#big scary man respects tiny child after they chew him out is one of my favorite tropes | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sea-owl · 2 years

Text

I'm tired of seeing that trope of Fugaku despising Sakura and trying to break up her relationship with Sasuke.

New trope! Fugaku likes Sakura better than his own sons sometimes and was rooting silently for sasusaku to happen. They are the platonic grumpy and sunshine trope.

Not one Uchiha knows how she did it, but Sakura won over her future father in-law to the point where he'll ask Sasuke if he's bringing Sakura to Clan gatherings. And this was before they got together.

Itachi and Sasuke are both impressed and flabbergasted. That infamous Uchiha stoicism broke the first time they saw little genin Sakura talk Fugaku's ear off. Their father did not react how they expected at all. All Fugaku did was nod and added his own comment every now and again.

During Sakura's training with Tsunade when Fugaku had to make reports to the Hokage he would visit Sakura. And when Sakura was stuck on something she would visit Fugaku if he had time. His quietness while she talked out her problems helps her think and 9 times out of 10 she solves it herself. Fugaku may have also slipped one or two older Uchiha medical/posion techniques in with her notes when she wasn't looking. He almost got caught when Kaname gave him that old scroll to give to Sakura.

When sasusaku did happen and they were getting close to marrying age Fugaku started hinting that Sasuke should teach Sakura the fireball jutsu. Sasuke was surprised his dad didn't push it earlier.

Unknown to him Fugaku knew Sasuke would teach Sakura that jutsu since their genin days. It was just after the Forest of Death and Orochimaru's attack on team 7. Fugaku was pissed that the snake man bit his son and infected him with the curse seal.

Anbu and the Uchiha Police were working together on this, after all Orochimaru not only made it into the village but he attacked rookie genins, one of them being an Uchiha.

Fugaku had gotten statements from Naruto and Sasuke. Both told him of Orochimaru's attack, how he sent a giant snake after Naruto and tried to impersonate the boy, the bite on Sasuke, and the group of Sound ninja sent after he finished his attack.

Naruto knew nothing of that last part, Sasuke began to shake every time he thought about it, a deep shame glazing over his eyes.

This lead to Fugaku talking to Asuma's and Gai's teams who had witnessed bits and pieces of the fight from the three Sound nin.

It didn't take long for Fugaku to realize he needed to talk to Sakura, the only one who was present and conscious from start to finish.

To be honest Fugaku didn't think much of the girl at first. She was civilian born, and a fangirl of his son. She won't amount to much unlike her teammates. She probably would retire early when she became a mother or go into the reserves.

Sasuke was at the station dropping something off from Mikoto when Sakura came in. And oh, Fugaku knew that soft look Sasuke was sending her. The statements of Sakura calming him down in the Forest began to make sense. His eyes fixtated on the girl's newly cut hair. The girl had cut it to free herself and defend her teammates.

Sakura spotted Sasuke when directed towards Fugaku. And Fugaku knew that look too, Sakura was afraid of his son.

Before the two teammates could say something to one another Fugaku called for the girl's attention. "Haruno, let's get your statement."

Sakura nodded and followed Fugaku to an empty room with a desk and two chairs.

"Tell me what happened."

Sakura retold the tale filling in the gaps of her dragging the boys away, and trying to cool down Sasuke's fever. Her setting up traps, and how the fight with the Sound nin went.

"Sasuke-kun woke up then, but. . ." Sakura began to shake. "The power that seal gave him was monstrous."

Fugaku's eyes narrowed. "You think my son is a monster?"

Sakura's head shot up. "No-"

"He defended you did he not when he woke up?"

"Yes but-"

"You're afraid of him."

Sakura slammed her fist on the table, Fugaku pretended not to notice the small cracks.

"That wasn't Sasuke-kun! That seal Orochimaru forced on him was poisoning him! He's not bloodthirsty, and he was shaking when the seal receded!" Sakura took a breath. "I hugged him, begging him to stop, and that's when the seal released him."

Fugaku could see it now, what Sakura was shouting at him. She wasn't afraid of Sasuke, she was afraid for him. Fugaku could see past that fear now in her eyes.

That's the moment Fugaku knew Sakura would one day join the clan, after all no one loved like the Uchiha. They are sometimes born with a different family name though.

