Post Reading: Eleanor and Park

2. “She didn't know there were things worse than selfish.”

     Eleanor experienced  a lot of hardship at home. Her drunk step dad that had a nasty temper. Her weak mom who put her own needs over her kids, and a dad that didn't care what happened to her or her siblings. All around Eleanor their were people that were incredibly selfish and because of these selfish acts Eleanor was constantly getting hurt.The question is are there people or things that can be worse than selfish?
     When the reader first reads this quote from the book Eleanor is recalling when she was twelve and heard her mom was seeing her future step dad. She didn't know who Richie was, but she knew that there was no way that he could possibly be worse then her real dad. How could anyone be more selfish than her dad was to his wife and children? At this time in the book I think that Eleanor is still holding on to a shred of her innocence. She doesn't know anything worse than what her dad did to her, and unfortunately Eleanor is in for a rude awakening. She soon finds out that their is such a thing that's worse than being selfish. Not only does her step dad hurt her mom, spend all the money he makes on booze, and treat everyone in the house poorly. He turns her mom and siblings into totally different people. Richie (Eleanor's Step Dad) controls everything everyone does. He is the alpha male and if anyone should say other wise he puts them in their place. Her mom waits on him hand and foot with kindness and with the hope that maybe the man she first met is buried somewhere underneath his rough exterior. Eleanor's mom excuses all of his actions. When he hits her she thinks she deserved it. When Richie kicked Eleanor out of the house her mom takes Richie's side over her own daughters. He caused her mother and her siblings to be brainwashed. They all think what Richie is doing is their fault, and that's just what Richie wants them to think. He has turned Eleanor's family into his own little puppets and Eleanor can't seem to think of the time where they weren't his loyal followers.  
   Richie is the cause of her awful life on a material level, but also on an emotional level. He goes as far as to write incredibly rude and inappropriate comments on her notebook. He does almost absolutely nothing, but when he does actually do something it is to hurt Eleanor, plot against her and try to make her miserable. He destroys any sunlight that may come into Eleanor's life just because he hates her so much. 
    Eleanor is forced to stay strong and not become the thing her step dad wants her to become. She has to fight everyday against Richie not on a physical level, but in her head. Eleanor fights a mental battle with her step dad everyday. Eleanor does find out what's worse than selfish and that is Richie and all he has done to her.

COMPARE AND CONTRAST ESSAY

The books To Kill a MockingBird and The Help are wonderful books that capture both sides of segregation in the 1900’s. When we see the character’s mistakes and victories we can also see the moral struggles inside everyone. We learn from the characters that doing the right thing is not always easy and that doing what is wrong is a whole lot easier.

These two books have more in common then you might first think. It’s obvious that both books deal with issue of segregation in small towns in the south, but the character’s similarities go much deeper than that. Scout and Skeeter are the two main characters in To Kill a Mockingbird and The Help. Both characters are tomboys that aren’t socially accepted due to their unladylike appearance, outspokenness, and their modern way of thinking. Scout and Skeeter both struggle with morally accepting that blacks should not be equal to whites. Unfortunately, when they speak out against unequal rights they are persecuted for their objections. When Scout stands up for her dad, who was defending an African American, she ends up fighting with a boy at her school and gets reprimanded at home. When Skeeter stands up for the black maids her boyfriend breaks up with her and her friends turn their backs on her. Another similarity between these two characters is that in a sense they both don’t have mothers and the black maids end up assuming that motherly role. Calpurnia being Scout’s mother figure and Constantine being Skeeter’s mother figure due to the fact her biological mom didn’t act like a mother at all to Skeeter. We see another set of characters that have some of the same traits as well. HIlly Holbrook and Bob Ewell  are the antagonists in the books. They constantly blame their mistakes on blacks, who are not allowed the right to defend themselves, in hopes to protect their reputation. Whether it's Bob blaming Tom Robinson for raping his daughter when really he was trying to cover up the fact his daughter tried to seduce a black man. Or Hilly claiming that the book The Help was not about their town and was probably just written by a black all because Hilly didn’t want people to know that she ate Minny’s pie. They struggle between doing what’s morally correct and protecting their reputation.

Although these books were similar they both have differences that make them one-of-a-kind. The Help takes place in the 1960’s where To Kill a Mockingbird takes place in the 1930’s. Another big difference between the two novels is that although they both give characters that speak out against segregation the way they do it is different. In The Help the characters stand up against segregation through the writing of the book, but in To Kill A Mockingbird Atticus stands up through defending a black man in a court case. Also, in The Help many people like the dozen housekeepers are involved in speaking up for African Americans, but in To Kill A Mockingbird  Atticus is in a way by himself. There may have been people who secretly supported Atticus, but they didn't publicly speak up like he did. The tone of the books were very different. In The Help you find yourself laughing about the "terrible awful" and the funny jokes the house keepers make, whereas to Kill A Mockingbird the tone is very serious just like a court case should be. The Help  definitely has serious topics, but it lacks the more solemn manner To Kill a Mockingbird has.

These two books To Kill a Mockingbird and The Help are written in a way that inspires us and truly show us how far we have come on the issue of segregation. They have their differences and their similarities, but they both give us the clear message that the color of your skin shouldn't matter, but rather what you're morals are and who you are as a person.

Pre-Reading for Eleanor and Park

3. Thinking about all areas of your life, write a thorough explanation of the difference between "like" and "love." 

We meet new people everyday, and, whether we mean to or not, we automatically decide whether we like or dislike them. One can like someone within minutes of meeting them, or maybe even before meeting them, but (contrary to some people's beliefs) love at first sight doesn't really happen.  

  Real love takes time and requires effort, but when you like someone, it is possible to not see them for years and still pick up where you last left off.  We are able to leave the ones we only like because we don't really need them.  When we love someone, we do need them in our lives.

  For example, a daughter loves her mom. The daughter can't and shouldn't live without her mom. That same daughter has a friend at school that she likes. If the daughter and the friend get into a fight and stop liking each other, (whether it seems possible or not) life will still go on and the daughter's life won't be seriously affected.

   Loving someone is harder than liking someone. It's easy to say you like someone when you don't know who they truly are. When you love someone, you have to learn to love every part of them, even their flaws. Saying you love someone (in my mind) is like saying that you are committed to them now and forever, through good and bad. When you say you like someone, it just means you have a connection. So when you finally tell someone that you love them, you can't leave them. When you say that you only like someone, you have the option to leave.

 Far too often people get confused as to what love is. They think they love that special someone at school, and they think they love instant mashed potatoes. Being loved is essential to life, so everyone is always looking for love and putting the label of love on everything because deep down we are all desperately searching for it in every possible way. The words "I Love you" are thrown around and misused way too much. We don't need be liked, we need to be loved. Sure we all want to be liked, but "like" is temporary and “love” should be forever.