Manga Realness: "Eerie Queerie!" by Shuri Shiozu

Hi, everyone.  For those who are new to my blog, welcome.  For those returning, welcome back and thanks.  Should I tone down all the colors? (^_^)  

I made the--now titled--Comic Towel to create a space where I can promote my Zazzle store/drawings and my interest in literature, manga, and philosophies (some personal).  Sounds like a lot, but as I find myself delving into the materials that I love in each category, I can’t help but want to share and create conversations about them and how they relate to my life.  A side objective to that is to help motivate and inspire others by finding inspiration in all mediums.

With that said, I would like to find some of that inspiration in

Awkwardness of Mitsuo Shiozu

Manga Realness Number 3: Shuri Shiozu’s Eerie Queerie (the original Japanese title is Gosuto!, or Ghost!).  The English adaptation title of Eerie Queerie is more or less a play on the fact that this manga series is within the shonen-ai genre, or "Boy’s Love".  That’s Boy’s Love in the sense that it features gay characters/themes.  See, the story is about a cumbersome high school teen name Mitsuo Shiozu [uke].  His cumbersomeness isn’t pressed upon him simply because of the awkward stage we all face in high school.  No, Mitsuo just happens to be a spirit medium, meaning he communicates with the dead.  Therefore, he has every reason to be weird, soft, and many times over dramatic   He has a lot to deal with besides crushing over boys--or hiding it, rather.  Undoubtedly, the paranormal aspect drew me into the four-volume series as it appease to my love of Japanese kwaidan stories.  Of course in a severely cutesy, melodramatic manga-style fashion.  Naturally, there are better manga featuring stories of the occult and paranormal, but Eerie Queerie! ranks a little differently with its shonen-ai elements.

The Handsomely Dedicated, Hasunuma

The problem Mitsuo finds himself in lies in his ability to become possessed by the ghost that he runs across.  Usually, they are female.  And usually, they uphold a somewhat unrequited love of a certain male classmate.  Tucked within Mitsuo’s body, these ghost seek the returning affection of those who’ve obtained their attention in life.  This leads to further awkwardness and a pattern of misunderstandings that creates a love triangle between Mitsuo and the popular boy in school, Hasunuma [seme].  The third piece of the triangle belongs to the neatly handsome, Ichi.  With the romantic stage set, the battle for Mitsuo’s affections commences through this winding series of miscommunication, bad intentions, hidden secrets, and desperate apparitions.  The crux of much of Hasunuma and Ichi’s intent is to both love and protect Mitsuo.  Which also fuels Mitsuo’s desire to strengthen himself from the weedy boy he started as?  

So will Mitsuo allow one of the boys in?  Will he gain the change that

The Competition, Ichi

he seeks in himself?  It’s all whimsical, comedic entertainment at its best.  However, the magnetism of watching your archetypal bad boy (in this case, Hasunuma) fall for the likes of Mitsuo is just too sweet to turn away.  Mainly because we see it all the time in conventional romance stories where the bad boy is reformed through the admiration of the good girl.  In essence, there isn't much differences in any budding relationships, despite the sex of the partners.  This, and the slow pace of love taken in this series, is the reason I loved Eerie Queerie!

Small Japanese vocabulary lesson in concerns to shonen-ai/yaoi genres...

The Uke and the Seme.  Guess who is which?

A uke character is normally described as the fail, feminine character in the dynamics of the male-male relationship.  The seme character is the opposite.  He is the moody, brawny character that often is overprotective of his uke.

A Glimpse into Daniel Black’s "Perfect Peace"

"Gracie left, convinced that Mae Helen would die before Emma Jean saw her again.  Still, she was glad she had tried.  A child's hurt obviously evolves into an adult's resentment, she told herself, so after years of abuse, the possibility that Emma Jean might forgive and forget was a virtual impossibility.  Maybe she should have fought more directly for Emma Jean when they were children, Gracie considered, but what could she do about that now?  Even if she apologized, which she felt she'd done, Emma Jean's pain wouldn't decrease.  All Gracie knew to do was promise to love any child she birthed--even if, like Emma Jean, it was ugly."

