Author: ermaldonado

by Elizabeth

Munro throws us into the middle of our narrator’s flashback to the time when she overreacted to seeing her husband and his ex get along. While this short story might seem a little tedious or ridiculous, Munro portrays human emotion and rational well. By giving us little to no context about the characters or their setting we are entirely dependent on the main character’s observations and feelings about the things around her.

“The thing was, he would do what I asked. I wouldn’t, in his place. I would rip it open, no matter what promises had been made. He’d obey. What a mix of rage and admiration I could feel, at  his being willing to do that. It went back through our whole life together” (254).

The narrator reminisces over a moment in her life when she was rash, which is the complete opposite of her and Franklin now. Munro introduces us to our character’s while they are in the middle of planning out their death, and clearly we can see a complete devotion and trust between the narrator and her partner Franklin. The flashback shared with us by the narrator however depicts a time when that wasn’t so, at least on her behalf. Though the narrator at times seems to make childish assumptions and takes rash actions, but the reason for this narrative is to demonstrate human behavior and how fleeting, complex, and irrational it can be.

Our narrator has expectations of everyone around her but none for herself, and she prepares for the worst at her own cost. I thought that was inconsiderate of her and even selfish, but again I think Munro’s point in all of this is to give us a glimpse into how irrational one can behave at unexpected events.

by Elizabeth Rangel

I had a nice time in class last Monday, it had been a while since I had seen many of my classmates and seeing everyone’s faces again was a nice surprise. I was not looking forward to being online for almost two hours because I find it difficult to concentrate in my classes when they are online but I did not find it as difficult as I first thought it would be.

I found Patricia Powell’s “The Balm Yard” to be a page turner and I sped through the chapter because I was so enthralled in the narrative. I found the chapter Powell provided us with far too short and I am  ready for the rest! I think I the mother-daughter relationship had a profound impact on me because the characters were written well, each with their own complexities. I think it is easy for the readers to connect with Dorothea and her mother, it was for me, and I credit that to Powell’s writing.  I thought the aspect of dreaming in the narrative  was very interesting and I am really intrigued  to see how it would pan out in an entire novel. I would like to have had a full grasp on why Dorothea struggles with spirituality, while the chapter delves into it slightly, it is difficult to fully form an understanding from a chunk of a novel.

Nevertheless, the concept of an entire  community being interconnected in such way that they can understand not only themselves but predict and prepare for Dorothea is mind boggling! I hope to read more soon!

Ultimately, I had a great time in class on Monday. As I said previously, seeing everyone in class again was something I did not know I needed. It  was nice to have a little bit of normalcy.

by Elizabeth Rangel

Tillie Olsen’s “I Stand Here Ironing” portrays the struggles of young motherhood and the hardships that rise in the midst of it all. The narrator in the story reflects back on the upbringing of her first child, all the while reflecting on her own behavior as a young naive parent. There is a guilt in the narration, and through the mother’s description of her daughter we can see how the narrators own inadequacies as a young mother appear in Emily.

The mother’s name is never mentioned in the short story, I think Olsen purposefully left out her name in to portray the mother’s own feeling of insignificance. As a matter of fact, the story start and end with the statement, “I stand here ironing.” I think this statement is a metaphor of the mother’s attempt at “de-wrinkling” her own life as well as her children’s only to be met with resistance, more labor, and self-doubt everyday. Mothership has taken a toll on the narrator.

The narrator describes the difficult decisions she’s had to make as a single mother, from sending her child away to live with her father as she worked a job to support herself, to sending her child away again to a convalescent home at the recommendation of a nurse in clinic. There is clear remorse in her narration of child’s upbringing but at the same time there is a certain helplessness and apathy in her tone, that I assume comes from not being able take control of her own life. Though of course it was the narrator’s intent to give her daughter the best life she possibly could, her child clearly suffered abuse as a result of being sent away, and thought the narrator is aware of this, to an extent she seems emotionally disconnected from it all. It appears as if she is in a constant dissociative state, perhaps trying to deflect her feelings of remorse.

The narrator comes to find out that her daughter, though having undergone a series of trials, is a beautiful and interesting person. However, it seems like concept that is difficult for our narrator to grasp, perhaps she sees her own short comings in her daughters newfound “arrival” or she feels as if she’s had nothing to do with her daughter’s emotional wellbeing.

