A/N - Thank you all for the wonderful feedback! This place rocks, actually :)
As Parker walked through the doors of that bar, a familiar nervousness crept in her stomach. She was instantly taken back to this same place that served as Ground Zero merely three years ago. This place had truly been the trigger, nudging her to finally be brave enough and step out of the darkness that overtook her life ever since her brother had died. After her first and up until now only evening in this bar, she had realized that she had held on to him for all the wrong reasons. Back then, in her still- grieving mind, it wasn't Auggie or the promise of a happy ending love story she was holding on to, but what he meant to her – a connection to Billy.
As Parker walked through the doors of that bar, she tried to fight back all the bad memories and lock them in a box. It took almost four years in the Peace Corps, countless arguments with her parents, a few hooks ups abroad and a man who didn't deserve to get his heart broken…but she had found herself and she didn't feel the need to run away again. Parker had finally gotten over her brother's death and now she was feeling like one of the escaped prisoners as described in Plato's "Allegory of the Cave". She had escaped the darkness and was ready to live her life. She was no longer chained; she no longer lived in a world of shadows.
Parker walked through the doors of that bar and rearranged her dress, put on her best smile and took a deep breath. She was finally healed and she was anxious to see her best friend after such a long time. This was the beginning of her new life. She found an empty table and sat down, texting her rendezvous that she has arrived, although close to twenty minutes earlier.
As she ...
... middle of paper ...
...onfused"
"You really don't have to explain yourself to me", Annie smiled warmly.
Parker nodded, and then made her way to the exit. She stopped a bit, like there was something else important she forgot to say. "I don't think he needs to find out about this, us meeting"
Annie nodded. "Sure."
Annie rested her head on her husband's shoulder and closed her eyes, smiling.
"I think I've outgrown Allen's".
"Reaaallly"? Auggie asked, softly kissing her forehead.
"It feels like I don't really belong there, you know? Now that I'm out…I don't know…"
"Just consider it a trip down the memory lane"
"Speaking of memories, guess who I ran into in the bathroom"
"Do I really have to guess or are you just gonna tell me?"
"Second option. I ran into Parker. Oh, and she told me not to tell you."
"And yet you are telling me."
"No more secrets, remember?", she noted playfully.
Throughout the story Parker is trying to escape reality and as a result becomes entrapped with no hope of escape. He is ashamed of his name and goes by his initials O.E. to prevent people from knowing his real name Obadiah Elihue. He continually shows his inability to accept blame and fully believes his problems are a result of another person’s actions with the first person possibly being the one who gave him his name. He was very rebellious and would not listen or cooperate with anyone. An example of this was his mothers concern over what was becoming of him and her decision to take him to church. “When he saw the big lighted church, he jerked out of her grasp and ran”. It was clear his mother had lost all control of him at this time. At the age of 16 he lies about his age and joins the navy. The story shows his life as a continuous downwa...
Lily is finally able to let go of the burdens she holds as her trust for August grows. She is able to come clean to August about all the lies and explains the real reason her and Rosaleen are in Tiburon. As the true story of Deborah unfolds, August is able to finally understand the troubles Lily face and how depleted the young girl is. With the help of August and all of the other influential black women Lily encounters along this journey, she is finally able to release her burdens and believe in the strength she possesses within. The last scene of the novel includes this powerful imagery of Lily’s new life, “I go back to that one moment when I stood in the driveway with small rocks and clumps of dirt around my feet and looked back at the porch. And there they were. All these mothers… They are the moons shining over me” (302). It is clear Lily can now grow and develop as the young woman she has always yearned to become with these important new women in her life there to guide her and be her supporters. They have shown Lily that she needs to be her own number one provider of love and strength, but as seen in this imagery, they will always be there when she needs them. By using this technique at the end of the book, Kidd is able to wrap Lily’s
All through their lives Pharoah and LaFayette are surrounded by violence and poverty. Their neighborhood had no banks, no public libraries no movie theatres, no skating rinks or bowling allies. Drug abuse was so rampant that the drug lords literally kept shop in an abondoned building in the progjects, and shooting was everywhere. Also, there were no drug rehabilitation programs or centers to help combat the problem. Police feared going into the ghetto out of a fear for their own safety. The book follows Pharoah and LaFayette over a two year period in which they struggle with school, attempt to resist the lure of gangs, mourn the death of close friends, and still find the courage to search for a quiet inner peace, that most people take for granted.
As a tattoo-clad high school dropout, a dishonorably discharged ex-navy, and a heavy drinker, O.E. Parker is a failure. His soul is a “spider web of facts and lies,” (393) and compared to his devout wife, he is a failure in religion because of his lack of faith. Parker detests his own wife, calling her “plain,” (382) but he still stays with his wife, an action that caused him to be “puzzled and ashamed of himself” (382). Perhaps the real reason he is staying with his wife is that she “had married him because she meant to save him,” (382) and Parker is waiting to be saved. Sarah knows that O.E. Parker’s real name, Obadiah Elihue, is significant when she says it out loud in “a reverent voice” (387).
Flannery O’Connor’s story “Parker’s Back” introduces us to a man who feels incomplete and is seeking to fill the empty space in his soul. He attempts to do so the only way he knows how, by getting tattoos. He continues this until “the front of [his body is] almost completely covered…” (514). In fact, Parker even considers getting a religious tattoo to appease his over-zealously religious wife Sarah Ruth. A brush with death that is literally a “burning bush” experience drives him to mark the change in his life by getting that tattoo. He races to the tattoo parlor and demands to see the religious tattoos. He chooses a Byzantine Christ. In this story, Flannery O’Connor tries to show that although Parker’s attempts to quiet his unease provide temporary satisfaction (his tattoos and marrying Sarah Ruth), what Parker is really longing for is a relationship with God, a desire echoed in his choice of tattoo.
