Summary—Chapter Sixteen: Soundness of Mind and Freedom
of Will
Estevan, Esperanza, Taylor, and Turtle go to the office
of Mr. Jonas Wilford Armistead. Estevan and Esperanza pose as Steve
and Hope and say they are Turtle’s biological parents. Taylor poses
as Turtle’s adoptive mother. Mr. Armistead, who assumes they are
telling the truth, explains the permanence of the adoption, and
asks Estevan and Esperanza to confirm they can give up their child.
Esperanza begins to cry, and Taylor realizes that she is not acting.
Esperanza says they love their daughter but cannot care for her.
She says that someday, when they have a home, they might have more
children. Watching Esperanza hold Turtle, Taylor realizes that if
Esperanza said she wanted to keep Turtle, Taylor could not deny
her. However, Esperanza gives her St. Christopher medallion to Turtle
and tells Taylor she knows Turtle will grow up happy. Estevan and
Esperanza sign a document stating that they agree to the change
in custody and that they sign in “soundness of mind and freedom
of will.” Afterward, Esperanza’s face seems newly happy.
Summary—Chapter Seventeen: Rhizobia
[Turtle] . . . entertained me with her
vegetable-soup song, except that now there were people mixed in
with the beans and potatoes: Dwayne Ray, Mattie, Esperanza, Lou
Ann and all the rest. And me. I was the main ingredient.
(See Important Quotations Explained)
Taylor takes Estevan and Esperanza to the church where
the reverend and his wife will provide them with shelter. Taylor
must say goodbye to Estevan. She tells him she has never before
lost anyone she loves. When she asks if it will be safe to write,
he tells her he can only send messages through Mattie. He kisses
her before he goes into the house, and Taylor muses, “[A]ll four
of us had buried someone we loved in Oklahoma.” After leaving Estevan
and Esperanza, Taylor calls her mother from a pay phone and tells
her she lost her love. Alice comforts her. She tells Taylor that
she has quit her job cleaning houses, and Taylor tells her about
Turtle’s official adoption. Taylor and Turtle have their “second
real conversation” (the first concerned Turtle’s burial of her doll).
When Turtle says she would like to see “Ma Woo-Ahn,” Taylor explains
that although Turtle has many friends, she now has only one Ma in
the world. She tells Turtle her name is now April Turtle Greer.
On a whim, Taylor decides to call 1-800-THE-LORD,
a number she imagined calling if she ever hit rock bottom, just
as her mother imagined cashing in their head rights in the Cherokee
Nation. When she calls, the number turns out to be a pledge line.
Taylor is not disappointed, but amused, and she tells the woman
who answers that the number has been a “fountain of faith” for her.
She and Turtle go to a library, where they look at horticulture
reference books. Turtle sees a picture of wisteria and recognizes
it as bean trees. Taylor reads out loud about wisteria vines, which
grow with the help of rhizobia, microscopic bugs that suck nitrogen
from the soil to help the plant. Taylor explains that the bugs are
like an underground railroad helping the plant, just as people have
people helping them. Taylor takes Turtle to the courthouse to pick
up the adoption papers, and calls Lou Ann. She nervously asks Lou
Ann if she plans to go back to Angel, and Lou Ann emphatically says
no. Lou Ann tells Taylor about a new man she is dating, a former
Rastafarian with a dog named Mr. T. She says that she does not plan
to move in with this man, because she feels like Taylor and Turtle
are her family. Taylor tells Lou Ann that she has adopted Turtle,
to Lou Ann’s great relief. Finally, Taylor and Turtle leave Oklahoma
City, heading back to Tucson. Turtle sings what Taylor calls her
“vegetable-soup song.” Along with vegetable names, Turtle adds the
names of her friends—Lou Ann, Esperanza, Mattie, Dwayne Ray, and
Taylor, “the main ingredient.”
Analysis—Chapters Sixteen–Seventeen
Just as Turtle closed a chapter in her life by reenacting
the burial of her mother, Esperanza finds relief in the ceremony
of giving up Turtle. Esperanza never got a chance to say goodbye
to her daughter, Ismene, so she finds closure in a formal goodbye
scene with a girl who looks like her own child and whom she loves
like her own child. She also has the comforting illusion that she
has left her own daughter in good hands with Taylor, a relief because
she does not know who now cares for Ismene. The goodbye serves as
a catharsis, a purification leading to renewal. Taylor notices that
Esperanza’s face looks refreshed as she leaves the office. As Taylor
later tells Estevan, “[S]he seems . . . as happy as if she’d really
found a place to leave Ismene behind.”
Taylor says that “all four of us had buried someone we
loved in Oklahoma”; Turtle buries her biological mother, Esperanza
buries Ismene, and Taylor buries Estevan. Taylor does not explain
whether the person Estevan loves and buries is herself or Ismene.
Taylor and Estevan never express their feelings for each other,
but Kingsolver implies that each understands Taylor’s love for Estevan
and his acknowledgement that in different circumstances, they could
have been together. In the moral world of this novel, Taylor and
Estevan cannot run off with each other, or even sleep with each
other, for several reasons: Estevan, a good man, loves and respects
his wife; Taylor does not want to betray Esperanza; and although
the novel prizes all-female families, it also respects conventional
families such as Estevan and Esperanza’s and does not advocate shattering
them.
Taylor’s successful maturation is confirmed when, in
Chapter Seventeen, she realizes she no longer needs her ace in the
hole, 1-800-THE-LORD. She
has hit her low point and lived through it, and she now feels strong
and happy. She says that 1-800-THE-LORD used
to be her “fountain of faith”; the number turns out to be a sham,
but Taylor now recognizes that her friends provide her with a true
fountain of faith. Kingsolver contrasts the useless phone call Taylor
makes to 1-800-THE-LORD with
the reviving, helpful phone calls she makes to her mother and Lou
Ann. Taylor also demonstrates the fullness of her maturation by
identifying herself to Turtle, for the first time, as Turtle’s mother.
Taylor now feels eager to provide care and love for her child.
