Can anybody tell me what page this quote is in for the book, Girl with a Pearl Earring? “The sensible part of me I had held onto for many years.”

ccd puts the honeybee populations and crop health at risk.

the above detail from paragraph 2 supports the inference about honeybee.

as for symbolic actions, the narrator's tearing down the wallpaper in an attempt to find the "woman" in the wallpaper represents her struggle to retain or regain her sanity.   the wallpaper has been part of her confinement and by her tearing it down, she is freeing herself from that confinement.