Blog 5-Natalie

I finished pages 108-139 and i really enjoyed this section of the reading because i learned more about the childhood Tayo had had with his mother. The farther we get along in the story Tayos health seems to be improving. Tayo's childhood with his mother is really explaned in deatail in this passage. His childhood does not seem to be a pleasant one at all, Tayo was basically left to fend for himself while his mother go drunk. His childhood flashbacks take place in a town called Gallup. Gallup sounds like it is somewhat of a ghetto town due to the fact that people live under bridges, or in tin shacks, and they get drunk all the time. It sounds like the people there are very low class and are portrayed as low lives. Silko paints an image of the people of Gallup to be drunken all the time and "loose" with there sexuality.

As a kid Tayo constantly watched his mother come back drunk with strange men. "Late in the night he heard voices, men stumbling and falling down the steep crumbling bank into arroyo, and he could hear bottles rattle together and the sound of corks being pulled from the bottles" Pg. 113. For the short while when Tayo's mother was around she it seems she was there in presence but gone in spirit, she never really cared for him appropriately and she just went off and did her own thing while he was left alone. Tayo basically had to care for himself as a child, he found food in trash cans and sucked on bones. The way Tayo was raised effected him socially, he never learned the right people skills early in his life because his mother was always drunk and had no time to raise him. "he did not play with the other children; he ran from them when they approached" Pg. 111. In Tayo's flashbacks as a child with his mother we learn that he saw a lot of traumatic things, "the next day it was quite, and the woman carried a bundle of bloody rags away from the bridge, far away north, towards the hill" Pg. 111. if i was a child and i saw someone caring bloody rags from there house i think it would effect me in a negative way. I think the trauma from his earlier life, going to war, and seeing Rocky being killed all had an adverse effect on Tayo's mental state and i think all these reasons are why he went temporary insane.

Night Swan is no longer around in the story but a new character named Betonie is introduced. Betonie is a medicine man, and has an intresting outlook on life. I really agree with what he he thinks about change. Change is a natural part of life, and that everything is subject to change. i agree because without change everything would be boring in your life and you would not progress in you life because nothing would have change to do so. It will be interesting to see what role this character has later in the story.

Some quotes i find amusing are..."He leard to watch out for shit and in the winter, when it was frozen, he played with it- flipping it around with a willow stick. This quote makes me laugh because he played with frozen shit.

“The cheekbones were like the wings of a hawk soaring away from his broad nose” (pg 119). i think this is a very beautiful and creative way to explain someones face. this is also a great example of beautiful simile.

"He crawled deeper into the tramatic bushes and pulled his knees up to his belly. He looked at the stars, through the top branches of the willows. he waited for here, and she would come back (pg. 113). This quote really shows that even though his mother was rarely around she would always some back for him st least he hoped. i don't get how she can just leaves him alone to fend for himself.