Dear Esau,
I cannot believe that your mother and father would send you away to be taken care of. Clearly, you were doing fine and school was not a problem, after all, you had Kate there looking out for you. If only you knew the things that have occured while you have been gone. First of all, your mother and father got into very significant arguments. They both would drink themselves silly and then argue. Your poor sister had a very difficult time listening to them argue, that sometimes she'd have nightmares. What you won't know for a long time, is that your father comitted suicide. He just couldn't take it anymore, and your mother found him. She is very hurt, with everything reminding her of him. The smell of his clothing made her dizzy with loneliness. Your house was crowded with many visitors, bearing gifts in rememberance of your father. Soon your mother will come to your care facility and take you home. Although it is against the will of your facility and thier pyschologists, her isntinct is telling her to bring you home. Hopefully then, she will tell you about where your father really is.
-:-caitlin-:-
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
[Post A Week 6]
bewildered (123): completely puzzled or confused; perplexed.
highboy (121): a tall chest of drawers on legs
EMOTIONAL APPEALS:
"She returned, holding her hands as if they were covered in something dity."(116)
Kate's hand are not acutally dirty, but her mother is describing the way she carried them when she walked in the room.
"We visited him on Sundays, as faithful as churchgoers." (121)
They didn't go to church, but often the churchgoers go ever faithfully. Instead of going to church faithfully, they visited their the husband/father's gravesight.
"So we swam through the ark, in the car, with his voice like his hands, giding me, keeping me afloat." (129)
Esau and his father aren't in a swimming pool or a lake or even by water. They are driving to Esau's treatment center in the dark and Esau describes it as he feels like he's swimming and his father's lovingness is keeping him afloat.
PROBABLE THEME:
The way one death has a complte ripple effect, as well as the way ecach individual grieves. Death can bring both togetherness and solitude from those who loved the desceased one.
highboy (121): a tall chest of drawers on legs
EMOTIONAL APPEALS:
"She returned, holding her hands as if they were covered in something dity."(116)
Kate's hand are not acutally dirty, but her mother is describing the way she carried them when she walked in the room.
"We visited him on Sundays, as faithful as churchgoers." (121)
They didn't go to church, but often the churchgoers go ever faithfully. Instead of going to church faithfully, they visited their the husband/father's gravesight.
"So we swam through the ark, in the car, with his voice like his hands, giding me, keeping me afloat." (129)
Esau and his father aren't in a swimming pool or a lake or even by water. They are driving to Esau's treatment center in the dark and Esau describes it as he feels like he's swimming and his father's lovingness is keeping him afloat.
PROBABLE THEME:
The way one death has a complte ripple effect, as well as the way ecach individual grieves. Death can bring both togetherness and solitude from those who loved the desceased one.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
[Post B Week 5]
Sometimes I wonder if the timing of a death can have different effects on the period of grieving and moving on.
If a death ocurs in the spring, I would think that healing time would be a decent period of time, but not extensively, because it is much more difficult to be sad when there are flowers blooming and the days are getting longer and the weather is getting warmer. It's natural to be happier with more exposure to light--especially sunlight
If a death occurs in the summer, I think that grieving would be the shortest. The temperatures are nice and high, and the days are so long! It's hard not to spend time outside, and the Vitamin D would naturally raise your mood.
If a death occurs in the fall, it would be a more difficult grieving time. The leaves are falling off the tress and it gets kind of windy. The temperatures are getting crispy, and the days get shorter. Almost as if the light is closing in on you.
If a death occurs in the winter, the grieving time would be the most difficult. The snow puts a blanket of silence, and there is essentially very few daylight hours. The cold, sub-zero temperatures Minnesota so kindly drops in our laps make it hard to find joy. In winter, the light does close in on you...if you let it, I guess.
That is why, in the book The Center of Winter, I think that the grieving is so much more difficult. Claire and Kate are nearly suffocated underneath the dead of winter. I'm curious to the degree of how much different the grieving behaviors would have been.
If a death ocurs in the spring, I would think that healing time would be a decent period of time, but not extensively, because it is much more difficult to be sad when there are flowers blooming and the days are getting longer and the weather is getting warmer. It's natural to be happier with more exposure to light--especially sunlight
If a death occurs in the summer, I think that grieving would be the shortest. The temperatures are nice and high, and the days are so long! It's hard not to spend time outside, and the Vitamin D would naturally raise your mood.
