"I wanta touch ya again, Tom. It’s like I’m blin’, it’s so dark. I wanta remember, even if it’s on’y my fingers that remember. You got to go away, Tom."
– John Steinbeck
The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 28. Ma Joad visits her Tom in his lightless cave hideout in the boxcar camp. Her great love for her son and family is shown as she touches his face all over with her hand. This is so that her fingers will remember Tom when he leaves the family to go on the run from the law. This is one of the novel’s most moving moments between mother and son.