Esperanza's Future

      The future holds many things, some of which are success. Hovever, in The House on Mango Street, Esperanza leaves her home on Mango street hoping to return one day to "come back" for the ones she "left behind". I think that Esperanza is leaving so she can go get an education to better prepare herself so that she can help the people she left behind on Mango Street.
      I think Esperanza's future holds success in education. Esperanza is going to go to school to get educated and then come back for the friends and family she left on Mango Street. This is exemplified when she says, "One day I will pack my bags of books and paper. One day I will say goodbye to Mango... They will not know I have gone away to come back. For the ones I left behind. For the ones who cannot out." (Cisneros p.110). Esperanza is leaving because she does not belong there. She is going to do this so that one day in the future she can come back and help the people who don't have the ability to leave. Most of Esperanza's neighbors probably have never been outside of Mango Street and lived there their whole life. Unlike her neighbors, Esperanza has moved around a couple of times so she knows places to go such as schools outside of Mango Street. Getting an education is the best decision Esperanza has made for herself.
      Esperanza has plans for her future. Esperanza has never really belonged to Mango Street, this is shown when she says, "No, this isn't my house I say and shake my head as if shaking could undo the year I've lived here. I don't belong" (Cisneros, p106) Throughout the story Esperanza kept saying that she did not belong to Mango Street. Esperanza feels like she doesn't belong because the people there are so different from her. I think that Esperanza is saying that she belongs to a place where she can start her own life and make decisions for herself. This is why Esperanza is going to go to school. I predict that Esperanza plans to go to school, get a job, buy her own house, live there for a while and relax, then come back for the friends and family she left behind. For example, Esperanza says,

 "Not a flat. Not an apartment in back. Not a man's house. Not a daddy's. A house all to my own. With my porch and my pillow, my pretty purple petunias. My books and my stories. My two shoes waiting beside the bed. Nobody to shake a stick at. Nobody's garbage to pick up after. Only a house quiet as snow, a space for myself to go, clean as paper before the poem. (Cisneros p108)

Esperanza wants her own house, with her own rules and her own things. I think that this is a goal Esperanza set up for herself. She is doing this because when she leaves Mango Street she has an incentive for going to school. Esperanza going to get educated and get a degree so she can get a job. Once she gets a job she is going to work hard. After a couple of years Esperanza is going to buy a new house, a house of her own. After that she is going to relax a bit. Finally after she accomplishes all of that, she is going to go back to Mango Street and help the people she left behind. Esperanza is very determined to succeed, and that determination is going to fuel her for the upcoming years in her life.
      The future is currently unpredictable, but I predict that Esperanza's future holds lots of hardships and success. Esperanza is planning to leave Mango Street to get education then eventually buy a new house. After she succeeds in getting all of these she will finally "come back" for the ones she "left behind" on Mango Street. Esperanza's need to leave Mango Street will be the spark that will eventually light up success.

What Cisneros Thinks

      Right now in the world, there is lots of sexism and debate on how teenage boys and girls should be raised. In the book The House on Mango Street written by Sandra Cisneros, there are many instances of sexism. It seems as if Cisneros thinks teenage boys and girls should be raised differently and shows this through many vignettes like "Alicia Who Sees Mice", and "What Sally Said".
      "In Alicia Who Sees Mice", Cisneros talks about the responsibilities of teenage girls and seems to convey the idea that they should be raised differently. This is exemplified when she she writes,

"Alicia, whose mama died, is sorry there is no one older to rise and make the lunchbox tortillas. Alicia, who inherited her mama's rolling pin and sleepiness, is young and smart and studies for the first time at the university...is a good girl, my friend, studies all night and sees the mice, the ones her father says do not exist. Is afraid of nothing except four-legged fur. And fathers" (pg.31). 

