Good Afternoon

Hello, all.

Today's been fun. Well, for the most part.

This morning, once I finally dragged my lazy butt out of bed, I had Chemistry. This was rather boring. We honestly spent the entire class period learning how to balance chemical equations. Having a basic understanding of algebra, after the first five minutes I was numbingly bored. However, although I had no internet in the classroom, I had been reading my friends blog (she's spending 9 months or so in Germany, check it out here) the night before, and had never closed out of the Safari window. So, as long as I didn't try to go to a different page, I could read all the text on the page I had been on. DorfGirl, you are a lifesaver.

The only downside of this is that now I really, really want to spend some time in Germany.

The next class was russian (да, россия) and that was pretty cool, aside from the fact that we got guilt tripped at one point for not having done our homework (guilty). We learned colors, and having spent some time on Rosetta Stone, I had a bit of an advantage over some of my classmates. We also learned how to count to 100 (sounds kiddish, I know, but considering this is an Elementary Russian 111 class, and this is the first time many of us have been exposed to Russian, we are, in effect, at kindergarten level). But it was fun.

After that, I grabbed a bite to eat in the cafe (a couple of horribly unhealthy Red Baron microwavable pizzas). Then, it was on to Rosetta Stone. At one point I had tried to keep a schedule of spending an hour a week there, but had grown lazy with it. So, I went, planning on spending some time on Russian, and also brushing up on my German. On the way there, however, I passed a classroom that had one of those "Class Cancelled" notices, and my teachers name (the teacher of the next and last class I was to have today) caught my eye. It was for today, and for the period directly before mine. I glanced down the hall (that class is on the same floor of the same building of the language lab) and saw on of my classmates sitting outside. "Certainly, if our class was cancelled, he wouldn't still be sitting there; she must just be running late and had to cancel her earlier class." I apparently gave him too much credit.

So, finding out my class was cancelled, and that I know had more than five hours of free time before I was scheduled to work, I called my dad (who was my ride today since I have no car and had left my bike at home). He couldn't come 'til 2:45. It was 11:20 or so when I called him. So, having signed my name on the roster posted in the hallway, I set off for the lab. I would not emerge for 3 hours.

I started off on German. Unfortunately, the program doesn't let you start off jumping in to the Intermediate (or Advanced) level, and having taken five years (give or take) of advanced german in high school, the beginner level was a bit too low for me. I was able to start in Unit 2 of the beginner program, which was good, a kind of compromise.

It wasn't too bad; I did know more than I was expected to had I progressed to this level normally, but there were nouns and verbs I encountered that were new, and it was a great refresher (especially on phrasing and especially especially on adjective endings).

Before I knew it, it was three hours later, and I had progressed through 10 sections. Thats pretty good, considering each section consists of 10 3-part exercises and then a wrap up. But still, three hours of german? Mein Gehirn ist zu viel Information gegessen.

So, a car ride later I'm...yup, you guessed it. Sitting at Starbucks. I have to work at 5. I'm (again) sipping an iced green tea lemonade, and it's great. A perfect refreshment.

And, contrary to my last statement yesterday afternoon, I did not add more. I worked until 8:30, and was too tired to do anything once I got home except crash.

But I'm here now, and although I wont be adding anymore tonight (I'm closing and wont be off of work 'til almost midnight), I'll definitely add more soon. I don't work again until Saturday morning.

Chapter 19. This chapter is relatively small, both in length and in narrative importance (not that it's unnecessary, quite the opposite; there's just nothing important to the story here).

Jessie wakes up from the dream and realizes that the situation she's in is no better than the one she just left. But there's an added bonus; her arms are dead. Not just numb. She can't move them even a millimeter, and there is no feeling coming out of them. She tried to push herself up with her legs, in order to get the pressure off of her arms so she can try to wake them up, and at first has no luck. Then, she's able to move her legs, and gets herself up into a sitting position. The combination between alleviating the pressure on her arms and stimulating more blood flow begins the uncomfortable and painful process of getting her arms functional.

When the chapter ends, she's still pumping her legs.

Chapter 20 is likewise rather short, and nothing much happens here either.

She finishes the last of her water, and places the empty glass back on the shelf, reflecting on her makeshift straw. It seems that having gotten wet and then dried 'cured' it in a sense, and now it leaks a good bit less. Perhaps, if she had realized that initially, she could have saved as much as 1/3 of the glass of water. Oh well.

The only other thing to note is that in this chapter she does some more reflection on her mother. Sally never really was the perfect mother, and it would seem that Jessie got the worst of it (and also that Jessie hasn't forgotten this).

Chapter 21 (halfway through the book now, as far as chapters go, and a little over halfway through page-wise).

This chapter is another dream flashback, continuing on the day of the eclipse. She has since gone to her room, taken of her dress and soiled underwear, and is in the process of redressing when she sees her father standing in the doorway. Even in the swirling aftermath of all of Jessie's negative emotions, her primary concern is that her mother will come back early and find out. Because her mom will disbelieve her and think Jessie's lying? Because her mom will be mad at her, will blame her? Because it would get her father in trouble? Me thinks it's the middle reason. She asks her dad if they need to tell her mom, and he reluctantly says that they do.

