Grass is greener if it's painted Gold

  We have all been there, the teenager who doesn’t fit in with anyone in your family. The one who, only your friends truly understand. Thinking something along the lines of “I cannot wait to get out on my own and be and adult.” In Joyce Carol Oates’s short story Where are you going. Where have you been? the theme is comparable to this as well as the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, but that may not be the case when you actually get there.  I believe that throughout the story Oates is trying to portray this through the eyes of a sexually curious teenage girl, Connie always wanting what’s coming next in life.

            In the beginning of the story Connie goes to the diner where she first sees Arnold Friend.  When she first sees him she wants to pretend that she is not interested, but she looks back at him again.  “He stared at her and then his lips widened into a grin. Connie slit her eyes at him and turned away, but she couldn’t help glancing back, and there he was, still watching her.” But then when he comes to her house she notices that maybe he isn’t what he seems. “She could see then that he wasn’t a kid, he was much older—thirty, maybe more.” Along with being older when he takes off his sunglasses she notices something strange. “… she saw how pale the skin around his eyes was, like holes that were not in shadow, but instead in light.” Both of these reasons make Arnold different than he first appears.

            Not only is Arnold not what he appears at first glance but his car as well is not as it seems. Although it is described as a jalopy the first time Connie encountered it, the manor by which it is described when Connie is actually able to see it up close is interesting, but not desirable.  When she first encounters it the car is described like something to be desired. “It was a boy with shaggy black hair, in a convertible jalopy painted gold.” In contrast to that when Arnold comes to her house and she looks at the car parked in her driveway she sees the various writings on the car along with the dent.  The only thing that this car has going for it is its paint job, which in the auto world is the thing you should take care of last. Arnold is in essence, for lack of a better term, polishing a turd. Just like Arnold’s exterior his car is something undesirable that seems the opposite from a distance.

            These are just two examples of the many throughout this story.  The lesson that things may not be quite as awesome as they seem stand out stronger in this story than you may have initially realized.

A once Proud People broken.

  

    Sherman Alexie's stories Every Little Hurricane, This is what It Means to say Phoenix, Arizona , The Only Traffic Light on the Reservation doesn't flash Red Anymore, and Indian Education are painful deep-seeded racist stories, but deeper than that the show of a people so broken and beaten down they live only day to day.  Not caring about the consequences of their actions and truly believing that there is nothing they can do to better their situation. Instead of taking action they dream of being great warriors, and their once great sense of community.

    Throughout the majority of Every Little Hurricane Victor's uncles Adolf and Arnold are in a brawl almost to the death, according to Victor because they love and hate one another. They obviously love each other due to the fact that they are brothers, but they also love the Indian in each other.  I believe what they hate in each other is the white washing of their once proud and fierce civilization, their names being actual representations of that. Victor says that while his two uncles are slugging it out the other family members are just standing by watching out the glass window.  He calls them "Witnesses," the opposite of the warriors they dream of being.

     In This is what It Means to say Phoenix, Arizona Victor has to deal with the death of his father while away from his people.  While the Native American's should have a good sense of community and should have funds to help Victor with the burial of his father, however they only are able to give Victor one hundred dollars. Although his father is one of the stereotypical drunken Native Americans, Thomas Builds-a-fire has a vision. In his vision he is to go to a very ancient spiritual location to see a sign.  He waited and waited and when he was about to give up Victor's father showed up, fed Thomas, told him he would get mugged there and drove him back home. This contributes to their ancient sense of community.

      In The Only Traffic Light on the Reservation doesn't flash Red Anymore, Victor and his friend talk about a young boy named Julius, who is a rising basketball star.  Throughout the entire story they talk about all the different boys over the years that have had promise as basketball players, but sadly never amount to more than another drunken Native American.  This story also adds to the aspect of Native Americans on reservations feeling like they are just existing without a purpose.  In the second part of the story Victory says "A year later, Adrian and I sat on the same on the same porch in the same chairs. We'd done things in between, like ate and slept and read the newspaper." That to me says they are just going through the motions of life, not actually live.

   Finally in Indian Education we are presented with a Victor who does well in school, in the beginning of the story he jokes with his friends drawing a stick figure of an Indian peeing.  This is his way of wanting to connect to the community. Later, starting as soon as second grade, he starts to realize that if he wants to make it in this life he has to live by white societies misconstrued standards. Resulting with him towards the end of college despising the Native American community. At the end of the story he says "Why should we organize a reservation high school reunion? MY graduating class has a reunion every weekend at the Powwow tavern."