Before I forget, this has to be pulled out of my “draft“ list and shared, especially after watching an amazing interview with the author on YouTube.  So I wanted to dust this work-in-progress off, share it with everyone, then let the video do the talking because what he says will blow the right mind away.  But first, in a way this passage is an extension of my Alice Walker post where I ask the questions revolving around parental guilt and our frustrating experiences finding purpose in our adult lives.  Maybe answers are here.  Please, enjoy.

Daniel Black a Perfect Peace

Manga Realness: "Doubt!!" by Kaneyoshi Izumi

Here we are guys; readers and friends of Comic Towel.  Manga enthusiasts and those curious enough to take my loved titles as recommendations, I present to you Manga Realness Number Two: Kaneyoshi Izumi’s Doubt!!.  But first, this is not based on Yoshiki Tonogai's manga series with the same name.  

The New Ai Maekawa

Coming from my loathsome sessions plodding through the Peach Girl manga series (which I bailed out on), Doubt!! did a good job dissolving the growing weariness I gathered from reading about Japanese schoolgirls who allowed her peers to run over her.  Translated as “bullying”, the Japanese term ijime describes this type of behavior seen in many school-based manga stories.  Now that’s not to say there wasn’t a supply of this in the five volumes that make up the complete series of Doubt!!.  After all, it wouldn’t be a shojo manga series without melodrama, plaid skirts, sharp-jawed boys, love triangles, depraved ijime, and the misunderstood tanned student with duck lips.  Nevertheless, the more or less distinct difference is that the protagonist in Doubt!! was (or at least started out) a little more on my temperamental level when it comes to not accepting crap from others.

Will So's past break his relationship with Ai?

A six volume shojo series crossing Romance and Slice of Life, Doubt!! tells the school life story of Ai Maekawa, an overlooked junior high teen who turns her image around to begin an acknowledged, new life in high school.  Armed with a new haircut and pimple cream, this transformation jumps off the series after a small prologue recounts her last embarrassing moment in junior high.  Feeling a lot more confident in her looks, Ai enters high school with the admiring eyes of her peers.  In turn, she suddenly finds herself in the mix of two of the school’s popular boys, So Ichinose and Yuichiro Kato.  A seemingly over flirtive (another word I made up) womanizer with a sketchy background related to his childhood, So Ichinose literally scoops Ai up and hangs off her backside during the first chapter of their meeting.  Why?  Because she is new, cute, and prospective-looking to his limbido.  Alternatively, his best friend, Yuichiro Kato, hangs back to admire Ai from afar, while berating So for his overzealous flirting.  The boys are two sides of the same coin, and as the placidly cool Yuichiro grows feelings for Ai, and Ai grows feelings for So, So tackles the difficult task of keeping his checkered past out of sight and from drawing a line between him and Ai.  Meanwhile, Ai has to battle her own past, as figures from then emerge to wreck her sudden popularity and budding relationship with the boys.  This all befits the web of drama that makes up Doubt!!.  And it only gets juicier as each of their secrets are revealed.

Now, what hooked me to this series…

Does Yuichiro stand a chance with Ai?

Some can say that the determination for Ai’s transformation reinforces how girls cater to a cultural obsession with looks and social popularity.  However, to me, Ai changing her looks installed in her that she is worth more than she believed before.  She didn’t think she was cute.  She didn’t think she would ever get a boyfriend.  She didn’t think too much of herself.  Then she decided to move away from that frame of thinking and make a change.  Granted, it can appear shallow for her to believe that looks is the beginning of this inner and outer transformation; nonetheless, her doing so sparked a fighting spirit inside of her.  I don't know about you, but I've always admired individuals who can make a change and take charge of their lives.  Seriously, how many people can wake up and decide to do battle with their issues instead of feeling sorry for themselves?  That's why I liked Ai and dedicated myself to reading her story. 

Still, her story doesn't stop there because soon she has to defend her new attitude--which kept me further invested in her story. 

Ai's ijime became jealousy-driven once she reached high school.  The girls who did not know of Ai’s past chose to bully her because she was pretty and gained the attention of the most popular boys in school.  However, driven by the torture she experienced in junior high, as well as her will to remain consistent in separating herself from those experiences emotionally, Ai did not back down from this new misconception that her bullies formed about her.  After all, the fight from her previous slew of misconceptions built enough character to combat the other.