#big scary man respects tiny child after they chew him out is one of my favorite tropes #i honestly just want more fics where sasusaku get along with their in laws and have a decent to good relationship with them #non uchiha massacre au #non massacre drabble #non massacre au #sasusaku #fugaku uchiha #sakura haruno #fugaku and sakura friendship #naruto #sakura uchiha

838 notes · View notes

cyanpeacock · 5 years

Text

Agh. It is morning. I am awake.

Don’t feel so hot. Lots of guilt and shame. Also fury. Trying to like... feel it without hating it and getting into that whole spiral.

I’m tired and struggling with like, reasons my body is worth caring for?

I feel kind of like... I’m ungrateful. Why would I cut all contact with a family that would accept me. They say they love me. They let me go to their houses. They’re alright... right?

But they didn’t fucking accept me.

OK this got long and furious under the cut wow. Apparently that’s why waking up was such a cunt this morning. Well. It’s out now.

They wanted me to be amazing in school, and got upset and/or angry and/or disappointed and/or guilty when I wasn’t achieving those kinds of grades. Punished for it. Means of social contact taken away from me, when I was already so fucking lonely. Constantly being fucking watched through a hole in the door. What the fuck kind of house just has holes in all the fucking doors? Why the fuck do you think that’s okay? Do you have any idea how much that fucked with my sense of privacy, how long I felt permanently observed for? Are you even aware how much your other kids hate it?

They wanted me to be a girl, and told me I was ‘just confused’ when I came out, got my name and pronouns wrong like they assumed it was going to pass in the next month, every fucking month. I wasn’t allowed boys’ clothes because “they wouldn’t fit me,” when being a “tomboy” was absolutely fine. Uh, I’m pretty sure ‘boy’ and ‘girl’ children do share dimensions? They’re both humans? I wasn’t even allowed to cut my fucking hair for years, because my mother wanted control over how my body wore my hair, and she wanted it long and blonde and pretty like the perfect working-housewife-to-be. She didn’t see me as a fucking man until after testosterone, and her eyes are still fucking looking for her “little girl.” Fuck off. She died ten thousand times living with you. She was one of those creepy dead-eyed dolls Sheila keeps on the landing in Killinghall. It drives me insane.

Okay this is pretty pointedly at my mother now so yeah.

“You’ll always be my baby” NO I fucking WON’T. Jesus fucking christ woman, I am not a baby any more. You might remember a tiny child and get all misty-eyed. I’m sure it’s reassuring to some adult children. How that feels to me? Oppressive. Like it’s a trap. All-consuming. Like if I go, and actually express and deal with all my rage, I’m going to destroy your world. Because that’s how it fucking worked at the beginning. If I expressed I was hurt, or angry, or upset, or hungry, or in need, I’d get fucking yelled at, I’d get yanked around, I’d get smacked. I’d get ignored. I’d get told I don’t deserve food. I’d get shut inside a lonely dark dirty disgusting fucking room and you’d pretend I didn’t exist.

You never saw how mental I went. You never saw me chewing the bedframes. You never saw me clawing at the walls. You never saw me picking the paint off the plaster, just the aftermath. You never saw me hurling my toys and books around in a rage, you just assumed I was ‘making a mess’. You never saw me beating my skull and body with my fists. You never saw me beating up Hank the teddy in complete rage then sobbing and apologizing to him like he was alive. You never saw me standing in the window crying wishing somebody, maybe the nice man Jeff down the road, would help me.

You never saw how I learned to imagine characters and stories so hard I began hallucinating them in my attempts to escape that ‘home.’ You never saw me wishing the ‘scary’ pedophiles in the white vans would come and take me away, because then maybe somebody would love my body for something different, and that I wouldn’t have to think so hard any more. You never saw me wish that mummy would just kill me so it would all be over. You never saw the help notes I wrote and tore up and posted outside, in the hopes somebody would put them together, and realize I was so scared of being caught asking for help that I destroyed my attempts to get it.

I’m fucking furious. Again and again you’d say bullshit like “imagine how I feel!” when you were the grown fucking adult in the dynamic. And I know-- Christopher comes into the equation, so does Sheila, who - man, that’s just, why would you still see that almost-murderer - I understand why, but holy fuck, I can’t watch myself start living like that - but this, right now, is about you and the child you did not protect, but transferred pain onto.

You got so fucking far inside my head I believed I was ungrateful, disgusting, a brat, just whining, that I had no reason to be so upset. That I should just buck up, and go to school, that I wasn’t doing good enough. I still don’t fucking feel good enough, because you’d go from essentially calling me worthless, to calling me a genius or a prodigy when I did something academically remarkable. It was the only way to convince you I had value.