Since Alicia is a girl she inherited all the responsibilities that her mom had. The responsibilities didn't go to the boy, they went to the girl. I think Cisneros is trying to say that girls should be raised to go to school rather than staying at home and having to cook. Since Alicia has all these responsibilities, she does not have a lot of time to study or do her schoolwork. Alicia probably tried to devote more of her time to studying, but her father might have got mad at her and made her do her chores. This is why Cisneros writes thats Alicia is afraid of fathers. Cisneros thinks that girls should have less responsibilities at home and have more freedom in choosing what they want to do.
      Another Vignette that shows what Cisneros thinks about raising teenage boys and girls is "What Sally Said". In this Vignette it talks about the horrible things that Sally's dad did to her because of Sally's beauty. Cisneros might think that girls should be raised differently because of their beauty. An example is this is when she writes,

 "A girl that big, a girl who comes in with her pretty face all beaten and black can't be falling off the stairs. He never hits me hard.  Until one day Sally's father catches her talking to a boy and the next day she doesn't come to school. And the next. Until the way Sally tells it, he just went crazy, he forgot he was her father between the buckle and the belt. You're not my daughter, you're not my daughter. And then broke into his hands.

Cisneros thinks that because girls are beautiful, parents need to raise them differently so that boys can't take advantage of them. Some parents, like Sally's, are very harsh because of her beauty. There are no Vignettes in this novel that talk about how beautiful boys are. It only talks about how beautiful girls are either beaten or locked up in a room. Since Sally was very beautiful and was talking to a boy, her father got really mad and started to beat her. If Sally was a boy and was caught talking to a girl, her father might have not done anything. I think that Cisneros is trying to say that in the sense of beauty, parents need to be stricter in raising girls and less strict in raising boys.
      In conclusion, it seems as if Cisneros has a strong sense in raising teenage boys and girls differently. She thinks that girls should be raised differently because of their beauty and should have more freedom in choosing what they want to do. In raising teenage boys, Cisneros probably thinks that parents should not worry about their beauty all the time. This is all very similar to the real world and how sexism is a big part of determining how teenage boys and girls are raised.

 

The Memories in Tony's Head

Table of Contents

-Humerus 

-The Funny Flood
-Blue Fire, Red Fire, Green Fire
-I Need a Doctor
-The Man in White

Humerus

Everyone in my family has a different sense of humor. My dad’s idea of a joke is similar to the different colors of the rainbow, it can range from very light and funny to really funny and a crying little brother. My sense of humor is similar to my dad’s except a little worse. The jokes I play are more harsh. My brother has not yet developed a sense of humor because he is still little, but words like poop and making armpit farts are funny to him. He is a monkey. He thinks that scaring people is funny. He will try to scare someone by hiding and then jumping out. If he succeeds he will drop to the ground and roll around laughing.

My mom’s sense of humor on the other hand is very subtle. It is sometimes hard to tell when she thinks something is funny. It’s like a mystery waiting to be solved. She smiles a lot, but I only hear her laugh when she watches TV or when she is talking on the phone. She watches some Chinese shows so when she laughs at the jokes, I don’t always understand what is funny. My mom’s sense of humor is unique and is only triggered at very specific times.

The Funny Flood

The water was rushing. I could hear it outside. My dad opened the door and ran to pick me up. “NO! PIGGYBACK RIDE” I yelled. I think it was the afternoon, I was about two or three years old, and my family and I were still in China. There was a flood and my family had to leave our house. The houses in China look like giant giant office buildings and usually have two houses per floor. We lived on the fourth floor. The water was rising. “ Did someone forget to turn off the water?” My dad jumped into the water with me on his back. My mom followed.  The water was cold. I started to laugh. “Yay, lots of water! Hey Mom can I go swimming?” My mom started to laugh, “ Are you crazy?” There were other people around. They were also leaving the building. The distance between our building and higher ground was about 24 feet. My dad began to swim harder. About five minutes later we were out of the water. I never really got to swim.

