“If she come, I be happy. If she don't, I be content.”

“And then, just when I know I can live content without Shug, just when Mr. ___ done ast me to marry him again, this time in the spirit as well as in the flesh, and just after I say, Naw, I still don't like frogs, but let's us be friends, Shug write me she's coming home. Now. Is this life or not? *I be so calm.* If she come, I be happy. If she don't I be content. And then I figure this the lesson I was suppose to learn.”

“I'm not happy," she whispered. "I don't know what I am, but this isn't happiness.”

“She is happy, Kate thought. Even in her circumstance, she is happy. Kate almost envied the wounded woman that contentment. Was that what suffering did? she wondered. Place you in such pain that with its lessening, contentment came more easily. (p. 180)”

“I loved her enough to forget myself, my self pitying despairs, and be content that something she thought happy was going to happen.”

“He took it for granted that she was content; and she resented his settled calm, his serene dullness, the very happiness she herself brought him.”