Previous
Chapter 8
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Return to Sender, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Immigration in America
Coming of Age
Democracy
American Values
Home and Belonging
Love, Friendship, and Human Connection
Summary
Analysis
Dear Mari. The day before he sets out to Boston to see Mari and her family one last time before they leave, Tyler composes his thoughts about everything going on with the Paquette family in a letter to his friend. A very rainy summer has meant low crop production, and low crop production means Dad will have to buy more feed to see the cows through the winter. This has resurrected talk about selling the farm. What’s funny, though, is that the thought of Dad quitting farming isn’t anywhere near as scary as it was a year ago. Maybe that’s because Tyler learned about how much the Cruz family suffered. Maybe Gramps’s death helped him practice letting go. Or maybe it’s because now there are other options than just giving up the farm altogether, like leasing it to Uncle Larry.
Mari and Tyler are going to see each other one last time before Mari returns to Mexico, but it’s fitting that the final chapter sees Tyler writing a letter just like Mari has been doing since the beginning. Mari’s letters kept her close to the people she loved no matter how far apart they were physically. By having Tyler write a letter, the book assures readers that his and Mari’s friendship will continue and will be strengthened rather than destroyed by their separation. And, with the benefit of hindsight, Tyler can see and appreciate how much he’s matured over the past year. A big part of this has been learning to accept the things he can’t control. He’s no longer trying to put on blinders to avoid seeing the painful things in life, because he now has the resilience necessary for surviving and thriving.
Active
Themes
As Mom keeps telling Tyler, change is a part of life. He doesn’t always like to hear it (neither does Dad), but deep down he’s starting to realize how true that is. Still, some changes are hard, like the Cruz family’s move back to Mexico. The judge who heard Mr. Cruz’s case dropped criminal charges, which means that he might be able to immigrate legally one day. But he—and the rest of the family—will have to wait until Ofie is 18 and can start the process. Eight years seems like a long time to wait. Tyler will be 22 then. Maybe he’ll be a farmer, or maybe he’ll be an astronomer or meteorologist.
Mom expresses one of the book’s most fundamental lessons about life and growing up. Things change all the time, so it’s important to get used to that truth and to find ways to embrace it. That doesn’t mean that a person has to like or accept their situation as permanent—the Cruz family clearly has intentions to try to come back to America in the future—but it does deal with the way things are now. Besides, Tyler has realized that there’s more than one way to be happy and fulfilled.
Active
Themes
Tyler plans to place his letter into a sealed envelope and to tell Mari not to read it until she’s opened his goodbye present—his telescope. He’s planning on asking Aunt Roxie and Uncle Tony for a new one for Christmas, and then he and Mari will be able to look up at the stars together, even though they’ll be thousands of miles apart. And, if it’s too big for her to take with her back to Mexico, Grandma has promised to bring it with her on the church trip in August.
Active
Themes
Before ending the letter, Tyler tells Mari that he didn’t pay for her birthday star. Talk of naming stars reminds Tyler that his family is trying to give the farm a name before they lease it to Uncle Larry. But they still haven’t come up with a good one. Tyler thinks it should be in Spanish, but Sara vetoed the only idea they’ve had so far—Amigos Farm—because that’s what her latest boyfriend, an exchange student named Mateo, told her he wanted to be when he went home to Spain. Tyler wonders if Mari can come up with a good name. Even if it’s not named “Amigos,” Tyler promises the farm will always be a place where Mari and her family are welcomed, just like the swallows. And he knows that the only hope for humanity’s future is if everyone starts treating everyone else as friends and working together.
Active
Themes
Get the entire Return to Sender LitChart as a printable PDF.
"My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." -Graham S.
Dear Tyler. It’s mid-August, and Mari hastily pens a letter for Grandma to bring back to Tyler. She, Mr. Rossetti, and the church youth group are in Las Margaritas on their mission trip, but they’ve decided to return early, fearing unrest following fraught Mexican national elections. Still, despite the tension, Mari is excited to see Mexican people participating in democracy. It gives her hope that things in her country will improve.
Active
Themes
Mari tells Tyler that Papá has gone back to the kind, loving man he was before and that he doesn’t even bother her for writing to a boy. And Mamá is slowly healing, too.
Active
Themes
Mari reports that the transition to life in Mexico has been hard on Ofie and Luby. They have forgotten a lot of their Spanish, and they don’t like helping with chores. Ofie protests a lot. But when Ofie insists that Mamá and Papá can’t make her do something because she’s American and she has rights, Papá just answers that if he had to work in her country, she must work in his. In a way, Mari knows how her sisters feel. Las Margaritas is where she was born, so it will always be home. But she can also say the same thing about the farm.
Active
Themes
Which brings Mari to the question of the name. Papá likes the sound of “Amigos Farm,” while Mamá suggests “Buenos Amigos” or “Good Friends Farm.” Ofie and Luby like “Three Marías Farm.” But the previous night, during the farewell feast the Cruz family hosted for Grandma, Mr. Rossetti, and their friends, Grandma had a flash of inspiration while looking through Mari’s telescope. What about Estrella Farm—or “Star Farm” in English.
Active
Themes
Naturally, Mr. Rossetti disagreed, suggesting the much more patriotic “Stars and Stripes Farm.” Mari likes that idea, but she also remembers Mr. Bicknell saying that his students aren’t just Americans, but citizens of an interconnected world, like the swallows. That’s when Mari thought of modifying it to Stars and Swallows, or Estrellas y Golondrinas. It’s a bit wordy, but everyone likes it. Mari describes a long, happy silence, broken eventually by Abuelito’s observation that the swallows will be back soon. They always return, no matter how far away they fly.