Blue Fire, Red Fire, Green Fire

Fire is very fun to play with. It helps pass the time. I know how to make fire, blue fire, red fire, and green fire. I have played with fire since I was little. It started with candles and melting wax to make animals,  then I used alcohol and a little Boric Acid to make green fire. I’ve burned myself many times too. One time I burned a piece of skin about a big as a penny off one of my fingers. I’ve also launched fireworks before, not the small ones, the big ones you see on the Fourth of July. When I stood under it, I felt my body pulse and my adrenaline rush. It was one of the most energetic experiences I’ve had in my life. I also make fireball. I hold the fireballs in my hand and play catch with myself. They help warm my hand when it is cold. Fire is relaxing to play with, is my invisible friend.

I Need a Doctor

He was coming at me fast, grasping the football like it was a newborn baby, cradling it carefully putting his body in front of the ball. I grabbed onto his waist and spun him around. He didn’t fall. I tried again, but this time I used all my strength to pull him down with me. He fell on top of my right thigh. I could feel his hip digging into my unflexed thigh. I heard a loud snap, and a second later, I felt like I was just shot with a gun. “FU**” I screamed. The pain was unbearable it felt as if someone was taking a nail and hammering it into my femur. My leg was throbbing and that wasn’t the worst part. The ambulance arrived. They told me that they were going to extend my leg so that it was straight. I thought “Aww fu** are you serious?” That was when I started to scream. They put my leg into a splint and carried me into the ambulance. My parents arrived a while later and followed the ambulance. Well that was fun.

I arrived at Children’s Hospital in Oakland about twenty minutes later. I felt as if my leg grew another pair of legs and decided to take a stroll. I could only feel pain, only pain. I couldn’t feel my leg. After I got into the hospital they took an x-ray. I waited about five minutes and they told my parents and me that they had good news and bad news. The good news, I had fractured my femur in three places. I thought  “WHAT! Are you serious” The doctor then told us that the bad news was that they had to put a titanium rod into the middle of my femur where the bone marrow would be and stabilize it with two pins. One right behind my knee cap, and one under my hip. Now, I was scared. I began to shake and soon started to cry. Lot of my friend were there comforting me and telling me that it would be OK. I think it was a day, but all I remember was that a nurse injected something into me and then I woke up sometime later. My leg hurt and noticed that I had about 30-40 stitches on my thigh and next to my knee. Breaking your femur is not fun. Life long lesson, don’t try to tackle someone that is twice as big as you and is fat.

The Man in White

I don’t know who he is. I don’t even know what he is. I’ve seen him multiple times. The first time was when I was going to Lake Tahoe. We were driving down one of the main roads when I saw a man about 6 feet tall wearing a full white suit with a white fedora and black shades. I thought it was just the snow playing tricks on my eyes, but about 3-4 years later I saw the same man. He was on top of the mountains near Costco. He stepped out from the clutter of trees, stood there for a couple of seconds, then disappeared back into the trees. I don’t know if I was just hallucinating, but I’m sure that I saw him. I also remember that his face was all white. I might have been a scarf, but every time I see him, I feel like I know somehow. I’m determined to find him someday in the future.

Symbols

      Throughout The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros leaves many significant, but subtle representations of how the characters feel in the story. These symbols are used in a wide array and usually represent more than one idea. Some of the objects include shoes, windows, the color red/pink, and trees. One symbol that stood out to me was the trees. Cinseros writes about the trees on numerous occasions throughout the novel.
      I think that the trees represent the will to keep on going. 

Cisneros states, “Four skinny trees with skinny necks and pointy elbows like mine. Four who do not belong here but are here. Four raggedy excuses planted by the city…Their strength is secret. They send ferocious roots beneath the ground. They grow up and they grow down and grab the earth between their hairy toes and bite the sky with violent teeth and never quit their anger. This is how they keep (p.74)”.

