told her how often he had seen the other men figuratively wallowing in it as she went about things in the store. And one night he had caught Walter standing behind Janie and brushing the back of his hand back and forth across the loose end of her braid ever so lightly so as to enjoy the feel of it without Janie knowing what he was doing. Page 55

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"Naw it ain't, it's nature, cause nature makes caution. It's de strongest thing dat God ever made, now. Fact is it's de onliest thing God ever made. He made nature and nature made everything else." Page 65

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A few of the porch sitters were talking about how nature can be dangerous, and bringing God into the conversation by saying that nature is safe because he made it.

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The porch sitters are talking about Janie in negative ways, and Janie hears and listens to every criticism of her.

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Mrs. Turner does not appreciate black beauty, and she wants to be friends with Janie because Janie, like her, is also mixed with white features.

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Joe forced her to wear a head rag and cover her hair. It's supposed to symbolize how he is keeping her stored away, unable to be seen from the outside world as anything other than his wife in the store.

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Before she slept that night she burnt up every one of her head rags and went about the house next morning with her hair in one thick braid swinging well below her waist." Page 89

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"It was after the picnic that the town began to notice things and god mad. Tea Cake and Mrs. Mayor Starks! All the men that she could get, and fooling with somebody like Tea Cake!" Page 110

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"'Aw, aw! Ah'm colored!'
Den dey all laughed real hard. But before Ah seen de picture Ah thought Ah was just like de rest.'" Page 9

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"Ah was born back in due slavery so it wasn't for me to fulfull my dreams of whut  a woman oughta be and do. Dat's one of the hold backs of slavery." Page 16

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Long before the year was up, Janie noticed that her husband stopped talking in rhymes to her. Page 26

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Oh to be a pear tree- any tree in bloom! With kissing bees singing of the beginning of the world! She was sixteen. She had glossy leaves bursting buds and she wanted to struggle with life but it seemed to elude her. Where were the singing bees for her? Page 11

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The town disapproves of Janie and Tea Cake's relationship.

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Nanny explains how slavery has made her a more mindful person.

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She would want to be a pear tree who could go through life easily. But instead she only has the buds, and she wonders where all of her opportunities are.

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She was borned in slavery time when folks, dat is black folks, didn't sit down anytime they felt lak it. Page 114.

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"It was the time for sitting on porches beside the road. It was the time to hear things and talk. These sitters had been tongueless, earless, eyeless conveniences all day long." Page 1

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Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches. Page 8
If Janie was a tree, her leaves would be her smaller struggles through life.

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Joe did the same thing Logan did after he got bored of Janie, except that Joe did much quicker.

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The porch sitters are gossiping about nothing important, but they feel the need to talk about Janie in negative ways.

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Janie tells her best friend that she's independent now, and she's putting the effort to stay single without any help.

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Tea Cake and Janie are smitten.

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The horizon symbolizes Janie's life and the ships represent what the men want. Some men reach her needs, but they're far away from where Janie actually is.

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In Janie's community, they are not as in-tune as the Indians when it comes to nature. When the Indians move, Janie's neighbors don't really pay attention to it.

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Janie thought she was white like all the children her Nanny took care of. She found out she was colored when she saw a photo of herself and she didn't recognize herself.

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Logan had stopped talking to Janie in a loving way. Their "honeymoon phase" had phased out.

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Her burning her head rags symbolizes her freedom from Joe.

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Nanny was born to slave parents, and she was born a slave baby. Her parents stopped being slaves when slaves were declared free.

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She would want to be a pear tree who could go through life easily. But instead she only has the buds, and she wonders where all of her opportunities are.

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Janie walks through the neighborhood she knew so well growing up.