So I learned to escape through school. I learned to just do the work, even though I still wanted to die right there. Easier to do an exam with an invisible gun to my head than to go home in the evenings, more fun, actually, because at least there was a chance of success in the exam. You didn’t see all the dark fucking nights I lived through considering suicide, wishing desperately that I could just kill myself, but feeling like my utter desperation to get away mattered less than your happiness. Awake all night trying to get away from the thoughts that told me to just stab myself, just go out in the cold, just rot away, because I felt responsible for holding the family together. And I also felt like I was the one destroying it.

I felt responsible for that, especially with how PISS fucking poorly you and David both handled that relationship. Neither of you are emotionally healthy people. You both used emotional manipulation on the children involved in attempts to achieve the same ends: harm the other party, gain power and control.

You know, I want to be a nice guy. I want to give happy happy endless love to the universe. Why do you think I was capable of moving in with a self-declared sadist, a man who’d shot men? Because I’d already lived with somebody who was wounding me every fucking day. In insidious, nasty little ways. That the David cunt only observed and copied. From you, Claire.

Your literal gibbering about “brainwashing!” and “mind control!!” - literally, what the fuck, woman. You’re not immune to propaganda either. You were literally making up your own. You two thought you were the entire fucking universe. He was the Right, you were the Left. It was the Tories and the Labour party, the Axis and the Allies, and the unwitting, dumb voters, with no experience in politics.

This is literally how you framed it to me.

That is literally how you two IDIOTS thought it was appropriate to navigate a breakup.

You know what? I’m done with it, again. You’re different to him in how you throw your shade, and that’s all. He’s alright, in moderation. You’re alright, in moderation. I could tolerate a serial killer, in moderation; I almost fucking was one, with how hurt I’d become, and how little trust in and respect for human beings I’d developed. All just meat to me. It’s all I’ll be in the end, anyway. It gave me a sense of power to stalk strangers at night, and observe their weak points, and consider how fucking easy it would be to get a rush that way.

And I can’t have these conversations with you, these furious fucking conversations, because I am conditioned to box up every bit of my rage when I even THINK of your face. You show up in my mind with your eyes all watery blue and bloodshot from drinking, and your lip and chin all tight like you’re going to cry, and it convinced - and still sometimes convinces me - “pack it in, you can’t destroy her like that, the world will fucking end, it’ll come back on you and your siblings. There will be punishment, there will be blood, and it’ll be yours, and you’ll be left all alone cleaning it up with no fucking support. The only eye that sees your blood will punish you for making a mess with it.”

Neither of you can see shit about what I really feel, unless you’re reading it here, like fucking omnipresent surveillant operatives of Big Brother, which I suspect at least one of you might actually be fucking doing.

Sure, things changed when I came back, still going through active trauma, desperate for something, some illusion of healthy family. Was that healthy? No. Was I actively going through unhealthy, traumatic times? Yes. We do unhealthy things in unhealthy times, and afterwards, while we process the feelings we went through but were numb to. It happens. I understand this, it’s why I kept making fucking excuses, why I thought ‘explanations’ of behaviour meant anything when you’d hurt somebody. It’s why I boxed up all this fucking rage. It’s why I thought my pain was meaningless compared to yours.

I’ll give this to you, you got nicer. You drink less. I appreciate it, for your other kids. They’re doing better than I was, but they’re still not well.

When did that change?

After your first fucking child ran away, because of the sheer amount of pain you were transferring onto them. Because of the toxic fucking environment of emotional manipulation and infantilization you’d continued to foster. Because it was easier to live with a racist opioid addict murderer for a while than to stay in that shithole city any longer. I had to force you to realize how fucking unhealthy that place was.

I’m not being kind right now, because I don’t know how to express all this fucking fury in a kind way. I don’t know how to soften the blow. Maybe there’s no fucking way, maybe that’s why I’m doing it on my blog. I still don’t believe you’re grown enough to handle this shit. You shut me down in every difficult conversation about feelings, and you don’t even mean to. Why do you think I cried on you so fucking much, but you could never fucking console me? Because you fucked up at the start. Because you didn’t establish a secure attachment between yourself and your child. Because you couldn’t provide for me.

I don’t blame you for being unable to provide for me. Circumstances align this way, often, and it’s inevitable.

