That final phrase got me thinking back to John Steinbeck's classic tale of migrant labour within the US, the dehumanising impact of poverty, the power of a dream of a better life and the infinite sadness of failure.
The story concerns George and Lennie, two itinerant farm workers during the great depression of the 1930s in the Salinas Valley in California.
"Guys like us that work on ranches are the loneliest guys in the world. They got no family, they don't belong no place," says George to his simple, childlike companion. The two of them deal with the hopelessness of their situation by hanging on to a simple dream of just a couple of acres of their own land, with a vegetable patch and a rabbit hutch and a few chickens: "And when it rains in the winter, we'll just say what the hell with goin' to work and we'll build a fire in the stove and sit around it an' listen to the rain comin' down on the roof."
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