At this point, Allende is no longer writing to her daughter because Paula's situation will not get better and she will never be able to read the letter by her. Paula will not be able to read because her brain is severely damaged. On the outside, Paula's body is healthy, but her insides have deteriorated. Paula's mother, Allende, is giving up on the painful tests that Paula has had to endure. She will help Paula so that her spirit will go in peace. .
I have really enjoyed this memoir because Allende is so descriptive in her writing. I feel like I am her character, empathizing with her situation. I feel that this book will end tragically, but I would prefer for it not to end that way.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Friday, February 13, 2009
"Dead" and "The Bicycle"
After reading chapter two "The Bicycle," I figured out that the narrator is the son of the narrator in chapter one "Dead." When I started reading "The Bicycle," I noticed that the voice of the narrator changed and was not the same tone as the one in "Dead." I was rather confused, but I kept reading chapter two and discovered that it was a whole different person telling the story.
Characterization is present in the tone of the persons telling their story. The author also use objects to describe the characters. In "The Bicycle," the object use is indeed a bicycle, which characterizes the author's mother. The bicycle is an old fashion, used, huge piece of junk as the author describes it, but his mother continues to ride it as though she did not have a care in the world what others thought of her.
I really liked the passage when the author had to go to school on a school bus and his mother would take him to and pick him up from the bus stop. The author likes his own time with his mother and since his family is so big, he never gets time with his mother other than the time they get to spend together as they walk to and from the bus stop. One day however, the author had to learn how to walk home by himself, but he was terrified and wanted his mother there. This is ironic because the author hates seeing his mother on the streets with her bicycle as she rides on it slowly, but wants to have his own time with his mother and for his mother to walk home with him from the bus stop. I can relate to this with my parents too. Parents are pretty embarrassing and we would not want to be seen with them, but when it comes to support, we want them around to cheer us on and guide us through whatever.
Characterization is present in the tone of the persons telling their story. The author also use objects to describe the characters. In "The Bicycle," the object use is indeed a bicycle, which characterizes the author's mother. The bicycle is an old fashion, used, huge piece of junk as the author describes it, but his mother continues to ride it as though she did not have a care in the world what others thought of her.
I really liked the passage when the author had to go to school on a school bus and his mother would take him to and pick him up from the bus stop. The author likes his own time with his mother and since his family is so big, he never gets time with his mother other than the time they get to spend together as they walk to and from the bus stop. One day however, the author had to learn how to walk home by himself, but he was terrified and wanted his mother there. This is ironic because the author hates seeing his mother on the streets with her bicycle as she rides on it slowly, but wants to have his own time with his mother and for his mother to walk home with him from the bus stop. I can relate to this with my parents too. Parents are pretty embarrassing and we would not want to be seen with them, but when it comes to support, we want them around to cheer us on and guide us through whatever.
Response: "My Mother's Blue Bowl" by Alice Walker
I usually think of love and comfort when I think of food. When I was a little girl running around with pigtails, my mom would sit at the dining table with all the different types of food she had cooked and she would feed my siblings and I. We would run around the table and take turns eating from the spoon that kept zooming into our wide open mouths like we were eagles soaring down to catch our prey. We would dance around the dining table like we were doing a cultural ritual dance and we would yelp and growl in satisfaction. My mom never told us to stop goofing around though. She'd just smile and keep spooning food into our mouths.
Things are different now. We eat ramen noodles and Tyson chicken hot wings. When we are hungry but too lazy to cook, we order pizza or go out to eat at restaurants or buffets. Once in a while, my mom would cook for us and at those moments I would be reminded of her love for us which still burns moderately even though she is usually gone from home.
The blue bowl in this excerpt symbolizes a love that never ends or gets weaker in time. "The blue bowl stood there, seemingly full forever, no matter how deeply or rapaciously we dipped, as if it had no bottom."
Things are different now. We eat ramen noodles and Tyson chicken hot wings. When we are hungry but too lazy to cook, we order pizza or go out to eat at restaurants or buffets. Once in a while, my mom would cook for us and at those moments I would be reminded of her love for us which still burns moderately even though she is usually gone from home.