At one point a student expressed: “Pretty girls get everything handed to them.  You don’t know what life is really like.”  Instead of succumbing like during her past insecurities, Ai chooses to stand up (quite violently I must add) for herself under the realization that the ijime she faced in junior high has only changed.  While she is somewhat thankful to be labeled "pretty", it did not come easy.  Therefore, she sure as hell wasn't willing to let someone taunt her about something they knew nothing about in regards to her emotional struggles.  So the best thing for her to do was to shut it down before it started.  And that's what she did when she fought back for her respect.  

This resonated with my experience adjusting from junior high to high school.  Like Ai, it was this adjustment that let me know that I didn’t have to take crap from anyone else anymore, and that I wasn‘t so unattractive that I needed to lay in my own darkness.  What I believed for myself was exactly what I had a right to pursue.  I didn’t have to lie in my shell any longer because there was nothing wrong with being confident, loud, and even obnoxiously cheerful.  So take control of your life when you find it necessary.  You’re going to come across opposition of some sort any way.  Might as well attempt to make the best of yourself in the process.  Feed confidence into your emotional diet even if that means changing your looks.  And most of all, stop feeling sorry for yourself.  Give yourself some credit for moving through life itself.

If you could go back to junior high or high school, what would you do differently?

When the Night Whispers Review

“The more time she spent with Asa, the more she couldn’t remember what she’d told or not told her daughter.  Her days away from him seemed blurred and dull.  It seemed as if she forgot everything: the lyrics to songs she’d sung all her life, the titles of books she’d read twice.  She’d stick milk into cabinets and empty bowls into the refrigerator--like some poor soul with dementia, she thought.  It frightened her, this forgetfulness, but then she decided that his presence in her life overshadowed everything else."

I finally managed to obtain a copy of Savanna Welles’ book, When the Night Whispers.  Moved by the fact that Savanna Welles is a pen name to one of my favorite African-American mystery writers, Valerie Wilson Wesley, the need to read this book was undoubtedly paramount.  Nevertheless, I hesitated in ordering a copy after the book released in February.  Maybe I thought it wasn't as absorbing as Wesley’s Tamara Hayle Mysteries (where the last two books actually weren't).  Perhaps it was the synopsis, indicating Wesley’s switch to writing Gothic paranormal under her Welles pseudonym.  Still, as a loyal reader, I knew I was going to get to the book one day.  Finally I did.  I spent two days devouring the novel, but left with that “meh” feeling that kept me from rushing to purchase it in the first place.  That’snot to say that I disliked the book.  However, despite the wonderful imagery, the plot just didn't seem to take off as I hoped.

When the Night Whispers revolves around a divorced mother named Jocelyn, and her eleven-year-old daughter, Mikela.  Separated from her husband for some time, Jocelyn decides to move her single motherhoodedness (yes, I made that up) back to her childhood home, a home passed to her by her deceased mother, Constance.  A house riddled with Welles' descriptions of generations of women gone past, it is here that Jocelyn discovers letters written by her ill-fated great-grandmother, Caprice.  Somewhat ostracized from the family for leaving her daughter behind, Caprice’s letters details the maddening journey she took to separate herself from the charming authority of a dark and influential gentleman.  The novel chops up pieces of Caprice’s personal letters.  Each entry is used to pace alongside the troubles Jocelyn faces when she, too, finds herself suddenly at the sway of another influential gentleman, her neighbor, Asa.  And down the road to the brink of madness does Jocelyn go.  Can Jocelyn salvage herself and break free, or will she fall to Asa’s power and sacrifice her family to please the darkness that he harbors?

Dark stuff, right?  It’s like the paranormal romance without the sappy romance that I so despise (such as Nora Robert‘s Sign of Seven Trilogy).  Another positive is the supporting cast.  Where Jocelyn was nearly out of her mind the entire book, it was characters like Luna and her mother Geneva that really compelled me to continue reading the book.  The novel itself, touched with Southern folklore and porch-songs, had these conscious and aware characters stand out the strongest.  Driven by their intuitive abilities, Luna and Geneva were two who believed in the danger surrounding Jocelyn's neighbor.  So they chose to uncover him.  I love stories surrounding Southern traditions meant to rid people of jinx and haints, and these two characters, buttered with oils and herbs and the will to face the darkness, did not disappoint.  I’ma sucker for cryptic conversations about thwarting the dead; this book had it.

