Al Capone Does My Shirts

Al Capone Does My Shirts

by

Gennifer Choldenko

Growing Up and Doing the Right Thing Theme Analysis

Themes and Colors
Disability, Dignity, and Shared Humanity Theme Icon
Friendship and Community Theme Icon
Family Theme Icon
Growing Up and Doing the Right Thing Theme Icon
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Al Capone Does My Shirts, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Growing Up and Doing the Right Thing Theme Icon

Over the course of 12-year-old Moose’s six months on Alcatraz Island, he grows up. The novel links Moose’s burgeoning maturity to his developing understanding of what it means to do the right thing. At first, Moose believes that doing the right thing—and being a good person—means following the rules and doing as he’s told. He thus resists getting involved in Piper’s rule-breaking schemes to make money off of Alcatraz’s infamous prisoners, and he feels he has no choice but to do as Mom tells him when she insists he must spend time with his sister Natalie every afternoon. However, as Moose spends more time with Natalie, he begins to question Mom’s methods. Eventually, he challenges Mom, first by giving Natalie her button box in the afternoons (Natalie isn’t supposed to have her buttons) and later, by insisting that it’s essential that the family acknowledge that Natalie is, in fact, 16 and not 10 as Mom has claimed for years. Doing the right thing, he comes to understand, means standing up for what’s right—even if that means breaking rules, causing conflict, or otherwise making things uncomfortable.

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Growing Up and Doing the Right Thing Quotes in Al Capone Does My Shirts

Below you will find the important quotes in Al Capone Does My Shirts related to the theme of Growing Up and Doing the Right Thing.
Chapter 2: Errand Boy Quotes

“Dad! Could you show me the cell house, and then maybe could we play ball?” I sound like I’m six and a half now, but I can’t help it. He’s been gone forever and I hardly got to see him at all yesterday. It’s lonely in my family when he’s not around.

His smile seems to lose its pink. He puts Natalie’s buttons down in two careful piles, gets up and brushes his uniform off.

I follow him into the kitchen. “You’re not working today, are you?”

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Dad/Cam Flanagan
Related Symbols: The Button Box/Buttons
Page Number: 7
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 12: What About the Electric Chair? Quotes

I have to admit...Piper is pretty smart. But she’s going to get in trouble for this, I just know it.

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Piper Williams, Warden Williams
Page Number: 79
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 13: One-Woman Commando Unit Quotes

“Gram doesn’t live down the street anymore, honey.” My mom sighs. “We can’t do this without you. Being around kids is good for Natalie. Mrs. Kelly says so. And if she’s to get accepted to the Esther P. Marinoff...”

Related Characters: Mom/Helen Flanagan (speaker), Moose Flanagan, Natalie Flanagan, Mrs. Carrie Kelly, Gram
Page Number: 85
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 15: Looking for Scarface Quotes

“Whatever you say, Mom,” I say, watching Nat fuss with her clothes like something’s too tight.

“What’s the matter?” I ask Natalie.

“She’s fine,” my mother answers for her. “We’ve been all over. We’ve had a lovely day.” My mom glances quickly at me and then away.

“She looks upset.”

“It’s just hot, that’s all.” My mom rubs her neck.

“She wants her buttons.”

“Well...yes...,” my mom admits. “But I’m sure once you take her out, she’ll forget all about it. Mrs. Kelly says it’s just a matter of redirecting her attention.” My mom’s voice isn’t quite so sure as her words are. She and Natalie have clearly had a hard time today.

“Don’t you think it’s kind of mean, taking her buttons away?”

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Mom/Helen Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Mrs. Carrie Kelly
Related Symbols: The Button Box/Buttons
Page Number: 90-91
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 23: She’s Not Cute Quotes

But right where the chain link meets the cement wall, I see a gap.

[...]

I look down at Natalie. She hasn’t moved a muscle. I won’t be able to see her once I get up there. But I know better than to try to move her once she’s all set up.

I’ll just make it quick, that’s all. A couple of seconds to look. One minute, that will be enough. A ball could be sitting right there out in the open, just waiting for me. I know this is a lousy idea. But it doesn’t matter. A gap in the fence is a magnet. It just is.

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Piper Williams, 105/Onion, Scout
Page Number: 139
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 28: Tall for Her Age Quotes

My mom has taken off her green hat and her green coat and she has begun to make supper. Every minute or so she comes back to the table to read a part of the article again. It’s as if the newsprint is warm and my mother’s hands are very cold.

Natalie is on the living room floor, reading my math book like it’s the newspaper.

“Mom, I need to talk to you,” I say.

“Okay, honey.” She smiles. “I can’t wait to tell your dad about this! [...] Your sister is going to be okay! She’s going to be fine!”

“But, Mom,” I say, “it says no kids are accepted after the age of twelve!”

My mother freezes. She’s so still, it looks like she’s stopped breathing. “Natalie is ten, Moose. You know that.”

“You can’t be ten for five years in a row,” I whisper.

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Mom/Helen Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, 105/Onion
Page Number: 155
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 30: Eye Quotes

“Stop it! Stop it!” I have my hands on Nat’s arms. I want to shake her, shake her hard. My arms tremble with the effort not to.

Natalie screams louder. I look into those trapped eyes. Wherever she is, she can’t get out, which only makes her scream louder. And suddenly I’m not angry anymore.