I can’t go back in time and re-establish that attachment. There’s always this lingering fucking, waiting for the stab in the back. Waiting for trouble. Those moments where I go completely blank and convince myself it’s always been happy, it’s always been nice, I really am imagining things, I really do just overreact... there’s something wrong with me, why am I so ungrateful? Why can’t I feel joy here? Why is it always bittersweet?

It’s fucking me up. It really hurts me, every day. Every god damn day when I’m living with myself, and actually working on acknowledging and expressing what I really feel, in as healthy a way as I can muster. I still wake up thinking I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve to smile today. I’ve ruined the world. I’ve fucked up so badly by making the decision not to speak to you again.

I have to stop doing that to myself.

I went psychotic from the amount of repressed trauma I’d been burying by smoking pot. My brain had to show me all that pain and instability I’d been avoiding, in the form of hallucinated symbols.

It was terrifying. It was also incredibly helpful. The doors of perception, as it were. Thanks for that one - I’m off making my own Brave New World, and it’s on the island, far away from the rest of them, with their neatly chemically controlled babies in fucking jars.

I needed to drug myself to function, for a while. I needed my meds to function. To do the only thing I’d ever been truly worth anything for, the only thing that was going to get me out and away. I’m coming to doubt that it was ever really my choice to be an academic. Between ability and unhealthy amounts of pressure, I was forced this way, like that fucking rhubarb you were growing.

So I suppose that’s why I woke up this morning and thought about staying in bed all day, hiding from the rest of the universe. I wanted to go back to sleep, so I didn’t have to feel how fucking angry and hurt I am. I can’t avoid feeling angry and hurt, now nothing’s actually hurting me in my daily life, now I’ve got people who respect my every word for what it is.

And I have to do this every day. Every fucking day, I’ve got to have these conversations with myself. Sometimes I write them. Sometimes I sing them. Sometimes I have to talk through them, slowly and haltingly, trying to understand why something apparently small hurts like something much bigger.

Why am I ‘doing this to myself’? So I don’t do it to anybody else. Not again. So I can come to a place where I feel worthy, and deserving, and like I can connect enough to my feelings and body to function without damaging myself even more.

All that fucking denial of my physical pain. All that denial there was anything medically wrong with me. It got inside me, man.

But - I have to accept my borderline. I have to accept that I have an intense emotional range, that causes me problems in meeting the societal standards of daily life, because I’ve been through an emotionally intense past.

I also have to accept that it’s not normal for this (almost) 22 year old body to click and crack and pop and grind and ache so much I have to literally limp around. My hips should not be audibly thunking when I go to sit down in an office chair to check my emails. My shoulders should not be sliding out of place steadily over the course of the day. I should never have gone so physically numb that I didn’t notice my binder warping my ribs.

I said I thought I had Ehlers-Danlos. You said I read too much, and that I was paranoid. Where am I now? Six years later, facing the possibility that that really is what’s wrong with my cartilage, the reason my skin is so soft, the reason my ribs bent so easily, the reason my vertebrae slide over each other audibly, the reason the only joints I have that don’t hurt are my elbows. And I’ve got to do it alone, because I can’t deal with looking right at your guilt every time I bring it up, because I know that you know now that this really isn’t normal, and you ignored it at a time so much damage could have been prevented.

I know why it went down that way. I do and don’t blame you. I just have to get angry, so I can fucking do something with my day that isn’t pure escapism, something constructive.

So now I’m wrapping this one up. I’m not fucking “packing it in” any more. I’ll wrap it up, at a time and place of my choosing, considering every body and mind my actions are affecting in the moment. Right now? This is for me.

#fliptext #trauma #abuse #neglect #suicide #addiction #murder #self harm #ask to tag #Good Morning #I Had To Get Mad So I Wouldn't Be Sad All Day #Things To Do U Kno #disability

2 notes · View notes

dadbodadl · 7 years

Text

How?

How did I get here? 41 years old, 102.8kg. Fat. Avoiding photographs at family events, hell I think I’m even starting to avoid events. No t-shirts fit anymore. I am just a big fat bloke. Probably no longer attractive to Mrs Dadbod (thank goodness for my amazing sense of humour). To summarise all of that, basically I’m embarrassed about this part of my life that I should be able to control but can’t.

