Janie

Will Landschulz

Am Lit Per. 2

Mrs. LaMagdeleine

When we first see Janie, we see her as a group of gossiping friends would see her: unkempt, dusty, back far too soon and alone.  Her appearance gives everybody a stir, sending them all into a flurry of preparation, making “burning statements with questions, and killing tools with laughs.” (2) The conversation instantly leans toward her when she is seen, but dies completely when she is close enough to hear.   Instead of continuing their speculation, they turn towards the spring that will quench their thirst for answers, and “good evenin’ ” (2) her in the hopes of enticing conversation.  No luck.  She exchanges pleasantries with the roost on the “bander log,” (2) then goes straight to her house.  They watch her go past, the men undressing her with their eyes and the women storing the garments in their memories to throw in Janie’s face later.  If they proved inconsequential, then “it was a hope she might fall to their level some day.”  (3) However, Janie does get a defender in the crowd, her old friend Phoeby Watson.  She rightly sees their irritation at Janie’s “arrogance” as frustration that Janie wouldn’t spill her secrets to them.  Phoeby placates the group with a promise of news and takes some dinner to Janie.  She, sitting in her backyard alone, is grateful for Pheoby’s company, and soon begins her tale.  However, she soon goes all the way back to the beginning, when she was a child in the household of “Mis’ Washburn,” who raised her equally with her white children.  The difference between them and her was invisible, so much so that young Janie didn’t know she was colored until she saw a photograph of herself and noticed her difference from the rest.  However, Janie was treated poorly by other black kids at school, for her good clothing.  She was told not to put on airs by the other kids, because the sheriff had set a bloodhound on her father, to keep him away from her mother.  What they didn’t remember was that Janie’s father had tried to get in touch with Janie’s mother later, so they could marry, and have Janie be their legitimate child. 

            The gossiping ladies seem to have more in common with the spiteful bullies of the playground than with the happy playgroup of her foster home, with their creations of implements of social warfare when they see Janie, and their annoyance and astonishing conclusions when she won’t talk to them.  However, age seems to have mellowed them.  They are polite to her, as opposed to spiteful on the playground, and graciously accept Pheoby’s services as messenger of Janie’s tidings.  They still “sit in judgment,” (2) though, as Mayrella and her allies did on the playfield at school.