The blue bowl in this excerpt symbolizes a love that never ends or gets weaker in time. "The blue bowl stood there, seemingly full forever, no matter how deeply or rapaciously we dipped, as if it had no bottom."
"How to Tell a True War Story"
I really like this excerpt from "How to Tell a True War Story." I liked how Tim O'Brien rewrote the story over and over in different aspects in hopes of getting to what actually happened to Lemon. He is never able to exact all the details of what actually happened because each time he remembers it, there are new images, different lighting, different people standing around, etc. As I was reading this excerpt, I kept thinking, "Why is he telling us the story again? I already know what happened to him. He died." After finishing the story though, I realized that the point was not that Lemon had died, but how he died and how vivid the image was to O'Brien each time he thought about and reflected on it. I really like that O'Brien tried to tell the story over in order for it to be true to him, not for anyone else. This also happens when Mitchell Sanders tells O'Brien a story about the soldiers in the mountain. He did not know how to tell it so that O'Brien would believe him but he knew it was true. After he had made up some things to the story, he later apologizes to O'Brien and tells him that one thing did not exist but the whole story was still true. This means that Sanders could not live with the fact that he had added details to the story when he knew they were not true to him.
I think this can be applied to any story in general. Stories are told in many different perspectives, but if the person who is telling them believes it to be true in his/her own eyes, then it is.
I think this can be applied to any story in general. Stories are told in many different perspectives, but if the person who is telling them believes it to be true in his/her own eyes, then it is.
Journal 2: Paula by Isabel Allende
I am starting to enjoy reading this book after getting used to how Allende moves from her memories to the present where she sits in the hospital. I've always had trouble transitioning from one idea to another, or in relation to this, from the past to the present, but Allende's transitions are sometimes in the same paragraphs which is not how we were taught how to write. This I find pretty cool because she does not write in a very structured format. Her memories sometimes jump from being six years old to sixteen to ten years old, but I like this because when I write or speak, my thoughts are usually scrambled and not well put together.
I liked how Allende used personification to describe "death" coming to get Paula.
"DEATH LAID ITS HANDS ON YOU MONDAY, PAULA. IT CAME AND POINTED to you, but found itself face to face with your mother and grandmother and, for now, has backed off. It is not defeated, and is still circling round, grumbling, in its swirl of dark rags and clicking bones." (pg 92)
Two days ago, I read a poem called "Incident in a Rose Garden," and it also involved the personification of Death. In this poem Death was, like Death was in "Paula," a dark, raggedy, bony person coming to take the life of a man. For known and unknown reasons, death, to all or most of us seem to be the same when we think of it. We describe death as a cold, dark, bony person/spirit coming to take our lives instead of something to look forward to and not be afraid of.
I liked how Allende used personification to describe "death" coming to get Paula.
"DEATH LAID ITS HANDS ON YOU MONDAY, PAULA. IT CAME AND POINTED to you, but found itself face to face with your mother and grandmother and, for now, has backed off. It is not defeated, and is still circling round, grumbling, in its swirl of dark rags and clicking bones." (pg 92)
Two days ago, I read a poem called "Incident in a Rose Garden," and it also involved the personification of Death. In this poem Death was, like Death was in "Paula," a dark, raggedy, bony person coming to take the life of a man. For known and unknown reasons, death, to all or most of us seem to be the same when we think of it. We describe death as a cold, dark, bony person/spirit coming to take our lives instead of something to look forward to and not be afraid of.
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Paula by Isabel Allende, Journal 1
It was very difficult to start and continue reading this book because it didn't go anywhere like it was stuck. The first part of the book was like a thesis statement that didn't catch the reader's attention or have any relevance whatsoever. I see myself relating to that because I always have trouble writing especially when I have to start with a "bang" either good or bad in order to keep the readers interested. Isabel Allende did and still does not know how to connect to her daughter Paula who is in a coma; therefore it was/is hard for her to start writing this book/letter to Paula.