Another supporting character was Jocelyn’s ex-husband, Mike, who did little more than baby-sat their sassy eleven-year-old daughter, Mikela.  Now while this small cast pushed and challenged the main protagonist, Jocelyn, she had some purpose of her own. Besides ruminating about her love/hate relationship with Asa, of course.  It’s through Jocelyn that most of the themes related to the bond between mothers and daughters come about.  As she explores the tension created between her daughter because of a man, she also realizes that those same tensions existed within her family's past.  That realization leads to her desire to keep from making those same mistakes.  And to further the theme of mother-daughter unions was the connection between Luna and her mother (who resided in a nursing home), Geneva.  I believe the secondary theme the book offers is that of relationships and how one can find themselves lost in sustaining one, particularly one that is abusive.

And here is where most of the material fell short to me.  There was a void of concrete sustenance in the development of Jocelyn’s relationship with Asa; toward the beginning to the end.  Their development primarily consisted of pages of told—as opposed to shown—storytelling scenarios revolving around their budding desire.  As someone who likes to dig deep into books and require lots of details to shovel, that wasn't enough for me.  I didn't want to be told about how Asa lured Jocelyn to other countries.  I wanted to see it.  I didn't want to be told how Asa managed to convince Jocelyn to poison her body.  I wanted to see it happen.  And I most certainly didn't want to be told how Asa came to put his hands on Jocelyn.  I wanted to witness it.  I wanted to see those charming good nuggets of things Asa did to win Jocelyn over to the darkness he had to offer.  I wanted to be captured in the moments of their unfolding relationship, but because it didn’t start on such a note, I only ended up humming right through it till the end.  This kind of defeated one of the main purposes of the novel.

Nevertheless, When the Night Whispers was a fantastic read, only because there is enough mystery and cryptic conversations to keep you guessing and reading on into the night.  Some areas could have used a little more fleshing out, but it was still a smooth sail toward some dark satisfaction.

Source:
Welles, Savanna. When the Night Whispers. New York: St. Martin's, 2013. Print.

1996 and Intruding Thoughts

“The Boys sit transfixed before the small computer screen. A green line, indicating the brain wave activity of the Naylor woman, scrolls across the screen. On the other side of the wall, she’s in bed, tossing and turning, trying to get comfortable. They catch their breath in excitement as the words appear at the bottom of the screen; This pillow is too soft. Paulo can’t help himself; every time he sees that a tingling occurs at the bottom of this stomach. To be inside of someone’s mind has to be the sexist thing in the world. There was nowhere left on earth to go, no new frontiers. This was it; they were touching someone’s soul. Each time that it’s his turn, he trembles just a little as he “answers” her. The pillow isn’t too soft. Your head is too hard. After typing those words, he presses the “send” key and there is a slight hum from the satellite dish. Leave me alone. Jesus, would you look at that. She heard them. They’ve done it a dozen times by now, but every time it’s like a little miracle. So this is what it feels like to be God, Paulo thinks."   

This frightening excerpt comes from Gloria Naylor’s fictionalized memoir, 1996.  It’s considered a fictionalized memoir because of the interlocking narrative, sectioned between Naylor’s first person perspective of events (considered reality) and a third person view.  The third person narrative (proposed as fiction) provides readers a glimpse into the villainous acts of the government “squad” used to torment Naylor because of a small series of misunderstandings that inaccurately labeled her an anti-Semitic (those who are discriminating towards Jews).  As a book submerged in Naylor’s familiarity with government surveillance and conspiracies, her accounts left me wondering how probable her experiences were as well as what were the odds of finding myself in something similar.  Should you find time to read the book, you will see how disturbingly easy Naylor arrived to her situation.  And I say that without arguing whether her accounts are fact or fiction.   

Nonetheless, I also left the book wondering whether some of the fleetingly negative criticisms I have for myself are produced from within.  Or are they manufactured thoughts by some other source, as seen in parts of Naylor’s situation?  I suppose the safest choice is to settle with those negative thoughts being constructions of my own.  This may keep me from falling into that whole state of believing that the world is out to get me.  Nevertheless, I’ve always taken into account that nothing--and I mean nothing--in this world can be contained within our knowledgeable grasp.  Meaning, anything can absolutely be.  Nothing is impossible.   