The story ends with the narrator anticipating a similar life for her daughter as she’s lived.

I had the pleasure of speaking to Kitty on Monday during our visit to the senior center. My partners and I arrived 3 minutes late to class and so all of the other tables were full with Mills students and the women from the center. We sat at an empty table hoping to find a seat with other students or women after Ruth’s introduction of the novel. After a couples of minutes, in walked Kitty, the woman who we would end up having a wonderful conversation about aging and death with.  She rushed over to our table and sat down.

Kitty shared with us how uneasy death makes her feel. She said there was a wall she did not dare move past because it would force her to face mortality, and she was not ready to be dependent on others. One of Kitty’s worst fears is to hear her daughter sighing as she tends to Kitty’s needs in the future.

I expressed that I felt the same way. I do not like to think about aging, I am worried enough about my parents aging and that is all I can take in the moment. Kitty wondered how the protagonists extreme preoccupation with everyone affected her and her loved ones. She mentioned that she knows people who like to concern themselves with other things in an attempt to relieve their minds of what she calls the dark cloud hanging over them. She admits that she too has a cloud following her but she tries to live in the moment and do the best with what she has. Kitty said it was important to live in the now and to take care of yourself as well because it puts your family members at ease.

Something that Kitty did not expect to have to worry about was her children and grandchildren as she aged. A huge part about aging is considering how it will affect the family members around you, Kitty says she doesn’t want to leave a mess for her daughter to take care of after she passes.

I really enjoyed my conversation with Kitty and my group this visit. It was a conversation I did not know I needed but something that brought me enormous insight and peace.

by Elizabeth Rangel

I was nervous about the visit to the senior center because in my head I had imagined the seniors at the center with full white heads hunched over their walkers, but instead a lot of the women there seemed to resemble my mother. My mother is in her mid-fifties, she’s only 6 years away from being considered eligible for social security benefits for seniors. As a matter of fact, the ladies that were waiting at the table where I took seat made it a point to tell my partner and I that they didn’t necessarily consider themselves seniors either. To them, seniors are those in their early eighties and no longer able to take care of themselves, someone dependent on another.

Not only was  I surprised by the age group that we consider seniors to be, I was surprised to see old women of color. Usually, when I think about seniors I think of old ashy white people but rarely if ever do I immediately think of an older person of color. I do not know if I should attribute to this to the lack of representation for seniors of color in the media or if I factually see less seniors of color due to the great disparity of medical resources available to them. Furthermore, I was surprised by their seemingly careless attitude to my gender presentation. Perhaps I was expecting to be gawked at momentarily, as I am when I am in the women’s restroom, because of my brief interaction with the older members of my extended family. Regardless, they seemed to have no interest in trying to spot the more “feminine” features of my physique, and that very reassuring. I was able to relax around them.

What topics did you discuss with the seniors? We conversed briefly about Tony Bambara’s “My Man Bovane” and shared our thoughts on female sexuality and how it is shaped by age. Something that really stuck out for me from that conversation was how we as children perpetually assign our parents a box wherein they can no longer “progress.” This is to say that we have a certain image of our parents and sometimes, according to the women at the center, it can be difficult for both them and their children to maneuver under the new roles families members take on with age. I thought this explained what transpired in the story perfectly. Ms. Hazel’s children were  uncomfortable at seeing their mother dancing with a man because it shines their mother in a new light outside of her caretaker role (but not entirely as she is to an extent caring for Mr. Bovane).

The women at my table were very open to discussing sex and the norms within that domain, which came to me as yet another surprise, because my mother and the other women in my family aren’t very keen on discussing such a topic. They empathized with Ms. Hazel greatly, and shared their thoughts on how unfortunate Ms. Hazel’s children’s behaviors was. They thought it unfortunate for there to be such shame about a topic so natural such as intimacy and sex, and repeated their previous statements about  feeling trapped in their children’s memories and expectations.

Overall, it was a lovely discussion. Though we were sidetracked by our many thoughts I would say it was all very productive and informative as their thoughts an experiences provided insight into the narrative for myself as mine did theirs.