If a death occurs in the fall, it would be a more difficult grieving time. The leaves are falling off the tress and it gets kind of windy. The temperatures are getting crispy, and the days get shorter. Almost as if the light is closing in on you.
If a death occurs in the winter, the grieving time would be the most difficult. The snow puts a blanket of silence, and there is essentially very few daylight hours. The cold, sub-zero temperatures Minnesota so kindly drops in our laps make it hard to find joy. In winter, the light does close in on you...if you let it, I guess.
That is why, in the book The Center of Winter, I think that the grieving is so much more difficult. Claire and Kate are nearly suffocated underneath the dead of winter. I'm curious to the degree of how much different the grieving behaviors would have been.
[Post A Week 5]
belatedly(115): old-fashioned; out-of-date
fatback(116): the fat and fat meat from the upper part of a side of pork, usually cured by salt.
EMOTIONAL APPEALS:
"[...]and trees waving their arms."(102)
The trees don't really have arms, but the author gives them personification by saying that their arms (branches) were waving in the wind of a storm.
"I felt as if I'd swallowed something warm and huge, like a child."(104)
This is how Claire says she feels after eating a bunch of sweet potatoes in sorrow for the death of her husband. When she wakes up, she explains the way her stomach feels with as if she swallowed a child, which is dark and twisty, but her husband comitted suicide. She's allowed to be.
"The corners were buried in snowdrifts of dark." (115)
The dark cannot acutally bury a corner, but it gives the reader a feel for just how dark it is.
PROBABLE THEME:
The way one death has a complte ripple effect, as well as the way ecach individual grieves. Death can bring both togetherness and solitude from those who loved the desceased one.
fatback(116): the fat and fat meat from the upper part of a side of pork, usually cured by salt.
EMOTIONAL APPEALS:
"[...]and trees waving their arms."(102)
The trees don't really have arms, but the author gives them personification by saying that their arms (branches) were waving in the wind of a storm.
"I felt as if I'd swallowed something warm and huge, like a child."(104)
This is how Claire says she feels after eating a bunch of sweet potatoes in sorrow for the death of her husband. When she wakes up, she explains the way her stomach feels with as if she swallowed a child, which is dark and twisty, but her husband comitted suicide. She's allowed to be.
"The corners were buried in snowdrifts of dark." (115)
The dark cannot acutally bury a corner, but it gives the reader a feel for just how dark it is.
PROBABLE THEME:
The way one death has a complte ripple effect, as well as the way ecach individual grieves. Death can bring both togetherness and solitude from those who loved the desceased one.
Sunday, December 2, 2007
[Post B Week 4]
After Kate's father commits suicide, the long funeral process begins immediately. Neighbors come over bearing casseroles and other hot dishes, as well as flowers. Listening to Claire discuss her emotions and happenings at the funeral immediately brought memoires of the funerals I've attended throughout my life.
Just the thought of a funeral gives me a feeling of pterodactyls in my stomach. Unlike butterflies, pterodactyl are evil, and gut wrenching, with their beaks tearing out your insides. At each funeral I've been to, essentially, the only thing that varies is the person who passed away. The most recent funeral I've attended was for one of my grandfather-like figures in my life. Papa Dave and his wife, Joann (who I had fondly nicknamed Bobes), babysat me when my parents worked. Every morning since I was 3 months old, I would get dropped of at Papa Dave's and Bobes' house. I credit my happy childhood with their personalized attention that I got all day. As I got older, their daycare was no longer needed. Papa Dave retired from his job as a cop, they moved south....about an hour away from Red Wing. I saw them during the summer and on some breaks, and they always came for my birthday. I loved staying with Joann and Papa Dave, and I espeically loved this little vanity that he made for his niece. Its ironic that the vanity he made for me was proably the last thing he made. Long story attempted to be shortened, Papa Dave battled for a long time with brain cancer, and in the final stages, I avoided seeing him, because he was no longer the Papa Dave that I love.
Papa Dave passed away peacefully.The funeral followed 3 days later. Funerals are so difficult. I personally think that the hardest part is when a family member gives the euology. Watching them try to give a speech without bursting into tears is something I can relate to, because when I was 10 years old I had to give a speech at my grandmother's funeral. I found it heartbreaking to see all the pictures, and the smudged make up of the wife, daughters, and sisters. The funeral is just a landmark of healing, and even moving on, from the death of a loved one.
