The soup lines were as long as the Great Depression. It seemed my family, the Joads, could not see the end of this. We lingered for hours and hours. “The soup ain’t hot no more” said Tom “by the time we git (t)her, it’ll be cold”. The setting sun was making the sky spin a calming tone of purple and blue. The boys were anything but steady. Night was settling down on us. Our stomachs started eating themselves from the lack of food. Ma is delirious and disappointed. We complain because our soup is mostly water. Ma says “a free meal is a great meal, no matter what is served. “
    Pa glances up at the sky. Through the last beam of light, a dove circled us and landed on the sign that read “FREE SOUP AND BREAD”. The bird had an olive leaf in its mouth. “This means good luck right Ma?” She answered “I dunno, but I sure hope so”. The line was finally at the front. Our family is next in line and the smell comes rushing to our stomachs. It was if our stomachs jumped up from the excitement. We got closer and closer and our mouths began watering. The soup was very watered down, so that there is more of it to feed all of the other impoverished people. I was lucky enough to have a larger noodle in his bowl. “Here Pa, take mine noodle, it’ll do good for ya.” My Pa replies, “come on now, it’s no bother to me, eat it for yourself.” My face lit up as I was eating it, but the bird flew by and swiped it from my fingers. The bird flew off, but as Tom jumped for it, he planted into the dirt below. Under his mangled out shoes, he found a paper. It looked green or faded out at the corners. It was a one dollar bill. He completely forgot he was hungry and rushed to show us what he had found. Maybe the dove was good luck.
     Ma bribed one of the workers to get her a job at one of the stands. She worked the whole day and only earned twenty-five cents. The next day, she woke up early and was passing out bowls for the people to eat from. She dropped one of them and they broke so she has to work three hours to make the same amount to buy a new bowl. Nobody in our family had anything to eat that day, or the next. I apologize to ma family” Ma said, “God forbid I drop another one”. We understood but hunger was about to overcome that feeling. It was the devil was on her side. She dropped another one, and she got blamed for another broken one, that was not her fault. Our family was cursed. The dove did not bring good luck.
     The next day, Noah went out in search for as much food as he could get with one dollar. He had not held that much money for a long and dreadful time. He almost felt boastful and prideful, for he has the most money in his hand at the time. I tell him, “take care of this money, it might just save us”. Without listening to a single word from my poor soul, he skipped into the small town in search for food. Bragging to a group of fine girls on the street, he shows off his money. Nobody was willing to sell food to our family for a dollar. Word spread fast that our family had a dollar.
     Hunger struck the town and any food we could get our hands on, was already gone in half a minute. The next day, the local group of boys jumped Tom, thinking he had the dollar. Tom was injured and was left next to the the road. A field worker walked by and says “poor boy prob’ly deserved it” as he walked away. My brother tries to beg for help but he can not speak. A retired teacher walked by a said “I retired fo’ reason. I’m done with helping kids”. Pa comes on the road to search for the boy, but instead he finds a boy on the side of the road. He picks him up and realizes it is Tom. Tom is beaten horribly. Pa takes him home and cleans him up. When his Ma comes home she says “oh my dear boy, when you ever gon’ learn?”  She thought he has Horton into another fight, but he did not fight the boys back.
     “That bird is as lucky as a three leaved clover” says Tom. He fell into a peaceful slumber. Ma walks in carrying a bowl. The room filled with the warm steamy smell of soup. “Eat up my boy, be blessed.” Tom wakes up from the sound of her soothing voice and starts eating like he has never eaten in his whole life. He looks at the gazing eyes around him. Hunger filled our eyes, and they filled his eyes too, but our love was stronger than any other feeling. We ate and were satisfied because family was enough to get us through anything, especially the difficult times.