He then tries to play the whole 'men-have-needs-and-your-mother-hasn't-been-affectionate' Stierscheisse (read: BS).

She asks him why, and he begins to tell her when the chapter cuts out.

The important thing to note, here, is that perhaps her father never had any intention to tell her mother...

Chapter 22 starts interestingly. It's initially RealTimeJessie, but then fades seamlessly into EclipseJessie. Jessie affirms the note made above (in this blog, not in the book). She thinks about how he had manipulated her so well, seeming steadfast but reluctant, and then second-guessing himself, finally spinning the problem around so that she's the one trying to tell him that she'd never tell anyone (remember that, at first, he wanted to tell and she didn't). He talks to her further, and when finally convinced she wont let the secret out, gives her a pretty weak, pretty inadequate, and pretty shitty apology.

So, her father seems to have been calculatingly manipulative from the get-go. He, despite Jessie weak request, seized on the opportunity to have her alone that day. He even fights it out with her mother, in a sense. Then, he plays all the right cards, pushes all the right buttons, in the aftermath. Do we dislike him? Should we dislike him? He's putting up a facade of concern for her, to in effect downplay his own goals. He seems like he got what he had wanted from the beginning.

And his apology. Does he really, truly think that simply saying "I'm sorry, I don't know what came over me" makes it all better? Does he really believe, as he seems to, that she understands the situation, and thinks of it as an accident that wont happen again, that it wont scar her? Does he feel that she's old enough not to have had her emotions completely destroyed by this? Which belief on his part is better, which one makes him less of an ass? He might have actually genuinely been sorry for what happened, but the book makes it seem like it all went according to plan for him. Maybe it's both? He knew what he was planning to do, he knew, deep down that it was a despicably wrong thing to do, that it would completely take advantage of his daughter's naturally placed trust and adoration, but he did it anyway, rationalizing it at every step. But does this mean that he doesn't truly feel sorry for what happened? I think, I hope, that he does feel sorry and horrible and guilty. Whatever he feels, though, it surely doesn't come through in his behavior. Even afterwards, when one would think that he might no longer be effected by the drives of the heat of the moment, he still seems purely self-interested, and is still operating so that he'll get off scot-free. Ugh. Times a thousand. And this happens to real people all the time, not just in books, and all too often it's much worse, much more disastrous, that it is here.

The chapter then switches back into real time, with her voices arguing again, Ruth commenting that Jessie's still making excuses for him after all this. This is interesting, because I could have sworn that earlier in the book it was Ruth's voice that was downplaying the magnitude of the abuse. Then again, they're all variations of Jessie, and so what if different voices vary in their opinions?

Sorry guys, I just looked up and realized that for each chapter I've only written a few short paragraphs. It's not that I'm losing steam, it's just that at this point not much of note is going on, and were I to put more, I'd be better off to scan the pages of the novel in than to try to write more on them. They'll get longer, I promise.

Chapter 23. Here we go; stuff actually happens.

First, though, it's important to know that Jessie's position on the existence of the Man (the stranger that she might have seen in her room the previous night. I don't know if I've called him Man/the Man so far in the blog, but that's his usual nickname in my notes). Sometimes, for example, when she's waking up from a dream (like the dream-recollection of her fathers abuse), she'll acknowledge that there was someone there, in that she'll think that she'd rather relive a dream than deal with him. Other times, one or more of her voices will completely refute the idea of his existence, like how Ruth did immediately afterwards. Still other times, and perhaps more commonly, she'll just completely ignore the event at all; she wont act in fear of him, and equally wont deny him. She acts as if it never happened. I don't know if this is important, but it was something I noticed.

The other main events in this chapter are that she tries, twice, to escape. Her first idea is that if she can slide off of the bed a little, so that one or both of her feet are touching the floor, she can slide the bed over to the bureau and somehow manage to get the keys, and then even more difficultly manage to unlock the handcuffs. This idea, not too smart or likely to begin with, falls flat pretty fast. She manages to slide off the bed a little, but only one foot is touching the floor, and doesn't have much purchase at that. Her body is very awkwardly and uncomfortably positioned, her shackled arms pulling her this way and that like taffy. She's in an even worse position than before. She somehow manages to get herself back on the bed, though, and begins formulating her next plan of escape.

She thinks 'Well, hey, if I can pull myself into a backwards somersault over the back of the bed and then push off from the wall, I'll be able to slide the bed out enough to finish the flip and then just push the bed from back here, I'll easily get it to the bureau! And I'll be able to use the keys better!" Silly, right? It sounded a little more plausible in the book, but not too much. Luckily, she realizes just in time that because the cuffs are hooked a plank or two down, they're way too low. She'd likely (or rather most likely) break her wrists. Then she'd really be up the creek without a paddle. So, she's still stuck. For now, at least.

And that's all for tonight. I had to finish up that last paragraph on my meal break at work, but I wanted to make sure that it got up here tonight. And I'll check this post (and any others that need it) for typos tomorrow. Thanks for reading, whoever is.

'Til next time.

This has since been edited for typos, grammar, phrasing, and I've fixed my embarrassingly brief detail of Chapter 22. It should be all good now.