Journal Five
I believe Lilly’s father is a man full of hatred. I do not believe that he is particularly racist but he just seems like he has hate in his heart. The way he treats Lilly is very mean. I believe that he still holds Lilly completely responsible for her mother’s death. Lilly is afraid of him. She has to keep the few things that she has from her mother, buried in the peach orchard out of fear of what he might do if he found out that she had those things. She then has to sneak out at night to go to the peach orchard to look at those things. Her father caught her there and thought she was out there meeting a boy. He brought her inside and she had to kneel on grits which damaged her knees.
Lilly is ashamed of herself. She doesn’t like her body too much. She is just going through puberty however and it is typical for girls going through puberty not to like their bodies. The fact that her mother is gone makes things worse though. She doesn’t have someone there to tell her what to expect. The closest thing that she has is Rosaleen. She states in the text that there is a definite class difference. She states that her clothes are beyond popular and that there is a sign on her back that says that she will never be popular. She wanted to go the girls training school but she could not because she had no woman in her life that could give her a flower after she had completed the training. She felt as if it was very important to go to this school because it would teach you everything.