Summary

The babies and small children were taken to the fields when the women went back to work. They entertained themselves or slept. Each of the women had a favorite among their children. They often cared more for their sons than their daughters, just as their mothers had done. They knew it was their sons who would be responsible for taking care of them in their old age. Their husbands left all of the child care and housework to the women.

As soon as the children were old enough, they went to work in the fields as well. Their mothers sometimes wondered if they’d been right to bring the children into such a world. The children, however, played with whatever they found, just as their mothers had in Japan. The children began to learn about the American children who lived beyond their farms...