A Bend in the Road
In Nicholas Sparks’s novel A Bend in the Road, the main character, Miles Ryan, allows himself to be tormented by the killing of his wife, Missy. By assuming that it was cold blooded murder, Miles spent two years on the case, trying to find the possible “killer” of the hit and run, only to find that it was indeed an accident and nobody was at fault. After finding that the death of his wife was indeed an accident, Miles realized that by living in the past for the last two years of his life he was not able to be the person that he really was.
At the beginning of the novel, the author states, ‘He (Miles) was tired of being alone, of waking up in an empty bed, though the feeling surprised him. He hadn’t felt that way until recently. In the first year after Missy’s death, He couldn’t even begin to imagine loving another woman… Even after he weathered shock and grief strong enough to make him cry every night, his life felt wrong somehow.’ The first impression that I got after reading this quote was that he was beginning to feel the need to move on. But as I read on I realized that he is so worked up about the case even two years later that he was not able to move on. As if there was something inside stopping himself. I can feel the great amount of hurt and sorrow that he is producing, a couple of weeks after her death Miles took up smoking, though he denies it. He says he is ready to move on, but his heart is not.
At one point in the story, Miles was at a bar and overheard a drunk talking about a guy named Otis and how he ran over Miles wife, and because Miles and Otis are not on each others good side, Miles rushes in and arrests Otis on the spot, pointing his gun at his head, ready to shoot when Otis gave any sign of struggle. Taking Otis in, Miles thought, ‘I don’t care. Otis is going to jail, no matter what happens to me. Otis will rot away in prison like he made me rot for two years.’ Miles has so much anger and depression from the death of his wife that if he hears anything about the person who killed Missy, even if it is from a drunk guy, that he will just rush in and take the guy down.
The climax of the story is when Miles is shot by the Bonewoman. The reader comes to realize that Miles’ choice to live life on the safe side was a mistake:
“I didn’t see—anybody. There wasn’t nothing, but a bunch of steers—and the barbed wire fence.” (94) His desperation and loneliness overpowering all, Adams takes up his initial idea of running down the hitchhiker, but his momentary traveling companion does not see the victim, claiming he was never there. Now in Albuquerque, New Mexico, the hitchhiker doesn’t wait for Adams to make a stop before appearing; his form and face flit by every other mile. (96) Learning of his mother’s prostration and the death of Ronald Adams, the protagonist leaves the audience with his last thought: Somewhere among them, he is waiting for me. Somewhere I shall know who he is, and who . . . I . . . am . . .” (97) Alone, without the willpower to fight for survival, the main character fades into a mist of doubt and helplessness.
This is the story of Becky, an 11 year old, African American, female client who has been placed in Therapeutic Foster Care. Becky describes her traumatic experience of losing her parents in a bad, bad storm. Becky’s verbal account of how her parents died is a wild fantasized story and inaccurate. She uses the word ‘bitch’ regularly, has frequent night terrors, acts out aggressively toward foster siblings, lies, is experiencing night terrors, and is excessively attached to her foster father and case worker named Emily. Becky has explained that sometimes she freezes which is an emotional and physiological response to the trauma she has experienced.
To live with uncertainty is not an easy task, always questioning and never gaining any form of understanding. Constantly running in a continuous loop of unsettling confusion, hoping to one-day catch up to the realization. The fact of the matter is life is quite erratic in the sense that one can never truly say they know what will come of tomorrow or the next day. But who does one blame for this confusion? Taken from Raymond Carver’s What We Talk About When We Talk About Love collection, Bath, depicts an ironic scene of an eight-year-old birthday boy, getting hit by a car and falls into a coma leaving his family in a desperate plea for normalcy. Carver’s neutralizing writing style tranquilizes the intensity of this tragedy,
The behavioral models of the traffic as a system has been developed and studied for several decades and the core behavioral models, Gipps’ car-following/acceleration model and lane-changing model are more or less enough to predict behavioral outcomes of vehicles in homogeneous traffic conditions with lane discipline. In mixed traffic conditions with weak/no lane discipline however, the behavior of a vehicle cannot be defined separately using the car-following and lane-changing models. The behavior of a vehicle under such conditions is very dynamic – depending on the behavior of other vehicles in its vicinity. Also, there exists a continuous interaction among the vehicles and therefore, every vehicle is influenced by its surrounding vehicles.
