For my coming of age book I decided to re-read The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd. It’s a story about a young white girl, Lily Owens, who lives with her father and her black caretaker, Rosaleen. Lily spends her day trying to curl her hair in soda cans and stay out of the way of her abusive father, T. Ray. I first read this a long time ago, maybe 4th grade. Back then, I didn’t see it as a “coming of age” story. I saw it as just a good book about a girl and bees.
But now, I’m four years older, possibly four years wiser, and I see Lily’s change throughout the book. When she comes to terms with her past and her lies, and learns to tell the truth. But, right now I’m only about halfway through the book. Lily is deep in her lies, and terrified T. Ray will find her after she runs away with Rosaleen to the only place she deems safe—a house she finds using the last belongings over her mother.
Lily faces one of the hardest struggles of coming of age. Learning to accept herself, who she is and all she’s done. Lily can’t dare admit what she’s done to her role models, the women who took her in once she ran away. She also is too terrified to ask about her mother, who she believes knew the 3 amazing sisters whose care she is in, August, May and June.
Coming of age happens to people all at different times. Sometimes it slow and gradual, sometimes it hits, all at once. But something Lily says about the night really stuck with me. It seems it could as easily be said about coming of age. “It was the in-between time, before day leaves and night comes, a time I’ve never been partial to because of the sadness that lingers in the space between coming and going.” This quote is about a stage of life Lily is in during the book. She’s in between day and night, childhood and adulthood. She’s sadly leaving behind some aspects of her child hood, and being forced into adult hood.
And as she’s being forced into adulthood, she’s forced to accept herself, exactly who she is. She has to leave behind her mask she created with lies. And it’s sad and it’s hard and it’s a tough time to be facing, especially for her, but she has these 4 great women to help her through it. And as she learns to accept herself, and them, and everything, Lily will be able to come of age.
