Love and Sacrifice

Author's Note: This is the Point of View assignment we were assigned in class Monday. In the first paragraph, I answer who's telling the story, if we can trust her, and how her Point of View affects how we interpret events in the story. In the second paragraph, I state how the interpretation of the story would change how we viewed events. In the final paragraph, I wrote creatively in his point of view. The main character in the first paragraph is Francesca Johnson, and the character is the final two paragraphs is Robert Kincaid. Enjoy!

If love comes your way at the wrong time, and in the wrong circumstances, what are you supposed to do? How do you make the decision against your heart or your family? That is exactly what Francesca Johnson, the main character in The Bridges of Madison County, must do. As she is telling the novel, you see a loving mother, willing to do anything for her children. She is even willing to give up her one destined love in life for them. Although you can trust her viewing of the story, the interpretation is changed. The reader is eligible to see the love affair through the eyes of someone who has something precious to lose. What would happen if the novel was shown in the viewing area of someone who has nothing to give up? Who has nothing in life lost, only gained?

Robert Kincaid was the man who had nothing that needed giving up, just everything to gain. He could gain love, acceptance, a permanent home. Robert found in all in his true love, Francesca Johnson. The primary issue? She was already married with children. Though Robert understood her circumstances, if it was told in his view point, there would be no terribly difficult decision making. Right away, the choice to be together for the rest of their lives would be made. Sadly, Francesca was the primary teller of this story, and her children are too precious for her to lose.

I gaze over at the love of my existence, sleeping soundly next to me. I analyze the face I've stared at for hours on end without boring, from her beautiful hair, her perfect eyebrows, the eyes that have the depths of a endless lake, the slightly pointed nose, and the lips I feel like I've kissed a million times. This is the face of the person I can't bear to lose. Yet, I'm sure, in the next coming days, I will lose her. Francesca must make the decision between me and her family, and I know the choice she will make. It's the choice that if I wasn't selfish, I would hope she would make. Her family can't survive without her. Yet can I survive without her? What will my life become? Will I morph into a wanderer of the world, with no point, no sense of direction? I'm almost certain that I will. It saddens me, but I can't avoid it. I accept it. I am lost without her, yet for her sake, for the sake of the purity of her soul, I will let her go. Although, I will never let her go completely. I will always be waiting in the wings for her, so she wishes to return. If this never occur, Francesca will have a location in the strongest part of my heart.

Solitude and Redemption

Author's Note: This was a journal that we had to do this morning. We had to write in the point of view of one of the options listed on the board. I decided to do the last living flower in a flower bad. It begins devastatingly, yet has a happy ending. Hope you enjoy!

 

I'm alone. No one around me, nothing surrounding me for miles and miles. The empty flower bed stretches for what seems like forever, never ending. I was planted here about two weeks ago, along with about two dozen other. Everything was going wonderfully! A new family was created with me. We loved and cared for each other, being best friends. Suddenly, my own little world collapsed out from under me. The huge, stalking figure that first planted us all began to spray a demon liquid from a ivy colored shape. It whacked every other member but me repeated in every part of their body. The arms, legs, torso, even their face. I heard their shrieks of agony, and in my head I heard my own. Not one of physical pain, one of mental exhaustion and agony from what my family was going through. Nothing I could do would be able to cease their pain. Everyone I ever knew died less than four hours later. Now, here I am. Solitude. For the rest of my existence. How can I survive? Wait just one second. Oh no! It's the huge stalking figure again! Is he coming to finish me off? No, no he's not. He's throwing seeds next to me, all around me. Stalking man is planting new flowers! Although nothing will ever replace my former family, I can create a new one! This is the beginning of the rest of my beautiful life!

The Bridges of Madison County Scene Piece

Author's Note: This is a scene that I dreamed up while reading The Bridges of Madison County. This is in Francesca's point of view, about when she meets Robert for the first time. Enjoy!

