Crazy Parents

After Rex got fired things got complicated. The family was starving of hunger, if they had food they would have almost none which is why one day Jeannette ate the last bar of butter that was left and her mother started shouting with rage towards Jeannette because she was intending to eat it, Jeannette told her she was very hungry, then both Jeannette and Rose Mary hugged and started crying they didn't want to live in that kind of poverty anymore. Rex would disappear during the day and spend it drinking. Rose Mary started and big argument with Rex because they had nothing to eat  and so he had to do something, Rex told her to find a job and so she did as a teacher. Rose Mary doesn't enjoy teaching because that would be the job that she would do if she failed her career as an artist. She got criticised for her lack of discipline control over the children she didn't thought that rules were necessary in children. Rex still was unemployed and even though Rose was the only one of the Walls with a job, Rex, still managed to gain control over Rose’s  money income and he would throw away that money by wasting it on alcohol and other unnecessary things, unimportant. It is a hard time for the Walls were the kids have to suffer through bad experiences. Even when it is Brian’s birthday his dad bought him a comic book and took a woman out to dinner called Ginger so that Brian would enjoy his birthday since Brian though that the woman was nice, but his dad and Ginger ended up leaving Brian with his comic alone while his dad and Ginger disappeared for very long time. Afterwards Ginger says that she likes Brian’s comic book and Rex makes him give his birthday present to Ginger.

QUOTES

“Tell them that we like eating margarine,” I said. “Then maybe they’ll stop fighting”.   

This happened while Rex and Rose Mary because Rose was sick of living in extreme poverty, where they had nothing to eat but some pieces of margarine. When I read this it really makes me really sad. Not because of the parents but those innocent children that unfortunately have to live with two irresponsible parents who can’t even provide basic needs for children it makes me really.

“She had to punish someone, and she didn’t want to upset the other kids,” Lori said.

After Rose Mary got into a fight with Rex about their resources, she went and applied to a job  as a teacher of middle school, she got accepted to teach Lori’s class. Rose was chastised because she let her students do anything they wanted, no discipline. The principle warned her that she had to enforce discipline or else she would lose the job. She didn’t obey but so that she didn't get fired, one day the principal entered into the classroom and Rose, in order to show the principle that she now enforced discipline she screamed at her daughter Lori and even whipped her with a wooden paddle. This couple of parents just can’t stop surprising me and not in a positive way. Again I feel sorry for those children because from what I read that woman is a psychopath.

CONCLUSION  

This was definitely one of the craziest parts that I’ve read until now of the Glass Castle. I it is shocking, the way that Jeannette and her sibling lived during this their childhood, very tough childhood very tough. I think that maybe one of the reasons this book became famous and successful is because of the madness that Jeannette had to live and experience at her childhood and adolescence. Still can’t believe that this actually happened in real life.

The Walls family keeps doing the skadaddle throughout various places like California, Nevada and Arizona. While living in these different exotic places, Rose Mary, Jeannette`s mom gets pregnant along the way and also claims that her previous children including Jeannette were born in a period longer than 9 months, in fact they were born around 13 or 14 months and that's why her children are so smart and intelligent. Jeannette lived many though experiences throughout the book , for example when the Walls family stopped at a little town, Jeannette and her siblings were left in a motel room and Jeannette, while playing with fire burned the rooms curtain and the room after a couple of minutes gets entirely burned but luckily jeannette and her siblings get rescued by her father. This and other sad memories along the way. After a few months while living in a town called Blythe, Rose Mary gave birth to the new member of the family, Maureen. Immediately after maureen was born the family moved from Blythe to another place called Battle Mountain which Rex had researched and said it was a great place to get rich since there was a lot of gold there and if they found it they would have enough to build the Glass Castle. Battle Mountain was good pace for the Walls family, Rex got hired as an electrician at mine. Jeannette and her siblings went to school were they  made friends who lived in their neighborhood. Jeannette started a rock collection of beautiful minerals, some looked like gold. She and her brother Brian also began to pretend that the dump was their laboratory and so the mixed a bunch of stuff which a whole little wood house and again their dad saved both of them. Unfortunately after six months within being hired, Rex got fired so that he could get more time to find gold, become rich and build the Glass Castle. After rex lost his job, the Walls family ate less and less food almost none, sometimes food would last about 4 days when Rex managed to get money by gambling.

