The Patient Wait

The Patient Wait

On July 2, 1997, I became a big sister. Unfortunately, no one ever fully explained to me the possibility of a baby brother.  In a family of three girls, my sisters and I naturally assumed we would only ever have sisters, so our brother came as quite the surprise. My sisters soon overcame their initial shock, but I remained stubbornly convinced that, logically, my brother would become a girl.  After years of taking care of my cherished baby dolls, barbies, polly pockets, and various other dolls, I knew that not only could I handle a baby sister, but I deserved one. Over the next few years, I patiently waited for my brother to magically transform into a girl. While awaiting this change, I took matters into my own hands. I always fervently wished for a sister to dress up, so I used all the plastic necklaces and glittery bracelets at my disposal to dress up my toddler brother, usually with a bribe of candy for him. In the evening, with everyone home, I paraded him around the living room, proud of my handiwork. Although as a child I never questioned my actions, while recently thinking about Edgar Allan Poe’s short story, “The Tell-Tale Heart,” I thought of my childhood desire for a baby sister. Confused, I wondered why I now remembered that family story that had gone unmentioned for several years. However, the more I analyzed my fixation on a sister, the more I compared myself with the story’s irrational narrator who focuses so intently on an old man’s evil eye that he allows his obsession to control him until he loses his grasp on reality and becomes mad. Fortunately, I never committed murder nor would I say I developed an obsession with the idea of a younger sister, but I allowed my desire for one to prevent me from accepting reality. For a few years, I remained blissfully in denial, awaiting the day when my sister would arrive. At around age five, I finally accepted what my parents always insisted upon— my brother would remain a boy and I would never have a younger sister. Luckily for my family, instead of going mad, like the narrator, when I realized the error of my ways, I embraced my younger brother and the importance of my role as a big sister to him. I never needed a sister to dress; I just wanted to act as the older sibling and I never opened myself up to the possibility that I could hold such a role with either a sister or brother. Perhaps we all have something in our life that consumes us for a time and controls our actions. For the narrator in “The Tell-Tale Heart,” it manifests itself in an eye, for me, in my wish for a younger sister.

The Shouts that Go Unheard

In Roald Dahl’s short story, “The Sound Machine,” he examines the importance of life and understanding one’s impact on the world. In the beginning of the story, Dahl portrays Klausner as a timid, curious man who dreams of uncovering a new world of sound. When Klausner first hears plants crying out when they become injured, he becomes excited and amazed by his discovery. However, Dahl soon illustrates that with knowledge comes the responsibility to act on that information. Klausner allows such responsibility to overwhelm him, as he cannot deal with the harmful consequences of his most basic actions, like pulling a flower from the ground. In order to share his new burden, Klausner begs a doctor he knows to come over so he can hear the screaming as well because ‘“it’s driving me mad!”’(32). Through using exclamatory syntax and directly characterizing Klausner as “mad,” the author indirectly characterizes him as desperate in order to assert that when people feel overwhelmed by their duties, they turn to others to help them. Although doctors often represent responsibility and helpfulness, the doctor tries to remain ignorant and refuses to acknowledge the sounds he hears, illustrating that some people believe in the idea that “ignorance is bliss.” However, Klausner forces the doctor to try to alleviate the tree’s pain, illustrating that no one can ever truly isolate themselves from others’ suffering and everyone must play a role in ending it. Fortunately, in real life, people do not have to constantly hear blades of grass scream when they walk across a lawn or roses cry out in pain when they create a bouquet. Constant, forced awareness of so much pain could only drive people crazy like it does with Klausner, because people can only help so much before they must accept their limits. Klausner’s fixation on the going beyond such limits causes him to become increasingly illogical and by the end of the story, he desperately begs the doctor to stitch up wood. His desperation illustrates that while people should try to help others, becoming obsessed with past harms, to a point where it unproductively consumes one’s life, can only cause more troubles. Dahl’s juxtaposition of two extreme views, Klausner’s obsession with helping and the doctor’s denial of the pain, demonstrates the importance of finding a middle ground where people focus on helping others in the present, but most importantly, use knowledge of the past and present to prevent tragedies form reoccurring. The story highlights the need for increased awareness for all living beings’ pain. Like the plants’ agony in the story, people’s pain in the world usually remains unapparent. For me, the story’s deeper meaning deals with preventing people from unnecessarily suffering. The story’s focus on the cruelty of one living being’s pain emphasizes the horrific nature of thousands or even millions of living beings facing torture or death, as in the case of wars and genocides. Klausner imagines, horrified, the sounds that entire wheat fields would make when cut.  In the short story, Klausner uncovers a suffering he never knew he could inflict- the torture he causes when he harms plants. Klausner asks how people can ‘“know…a rosebush doesn’t feel pain?”’ (31). Through his use of a rhetorical question, the writer creates internal conflict in Klausner as he desperately tries to understand his impact on living beings. Furthermore, Klausner’s internal conflict allows him to serves as a synecdoche for people who question their role in life. The pain that even the smallest flower feels in the story demonstrates the importance of valuing all life, for we can never truly understand how significant a role we may play in others’ lives. The story, particularly its theme of sound and nature, reminds me of a question I have often heard: if a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, does it still make a sound? After reading “The Sound Machine,” I realize that events, like a tree falling, carry the same impact regardless of whether or not we observe them. Poverty, war, hunger, genocide, fatal diseases, terrorism - every day, people around the world suffer. Although we do not hear screams and shouts from every distressed person, like Klausner hears plants’ cries of pain, a cry for help, whether figurative or literal, should never go unheard. Regardless of whether one witnesses suffering, the pain remains just as real, as well as the need for people to take an active role in lessening it.