Overall, funerals mean pain. It means that someone is gone forever, someones love, husband/wife, sister/brother, grandmother/father, niece/nephew.
I admire Claire's courage through the funeral. I know more than well just how hard funerals are, whether you are giving a speech, standing at the gravesite years later, or just a family member or friend there for support.
Just the thought of a funeral gives me a feeling of pterodactyls in my stomach. Unlike butterflies, pterodactyl are evil, and gut wrenching, with their beaks tearing out your insides. At each funeral I've been to, essentially, the only thing that varies is the person who passed away. The most recent funeral I've attended was for one of my grandfather-like figures in my life. Papa Dave and his wife, Joann (who I had fondly nicknamed Bobes), babysat me when my parents worked. Every morning since I was 3 months old, I would get dropped of at Papa Dave's and Bobes' house. I credit my happy childhood with their personalized attention that I got all day. As I got older, their daycare was no longer needed. Papa Dave retired from his job as a cop, they moved south....about an hour away from Red Wing. I saw them during the summer and on some breaks, and they always came for my birthday. I loved staying with Joann and Papa Dave, and I espeically loved this little vanity that he made for his niece. Its ironic that the vanity he made for me was proably the last thing he made. Long story attempted to be shortened, Papa Dave battled for a long time with brain cancer, and in the final stages, I avoided seeing him, because he was no longer the Papa Dave that I love.
Papa Dave passed away peacefully.The funeral followed 3 days later. Funerals are so difficult. I personally think that the hardest part is when a family member gives the euology. Watching them try to give a speech without bursting into tears is something I can relate to, because when I was 10 years old I had to give a speech at my grandmother's funeral. I found it heartbreaking to see all the pictures, and the smudged make up of the wife, daughters, and sisters. The funeral is just a landmark of healing, and even moving on, from the death of a loved one.
Overall, funerals mean pain. It means that someone is gone forever, someones love, husband/wife, sister/brother, grandmother/father, niece/nephew.
I admire Claire's courage through the funeral. I know more than well just how hard funerals are, whether you are giving a speech, standing at the gravesite years later, or just a family member or friend there for support.
[Post A Week 4]
VOCABULARY:
viscerally(96): proceeding from instinct rather than intellect
harlequin (97): fancifully varied in color, decoration
FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE:
"Her sharp blue eyes met mine, as if she were looking for something."(88)
Claire is describing Kate's eyes, and the adjective "sharp" doesnt mean "pointy". It means more of a direct, or intense, blue-eyed look.
"Night hovered just over the horizon, the thick dark hesitating at the edge of town." (93)
This sentence gives night a little bit of human characteristics, because night cannot acutally hover, and dark cannot be thick or cannot hesitate. The author chooses to give the night and dark human characteristics so the reader can more easily imagine the night.
"Then you disperse like a shattered atom." (96)
This is an example of a similie, used at Mr. Schiller's funeral. Claire feels amost disbelief that her husband is in a box at the front of a church, and as she walks down the aisle to her husband's casket, talks about "dispersing like a shattered atom".
PROBABLE THEME:
The way one death has a complte ripple effect, as well as the way ecach individual grieves.
viscerally(96): proceeding from instinct rather than intellect
harlequin (97): fancifully varied in color, decoration
FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE:
"Her sharp blue eyes met mine, as if she were looking for something."(88)
Claire is describing Kate's eyes, and the adjective "sharp" doesnt mean "pointy". It means more of a direct, or intense, blue-eyed look.
"Night hovered just over the horizon, the thick dark hesitating at the edge of town." (93)
This sentence gives night a little bit of human characteristics, because night cannot acutally hover, and dark cannot be thick or cannot hesitate. The author chooses to give the night and dark human characteristics so the reader can more easily imagine the night.
"Then you disperse like a shattered atom." (96)
This is an example of a similie, used at Mr. Schiller's funeral. Claire feels amost disbelief that her husband is in a box at the front of a church, and as she walks down the aisle to her husband's casket, talks about "dispersing like a shattered atom".
PROBABLE THEME:
The way one death has a complte ripple effect, as well as the way ecach individual grieves.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)