And of Clay We Are Created

After reading the short story "And of Clay We Are Created" by Isabelle Allende, I have various reactions to this piece. The first one was sadness because they built up this whole story around this girl and how everyone is trying to save her, but then she dies in the end. That kind of upset me, but at the same time I realize how this is a great way for Rolf Carle to reflect on himself and it brings meaning to his whole relationship with Azucena.

I also was intrigued by the growth of their relationship throughout the story, and how they shared such personal experiences. The story says, "This girl had touched a part of him that he himself had no access to, a part he had never shared with me." I thought of this as Allende trying to convey that Rolf had gotten more attached to Azucena herself by the end of their journey together, not just her story, which was pretty inspiring. 

Another great part of this short story was how Rolf Carle connected Azucena's life to tragedy that he had suffered earlier in his life. He was victim of the Holocaust, and I liked that connecting with Azucena brought these memories back to him and let him think about his past emotions that he tried to ignore in depth before. It let him empathize with her more and more and also brought him closer to himself and his feelings.

This short piece was written based on a true news story. I did some research and found this news story that interested me personally, and I would love to create a piece of writing based on it.  
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/10/15/florida-bullying-arrest-lakeland-suicide/2986079/

The Story of an Hour

I just finished reading "The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin. At the beginning, when it started off saying that a women's husband had died, I definitely thought that the rest would be about her grieving. Then, I found out that she was happy about his death, which was a huge surprise. This happiness gave me an interesting perspective on the story, because I personally would not want to escape a love-filled marriage like that, however I understand that times were different back then. Having a husband was like being put in jail, in the sense that you could do nothing for yourself and were being controlled by someone else. At the end, the story takes a turn by telling me that the husband was never actually dead! When he walks through the front door and the wife seems him and dies, I was so shocked.