Something I posted on the subject a while back:
"Well, everything changes -- that is the natural state of everything in this world. However, those who refuse to change, or, in the case of Caroline, those who simply cannot change because of their situation and circumstances, generally really struggle and suffer. Caroline wishes she could go to college but, as she says, "she can't hardly read" so that's not an option. Maybe she'd like to get involved in civil rights movement that's changing everything around her (at a speed way too fast for her), but with a full time job and three kids at home, when would she find the time? Caroline deeply and sincerely wants a man in her life, but her ex-husband ("the handsome navy man") is apparently gone for good, Nat King Cole is apparently unavailable, and there don't appear to be any other prospects in sight. She's making $30 a week and this crazy white lady she works for thinks it'll be a nice liberal gesture to her to help her out by letting her keep the pocket change of a little boy. She trapped, she's angry, and with the temptation of each quarter going into the bleach cup, she's losing what little self-respect and integrity she has left for herself.
Her only companions are the radio and the washing machine (the dryer is her enemy in that already too hot basement). 16 feet underground, she's not in hell, she's in purgatory (as the dryer says in the first act) -- an underwater no man's land between heaven and hell and depending on how well one behaves, one can either go "up" or "down" and she feels like she's drowning.
After she finally gives into temptation in taking the $20 bill (and then eventually giving it back) she realizes she's totally hit rock bottom. She realizes that she must do the hardest thing any human being can do -- she must change herself. For Caroline, who has no other options than (at least for now) going back to that miserable dead end, soul-sapping reality of the purgatory of that basement and remaining a maid, it means she must find a way to accept her fate.
In "Lot's Wife" she prays to God to "murder" that Caroline who had dreams and wants and desires, so that she can go on with her life without the bitterness that almost cost her the job that she needs to keep for her family's future. Tesori has called the number an "anti-'Rose's Turn'" because Caroline is praying for her own negation -- praying for the strength to be able to go on with her life without ever wanting for anything again.
By the very end, Caroline is able to accept her life. Tesori and Kushner could have called this piece "acceptance, or change" -- in life, if one is to be contented, you either are able to handle, embrace and move forward with the ever-changing world around you or, upon the realization that you cannot move forward, you manage to find the courage to face your reality, make peace with it and accept it. Caroline eventually chooses and accepts the latter, largely upon the understanding that (as the final prologue indicates), her sacrifice will mean that her children will have a very different set of options because of her. Emmie, Larry, Jackie and Joe will never have to work in anyone's basement and, perhaps, will be able to go to college and become anything they want in life, because they had a mother who was willing to give up all of her dreams, so that her children will be able to achieve theirs."
"What a story........ everything but the bloodhounds snappin' at her rear end." -- Birdie
[http://margochanning.broadwayworld.com/]
"The Devil Be Hittin' Me" -- Whitney
