One of the most difficult challenges of life in society is finding the
strength to break out of the mold which has been set by the values of
previous generations. From infancy onward, everyone's heart and mind are
struck by a deluge of ideas which declare what is "right" and "proper" and
"appropriate"; most defer to these pronouncements, for the realization
that there could ever be anything more has never come to them, and lack of
desire for something can be the most potent barrier to its realization.
Janie is one of those that realizes very young that the world can be so
much more than anything she has been taught by an outside source. The ills
which her people have suffered for so many years have blinded them to the
subtle magnificence which can pervade even the lowliest life, and can be
tapped by any imagination with sufficient motivation. As a child, Janie
longs for the glorious truth which tickles her fancy through the heavenly
scent of the pear tree, but the hard materialism of her grandmother and
later her first husband restrain her by trying to crowd her mind with the
empty trinkets which they themselves have learned to value. Her second
husband is similarly stifling; though his strength and power is at first
appealing, he too is unable to comprehend that life is in the living and
the being, and not in the having and the controlling. Janie not knowing
what marriage really meant, married because she thought he could take care
of her.

Marriage is defined as an insitution uniting a man and a woman in a special
form of mutual dependence, often for the purpose of founding and
maintaining families. As a social practice entered into through a public
act, it reflects the purposes, character, and customs of the society in
which it is found. Janie's questing spirit is crushed under the pervasive
blindness which surrounds her in her early marriages, but when her second
husband dies, she again begins to seek the revelation which she so longed
for as a child. Her heart is open, and when she encounters Tea Cake, their
hearts strike a chord, and Janie finds it possible for her own inner
values to resonate. She finds not judgment, but a confidence in her truth
of spirit which gives her the affirmation she needs to allow her own
beliefs to take control of her life.

Being that there are several forms of marriage, monogamy, the union of one
man and one woman, is the most widely accepted form, predominating also in
societies in which other forms are accepted. Janie was not monogamous
because she cheated on Logan Killicks with Joe Starks thinking he could
help her more in life. Polygamy, another type of marriage means a person
has more than one spouse. Janie never had more than one husband but she
did cheat. It is in her early years that Janie's optimism, and her ability
to let her own heart find its voice, is truly developed. She spends many
days lounging under the pear tree in her yard, letting the sweet
magnificence of nature pervade her being, trying to understand how she can
become a part of the truth which is all about her. To her wide-open mind,
the "rose of the world was breathing out ...