Theme: As long as you allow others to control your actions, your goals are unachievable.
This could use some clarification...but the idea is Janie knows what she wants from marriage very early in life, but by allowing her grandmother, Logan, and Jody to control her actions, she cannot achieve her goal until she meets Tea Cake who does not control her.
"She saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the sanctum of a bloom; the thousand sister-calyxes arch to meet the love embrace and the ecstatic shiver of the tree from root to tiniest branch creaming in every blossom and frothing with delight. So this was marriage!" (pg. 11)
[this sets up Jaine's goal]
"I wants things sweet wid mah marriage lak when you sit under a pear tree and think." (pg. 24)
[again, setting up her goal]
"Ah wants to see you married right away[...]Brother Logan Killicks. He's a good man, too." (pg. 13) [nanny is controlling Janie's actions]
"The vision of Logan Killicks was desecrating the pear tree..." (pg. 14)
[Nanny's control of Janie is destroying her goal.]
"She knew that marriage did not make love. Janie's first dream was dead, so she became a woman" (pg. 25)
[her goal of a loving marriage is destroyed by Nanny forcing her to marry Logan...]
"Ah never married her for nothin' lak dat. She's uh woman and her place is in de home" (pg. 44)
[Jody controlling her...]
"It must have been the way Joe spoke out without giving her a chance to say anything one way or another that took the bloom off of things" (pg. 43)
[joes first time controlling her has disrupted her goal of happy marriage, but not destroyed it]
"But you ain't goin' off in all dat mess uh comminuted." (pg. 60)
"'...why don't you go on and see what Mrs. Bogle want? Whut you waitin' on?'. Janie wanted to hear the rest of the play-acting and how it ended, but she got up sullenly and went inside." (pg. 70)
"he wanted her submission and he'd keep on fighting until he felt he had it " (pg. 71)
[Jody controlling what Janie can and can't do...]
"It was her image of Jody tumbled and shattered. But looking at it she saw that it never was the flesh and blood figure of her dreams. Just something she had grabbed up to drape her dreams over.[...]She had no more blossomy openings dusting pollen over her man, neither any glistening young fruit where the petals used to be. [...] She was saving up feelings for some man she had never seen." (pg. 72)
[Janie realizes that her goal of a happy marriage has not been reached because he insists on controlling her so. She realizes her goal will have to wait for another man.]
"He could bee the bee to her blossom-a pear tree blossom in the spring."(pg. 106)
[Janie realizing that Tea Cake could finally fulfill her goal because he wants her to be herself]
"...Tea Cake ain't draggin' me nowhere Ah don't want tuh go. Ah always did want tuh git round uh whole heap, but Jody wouldnt 'low me tuh." (pg. 112)
[tea cake allows Janie to be herself and do what she wants]
"'Cause Tea Cake ain't no Jody Starks[...]dis is uh love game. Ah done lived Grandmas way, now Ah means tuh live mine." (pg. 114)
[Janies goal has been reached. She knows that she will have a happy marriage with Tea Cake because she is allowed to make her own decisions]
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