Isabelle's Inquisitions

"You’re a mother, Ma. You’re also a monster. But so am I — which is why I can’t turn away from you." These are the words Ocean Vuong addresses his mother with in his part-memoir/novel, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous . Vuong says this because over the course of his childhood, violence and care are the languages that his mother is most comfortable in speaking to him with. In the "...More Than It’s Gonna Hurt You: Concerning Violence" chapter from How to Read Literature like a Professor , Thomas C. Foster writes about how violence often implicates something so much greater than just the damage it causes; in Vuong's case, violence originates from a place of generational trauma, PTSD, and righteous intentions to guard him from socially unacceptable behaviors his mother doesn't want him to engage in if he wishes to assimilate into the United States. Noticeably, love is not one of the languages listed above that his mother employs. That is because, as accordin...

  I have always been a hopeless romantic. More tragically, I've never been in love. Of course, I want to fall in love, but it's difficult to do so if you're not Rory Gilmore or any other main character in a rom-com or coming-of-age TV show. I never lose sight of the possibility that one day, I, too, can be in love — to see myself so clearly reflected in another that life gleans a higher meaning. In spite of this, I have never been one to obsess over marriage. I love the idea of love, but I balk at the idea of "forever." Even the term "soulmate" scares me a little. Maybe being so young explains some of this, but I feel like I'm also just really drawn to the feeling of being swept off my toes and none of the other great complexities a relationship brings. The article this post was based on, "Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person," mentioned that spouses often aren't fit for each other because they don't get to know each other well enoug...

In the short story we read this week, "Saving Sourdi," we explored differences in worldview between the protagonist and her older sister, and how this made their paths diverge. It made me think of something that's been on my mind a lot lately: how similar my two younger siblings and I am, yet how far apart we also are. I think as is the case for people who grow up in the same environment during the extremely impressionable early years of one's life and share the same genetic makeup, my siblings and I are fundamentally bound to one another because of the same lessons and teachings we grew up on. However, I have come to realize more and more how different we are. Sometimes I cannot understand my sister — only six years younger than me — for what she does, how she reacts to scenarios I would adamantly hold my ground in, for what she values. How could this be possible? In a way, we grew up on the same life, only significantly displaced by better-informed parenting and dif...