These trees inspire Esperanza to keep on going. The trees also represent the situation in which Esperanza got put into when her family moved to Mango St. She moved to a place in which she doesn’t belong. Esperanza is a new stranger to this neighborhood just like the trees. They are both very similar to each other. Four slim, skinny trees were planted by the city in a foreign environment, they look weak and hopeless yet they keep on growing and pushing though. The trees secretly anchor themselves with their roots and keep on growing. This is what Esperanza does. She adjusts to the foreign environment and keeps on growing herself.
      Another symbol that the trees might stand for is that they are a source of comfort and can be a place where Esperanza can go to let out her emotions without anyone judging her. This is exemplified when Cisneros writes, “And then I don’t know why but I had to run away. I had to hide myself at the other end of the garden, in the jungle part, under a tree that wouldn’t mind if I lay down and cried a long time. I closed my eyes like tight stars so that I wouldn’t, but I did (p.97)”. The trees are a place where Esperanza can go to relieve stress and let out her feelings without feeling the odd one out. There is no other place where Esperanza can go without someone disturbing her or making fun of her. The trees act like a safe house where she can hide and let out her feelings. 

Another example would be when Esperanza says, " But what you remember most is this tree, huge, with fat arms and mighty families of squirrels in the higher branches. All around, the neighborhood of roofs, black-tarred and A-framed, and in their gutters, the balls that never came back down to earth. Down at the base of the tree, the dog with two names barks into the empty air, and there at the end of the block, looking smaller still, our house with its feet tucked under like a cat. (Cisneros p.22)".

This shows that the trees sort of "protects" their house and is a place where other creatures can go to live. The trees are what Esperanza remembers the most thus making them very significant to her. I think the trees also represent the comfort she feels when feeling down.
      In conclusion, the symbols Cisneros includes in her piece creates a unique experience for the reader. In this case, the trees symbolize the comfort Esperanza feels when she is feeling bad, they are also a place where she can go to let out her emotions. Esperanza is also similar to the trees because there were four weak looking trees that were planted but still kept going. They represent the emotions Esperanza feels after moving to the house on Mango Street.

 

The Windows of Truth

      I think the symbolic significance of Windows in "The House of Mango Street" is that the only place where a woman or girl can see the outside world is trapped in their house looking out the window. Women that were wild and wanted to do something else were locked up in a house, and all they could do to see the outside world was look out the window. The only difference between a prison and a room are the windows. This is exemplified when Cisnero states, " On the corner there is music from the bar, and Rafaela wishes she could go there and dance before she gets old." (p79) Rafaela is trapped in that house looking out the window because she was too pretty and her husband didn't want anyone looking at her. Other women like Sally have the same problem, her beauty creates conflicts for herself.
      Another possible meaning of the windows is that since the women want something and were strong, they look out the window and imagine it so that maybe one day it would be real. Esperanza's grandmother, was a wild woman and was very strong. "She didn't want to get married (p11), Mamacita wanted to go back to her home and didn't want to speak English (p76-78), Rafaela wanted to dance, and Sally wanted to stay pretty." (Cisnero). By wanting these things, men start to get mad and end up locking the women and girls in their rooms. The windows are the only place where they can use their imagination. Sitting in a room all day gets pretty boring, so what else is there to do, but look out a window and daydream.
      The window also the only possible place where these women and girls might be able to escape one day. Rafaela dreams of Rapunzel and says, " Rafaela leans out the window and leans on her elbow and dreams her hair is like Rapunzel's." (Cisnero, p79). She does that because she hopes that maybe one day she will be saved from that prison.
      I've noticed that the how the women are treated in the book are similar to how they are treated today. They are expected to stay home while the man goes out to work, or meets up with his buddies, but when the woman goes outside and wants to do something, the man gets mad. It's like the men treat the women like property. This is like the sexism that is exemplified everyday. Some women are underpaid, and other are looked upon as sluts or hoes by the way they dress. It's very degrading. I think that Cisnero incourperates the windows because its the the only thing that separates a room from a prison.