In Need of A LOT of Rest and Relaxation

Elizabeth Strout’s 2008 novel, Olive Kitteridge, focuses on a stressed, depressed woman in need of relaxation, so I would give her a day at the spa and a cat for her birthday. Olive needs a day at the spa more than anyone I know. Her father’s suicide, husband’s stroke and death, son’s divorce and separation from, and her own issues with adultery, depression, and loneliness create an extremely tense life and a trip to the spa could begin to help her relax. As a very self-conscious woman, she also constantly worries about her appearance. Olive struggles to stay involved in activities and interact with others so a spa day would keep her busy and combat her loneliness. Towards the end of the novel, she begins dating for the first time since her husband’s death, but she struggles to embrace her new relationship. While out on a date, she fears she looks “like a whale” (261). Through Strout’s use of a simile comparing Olive to a massive animal, she indirectly characterizes Olive as insecure in order to juxtapose Olive’s sensitive feelings with her indifferent attitude and highlight how important Olive really views her appearance. Throughout the entire book, Olive’s doubts about her body plague her and lead her to feel even more isolated from others, so a day at the spa would help her self-esteem and overall well being. However, I recognize the need for a long-term solution to her problems so I would give Olive a pet cat because she often feels lonely and unneeded in life. After her husband dies she finds herself  “drowning in the emptiness” (257). Olive owns a dog but I think she views her dog as more of a burden than a comfort. Additionally, unlike a dog or many people in Olive’s life, a cat would require very little from her and accept Olive’s constantly changing emotions. When Olive feels anti-social, which she often does, she would not need to worry about entertaining the cat, as cats often act aloof. However, Olive’s loneliness consumes her at times, such as once when for a “few days she stayed in bed” (267) due to her depression. I appreciate my cats most when I lie in bed, sick, and my cats quietly curl up next to me and sleep. A cat would provide Olive with love and comfort but need little in return, the perfect gift for a lonely woman who struggles to connect with others. 

Escape from Reality

In Olive Kitteridge, Elizabeth Strout’s 2008 book, I disagree with Olive Kitteridge’s coping mechanism of ignoring her problems and focusing on others, but I understand her denial after her life suddenly changes for the worse. Before her husband suffers a stroke, Olive admits how it feels “‘nice to hear other people’s problems’” (108) and gossip for fun because her life seems better in comparison. However, after her husband becomes ill, Olive begins to rely on others’ pain to help her survive. With her husband living in an assisted living home and unable to recognize her, Olive struggles daily with her grief and seeks out other people suffering. Unfortunately, each time she does, she ends up disappointed and with the realization that others’ lives seem better than hers despite their problems. When talking with a grieving widow, she becomes jealous of the women because her family and friends love and support her while Olive admits to herself, “no one will miss her” (172). Instead of trying to move on, she continues to ignore her grief and spontaneously visits Louise Larkin, a woman whose son murdered a girl, causing his parents to become pariahs in their small town. Olive hopes to “feel better…knowing the woman suffered” but even in such a horrible situation, Louise maintains her self-assured attitude and chips away at Olive’s façade of normalcy (162). Instead of focusing on improving her own life, Olive concentrates on other people’s problems, as if her life will improve if everyone else suffers. At first, Olive seems selfish and I resent her self-pitying nature, but Strout divides her novel into thirteen different stories with multiple points of view in order to demonstrate how many characters incorrectly view Olive as abrasive and aloof even though she simply hides her emotions. Strout creates sympathy for Olive as the novel continues and she reveals Olive’s loneliness and depression. After Henry becomes ill, Olive finds herself alone with her fears and self-consciousness for the first time in her life. While I pity Olive, I also recognize that she allows herself to continue suffering as a result of her resistance to change; she still waits for her son and husband to return home. She spends her life controlling her son and husband and all of a sudden, she finds herself unable to control even her own life. I can understand why she wants to escape from reality when her life suddenly falls apart, but I also think she needs to seek positive help with her life, whether in the form of a therapist or support group meetings. Olive refuses to take the initiative herself and move on with her life and becomes even more depressed when she realizes that others accept their situations.