It is apparent in Parker’s poems that she has had plenty of damaging experiences, and she has turned these into her life’s
... engages in a struggle with sexual identity. Both the governess and Miles find themselves lost in a gray area of their own sexuality. Although for Miles it relates to his relationship with Quint and how that translates into his own sexuality, the governess creates her own hardship through her desire for a sexual identity. While she is eventually attracted to every male that she meets, she still does not accomplish her various goals, from privilege to love. The wealthy uncle indeed presents an opportunity to achieve a higher status, but even in this case, she translates her dream into sexual desire. It is this desire which manifests itself in the ghosts of Peter Quint and Miss Jessel. These two individuals manage to represent everything about the governess that she fears. Quint presses her desire for the wealthy uncle while Jessel questions her adoration for Miles.
Maggie’s failure to override the desire to escape the streets of Bowery and the lust for Pete had caused a rift between her family and herself. Her opportunistic outlook and consciousness in apparences increases the longer Maggie is in company with Pete and her dependency decreases over this course of time. Despite the difficult environment that Maggie grew up in, her outlook on people and life are very similar to the people of the past and future. With the life that was destined for possible greatness, Maggie took a wrong turn somewhere down the streets of Bowery and left the memorable legacy behind in Rum Alley.
Francis Parker had lived in the small town of Lancaster for his whole life which was only six years but seemed like a lifetime to him. Most of Francis’s memories revolved around his family, the Clark family, and the Reed family. All three families have been family friends for as long as they’ve been in the town of Lynchburg. So, Francis spent most of his days with the two sons of the Clark family, Theodore, and Isaac, mainly the elder son Theodore who was the same age as Francis. Wherever Francis and Theodore went tagged along with them the only child of the Reed family – Elizabeth Reed – who was just about a year younger than Francis and Theodore.
Since Ma’s kidnapping, seven years prior, she has survived in the shed of her capturer’s backyard. This novel contains literary elements that are not only crucial to the story, but give significance as well. The point-of-view brings a powerful perspective for the audience, while the setting and atmosphere not only affect the characters but evokes emotion and gives the reader a mental picture of their lives, and the impacting theme along-side conflict, both internal and external, are shown throughout the novel. The author chooses to write the novel through the eyes of the main character and narrator, Jack. Jack’s perception of the world is confined to an eleven foot square room.
At 14, Jackie went to a boarding school. She has always had a very close relationship with her parents and her brother. “I was used to leaving home very often, but I always knew that I’d be back in a couple weeks, or even months. This just felt so final.” But just like that, Jackie and Devon packed their bags and drove off. There they were, stuck in a pick-up truck with each other for the next 5 days until their destina...
The narrator talks about how her new life at, assumedly, college and how it is different from the raising that she had. She talks about “[crying] into the familiar heartsick panels of the quilt she made me, wishing myself home on the evening star.” In my poem, I also talk about how my life in college is different than what my family back home might expect from me, but I, however, do not view this with sadness like Parker’s character does. What was originally just a poem about being homesick, is now one with social commentary. The purpose of my poem, however, is not the same as the small-town-gay-boy-moves-far-away-and-never-sees-his-family-again story, but a story that I feel is more realistic. For many LGBTQ+ people, financial dependence on our parents/family requires us to remain civil with queerphobic family members, regardless of any hard feelings we might have towards
It’s late Friday night, Rachel has just finished grading papers. She leaves the school and heads for Phillies, knowing Jacob will meet her there she stops to give a homeless man some change. Little does she know, he has shed his dirty coat to reveal a beautiful suit and is wiping the grime off of his face. He wants that girl’s watch so bad he can taste it. She walks into the cafe and sits at an empty seat. The man waits a few minutes before placing a hat on his head, walking inside, and sitting as far away from the girl as possible. It’s just a matter of time.
... eternally knotted in the combined tapestry of their lives, never to be disentangled from each other and therefore entwining their lives together as well as their memories of idyllic summers and bitter storms. Memory can be triggered by anything, causing life to run in a continual loop between the past and the future, the truth and the dream. Peter and Clarissa will always be shaped by their memories; that is, the core of their being. As Clarissa descends the stairs at the end of her party Peter wonders “what is this terror? What is this ecstacy? . . . What is it that fills me with extraordinary excitement? It is Clarissa . . . For there she was” (194). And there she will always be, forever bound in his memory just as he is forever tied into hers, together creating their true identities.
Denver has grown up alone. When she was younger, 124 was filled with people; Baby Suggs, Howard, Buglar, Sethe, and many others. However, as Denver grew up 124 became emptier, until the only people remaining were herself, Sethe, and the ghost of Sethe’s baby, Beloved. The three of them lived “harmoniously”, almost as if they were a family. Until, one day Paul D, a man of Sethe’s past, shows up on the front porch of 124. Denver notices how the two instantly reconnected and were a twosome; the reminiscing of the past “made it clear [it] belonged to them and not to her.” With the only person in her life being Sethe, Denver “[hoped] that her mother did not look away [from her] as she was doing [with Paul D], making Denver long, downright long, for a sign of spite from the baby ghost.” Feeling left out, Denver wanted Paul D to leave, but instead Paul D “had gotten rid of the only other company [Denver] had,” the baby ghost. Denver’s only company was gone, “whooshed away in the blast of a hazelnut man’s shout, leaving [her] world flat.” Paul D was taking up Sethe’s attention and he got rid of the ghost, leaving D...