So if those negative voices in our head are not manufactured, as they were in 1996, where do they pop up from?  As the depraved Paulo referred in the passage above, are they from God?  The better question is how true are those voices and should they always be acknowledged when we are faced with decisions or realizations about ourselves?  What percentage of them are thoughts influenced by the beliefs of others?  And how much of those thoughts are residual from our childhood experiences?  That’s what I really wanted to get to.   

So when our mind is wrestling with something, how easy is it to stay impartial and allow the debate to pass?  Is it helpful to stuff down the negative thoughts with positive ones?  Or should the negatives be just as accepted.  Because the mind won’t shut off, will it?  Every bad thought it shares does not pertain to you, though.  That's to be realized.   

Imagine the feeling of relief when we make peace that we are not that stupid voice in our head.  Instead, we’re just there to “listen” to it play out if we choose to.  We don’t have to participate with its corrugated reasoning.  It’s easier that way, but why is it so damn hard to reach such a state?  I find myself wondering this when in my head I am debating the behavior of others based off a decision I’ve made, of course translated through the lens of negativity.  See, a schedule was posted at work, and me being a first shift associate, suddenly found myself relegated to working two second shifts as the MOD, or manager on duty.  At the beginning of the summer I explicitly asked to move and stay exclusive to first shift.  Here, I could continue to have the personal space I felt required to better myself.  As far as the MOD status, I could have sworn that I turned down being a lead back in March.  Trusting my instincts, I should add.  So I was thoroughly perplexed looking at the schedule.  I was not going to get paid to watch over the second shift team members’ work, and should something happen within the store, I wasn’t willing to take the heat and stress crashing on my shoulders.  Nonetheless, I didn’t put up a fuss looking at the schedule, besides the managers had all dipped out!  I simply wrote a post-it note that read something like this:   

“I am not interested in managing second shift or working its hours again.  Thanks.”   

Well, that became the talk of the store.  People began to believe that the real second shift team lead was quitting (management put me on those two days to work her days off).  People thought I was quitting.  People became concerned for the store’s coverage.  Some were even proud of me.  But as for me... I (in my head) just kept thinking that I should have handled the situation differently.  Why?  Because I--once again in my head--believed I had upset some people by causing them to rearrange matters that inconvenienced others.  I am the type of person who tries not to make a fuss wherever I go.  I try to keep things mellow and fun.  For me to outright say “I won’t accept this” is almost unusual.  Granted, I speak my mind and take a no-bullshit approach to certain areas of my life.  However, I was also taught to take on my responsibilities however they come.  Nevertheless, it really did bother me that management felt they could just throw me into such a position after discussing months ago that I didn’t want such.  Still, this negative tape in my head kept insisting that my insubordinate “violation” of other employee’s time and space might’ve been doing too much.  What gave me the right to protest management’s decisions (besides the fact that I wasn’t going to get paid for it)?    

So when a certain employee may have forgotten to speak to me one day, I think it’s because of my demands.  Or when a manager eyes me across the room, I wonder is he ready to give me the boot (which I probably would gladly take) or cut my hours for making such a bold demand.  Is everyone mad at me?   

But it’s all an illusion, you see.  Those things only exist if I make them so and making them so starts with hooking myself into the negative thoughts that encourage them.  Things like my personal intentions and motivations play a role in my decision to spend my good times chasing a better life.  So if those choices ask me to stand up for myself, I must oblige.  It is much more rewarding to congratulate myself than berate myself over the falseness of guilt and negative illusions, which would once again turn into an inner battle begging me to quit the job all together.   

Nevertheless, I suppose the point of this post, in relation to Gloria Naylor’s novel, is to not allow anything, including your very own battling thoughts, to control and wear your purpose.  On all accounts, stand up for yourself throughout inner and outer circumstances.

Source:

Naylor, Gloria. 1996. Chicago: Third World, 2007. Print.

Manga Realness: "Absolute Boyfriend" by Yuu Watase

I have a humble collection of manga, so this will be a modest series of posts (not really).  Nevertheless, my manga library was a lot larger in the past, but many of the titles that I decided not to venture pass book one (unless it was a one-shot) did not make it during years of moving and rearranging cluttered bookshelves.  In retrospect, I wish I kept many of them because I fume silently at the absence of my copy of Antique Bakery Volume 1.  Did I give it away?  Or did I misplace it in my mess?  It always seems to work that way: you grow out of certain phases then you tumble your way back in.  One year my manga library grows, the next year it’s stagnate, the following year it’s dwindled.  And on it goes.

