Reading Reflections

Reading Reflections

Reading Reflection 1 Pages 1-31

I had very mixed emotions on this chapter,Jeannette Wells is put through terrible experiences growing up as a young child but also gets to experience things that are great experiences. Jeannette goes from innocent to experienced at a extremely young age, which was caused by her parents Rex and Mary. They intentionally put their child through rough and even horrific experiences. Although they did it out of "love" to teach their kids to be independent and grow up. Jeannette and her siblings are taught what the world is really like which in some ways is good and bad. On one hand they are taught to be independent and they learn how to do things like make their own food at a young age. Such as Jeannette being sent to the hospital with burns, while she was trying to make herself hot dogs. Or Jeannette's tinker bell doll that has her face melted off, which was a toy that meant a lot to Jeannette. On the other hand Jeannette has many instances where she seems very happy and that she is enjoying life. Which is where my mixed emotions come in, did she have a happy childhood? Or was it all a miserable experience?

Reading reflection 2 Pages 32-53

This section of the book was very shocking to me , it really made me wonder how a parent could possibly treat their children that way.In this section Jeannette's parents are so careless with their children. They treat them like they are not actual human beings, young children should not be treated like twenty year olds.  Jeannette and her siblings including their baby sister are thrown into the back of a U-haul and drive for hundreds of miles stuck in the dark. Their parents never stopped to check on them and see if they are were ok. They drove for hundreds of miles in the dark, without stopping to go to the bathroom or for food or water. Until finally the back doors opened up almost causing the kids to fall out of the back of the U- Haul. If their little baby fell out of the back, what would have happened? She can not defend herself at, which shows how little thought her parents put into them. When they were put in the back of the U- Haul i felt extremely bad for them, how could they defend themselves? No child should be forced to have to defend themselves and be put in the position of taking care of a little baby at the same time. Through all the bad Jeannette was put through and the light that was shown on her horrible parents i was also very inspired by her. It was an inspiration to see that Jeanette was forced to grow up very early but at the same time she was still able to keep her sense of youth and adventure.

Reading response 3 pages 54-75

This is one of the most shocking parts of the book that we have read so far. Jeannette is shown a horrific amount of violence as well as almost being starved as they would go days without eating. To many parents their main responsibility is to feed their child and keep them away from violence that could teach them bad things. It is a parents responsibility to keep them sheltered from violence and teach them that thing like that are not ok. Jeannette and her siblings see their mother flailing out of window with their father trying to pull her back in after pushing her out. For days her parents fought like this and at some points it seemed like it had no end. Would you feel guilty if you let your child experience these actions? In addition, to all the violence,what would it feel like to have absolutely no food and at the same time not being able to rely on your parents for it? There were many instances when the Walls children have no food, and are forced to steal it or find it.  One time Jeannette and Lori could only find a stick of margarine to eat and ate a whole stick of it as they were so hungry. It is very shocking to me to think that some children are forced to live this way and their parents are okay with it. It would be very different if Jeannette's parents had tried to help their children but they seemed like they didn't care at all. In addition, how could no one else try and step in to stop it? Out of all of this how could anyone allow their children to live this way?

Reading Response 4 pages 75-120

In this section we learned a lot about different characters. Jeannette is assaulted by a boy named Billy and we also see how different the values of Mary Walls and Grandma Smith are. When Jeannette was assaulted by Billy she was very shocked and upset at the same time. Jeannette was shocked that someone would do something like that to her especially in a place like Battle Mountain. She was also very  upset that Billy said he cared about her and then would do something that she didn't want and tried to hurt her. Jeannette decides not to tell her father because she knows what type of person her dad is and his short temper. If she had told her dad it would have caused an unbelievable amount of problems which would have caused them to "Skedadle" again.  The other children in the family didn't seemed to be phased about what Jeannette had told them. This shows that in the Walls family it is only important to think about your self and make sure the other children do not cause significant problems to compile. In addition, in this section we see the differences in values between Mary and Grandma Smith. Mary does not like to follow traditional rules such as a steady job, nice home and how you dress and take care of yourself. Mary does not care about these things and thinks of them as not being important at all. While these values are  important to Grandma Smith and what her life rules are based around. Which makes them extremely different types of people based on what they believe in.

Reading Response 5 pages 121-154

In this section of the book it is very clear to me now why the Walls live the way they do and why Jeannette's father Rex commits many of the actions that he does. We are introduced to Erma, Rex's mother, his father as well as his brother Stanley. While getting to know Erma we see that she is a very cold person and shows little emotions towards her whole family. She is racist, and makes extremely rude comments about people of a different race when Jeannette goes to meet up with them. Erma is also very cold towards Jeannette and punishes her for things that truly deserve no punishment. In addition, she touches Brian in a very inappropriate way, then twists her story to blame it all on Jeannette. While reading this section it is now easy to understand why Rex is such a bad parent. He is a very heavy drinker which can all be blamed on his childhood. Based on the type of person that Erma is, it forced Rex to drink and be the type of parent that he is today. Rex might believe that what he is doing by providing almost nothing for his children is better then what he grew up with. In the short section of getting to know Erma, it could have caused anyone to turn into a heavy drinker like Rex.  He is trying to be a better parent for his kids then Erma was for him. He may not be a great parent or anywhere close to it but he is trying to teach his kids to take care of themselves. Also to not be stuck in situations like he was that would have a damaging effect on the rest of their lives. Such as the affect that Erma has influenced on his life.