QUOTES

“Sink or swim!”

This is what Rex said to Jeannette the time he took her and children to swim but Jeannette didn't know how to. Rex taught Jeannette how to swim by just throwing her into the water let Jeannette learn for herself although this did not took only one try. Jeannette would shake desperately trying to grab her dad in order to get out but Rex let go until she would sink and then try again. Crazy thing is that she did learned by that insane method. When I read this I, again was amazed of what a crazy family Jeannette had, when I read this I said to myself, Why would someone do something like that? The fact that Jeannette shows no judgement or something else against her father makes me infer that , those type of crazy things became kind of normal to her.

CONCLUSION

Honestly this book just can not stop surprising me. It is just crazy ! I just want to keep reading and find out what happens next, does she ever leave her parents or maybe they get rich and live a happy and normal life afterwards? I just don't know , after all she had been through how did Jeannette Walls managed to rise up from the point where she has absolutely nothing to were she accomplishes a successful and admirable life.

Tough Life

I have read the first forty pages of the book The Glass Castle  and once again I nailed it at reflecting the following analysis. The Glass Castle is a memoir narrated from a little girl’s point of view who describes how her family was and what was their lifestyle. The girl’s name is Jeannette Walls (author). Imagine a 3 year old girl that in order to not starve has to cook hot dogs all by herself while her mother is doing and “important” painting, just from the beginning you realize that this family is crazy. There were 5 integrants in Jeannette’s family: her parents (Rose Mary and Rex Walls), her brother Brian, and sister Lori. Jeannette’s earliest memory is the one of her cooking hot dogs when she was 3 at the time she lived in a trailer park in Arizona, when cooking her clothes got burst into flames and screaming for her mom in pain she came with an army blanket which she used to turn of the fire. As simple as that her mom grabbed her and went toward the trailer beside theirs where a lady lived, Jeannette's mom calmly asked the woman for a ride to the hospital as there was no rush at all , after all her husband had taken the car that day. Finally after some weeks at the hospital, jeannette’s father got into a disagreement with the doctor and a few moments later decided to grab Jeannette and run with the rest of the family to the car. 2 months later  Rex (her dad) came in middle of the night in a rush, they were leaving. He told the family that they had 15 minutes to gather whatever they could, just what they needed to survive, then they slowly got out of the trailer park so that no one could see them, Rex called it “doing the skadaddle”. Jeannette’s family would do this really often, move from one place to another around the country like nomads. They escaped from bill collectors, but rex liked to say that he was being chased by the FBI.  

QUOTES

“He unhooked my right arm from the sling over my head. As he held me close, I breathed in his familiar smell of Vitalis, whiskey, and cigarette smoke. It reminded me of home.”                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

I was, honestly shocked when I first read this since then I quickly remember that at the time Jeannette was a 3 year old girl, knowing that is how home , smelled. Part of the reason I also got surprised was that I also remembered that this was a memoir meaning, something that actually happened which makes it more intense as I keep reading the book. I can quickly identify that Jeannette Walls is not an easy person to relate on personal experiences not at all, This quote made me feel pity for that little girl who got burned COOKING HOT DOGS which in most of the cases would’ve been her mother doing that job, but no the painting was far more “important”, plus she “felt inspired”. Finally the fact that “Vitalis, whiskey,and cigarette smoke” reminded her of home, just makes you wonder if she lives these types of crazy experiences constantly, and as you keep reading you you notice that she does.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion I´m really happy that I chose this book because it is super different than the other ones I have read. For instance I a big difference is that this book is a memoir and it happened for real in the author's life which does cause a significant impact on the reader. It is incredible how many people like Jeannette have to live they way she did and in a way not have as many opportunities as other people had.