Nonetheless, there are a few manga series and one-shots that I refuse to separate from.  Some of them I’ve completed and some of them I hold on to in the hopes of one day picking back up to complete.  Naturally, the other singular element that assists with my decision to hold on to a title is the artwork.  

So with all of that said, let’s get into Manga Realness Number One.  By the way these are not ranked; alphabetically arranged with each category, though.  With Sailor Moon completely out of the way (what manga series can beat that?), my first favorite completed manga series is Yuu Watase’s Absolute Boyfriend.

Absolute Boyfriend is about a withdrawn Japanese high school girl (she happens to live alone while her parts work overseas) named, Riiko Izawa, and like many shojo genre girls, Riiko is having romantic problems.  Well, Riiko’s problem is that she can’t seem to have a romantic problem.  Guys that she's interested in are never receptive to her.  When it finally appears that she will remain loveless throughout her school years, a strange set of circumstances, involving her returning a missing cell phone, sets Riiko on the path to finding love.  Or does it?  It is nowhere near as easy to determine.  The missing cell phone belongs to a mysterious stranger who, after listening to Riiko’s romantic woes, offers her a card and CD-ROM that directs her to a website called Kronos Heaven.  It is here that Riiko spends a late school night customizing what appears to be her perfect boyfriend, offered for order by Kronos Heaven.  While she approached much of this as a joke, the next day Riiko receives her wish in the form of the perfect, robotic boyfriend named, Night (he is part of the Nightly Lover android series).  Per the instructions, a kiss is required to activate Night.  With Riiko ready to comply, this is where the fun of the 6 volume manga series begins!

Riiko Izawa

Night is given to Riiko on a trial basis; he must be returned three days after purchase.  The mysterious cell phone stranger reveals this to Riiko during his service-appreciated visit.  The problem is that Riiko wasn’t aware of the statement, and is therefore stuck with Night and a one million dollar (or yen) bill.  With her first payment only days away, Riiko and Night quickly devise ways to earn money, including working in a hostess bar.  Night even disguises himself as a woman to assist Riiko; such a dedicated fellow him be.  Until Riiko is groped by a drunk patron does Night come out of his wig to protect her, subsequently leading to both of their terminations from the bar.  Leaving the bar broke, they run into the mysterious cell phone stranger.  Realizing her struggles, he offers Riiko a deal: the organization will waive her fee if she provides them with data concerning her relationship with Night.  This will assist the company in creating even better boyfriend models for future customers.  Gladly, Riiko agrees.  She is determined to teach Night everything about women.

It all makes for a great set-up, especially when you factor in the antics the two go through to keep their secret, as well as their comedic dialogue.  Other elements that unfold within the series includes the crush Riiko’s neighbor, Soshi, has on her.  This eventually forms a love triangle between the three where Night and Soshi battle it out for Riiko’s attention and affection.  Other characters join in on the adventures, including a miniature version of Night who assists Riiko during a time when Night requires repairs to his cyborg body.  Nevertheless, the main focus of the series revolves around Riiko’s maturity and choice.  With a sudden brew of romantic options, will she choose the robotic boyfriend, Night?  Or will she choose the moody and flawed human character, Soshi?

Night.  The robot mate.

Without a doubt, this manga series contains many of the elements that I love in manga.  That's one reason I loved it so much (other than the hilarious plot).  I read the volumes as each English adaptation was released (2006-2007), so it came along as a positive distraction from the mundane life I faced working my ass off to keep up with bills and rent in a city three hours away from home.  I can distinctly remember reading volume three while gassing up my car for a trip to Six Flags (needed that break).  So why was I so invested in the series?  Because Riiko was so terribly unsound when it came to figuring out her love life, and for good reason when you consider she resorted to a robot to try to fulfill that void.  I could relate to her in that aspect--not the robot nonsense.  I knew what it was like to wonder why certain tingling elements revolving around relationships and finding love did not seem to operate correctly in my own life.  I, too, like Riiko, spent a lot of time swallowing down the interest in place of accepting my solidarity.  But at the same time I longed for companionship.  You begin to adapt this armor where you stress to others that connections and relationships are not needed in your life, meanwhile you watch the relationships of others blossom and secretly ask yourself what is so wrong with you.  Now, I wouldn’t dare pay someone to be the “absolute mate”, but I know what it’s like to struggle in finding answers to your questions without endangering the integrity and self-respect that makes up yourself.  Even if those two things are the very things that get in your way.