So for something different (to all of my last attempts at losing weight) I thought I’d do a little grave-digging. See if I can sift through the ashes of my weight loss attempts, and the story that is my life to pick up a few weapons I might be able to add to my arsenal for this attempt. Correction, for this BATTLE. I have been overweight since I was 7 years old, there have been many weight loss battles (let’s say 15 genuine attempts). I won the battle once after a break-up when I was 21, got down to 83kg for about 6 months and then met a new girl and 6 months later I was 2kg heavier, and then you can pretty much add 1kg per year since then. Every other battle has been lost in this war that is my weight.

It’s as if I see my eating habits as childish. All the other parts of my life are an adult doing adult things, and there is this one little part of me that is still a child, and I can’t control him. He drags me into junk food places, makes me eat big portions, shouts over the logical (adult) part of me telling me this isn’t good, and what this brat is encouraging me to do really has no good outcomes. Diabetes, bowel cancer, heart attack; really, really scary shit. Yet I still slowly lower my two hands, get a firm grip on a quarter pounder with bacon and mayo, and bring it to my mouth and chew it down. And then I do it again a few meals later (3 or 4 at most). And again. And again. Repeatedly for 35 years.

So why was I overweight at 7 years old? Aristotle said, “Show me the boy at 7 years old and I will show you the man”. My take on that is his theory is many of our life-long habits are formed before we even have a chance of controlling our emotions. Emotions which water the tiny seedlings of behaviour, behaviours which grow to be habits. Habits are like weeds. So, when I tell you this next bit of my story, I am wondering whether Aristotle’s ghost might appear in front of me and do that “Nothing but net” gesture NBA guys do when they nail the winning 3-pointer in the final.

Mum and Dad bought a McDonald’s Franchise when I was four years old. Before you start hating on my Mum and Dad, in all respects they have been amazing parents. Like all young parents, they wanted to work hard to build a good life financially for their children. There is a ‘but’; as I progressed through primary school I would catch a bus to the shop because mum and dad were both flat-out growing their business. At that stage I was an only child so I would wait until other kids came into the restaurant and then play with them in the playground. In between those times, I would often have the occasional cheeseburger, and French fries. I unofficially started working there when I was ten years old (I stood on a milk crate dressing burgers in the kitchen) and then I was officially on the payroll from twelve years old. Between waiting for mum and dad to finish work, and working shifts there, from the ages of eight to fifteen, I would have averaged six days a week in the McDonald’s store.

At that age, your metabolism is off the charts, combine that with an active participation tennis and aussie rules footy most of my teenage years, and I would say I was still one of the stockier kids in my circles. It is only the last few years that I sense the real damage that was occurring at that early age was the repetitive behaviour around junk food.

Now that I’m 41, I am acutely aware that if I can’t change this habit and soon, the outlook is pretty grim.

So, the strategy this time is to join the gym, and meet a Personal Trainer to discuss all of the above, my goals, aims and critically, my diet. Einstein said, "Education is that which remains, if one has forgotten everything he learned in school." So, if I imagine the school Albert was talking about was the college of eating well, I figure if I can meet a PT once a month, and focus on the first goal of losing this 20kg before November, then I might just accidentally create a new habit; eating and enjoying healthy, nutritious food all the time.

Speak soon,

DadbodADL

#weightloss #weightgain weight gain weight loss dadbod imgettingfat personal trainer

1 note · View note

hannahkpatel-blog · 7 years

Text

To Kill a Mockingbird Analysis

Part One

Pg 11: ‘Maycomb was an old town’ Because it’s an old town, they are stuck in their old ways

Pg 17: ‘Boo drove the scissors into his parent’s leg, pulled them out, wiped them on his pants and resumed activities’ An insight into the childrens imagination on how they think Boo is as a person.

Pg 17: ‘The sheriff hadn’t the heart to put him in jail alongside Negroes, so Boo was locked in the court-house basement’ Shows racial discrimination and how the society was when this story was set.

Pg 18: ‘We looked at her in surprise, for Calpurina rarely commented on the ways of white people’ Shows that white is considered the ‘right’ way in society.

Pg 18: ‘Looks like he’d just stick his head out the door’ Childrens perspective of Boo. He’s shy

Pg 19: ‘Boo was about six and a half feet tall, judging from his tracks; he dined on raw squirrels and any cats he could catch, that’s why his hands were blood-stained - if you ate an animal raw, you could never wash the blood off. There was a long jagged scar that ran across his face; what teeth he had were yellow and rotten; his eyes popped, and he drooled most of the time.’ Jems description of Boo. Although we have not actually seen what Boo looks like, the way the children see him is scary.

