Building Bridges Published Essay

It’s hard to fight for your dreams. Bebe is trying to follow her passion but her grandmother won’t let her.  Building Bridges, by Andrea Davis Pinkney is a short story about a girl named Bebe and her relationship with her Grandmother, Mama Lil. Bebe’s parents died when she was young and so she grew up with her grandmother for most of her life. Throughout the story, Bebe and Mama Lil's relationship changed. This story takes place in a time period where racism was still very prevalent. Bebe wants to be an engineer but Mama Lil says “Ain’t no black woman gonna do a white mans work.” This story has many symbols and they are what drive this story until the end.

Mama Lil and Bebe are separated in many ways throughout the story. One way is the smoking, which symbolizes the uncommunicative relationship between Mama Lil and Bebe. Whenever Mama Lil is watching TV, she is always smoking and it seems like she is in another world, to Bebe. On page 30, Bebe says “Mama Lil sat as still as a statue… ‘if you don’t sign this- if you won’t sign it-  I’ll sign it myself.’” I feel like this shows the separation of Mama Lil and Bebe and also what a lot of kids are experiencing in the world, therefore it is an important symbol in the story. Mama Lil turning her back on Bebe is another symbol of their lack of communication. Mama Lil always turned her back on Bebe because she wanted to avoid the truth. On page 22, Mama Lil says “‘You get cranky every time we talk about that nasty job you wanna get.’ Mama Lil turned her back to me and began to fill the sink with soapy water.” Also, the fact that Bebe notices strong back muscles means that Mam Lil turns her back to Bebe a lot.

Throughout the story, Bebe wants to work as an engineer on the bridge project but Mama Lil doesn’t think a ‘black woman’ should be an engineer.  The symbol of the bridge is one of the most important because it is what drives the story. At the end of the story, Mama Lil and Bebe have a much better relationship and the bridge symbolizes the connection between them. On page 34, Pinkney writes “’Bebe, that bridge is lucky to have you,’ she [Mama Lil] said. I [Bebe] hugged Mama Lil good and hard, then I got up to go. Just before I left the kitchen, I turned and smiled big, right at her. ‘Yeah, it is,’ I [Bebe] said.”  The bridge also symbolizes the state of their relationship. The bridge needs fixing and so does their bond. On page 25, Pinkney writes “She [The Brooklyn Bridge] needed repair. She was some 40 years older than Mama Lil. As lovely as she was, she had some serious rough spots”.  This concludes, at the end of the story, Bebe and Mama Lil’s fixed friendship.

“With each scrub, she hunched further over the sink, giving that pan every bit of strength she had. ‘This damn grease is stubborn,’ she said, her back muscles tense with effort. This quote, on page 23, shows the pan as a symbol because Mama Lil thinks that Bebe is stubborn and she wants to scrub that stubbornness off her.  A final symbol, the cigarette pack, represents Mama Lil at the end of her fight. She smoked throughout the whole story and at that moment, she wants a cigarette and the pack is empty. On page 30, Pinkney states “Mama Lil reaches for her pack of Carlton’s, which were resting on the arm of her sofa. She felt for a cigarette, but the pack was empty.”  This is a powerful symbol because it shows emptiness.

Pinkney shows lots of symbolism through the story. Even the title, Building Bridges, shows what the story is about, building a better relationship. This story shows how people can get through hard parts of life. Stubbornness, avoidance and giving in are all aspects of life that we have experienced. Many teenagers in the world go through the same stuff that Bebe and her grandmother went through in the story.  It's hard to fight for your dreams, but it is worth it when you try.