Jake considers himself free because he has no job holding him down, he knows in order to have a “steady occupation” (248) he would be giving up his freedom. Jake thinks about a steady job once “A steady occupation had its advantages, and he couldn’t deny thinking about that too.” (248). Gilbs lets the reader know that Jake is well aware the results of having a job would give him the necessities to make his life easier as well as help achieve his goals. But instead, Jake went back to thinking about the interior of his dream car, which caused the car accident. Immediately after the accident, Jake begins to think of quick lies and begins womanizing the woman he hit. Jake begins to flirts with the women by saying “So maybe we should go to coffee somewhere and talk it over” (249). And although she rejects the invitation the reader starts to realize Jakes motive. Jake was also trying to impress the women by telling her “‘I act too’, he lied to enhance the effect more. ‘Been in a couple of movies’,” (250) Ironically in this situation he had to stop thinking about his fantasy life and had to think of lies to make everything believable. What becomes revealed is that Jakes has it worse than originally thought “She was writing down the license plate number on his Buick, ones that he’d taken off a junk because the ones that belonged to him had expired so long ago” (250). Because Jakes license plate
Farmer markets have always been around and a strong reason to believe that they will still be around long after our time. There are several reasons why this age old tradition still exitst today and revolves around a very common question, “What does a buyer find important when they are about to buy food to be consumed, or how the produce is grown/manufactured, processed, marketed, and distributed. Supporting farmer markets and ensuring fair trade among the dealer and the seller can help promote healthier lives while building stronger communities. There are several reasons to support a community’s farmer market event because buying true locally grown food can allows the buyer to have options to food that is picked fresh and tastes better than what is sold in the supermarkets. Another benefit to farmers markets is that the food is sustainable, flavorful, supports local farms, and also in some areas, part of the proceeds goes to the unfortunate within that community. With the addition of the food generally being more flavorful, locally grown food is adapted to the climate in which it was grown, and can remain fresh longer than that of an imported produce grown in a different climate. Final...
Today, CKLW is a news and information station for the Windsor-Essex community. Now in Windsor, Detroit radio dominates once again. Now, 68% of Windsorites listen to Detroit radio stations. The Big 8 still had a tremendous influence in shaping the face of radio, in creating megahits in music industry, and held a huge community presence in its hometown of Windsor, Ontario. CKLW was a small town radio station that became one of the biggest radio sensations of the 1960’s and1970’s. The Big 8 developed into an icon for not only music and radio; but, also brought out the music fanatic in everyone.
...t would be released on a weekly basis. These Top 30 chart surveys listed the top thirty songs of the week and could be found in any record store or department store such as Sentry or K-Mart. Trombley and her staff researched record sales from local stores, and the request lines to see what the kids wanted to listen too. For the music industry, the Big 8’s Top 30 charts were their Bible. These free charts were “eagerly snapped up by groovy teens.” Decorated in bright colors, these charts allowed local children to follow their favorite song on the Top 30 list. In March 1970, “Let it Be” by the Beatles was number one on the charts, fell to number 2 four weeks later, and by May 11th, was completely off the charts. Today, these charts are “pop music memorabilia” and crazy stories have been heard that these Top 30 charts were used as wallpaper in teen’s bedrooms.
committing murder. The author stated that “The chilling truth is that his could have been mine.
The victim is nineteen year old Khadijah Stewart. Stewart had grown up in the south side of Richmond, Virginia (a high crime area) where she met a boy named Tommie. Both were in middle school but Tommie soon got arrested for robberies and gun charges, he was sentenced to life as a juvenile. As time goes on Stewart forms a history of dating bad boys. The main on and off again boyfriend throughout her high school years was a young man named Lionel. In High school Stewart is skipping school to hang out Lionel and his gang members. Afraid how the streets could impact Stewart, the mother moves the family to Chesterfield County, a successful middle class suburbs, to create new life. As her life is changing for the better her heart longs to maintain
Though the United States is home to many immigrants, controversy surrounds the issue of immigrants in the United States. The United States in a melting pot of various backgrounds and cultures, yet it is hard for all to merge into acceptance of one another. The first chapter of Race, Ethnicity, Gender, and class covers stratification, prejudice and discrimination, and inequality.
“Car Crash While Hitchhiking” and “Work” both follow the stream of consciousness of the narrator, which shows the influence of drug on people’s mentality. Both stories are confusing with the narrator moving around the time and place; it seems as if the narrator is talking about whatever comes into his mind without specific plot or message. In “Car Crash While Hitchhiking,” the narrator talks about the family that picked him up, and suddenly switches to the story of him and salesman by saying “…But before any of this, that afternoon, the salesman and I …” (4) In “Work,” narrator says “And then came one of those moments,” (52) when he recalls a memory about his wife while talking about Wayne. Both stories shift abruptly without proper conjunction. In everyday lives, people think of numerous things. However, what they say are limited, as they talk consistently with a specific purpose, considering factors such as time, place, and appropriateness before they speak. On the other ha...
Spencer’s father had been sent to jail for drinking and driving, however, in truth it had been Spencer driving drunk. Her father took the blame for her. She hasn’t visited her father in years. In order to forget what she had done, she forgot about her father and built her reputation and business from the ground up. If anyone found out, her life would be
Evan knew that his father would never let him disappear for the summer. He had to know his son’s whereabouts at all times. His father would enlist his mother to find him; his mother would protest, briefly, that Evan is old enough now to be on his own. But she, too, would want to know what hd become of him. And his father would point out that Evan was at a vulnerable age—old enough to get into serious trouble, and then have no idea how to deal with it. His mother would look doubtful for a few minutes aftre that. She would be waffling, and then his father would run down the list of examples of celebrity kids run amok. The Drew Pendergast story would be brought up, Chappaquiddick, the Whittlingtons. The Hilton sisters would clinch his argument, so much so that he woldn’t even have to say anything beyond their names. They both agree about the Hilton sisters.