Check out Absolute Boyfriend Volume 1 on Amazon.com and look out for Doubt!! by Kaneyoshi Izumi.

Alice Walker and Parental Guilt

In the beginning of Alice Walker's “Everyday Use” we are introduced to Mama and her unconditional love for her two daughters, including the rather errant one named, Dee.  It is Dee that Mama is waiting for in the opening line that reads: “I will wait for her in the yard that Maggie and I made so clean and wavy yesterday afternoon.”  With Maggie as the other sister, this is Walker’s way of passing on to the reader that there is a sense of desperation in their expectancy.  The more you read, the more you realize how stressed the character of Mama is for the return of her daughter, Dee.  The opening paragraph further discloses that Mama views her yard as “comfortable” and an “extended living room”; every aspect of her home has to be in place for this return.  You have to ask yourself why?  Why all of the fuss, Mama?  Why are you placing your best efforts into appearing approachable and damn near spotless for your grown child's return home?  Shouldn't it be the other way around?

I believe that this opening illustrates the sense of disconnect within the story itself.  There is an obvious split between the two generations of women as a mother and a daughter.  Could you believe that a mother acknowledges that her child has changed so much that she must break her back to appease the transformation in her offspring?  Where does that come from?  Guilt of some sort?  Or is it simply a way to change and attract her child back to her roots?  Maybe it's a combination of guilt for not maintaining her child as well as her holding unshakable pride in her background.  Therefore, Mama has to polish the house and yard to remind Dee how wonderful home is.  However, at Dee's return, we learn that Dee is of a worldly perspective now.  She considers herself cultured and can easily frown upon the upbringing she tried to shed herself away from by leaving Mama's home.

This is only a quarter of the battle within this short story.  A fraction of all that's available.  Without a doubt Walker's story serves readers themes concerning upholding one's identity through inheritance (Dee returns home to take away an antique heirloom).  It is also a story meant to remind individuals never to lose sight of their background, even as they venture out into new worlds, conversations, and lives that differ from their roots.  So at the conclusion of Dee's visit, Mama expresses the simplicity behind being true to oneself by stating: "…But a real smile, not scared.  After we watched the car dust settle I asked Maggie to bring me a dip of snuff.  And then the two of us sat there just enjoying, until it was time to go in the house and go to bed.”   

Should you find time to read the story, you may find a simple story about a mother’s imperfectly unconditional love for her two adult daughters, Dee and Maggie, worth diving into.  I have to confess that the only thing I've read by Alice Walker besides “Everyday Use” is The Color Purple.  Who hasn't read that, right?  Once I tried reading Now is the Time to Open Your Heart by her and just could not get into the novel.  So I really need to read more of Walker, knowing that she has so much more to offer as an intensely copious author.  Shame on me!

I read “Everyday Use” a few years ago for a class and recently got to thinking about the push-and-pull relationship with my own mother, seeing that Walker's story features mothers and grown children.  As my own mother's eldest child, I used to feel like she treated me differently than my younger sister.  I’m not really sure if it was because I was the oldest, and therefore driven to be hyper responsible.  Or was it because I was a boy when she may have wanted a girl?  Or was it something different altogether?  I can imagine a scenario where she spotted something in me that required extra molding.  Yet... who knows?  Or do I care to truly know?  See, there are always these places we can’t go with family members and friends, places that seem dark, with the potential to cause disruptions to our relationships.  And while the conversation was more or less oblique than directly spoken of, recently my mother has sort of apologized for some of the things she’s done to have made me feel some of the ways I’ve felt growing up.  

In her estimation it had a lot to do with what she was dealing with herself during the time of my youth.  In any regard, Walker’s short story nudged at my thoughts and I dug up a little in the notes I wrote on it for myself to share and discover answers to any of my own looming questions.  The biggest answer is that we are who we are.  Our parents and their parents and their parents make us, whether we respond one way or the other to their degrees of generational child rearing.  And when we grow to blame and resent our parents for their attempts, we sometimes ignore the guilt that they suffer with.  Many times our parents are only working with what they have, and not just physically speaking.  We all do the best that we can with the tools and understanding that we were given, even our mothers and fathers.