Whiteness
Ruth’s remembrance of the snow that she beholds throughout her childhood is vibrant. Ruth recalls, “When we finally emerged at Seventy-second Street, the world was white. It was not just that Central Park was caught in a snow globe. The faces of the men and women shuddering through the storm to get to work looked nothing like mine, or like my cousins’ or neighbors.” The whiteness is emblematic of the snow that is universal in the street. With such snow, it must have been problematical for Ruth’s mother to commute with her children to her employer’s abode.
Christina
Christina epitomizes indulgence and privilege: “Christina was six, falling neatly between the ages of Rachel and me. Christina had the biggest bedroom I had ever seen and more toys than anyone I knew. When she was home and we came to work with our mother, we played school with her and her teddy bears, drank water out of real miniature china teacups, and braided the corn-silk hair of her dolls. Unless she had a friend over, in which case we stayed in the kitchen and colored.”
Christina’s life is more gratified relative to Ruth and Rachel’s lives. Her parents are prosperous so they accord her all the childhood fancies which Ruth and Christina may never have throughout their childhood no matter how hard their mother works. Christina is conditioned regarding the subservience of blacks based on how she disregards them when she has other associates to play with.