Pg 19: ‘Jem had never declined a dare’ Jem is a brave child. He doesn’t want to be seen as a ‘chicken’.

Pg 21: ‘The house was the same, droopy and sick’ Description of the Radley house. Even after Jem touches the house, there is no movement from it whatsoever.

Pg 22: ‘(When Alabama seceded from the Union of January 11 1861, Winston Country seceded from Alabama, every child in Maycomb Country knew it.) North Alabama was full of Liquor Interests, Big Mules, steel companies, Republicans, professors and other persons of no background.’ Background info on Alabama - Where the story is set.

Pg 23: ‘Now tell your father not to teach you anymore. It’s best to begin reading with a fresh mind. You tell him I’ll take over from here and try to undo the damage’ ‘Your father does not know how to teach. You can have a seat now’. Scout already knows how to read. This could be a feature in the book cover - having child like writing.

Pg 24: ‘Sure you do, You hafta know about cows, they’re a big part of life in Maycomb Country’ Insight into Maycomb life.

Pg 24: ‘She would set me a writing task scrawling the alphabet firmly across the top of a tablet, then copying out a chapter of the Bible beneath. If I reproduced her penmanship satisfactorily, she rewarded me with an open-faced sandwich of bread, butter and sugar’. More into Scouts handwriting and how it was used to keep her quite. She is advanced for her age.

Pg 33: ‘He’s one of the Ewells, ma’am,’ and I wondered if this explanation would be as unsuccessful as my attempt. ‘Whole school’s full of ‘em. They come first day every year and then leave. The truant lady gets ‘em here ‘cause she threatens ‘em with the sheriff, but she’s give up tryin’ to hold ‘em’ Explanation of the Ewell family. Ain’t nice people.

Pg 35: ‘His fingers wandered to his watch pocket; he said that was thge only way he could think’ Atticus’s pocket watch. It symbolises that it is important to him if it is the only way he can think. Also, in the film, Scout talks about how Jem will inherit that very pocket watch int he future.

Pg 35: ‘You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view - until you climb into his skin and walk around in it’. Important quote from Atticus. Also a link to further on in the story with Tom Robinsons trial.

Pg 36: ‘The Ewells had been the disgrace of Maycomb for three generations’ ‘They were people, but they lived like animals’ They give Maycomb a bad reputation. They are not pleasant people.

Pg 38: ‘Jem to spend the following Saturday aloft in the treehouse’ Treehouse represents childhood innocence. Also could play a part in the scene where they find gifts in the tree.

Pg 39: ‘Two live oaks at the edge of the Radley lot; their roots reached out into the side-road and made it bumpy. Something about one of the trees attracted my attention. Some tin foil was sticking in a knot-hole just above my eye level, winking at me in the afternoon sun. I stood on tip toe, hastily looked around for more, reached into the hole, and withdrew two pieces of chewing gum minus their outer wrappers.’ Scout first discovers gifts in the tree. At this point of the story, we don’t know who has left them.

Pg 40: ‘We ran home, and on the porch we looked at a small box patchworked with bits of tin foil collected from chewing gum wrappers. It was the kind of box wedding rings came in, purple velvet with a minute catch. Jem flicked open the tiny catch. Inside were two scrubbed and polished pennies, one on top of the other.’ ‘Indian heads’ ‘ Nineteen-six and Scout, one of ‘em’s ninteen hundred. These are real old.’ Description of the gifts left in the tree.

Pg 45: ‘Mrs Radley had been beautiful until she married Mr Radley and lost all her money. She also lost most of her teeth, her hair, and her right forefinger (Dill’s contribution, Boo bit it off one night when he couldn’t find any cats and squirrels to eat). Childrens take on the Radleys. Descritive works and easy to imagine.

Pg 59: ‘Then I saw a shadow. It was the shadow of a man with a hat on’ The figure of Boo when the children sneak to the Radley house.

Pg 64: ‘When I went back for my breeches - they were all tangled when I was gettin’ out of ‘em, I couldn’t get ‘em loose. When I went back -’Jem took a deep breath. ‘When I went back, they were folded across the fence... like they were expectin’ me.’Pg 64: ‘When I went back for my breeches - they were all tangled when I was gettin’ out of ‘em, I couldn’t get ‘em loose. When I went back -’Jem took a deep breath. ‘When I went back, they were folded across the fence... like they were expectin’ me.’ Friendly gesture from Boo. He is being generous to the children.