I hear the rumbling of a truck before I see it. The faded-red painted vehicle, looking at least ten years old. It pulls into my driveway, and then he comes out. I see him. I see him, and suddenly, a realization slams into my mind. I know him. I mean, I don't know him, yet I feel like I've met him before. Not just met, but already gotten to know. This man is already a friend, heading down the road of more than a friend. I'm married, and yet I feel a greater connection to him than I do to my own husband, the supposed love of my life. Yet he's not. Looking at him, this "stranger", and I know I am looking at the true love of my life.

The Bridges of Madison County Prediction Piece

Author's Note: This is a prediction piece about The Bridges of Madison County. I am writing about how I think that the primary characters will ultimately fall in love, no matter how challenges almost tear them apart. I explain why I think this by connecting this to the novel The Notebook. Enjoy!

Walking across the yard, seeing a traditional southern home rising up in front of you. Looking at the woman sitting on the porch, and feeling an intense connection. This is exactly what has happened so far between Robert Kincaid and Francesca Johnson in The Bridges of Madison County. The strong connection that has sparked between them leads me to believe that Robert and Francesca will ultimately fall in love, no matter what consequences fall from it or what obstacles face them. Another primary factor that leads me to believe this is the novel The Notebook. The Bridges of Madison County reminds me of this book in the fact that like Madison County, the main characters of The Notebook, Noah and Allie, encounter an intense connection right when they first meet. No matter what challenges face them, they still manage to stay in love. Robert and Francesca's connection reminds me of Noah and Allie's, so I predict nothing will be able to rip their love apart.

The Yellow Wallpaper Abstract

Author's Note: This is an abstract piece that I wrote based on the short story The Yellow Wallpaper. I would like feedback on my ability to summarize without summarizing too much. Thanks!

My essay title is called Lost in Your Own World.  In this essay, my main thesis is that the narrator of the story is lost in her own world of depression. No one could help her and drag her out of it, because she wasn't willing to help herself. Her husband, John, delievered her to a wonderful summer house for this season. He catered to her every need, making sure there was a full staff of housekeepers to wait on her needs. She was showered with nothing but love and affection from him. The narrator also had a beautiful new child living in her mist. Someone to love, nurture, raise as her own. Yet what does she do? Shove John out of her little shelter, refuse to take care of her own child, leaving a nanny to be its main caregiver, and leaving her husband without a wife. Why did she close in herself? Why was she not willing to help herself? The narrator wasn't because she didn't feel she had enough. Nothing could please her, she always wanted more. The most terrible part? She did not just destroy her own life. This woman brought down the lives of others, as well.

Mockingbirds and Mockingjays

Author's Note: This is an compare and contrast essay about Mockingbirds and Mockingjays based primary on the novel To Kill A Mockingbird, with some ideas from The Hunger Games added in. I would like feedback on my ability to analyze symbolism of animals and how they are conveyed through characters in a novel. Thank you and enjoy!

            As children, we all remember dancing around our neighborhood, totally carefree, no worries at all in our little world. Of course, we also remember the moment that changes. The time we put that innocence away and become defiant, willing to do anything for what we believe in. Innocence can be conveyed through many symbols, even a tiny bird called a mockingbird. To kill, harm one minuscule hair on this animal’s head, is harming something that has never done anything awful in its life. In contrast, defiance is conveyed through a headstrong bird named a mockingjay. A mockingjay should have never existed, and through its living it shows how you can be whoever you want to be, no matter the obstacles stacked upon you. Even though these birds themselves do not make an appearance in To Kill a Mockingbird, the symbolism of what these animals stand for are unmistakably shown in the novel.

              When mockingbirds are born, their innocence begins. No knowledge of the world, how it works, and the horrors tucked into it. As life continues for them, though, loss of that innocence begins to set in. Survival, attempting to find food, and quarrels between other mockingbirds has the world look like a terrible place to live in. This is exactly what happens to Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird. When she was born, nothing really troubled her, no ideas harmed her. Once Atticus, a lawyer and her father, takes his most risk-filled court case ever, innocence is suddenly stolen from her. Feedback from her neighbors and school peers filled her life with adult topics. Scout wasn’t eligible to be a true child anymore, which is exactly what mockingbirds have in their fate.

