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The Great Depression
Methemoglobinemia is a medical condition where a person’s blood is unable to carry the normal amount of oxygen throughout the body, resulting in blue-tinged skin, as well as other symptoms including dizziness, headache, and poor muscle coordination. Usually, methemoglobinemia results from a reaction to foods, chemicals, or medications. But, in rare cases, a recessive gene can cause hereditary methemoglobinemia, as is the case for Cussy Mary Carter and Pa in The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek. Their story is based on the “Blue Fugates,” a Kentucky family in whom the recessive gene was so prevalent that generations of family members were born and lived their lives with blue-tinged skin.
Methemoglobinemia Quotes in The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek
The The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek quotes below are all either spoken by Methemoglobinemia or refer to Methemoglobinemia. For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 1
Quotes
A lot of people were leery of our looks. Though with Pa working the coal, his mostly pale-blue skin didn’t bother folks as much when all miners came out of the hole looking the same.
But I didn’t have coal to disguise me in black or white Kentucky. Didn’t have myself an escape until I’d gotten the precious book route. In those old dark-treed pockets, my young patrons would glimpse me riding my packhorse, toting a pannier full of books, and they’d light a smile and call out “Younder comes Book Woman…Book Woman’s here!” And I’d forget all about my peculiarity, and why I had it, and what it meant for me.
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Chapter 28
Quotes
“I feel the same as before, Doc.” But I turned back to the mirror and know’d I wasn’t, nor would ever be. I brushed my hand slowly over my face, poked my lips that had colored a pretty pink, my cheeks a soft rose. Normal. I peered again at the stranger looking back at me, then looked at Doc, questioning.
“Modern medicine,” he exclaimed.
“I’m a stranger.” I stared at my reflection.
“A right pretty stranger at that,” Doc commented. I gazed back to the glass and inspected closer.
Pretty. Could it be? My neck looked white, like linen that matched my hands. I raised a palm and lightly braced it at the base of my neck. A tear rolled off my cheek, then another and several more, splashing onto my white hand. I was white, and that pretty white stranger was me. Me.
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