Pg 65: ‘I pulled out two small images carved in soap. One was the figure of a boy, the other wore a crude dress’ The gift that was left in the oak tree. They were carved ‘almost perfect miniatures of two children, The boy had shorts on, and a shock of soapy hair fell to his eyebrows’

Pg 67/68: ‘Dear sir, we appreciate everything which you have put into the tree for us. Yours very truly, Jem Finch and Jean Louise Finch (Scout)’ The childrens letter that they are leaving in the tree.

Pg 95: ‘Jem was football crazy. Atticus was never too tired to play keep-away, but when Jem wanted to tackle him Atticus would say: ‘I’m too old for that, son.’ Jem wants to play football with his dad, although his dad doesn’t want to take part. It’s not part of what Atticus’s interest.

Pg 95: ‘Besides that, he wore glasses. He was nearly blind in his left eye, and said left eyes were the tribal curse of the Finches. Whenever he wanted something well, he turned his head and looked from his right eye. He did not do the thing our schoolmates’ fathers did: he never went hunting, he did not play poker or fish or drink or smoke. he sat living-room and read.’ Atticus is a unique man. He does what makes him happy. He is older than the other dads and has a different lifestyle.

Pg 95: ‘I’d rather you shot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you’ll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird’. Atticus is telling Jem that a Mockingbird is important - reference to the title. ‘Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don’t eat up people’s gardens, don’t nest in corncribs, they don’t do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird’. They are innocent creatures. This could be a later reference to the case of Tom Robinson. He only did one thing, and that was to help others.

Pg 96: ‘Well, did you know he’s the best checker player in this town? Why, down the Landing when we were coming up, Atticus Finch could beat everybody on both sides of the river’. Atticus may not seem like every other father, but he does have this traits to be proud of.

Pg 97: ‘Everybody in town’s father was playing it (football), it seemed, except Atticus.’ Another reference to Atticus and his ways.

Pg 101: ‘I haven’t shot a gun in thirty years-’ Atticus. He has left his old ways, he is no longer interested in the outragoues lifestyle of violence.

Pg 102: ‘Atticus pushed his glasses to his forehead; they slipped down, and he dropped them in the street.’ Not much of an actual reference, but Atticus’s round glasses are an iconic feature of his.

Pg 105: ‘I did not remember our mother, but Jem did - he would tell me about her sometimes.’ Scout has no memory of her mother. She does not feel that her mother was part of her life. She was young when she passed away. Jem still has a memory of her. And it is important to him to keep that memory alive.

Pg 107: ‘Your father’s no better than the niggers and trash he works for!’ - Mrs Dubouse. Although Atticus is a well respected man, the town doesn’t agree witht he trial Atticus is working on. Racial difference is a big thing when this story is set.

Pg 108: ‘He did not begin to calm down until he had cut the tops pff every camellia bush Mrs Dubose owned, until the ground was littered with green buds and leaves. He bent my baton against his knee, snapped it in two and threw it down.’ Jem was angry and what Mrs Dubose called him. Camellia bush could be an iconic feature.

Pg 111: ‘Atticus, it’s all right on the sidewalk but inside it’s - it’s all dark and creepy. There’s shadows and things on the ceiling...’ Atticus smiled grimly. ‘That should appeal to your imagination. Just pretend you’re inside thr Radley house.’ Atticus and Jem are talking about the Dubose house. Atticus is telling Jem to think of the house as the Radley house. Could be to make him feel comfortable in the environment?

Pg 114: ‘You aren’t really a nigger-lover, then, are you?’ ‘I certainly am. I do my best to love everybody’ Although Atticus is having a hard time with everybody thinking that he is supporting a ‘nigger’, he tries to keep peace and not letting everyone ruin his reputation. Atticus is a strong character. He is sensible and will do what he pleases to make him happy.

Pg 117: ‘She has Jessie fix you this box-’ Atticus reached down and picked up the candy box. He handed it to Jem. Jem opened the box. Inside, surrounded by wads of damp cotton, was a white, waxy perfect camellia. It was a Snow-on-the-mountain.’ ‘I think that was her way of telling you - everything’s alright now’ - Atticus. The flower is used as a symbol. It symbolises that Mrs Dubose is at rest, and no longer needs help.

Pg 118: ‘He picked up the camellia, and when I went off to bed I saw him fingering the wide petals.’ Another reference to the Camellia.

0 notes