A Journey from an Innocent Child to a Compassionate Woman in Marigolds by Eugenia Collier

The devastation of The Great Depression was experienced by many during the 1930’s. This event was a very difficult period for many families, especially for African American families in rural Maryland. Many stories have been written about struggling families during the Depression. Children were often expected to mature very quickly. In Eugenia Collier’s “Marigolds”, Lizabeth, a young adolescent African American girl, transforms from being an immature and insensitive child, to a compassionate woman during a time when many were suffering hardships.

In “Marigolds,” Lizabeth’s childhood innocence starts as a thoughtless time in her life. The story begins with the main character remembering back to her childhood in a poverty stricken shantytown. Bored on a hot summer day, Lizabeth’s younger brother, Joey, suggests some childish fun to pass some time, ''Tell you what,’ said Joey finally, his eyes sparkling. ‘Let’s us go over to Miss Lottie’s.’ The idea caught on at once, for annoying Miss Lottie was always fun”. When they arrived at Miss Lottie's decaying old house, they plotted their plan of attack. Mrs. Lottie’s brightly colored marigolds which stood out in her barren yard. They all threw stones at the marigolds while Miss Lottie tended to them. All the children hated those colorful blossoms. “They interfered with the perfect ugliness of the place; they were too beautiful; they said too much that we could not understand…”. Miss Lottie became upset with the children as they wildly laughed. Right after, Lizabeth feels guilty about throwing the pebbles at the flowers, but she didn't fully understand why she was having these feelings.

Lizabeth begins to experience the realization of her feelings, the turning point of becoming a compassionate woman. In the middle of the night, Lizabeth wakes up to her mother and father arguing about supporting the family and to her father sobs, “He sobbed, loudly and painfully, and cried helplessly and hopelessly in the dark night. I had never heard a man cry before. I did not know men ever cried. I covered my ears with my hands but could not cut off the sound of my father’s harsh, painful, despairing sobs”. Hearing her father cry shattered Lizabeth's world. She'd never heard a man cry before. Then, before she knew where she was going, she hopped out the window and started walking. She realized she was walking to Miss Lottie's house. She leaped into Miss Lottie's flower bed and crushed all the marigolds. “I leaped furiously into the mounds of marigolds and pulled madly, trampling and pulling and destroying the perfect yellow blooms”. They were all destroyed by the time Miss Lottie came out to see what was going on. She stood looking down at Lizabeth, and that was the moment Lizabeth's childhood faded. She realized Miss Lottie wasn't a witch, but 'a broken old woman who had dared to create beauty in the midst of ugliness and sterility'. Lizabeth’s childhood innocence had faded.

In Eugenia Collier’s “Marigolds”, Lizabeth, a young adolescent African American girl, transforms from being an immature and insensitive child, to a compassionate woman during a time when many were suffering hardships. Lizabeth, like many other children during the Depression, experienced the end of childhood innocence and the beginning of womanhood. The years pasted after her innocence faded away. She soon realized she was seeing things only for what their face value was, and not for what they truly were.