            Fuse together a mockingbird, a sign of innocence, and a jabberjay, a sign of defiance and being able to trick your enemies, and what is created? A little bird named a mockingjay. Government in The Hunger Games, accurately called the Capitol, never meant for these animals to exist. Jabberjays, these creatures’ fathers, should have died off in the woods. Yet they didn’t, and through them mockingjays were born. Since they defied the odds, they became a symbol of rebellion and defiance. As long as mockingjays existed, there would be hope. A mockingjay is shown through Atticus Finch, Scout’s father. He probably shouldn’t have been willing to conquer on Tom Robinson’s court case, yet he did. He was prepared to define the government and rebel against what society was in the 1960’s. As long as Atticus lived, the symbolism of the mockingjay would still live on.

            Even though they don’t even know it themselves, symbolism of animals shines through in the two primary characters of To Kill A Mockingbird. Scout and Atticus equally have the symbolism in their personalities. Scout, like a mockingbird, had an innocent aura about herself, and an ignorance of the terrors of the world around her. Adults living in the racist time period of 1960 were usually awfully mean-spirited people, who didn’t accept people unlike them. Yet sometimes, a mockingjay rises out of these types of people, and Atticus was that mockingjay. To Kill a Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee, is a truly thought-provoking novel that shows how the symbolism of unique types of animals shines through in the primary characters of her novel.  

Aunt Alexandra

Author's Note: This is a small character point of view that I did in the point of view of Aunt Alexandra. This piece's purpose is to show that Aunt Alexandra wasn't just an awful old woman who didn't have any purpose in life but to be a lady and to try to force Scout to be a lady. She wanted something else out of life, but discovered she couldn't get it. Enjoy!

Life has always been a hardship for me, ever since birth. I've always wanted something more out of life, a way to show people that I'm smarter than they think I am. That I'm not just a simpleminded lady, only thinking about how to act proper and gossip about the rest of the neighborhood. There's more to me than that! Yet I don't understand how to show those feelings. Ever since I was younger, a tinny child of only three years old, my true personality has been shunned. Shunned by everyone in my little world, all of my family. Don't do that! They screeched at me if I began to behave like a "tomboy." It was whipped into my brain that I couldn't be myself, to be prim and proper. Seen, not heard. Never let my opinion be spoken.

It was drilled into my head to place a impenetrable mask over my true self.ll

If I didn't, what would happen to me? I was to be ignored, like I wasn't even in the area. Whenever people looked at me, their eyes glazed and then passed over like I was invisible. That feeling was very well known. In a few years of unsensable rebellion, I threw the mask off and attempted to let people see the real me. After a few days of shock, everyone in my life began to ignore me. I assume they were doing so to make me snap out of it.

It worked.

So, ever since them, I had been Alexandra, perfectly prim and proper in every way possible. A tomboy, rebellious and unkept? Never! That was not me anymore. At least, on the outside. I have perfected the illusion. No one would doubt it, especially not my brother, Atticus. I was going to visit him while he took on his most riskfulled court case ever. Taking care of the children would become my task. Jem, I had no fears about. Scout, though, I was concered for. When I looked at her, I saw my eyes burned exactly into her beautiful face, filled of wonder and joy and curiosity. That final idea was the most frighting. Curosity lead to dangerous situations, where judgement lurked in every corner and being accepted was at risk. If I didn't dim that ray of light in her eyes, it would sweep and grow and take over her whole life, ruining it.

That could not happen to her. As her aunt, I would not allow it. Would it easily be the most challenging task I ever committed? Yes, of course. Would I fail? No. No, I would not.

Society could not allow it.