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Mom/Helen Flanagan, 105/Onion
Related Symbols: Alcatraz, The Button Box/Buttons
Page Number: 168
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 32: The Button Box Quotes

“I know what Mrs. Kelly says. I’m talking about Moose now and what he thinks. He’s good with Natalie. They’ve worked out a relationship. We have to respect that and trust him.”

“Well, yes, but—”

“You have to let him care about her his way.”

And then something I can’t hear.

“I got one child who has everything,” my mom says, “big, strapping, healthy, smart...makes people laugh. Got kids coming over looking for him night and day, just like at home. Little ones, big ones and the girls—they all like Moose. But Natalie, Natalie doesn’t have the whole world looking out for her. She needs me.”

“Moose needs you too.”

Related Characters: Mom/Helen Flanagan (speaker), Dad/Cam Flanagan (speaker), Moose Flanagan, Natalie Flanagan, Piper Williams, Theresa Mattaman, Jimmy Mattaman, Annie, Mrs. Carrie Kelly
Related Symbols: The Button Box/Buttons
Page Number: 174-175
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 33: The Sun and the Moon Quotes

Natalie is holding hands with a man convicted of some awful crime. It’s so strange, so awful, and so...normal. Natalie doesn’t look weird. She’s my older sister. A sixteen-year-old girl holding hands with a man not much older than she is.

This is terrible.

This is good.

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Piper Williams, 105/Onion
Page Number: 185
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 35: The Truth Quotes

“People know, Mom. They know.”

“They don’t know!” she cries, tears streaming down her face. “You don’t know! She won’t have a chance at sixteen. No one will take her. No one cares about an adult that isn’t right. It’s only kids who have a chance. It’s too late if she’s sixteen. Don’t you see?”

“Yeah, but Mom, you can’t pretend! It’s worse. People know—”

“No one knows. They don’t know and they don’t care. Put her in an institution. Do you know how many times I’ve heard that? Lock her up with all the nuts. She has to be TEN. It’s the only chance she has!”

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Mom/Helen Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Piper Williams, 105/Onion
Page Number: 193
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 36: Waiting Quotes

“You didn’t care that it made me mad,” my mom says in a quiet tone of voice. “You didn’t care that it upset your father. You didn’t care that it was the night before Natalie’s interview. You didn’t care about anything. [...]

“But I see how much you care about Natalie. That’s the part that didn’t make sense. All night I tossed and turned. I kept asking why. Moose, of all people. Why did he say that? Why? And you know what? I could only come up with one answer.

“You did it because you believed in your heart it was the right thing to do. You were doing what you thought would help your sister.”

Related Characters: Mom/Helen Flanagan (speaker), Moose Flanagan, Natalie Flanagan, Dad/Cam Flanagan
Page Number: 196
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 37: Carrie Kelly Quotes

I try to go to sleep. But I keep thinking about Natalie at home in Santa Monica—living her life in the back room of our house and on the steps of Gram’s. I rode bikes with Pete, played ball, did my homework. She did not. I will graduate from high school, go to college, get married, have kids. She will not.

[...]

Nothing has helped. But suddenly I see this isn’t true. One thing has helped. Carrie Kelly. Natalie has been more a part of things here on this island than she ever has before. She’s had a life here, for the first time. Maybe just a little bit of a life. But a life just the same.

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Mrs. Carrie Kelly, Gram, Pete
Related Symbols: Alcatraz
Page Number: 199
Explanation and Analysis:

When I hang up the phone, I know I have to do something. Have to. I have no idea what. I wonder if this is how my mother feels. How she has always felt.

Now I understand. When you love someone, you have to try things even if they don’t make sense to anyone else.

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Mom/Helen Flanagan, Al Capone, Warden Williams, Mrs. Carrie Kelly
Page Number: 201
Explanation and Analysis:

I look directly into his blue eyes. “Remember you said we should think hard about going against the rules? Remember you said that. Well, I have thought hard.”

The warden meets my gaze. “I see that,” he says. “But in this case you’re asking me to bend the rules. And I’m not about to. You may think it’s the right thing to do, but I do not.”

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Warden Williams (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Al Capone
Related Symbols: Alcatraz
Page Number: 204
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 38: What Happened? Quotes

“I figured Capone could write back in the book—you know, underlining very faintly in pencil the way the cons do.”

“No, I don’t know.”

“Let’s say you want to say, ‘I need your help.’ You go carefully through the book and look for an I and underline it. And then an n and underline it and an e and so on until you’ve spelled your whole message.”

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Piper Williams (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Al Capone, Warden Williams
Page Number: 207-208
Explanation and Analysis:

“‘I like your mother very much’?” Piper says when she reads it.

“You got to say something about the guy’s mother.”

“Why?” she asks.

“Because then he remembers he has one. And he knows we know her too. Makes him act better. It’s The Mom Rule—all guys use it.”

“This is Al Capone we’re talking about. I don’t think he’ll fall for a cheap trick like that.”

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Piper Williams (speaker), Natalie Flanagan, Al Capone, Teresina Capone
Page Number: 210
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 39: The Warden Quotes

And every day I wonder if we’ll be going back to Santa Monica. It seems so long ago that we lived there now, I’m not even sure I want to anymore. And I know moving back will be bad for Natalie.

Related Characters: Moose Flanagan (speaker), Natalie Flanagan
Related Symbols: Alcatraz
Page Number: 212
Explanation and Analysis: