Water by the Spoonful

by

Quiara Alegría Hughes

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Water by the Spoonful makes teaching easy.

Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz Character Analysis

Yaz is Elliot’s cousin, Odessa and Mami Ginny’s niece, and William’s ex-wife. She is 29 years old, a music composer, and a professor at the prestigious Swarthmore College. Although Yaz was born into the same extended family and circumstances as Elliot, her musical talents earned her an early scholarship to an all-white prep school, removing her from the barrio and propelling her on to a successful career and a marriage to a respectable white man. Though Elliot and many of their cousins view Yaz’s life as a great success story, proof that one of them could actually make something of themselves, Yaz finds her life to be hollow and disappointing—her marriage ends when William wakes up and decides he simply doesn’t love her anymore. Although Yaz was able to find freedom outside the barrio by building a “normal” life for herself, the dissonance between the Puerto Rican world she grew up in and the cultured, white, sophisticated world she inhabits causes her to have an identity conflict, alternately ashamed of her Puerto Rican blood or her attempts to inhabit a white world. To solve this dissonance, Yaz ultimately decides to move back into the barrio, stepping into the role of family leader left vacant by Mami Ginny’s passing. While she once buried her Puerto Rican heritage and oriented her life around personal achievements, now Yaz opts to embrace who she is as a Puerto Rican and take responsibility for her family and her community.

Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz Quotes in Water by the Spoonful

The Water by the Spoonful quotes below are all either spoken by Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz or refer to Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Substance Addiction Theme Icon
).
Scene One Quotes

YAZ: You wanna be my witness?

ELLIOT: To What?

YAZ: My now-legal failure. I’m divorced.

ELLIOT: Yaz. I don’t want to hear that.

YAZ: You’ve been saying that for months and I’ve been keeping my mouth closed. I just need a John Hancock.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), William
Page Number: 8
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Three Quotes

YAZ: […] The ugliness bore no promise of a happy ending. The ugliness became an end in itself. Coltrane democratized the notes. He said, they’re all equal. Freedom. It was called Free Jazz but freedom is a hard thing to express musically with spinning into noise.

Related Characters: Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker)
Page Number: 18
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Five Quotes

ELLIOT: All those have carnations. I don’t want a carnation within a block of the church.

YAZ: You told me to eliminate seven. I eliminated seven. Close your eyes and point.

ELLIOT: Am I a particularly demanding person?

YAZ: Yes. What’s so wrong with a carnation?

ELLIOT: You know what a carnation says to the world? That they were out of roses at the 7-Eleven.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Mami Ginny
Page Number: 29
Explanation and Analysis:

YAZ: […] You know, [William’s] been to four funerals in the Ortiz clan and I could feel it, there was a part of him, under it all, that was disgusted. The open casket. The prayers.

ELLIOT: It is disgusting.

YAZ: Sitting in the pew knowing what freaks we are.

ELLIOT: He’s good people.

YAZ: I was probably at his side doing the same thing, thinking I’m removed, that I’m somehow different.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), William
Page Number: 32
Explanation and Analysis:

YAZ: […] Look at that guy. Arranging his daisies like little treasures. What do you think it’s like to be him? To be normal?

ELLIOT: Normal? A hundred bucks says that dude has a closet full of animal porno at home.

YAZ: I bet in his family, funerals are rare occasions. I bet he’s never seen a cousin get arrested. Let alone one under the age of eighteen. I bet he never saw his eight-year-old cousin sipping rum through a twisty straw.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker)
Page Number: 33
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Eight Quotes

ELLIOT: Let’s not act like this is some heroic sacrifice. Like this makes her the world’s martyr.

YAZ: We’re not going to get more than fifteen bucks for it.

ELLIOT: Symbols matter, Yaz. This isn’t about the money. This is shaking hands. This is tipping your hat. This is holding the door open. This is the bare minimum. The least effort possible to earn the label “person.”

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz
Page Number: 56
Explanation and Analysis:

YAZ: Why wouldn’t you ask me for help? Why would you deal with that alone?

ELLIOT: The opposite of alone. I seen barracks that looked like dope houses. It was four months in my life, it’s over. We’ve chopped up a lot of shit together, Yaz, but we ain’t gonna chop this up. This shit stays in the vault. You got me?

YAZ: No!

ELLIOT: Yaz. Please. Please.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz , Orangutan / Madeleine Mays
Page Number: 59
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Twelve Quotes

ELLIOT: Titi, Odessa fucking OD’d and she’s dying on her living room floor and I can’t take this anymore! COME GET US before I walk off and leave her on the sofa.

YAZ: If you need to, go. No guilt. I got this.

ELLIOT: She’s my mom. Can I be angry? Can you let me be angry?

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz
Page Number: 74
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Fourteen Quotes

YAZ: […] I wrote a list [of achievements] on a piece of paper and dug a hole in Fairmount Park and put it in the ground and said, “When I turn thirty, I’ll dig it up and cross it all off.” And I promise you I’ll never have the courage to go to that spot with a shovel and face my list full of crumbs, decoys, and bandaids.

Related Characters: Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Elliot Ortiz, Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz , Mami Ginny
Page Number: 83
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Fifteen Quotes

ELLIOT: I wanted Mami Odessa to relapse, Yaz. I wanted her to pick up that needle. I knew precisely what to do, what buttons to push, I engineered that shit, I might as well have pushed the thing into her vein. Because I thought, Why would God take the good one? Yo, take the bad mom instead! I was like, Why wouldn’t you take the bad fucking mom? If I stay in Philly, I’m gonna turn into it. I’m gonna become one of them. I’m already hallway there. You’ve got armor, you’ve got ideas, but I don’t.

YAZ: Go. Go and don’t you ever, ever look back.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz
Page Number: 91
Explanation and Analysis:

YAZ: I’m the elder now. I stay home. I hold down the fort.

Related Characters: Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Elliot Ortiz, Mami Ginny
Related Symbols: Yaz’s Piano
Page Number: 92
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Water by the Spoonful LitChart as a printable PDF.
Water by the Spoonful PDF

Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz Quotes in Water by the Spoonful

The Water by the Spoonful quotes below are all either spoken by Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz or refer to Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Substance Addiction Theme Icon
).
Scene One Quotes

YAZ: You wanna be my witness?

ELLIOT: To What?

YAZ: My now-legal failure. I’m divorced.

ELLIOT: Yaz. I don’t want to hear that.

YAZ: You’ve been saying that for months and I’ve been keeping my mouth closed. I just need a John Hancock.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), William
Page Number: 8
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Three Quotes

YAZ: […] The ugliness bore no promise of a happy ending. The ugliness became an end in itself. Coltrane democratized the notes. He said, they’re all equal. Freedom. It was called Free Jazz but freedom is a hard thing to express musically with spinning into noise.

Related Characters: Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker)
Page Number: 18
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Five Quotes

ELLIOT: All those have carnations. I don’t want a carnation within a block of the church.

YAZ: You told me to eliminate seven. I eliminated seven. Close your eyes and point.

ELLIOT: Am I a particularly demanding person?

YAZ: Yes. What’s so wrong with a carnation?

ELLIOT: You know what a carnation says to the world? That they were out of roses at the 7-Eleven.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Mami Ginny
Page Number: 29
Explanation and Analysis:

YAZ: […] You know, [William’s] been to four funerals in the Ortiz clan and I could feel it, there was a part of him, under it all, that was disgusted. The open casket. The prayers.

ELLIOT: It is disgusting.

YAZ: Sitting in the pew knowing what freaks we are.

ELLIOT: He’s good people.

YAZ: I was probably at his side doing the same thing, thinking I’m removed, that I’m somehow different.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), William
Page Number: 32
Explanation and Analysis:

YAZ: […] Look at that guy. Arranging his daisies like little treasures. What do you think it’s like to be him? To be normal?

ELLIOT: Normal? A hundred bucks says that dude has a closet full of animal porno at home.

YAZ: I bet in his family, funerals are rare occasions. I bet he’s never seen a cousin get arrested. Let alone one under the age of eighteen. I bet he never saw his eight-year-old cousin sipping rum through a twisty straw.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker)
Page Number: 33
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Eight Quotes

ELLIOT: Let’s not act like this is some heroic sacrifice. Like this makes her the world’s martyr.

YAZ: We’re not going to get more than fifteen bucks for it.

ELLIOT: Symbols matter, Yaz. This isn’t about the money. This is shaking hands. This is tipping your hat. This is holding the door open. This is the bare minimum. The least effort possible to earn the label “person.”

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz
Page Number: 56
Explanation and Analysis:

YAZ: Why wouldn’t you ask me for help? Why would you deal with that alone?

ELLIOT: The opposite of alone. I seen barracks that looked like dope houses. It was four months in my life, it’s over. We’ve chopped up a lot of shit together, Yaz, but we ain’t gonna chop this up. This shit stays in the vault. You got me?

YAZ: No!

ELLIOT: Yaz. Please. Please.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz , Orangutan / Madeleine Mays
Page Number: 59
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Twelve Quotes

ELLIOT: Titi, Odessa fucking OD’d and she’s dying on her living room floor and I can’t take this anymore! COME GET US before I walk off and leave her on the sofa.

YAZ: If you need to, go. No guilt. I got this.

ELLIOT: She’s my mom. Can I be angry? Can you let me be angry?

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz
Page Number: 74
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Fourteen Quotes

YAZ: […] I wrote a list [of achievements] on a piece of paper and dug a hole in Fairmount Park and put it in the ground and said, “When I turn thirty, I’ll dig it up and cross it all off.” And I promise you I’ll never have the courage to go to that spot with a shovel and face my list full of crumbs, decoys, and bandaids.

Related Characters: Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Elliot Ortiz, Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz , Mami Ginny
Page Number: 83
Explanation and Analysis:
Scene Fifteen Quotes

ELLIOT: I wanted Mami Odessa to relapse, Yaz. I wanted her to pick up that needle. I knew precisely what to do, what buttons to push, I engineered that shit, I might as well have pushed the thing into her vein. Because I thought, Why would God take the good one? Yo, take the bad mom instead! I was like, Why wouldn’t you take the bad fucking mom? If I stay in Philly, I’m gonna turn into it. I’m gonna become one of them. I’m already hallway there. You’ve got armor, you’ve got ideas, but I don’t.

YAZ: Go. Go and don’t you ever, ever look back.

Related Characters: Elliot Ortiz (speaker), Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Haikumom / Odessa Ortiz
Page Number: 91
Explanation and Analysis:

YAZ: I’m the elder now. I stay home. I hold down the fort.

Related Characters: Yaz / Yazmin Ortiz (speaker), Elliot Ortiz, Mami Ginny
Related Symbols: Yaz’s Piano
Page Number: 92
Explanation and Analysis: