The Mask

What strikes me at first is the fact that not only did her cancer cause changes in her life, it also put her life on hold. Friends that she had grown up with were curious but distant. She missed a great deal of what most kids learn in the social climate at school. Entering sixth grade is not and ideal time to begin to learn these valuable life lessons. “Most of sixth-grade consisted were children I’d grown up with. They were, for the most part, genuinely curious about that had happened to me. They treated me respectfully, if somewhat distantly.” What I found typical, however, was that even the kids who seem to have everything together are just as unsure of themselves as she was, but for a long time she did not understand this, most kids don’t. Everyone wants to be someone else or have the things that others have, not just her, and I think towards the end of her essay she came to realize this, and it somehow changed her outlook on life.

“My sister and her friends never had to worry about heir appearance, or so it seemed to me, so why didn’t they always feel as bold and as happy as I felt that night?” pg (43) Here we see her confusion about how others view themselves. Since her sisters did not have her deformity, they shouldn't have any problems, right. “For weeks I pictured the ruined estate where Zhivago wrote his sonnets, aware that the true splendor of the house was inextricably bound to the fact that is was ruined.” pg (44) Here the author is discovering that people, like things, can be both beautiful and ugly for the very same reasons. Although her deformity kept her from a normal life, it also caused her to see things differently, more profoundly.

“I viewed other people both critically and sympathetically. Why couldn’t they just stop complaining so much, just let go and see how good they actually had it?” pg (47) Here she is beginning to understand that each of us has a mask that we hide behind, something about our life, or ourselves, that we would like to change. Although she complains about it, she understands it perfectly.

Works Sited:
Latterell, Catherine. Remix, Reading and Composing Culture. Bedford/Saint Martin’s, Boston/New York, 2006