I find Bich to be a very relatable character, which is funny given my relatively easy American life versus her somewhat difficult immigrant life. Though I am from the United States, am blonde with blue eyes, and fairly spoiled, I have without a doubt faced the struggle of fitting in. Unbeknownst to Bich, I bet all of us have had trouble with this at one point or another.
I feel that my life is actually almost opposite Bich’s. I found elementary, middle, and high school an easy place to fit in. I was rarely, if ever, alone, and still have a group of about 20 friends I see from these years. College, on the other hand, has been a totally different story. Gone is the group which I have been able to hide in for so many years. After sustaining such strong bonds with so many people, it seems strange to start again. I find it more difficult to find my niche. This may be my fault, it may not. Like Bich though, I feel angst at times to find these people to call my own. Why am I not more “K like?”
This is not the only similarity I find between us though. I, like her, have a strong fear of getting into trouble. Although I am not necessarily a model 19-year-old, I must say that I have always been a relatively easy kid. Never have I been in trouble with the law, never have I served a detention. The difference though, is that I never did this for the invisibility it brought to her. I was always an actively involved student, athlete, club member, daughter, sister. Not wanting to get myself into any trouble has come from a very strong conscience, which I think Bich also had.
I found that I could also relate to Bich’s insane anxiety. Her fear of almost everything is parallel to my own. Fear of her parents, natural occurrences, gold stars, all of this I have felt. When I was very young, five I think, we were just beginning to learn about fire safety. For God knows how long after, I used to let my parents tuck me into bed, and as soon as the door closed, move my pillow and blanket right up against it. I thought that this way, if a fire started in the night, I’d have a better chance of getting out safely. Good Lord! No judgment here, please. This high anxiety caused Bich to lose sleep, which I have experienced many times.
On another note entirely, I found some of the way in which the memoir was written very confusing. I didn’t like the jumpiness of her storytelling. One moment she was in third grade, the next she was 14, and so on. Most of the time I could figure out the jest of what was going on, but from time to time I found myself needing to reference where in the hell we were. Were we in the house on Florence or the house in Ada?
Well now I’ve gone over my limit and it’s just about time for class. See you all in a few!
I can definitely relate to your anxiety as well as bich's. My overachieving nature takes over and it's like I can control my impulse to worry and fret over every little thing. I often find myself searching for middle ground in between the two extremes of anxiety and blatant procrastination.
ReplyDeleteI can also relate to not fitting. I have found that it's something that you have to work at. At the beginning of my first year at K I thought that friend making would just happen naturally but it wasn't for me and I couldn't figure out what was wrong with me. But then I realized it was because I stayed in my room most of the time thinking that people would come looking for me. But that was the wrong idea.
Wow, Stephanie. Your writing has improved exponentially since fysem. Do you know that?
ReplyDeleteNice job engaging personally with the text. As for your confusions about time shifts, well, she pretty much told it chronologically, because she wanted the reader to have the same experience she did; however, a distinctive quality of memoir is its treatment of time and time shifts--it's that slipperiness of memory again, and the way we remember things isn't perfectly chronological. . . .
Also note "jest" means joke, while "gist" is the word you were actually going for!