The Lost Pearl

In the chapter When the Emperor was Divine, the mother emotionally fell apart in the beginning she presented herself as a strong unemotional mother making sure that her children were safe and even taking on the role of her husband hauling around heavy buckets of water. She continued her everyday routine of cooking, cleaning, and lying.

Her once hard shell was slowly cracking each day but I believe the night when her husband was taken was the night was the end of her life, and the beginning of her new life having to portray this unemotional women being forced to hold it together for the sake of the kids. We learn that she had destroyed her personal belongings, burning family photos and her silk kimonos; she slowly erased her cultural-identity and began Americanized herself and the kids.

The pearl earring was what caught my attention; I interpreted the missing pearl earring as a symbol of the absent husband. The way she randomly turns to her son and says, “I lost an earring on the train. Did I ever tell you that?” (pg87) She nonchalantly expresses to the boy how she hasn’t felt right ever since, and for a moment wonders where the earring is. I believe this was a way for her to open up out loud without having to say what she was really missing, her husband.

The mother repressed the feeling of regret the night of the arrest, she opens up to her son again about how the father asked her if she would get a glass of water, telling him to get it himself. She relives their last moments in her dreams picturing him searching for a glass of water. I can relate to the feeling of “if I only had but I just didn’t moment”, which can be very taunting. This once strong mother is on a path of destruction and it’s only a matter of time until she surrenders.   

LOUD

The monotone feel is throughout the book the way Otsuka describes the days, food and the family. It gave off a sense of stillness even though time was passing by everyday was the same. Otsuka wanted the reader to feel alone and trapped just like the family.

Otsuka was repetitious when describing the day in the life of the characters, a routine of waking up, looking into the distance, and going to bed. As the reader you get lost in time just like the family did, not knowing what day it is.

Even the description of the weather and characters were very stale either it was hot or cold, windy or rainy. The characters were described as if they were one person, “For it was true, they all looked alike. Black hair. Slanted eyes. High cheekbones. Thick glasses. Thin lips. Bad teeth. Unknowable. Inscrutable.” (pg49) As I continued to read I noticed how the boy started to forget what his father looked like, began to see his father appear everywhere, “in the beginning the boy thought he saw his father everywhere. Outside the latrines. Underneath the showers. Leaning against barrack doorways.” (pg49) The longer the family lived in these camps the more they struggled with their own identity.

The only time I did enjoy reading this book was when either the boy was dreaming or the mother was talking about past memories, it added personal emotions. Especial when the boy would imagine the day when his father would come back home wearing the robe and beat up slippers, picking up where they left off. To me Otsuka was just like the Fourth of July, in the beginning its one or two fireworks and suddenly it’s the grand finally, Otsuka built the individual to stop being silent and express themselves!

Failing Precious.

Who Failed Precious?

It is easy to say that everyone failed Precious.

1)      Her mother. She developed jealousy and envied Precious because her “man” Precious’s father was giving her more sexual attention than the mother which she took that sexual acts as love and affection something that she was receiving lack of. As sick as that is the mother despised Precious for something that wasn’t controllable.  Precious wasn’t able to control the way her father abused her, her mother COULD have changed the situation by realizing the sickness of his acts instead of seeing it as another women from the streets stealing her man.

2)      Her grandmother. Precious’s grandmother was aware of the sexual and violent abuse that was occurring in the house hold but she failed to take Precious out of there because she was afraid of the mother and the father, she just didn’t want to be involved in the situation maybe because she has dealt with too much in her lifetime.

3)      The community as a whole were aware of the abuse that was happening it was like the bystander affect. The people in the apartment heard the fighting and one neighbor even made a commit saying, “We know she didn’t take your man” but didn’t report it to authorities of the sexual abuse from her father. The EMT failed her because when she wrote down the name of the father the nurse didn’t account that this is possible the second time her pregnancy was from her father again.

Second Time Around

How did her second child affect her progress?

      Precious second child affected her progress in many ways. Since the birth of her first child Precious was still stuck in the environment of abuse and didn’t have a window of opportunity that she has with the second child. In the beginning of the book she was pregnant with Abdul it was just another setup for failure, but the Principle Mrs. Lichtenstein used her second pregnancy as a way to punisher her by kicking out of public school and gave her the opportunity to start in a program Each One Teach One, that would benefit Precious’s situation. Abdul was a blessing in disguise not only did she get transferred to a program for her needs but she met people that she could relate too which opened her eyes to see that she isn’t the only one with an abusive background. She was now was able to accept her past for what it is and she now knows she can make something for herself and Abdul’s future. With her second child arriving Precious was more ambition wanting to learn the ABC’s, being able to read and write.