Isabel Allende wants her daughter Paula to remember her past because she believes memories are what makes a person. However, Allende is only writing about her own memories, which are important but I feel they are unnecessary and not relevant to Paula. Allende writes in great detail, but sometimes I get lost in all those details because it just turns into a list of things. As Allende is writing this letter to Paula, I don't think she is processing and organizing what she wants to write about. Her thoughts and feelings are just flowing out onto the papers in front of her. I got this sense because one memory would lead to another memory, or a memory would go right into the present, all in one paragraph. Because of that, I would get confused as to what was happening, but I have gotten used to how Allende writes and I don't even recognize the structure of it. I guess she wrote like that because that's how we think and speak. Our words are usually not completely processed and put together as we spill them out onto paper or through our mouths... to me at least.
Even though this memoir is titled Paula, the character that stands out most is the author herself. I don't feel like I know Paula at all. All I know is that she is in a coma and that she was a very generous, giving person. Isabel Allende had experienced a lot as a child and growing up. Because she wrote about so many of those experiences in just the first fourth of the book, I couldn't believe that some of them were even true. I now read Paula as though it is a fictitious book, unlike when I started.
Even though this memoir is titled Paula, the character that stands out most is the author herself. I don't feel like I know Paula at all. All I know is that she is in a coma and that she was a very generous, giving person. Isabel Allende had experienced a lot as a child and growing up. Because she wrote about so many of those experiences in just the first fourth of the book, I couldn't believe that some of them were even true. I now read Paula as though it is a fictitious book, unlike when I started.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Feet.
Feet. I think they are the most disturbing things on the face of the earth. I really can't stand them, and I don't just mean the stink of them when they get all sweaty either.
As a kid, I never cared for feet. I never really looked at them nor cared to examine them thoroughly. I'd just put on my sandals and go. I don't remember when it happened (some time ago), but I do remember what happened that got me thinking about feet.
We were at a Payless Shoes store and I was trying on some sandals. My dad watched as I tried on a pair of brown, gladiator-looking type of sandals. He looked at my feet and smiled. I asked him if the sandals were pretty, but he didn't answer me. Instead, he said that my second toe was longer than my big toe and he asked me why they were like that. I was taken aback and I too looked at my feet and saw that it was true what he said. Whoa, they are beasts. Not the "oh man, she's beastin' " like it's an amazing thing, but.... Oh... uh...
I didn't know how to answer my dad. It's not my fault that my second toe is way longer than my other toes. I shrugged and just stared at him. No longer did I want to buy sandals.
My feet are small and short in length, but wide and chubby in width. The big toes are not actually big; they are too short which makes the second toe stand out even more than it should. The rest of the toes are just short and small.
My old friend once told me that my long toe meant I would wear the pants in the house when I am married. I don't know if physical features do determine how we will be or how we are now. I don't even know how to contradict that last phrase I wrote, nor this one. I just don't know.
Sometimes when I'm not thinking too much, I forget about my feet, like they don't exist underneath me anymore. However, if someone starts looking down...
As a kid, I never cared for feet. I never really looked at them nor cared to examine them thoroughly. I'd just put on my sandals and go. I don't remember when it happened (some time ago), but I do remember what happened that got me thinking about feet.
We were at a Payless Shoes store and I was trying on some sandals. My dad watched as I tried on a pair of brown, gladiator-looking type of sandals. He looked at my feet and smiled. I asked him if the sandals were pretty, but he didn't answer me. Instead, he said that my second toe was longer than my big toe and he asked me why they were like that. I was taken aback and I too looked at my feet and saw that it was true what he said. Whoa, they are beasts. Not the "oh man, she's beastin' " like it's an amazing thing, but.... Oh... uh...
I didn't know how to answer my dad. It's not my fault that my second toe is way longer than my other toes. I shrugged and just stared at him. No longer did I want to buy sandals.
My feet are small and short in length, but wide and chubby in width. The big toes are not actually big; they are too short which makes the second toe stand out even more than it should. The rest of the toes are just short and small.
My old friend once told me that my long toe meant I would wear the pants in the house when I am married. I don't know if physical features do determine how we will be or how we are now. I don't even know how to contradict that last phrase I wrote, nor this one. I just don't know.
Sometimes when I'm not thinking too much, I forget about my feet, like they don't exist underneath me anymore. However, if someone starts looking down...
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