     Not only did Precious progress in school but she was breaking the cycle of abuse! She wanted to be a loving mother to Abdul something that her mother wasn’t was never for her. Her whole childhood she learned from example by only her environment at home by her mother, but now that she was in Halfway House, incest support group and Each One Teach One, she had new role models to learn how to react/act to others. Precious’s second child is what gave her that PUSH to change and not become another statistic.

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic

Do you think the lack of love and affection from Bruce led Allison to where she is today?

           I do think the lack of love and affection from her father is what shaped the real Allison into the person she is today. In the beginning of the book I felt that Allison observed her family questioning the way they interact with one another, especial the why her parents and why the way they try to be the ideal family. In the process of discovering her family Allison was in a way trying to avoid this unhappy fake act that mostly from her father was living. She did what I feel her father Bruce wanted to do years ago was coming out, introducing the real Allison. By her coming out was a breakthrough for Allison and Bruce’s relationship having that short lived moment in the car when Bruce was telling a story about his past when he had a feeling that he was different, “When I was little, I really wanted to be a girl. I’d dress up in girl’s clothes.”Allison replied, “I wanted to be a boy! I dressed up in boy’s clothes!”(pg221) and for that instant they both shared a connection, even though Bruce was adamant opening up Allison took that moment to heart. Allison today isn’t ashamed of her sexual identity because she saw how her father was prisoner in his own body having to live a lifetime of lies.

Hatching into Butterflies

The one theme that stood out to me was the hatching of each sister’s identity, the defining moment when reality sets in and each sister gains her own voice.

Patria represented faith and believing in a higher power, just like her mom.

“From the beginning” “pearl of great price” She was very grounded by her faith in god. Patria hatching from her cocoon for me was when she meets her husband Pedro on ironically “Holy Thursday”. She previously had struggled with desires, questioning herself and her life’s “calling”. For once Patria put her own desires first before her religion.

Minerva was a strong independent, opinionated woman. She is an educated girl who is driven by politics fighting for freedom, which is derived from being under the control of Trujillo. Her defining moment was when she was confronted by her father about the secret letters from Lio explaining how angry that made him, but she came back at him because he was in the wrong too having a secret that he’s kept from Minerva and the sisters that he has another family. She stood her ground that night asserting her independents.

Dede was the realistic sister who would avoid any kind of trouble. She puts other needs before hers

Her transformation was the day of her sister’s death; she has to relive that day every Nov. 25 or whenever a reporter interviews her. She has to keep her sister’s legacy alive through storytelling.

Maria Teresa kept to herself writing in her diary idealizing her older sister Minerva. I feel that Mate was the most sheltered sister, because she was the youngest and she had older sisters who protected her. She broke free from writing in her diary questioning her surrounding asking Minerva to explain herself and the things she does like sneaking about. This was her truing point a sense of reality.

Maria Teresa Timeline.

Maria Teresa Timeline.

1935

- Born

1943

-Age 8, wants to become a lawyer like her older sister Minerva

1945

-Age 10, kept a journal. She called her journal her "Little Book".

-Had her 1^st communion, that her father was absent for.

-Mate started to find her own voice, felt mature for her age because she knew how to read before going to school

-Trusting & naïve of peoples intentions until she meets a young boy (introduced to the opposite sex), who had a hidden agenda to get to know her sister

-Grows up from being a little naïve girl, has a sense of reality

1946

-Mate starts standing up for herself, questioning her sister Minerva (but hasn’t really been exposed to what “reality” is)

-Minerva explains to her why she in sneaking around

Feb. 25, 1946

-Mate turning point hatching out of her cocoon, saying  "It is strange now, I know something...everything looks just a little different.." In a way she starts to wake up becoming a butterfly (very defining moment).

-Has a sense of suspicion of spies and being watched

Mar. 6, 1946

-Mate is in love

July. 20, 1946

-Patria’s baby was born dead

July, 23, 1946

-Mate barriers her diary

1947- Went away to boarding school. Introtuced to the opposite sex, and the fact of hidden agendas.

Dec. 15, 1953

-Papa’s funeral, “feels like death”

-Encounters her father’s other family, “I can’t believe she came to the funeral mass with her girls”

1953

-Meets her future husband