Quotes From The Bridge Dialectical Journal

1. Albom says that “all endings are also beginnings,” and I think he means that when one door closes another door opens. When a part of your life ends, a new chapter is starting. This quote relates to the story because Eddie’s ending was his death which led to his beginning of heaven. His death was also his beginning of the next chapter in his life. I can relate to this quote because when I ended middle school, I had then entered into high school. I was able to get my drivers license and become more independent.

2. The Five People You Meet in Heaven initially grabbed my attention when it talked about how the last hour of Eddie’s life was spent at Ruby Pier. The book held my attention by counting down the minutes of Eddie’s life.

3. Counting

down the final minutes of Eddie’s life made me anxious and worried. I didn’t know what would happen to Eddie at the end of the hour. I think Albom does this to create suspense and make the reader want to keep reading. Albom’s technique of moving through the past and present help the reader to understand Eddie’s relationships with his family and friends. I also saw Eddie’s personality change from each birthday to the next. When Eddie was a child, Eddie loved celebrating his birthday. However, at Eddie’s 51st birthday, he was sad and refused to celebrate his birthday without his wife Marguerite. The reader learns how Eddie became very sad. I think Albom’s style is very effective because he gives us a view of Eddie’s life in the past and present.
4.

“At the time of his death, Eddie was a squat, white-haired old man, with a short neck, a barrel chest, thick forearms, and a faded army tattoo on the right shoulder” (Albom 2). His knee was wounded in the war and had arthritis. He was a workingman. Eddie’s job was maintaining the rides at Ruby Pier, an amusement park by the ocean. “The park had the usual attractions, a boardwalk, a Ferris wheel, roller coasters, bumper cars, a taffy stand, and an arcade where you could shoot streams of water into a clown’s mouth” (Albom 1). Ruby Pier also had a ride called Freddy’s Free Fall. The kids that went to Ruby Pier loved Eddie. The amusement park created a good backdrop for the story because amusement parks are where people go to have fun. Everyday Eddie takes care of people wanting to keep them safe and happy, but Eddie isn’t

happy.
5. This statement means that the actions people take in their lives affect others. Nobodies life story sits by itself because it was affected by somebody else. For example, the Blue Man died of a heart attack because he shaken after he almost hit Eddie.
6. Before the amusement park ride accident, Eddie was yelling at Dominguez saying do not release the cart. Eddie kept yelling at him, and this built tension in the story because Dominguez did release the cart. The reader didn’t know what was going to happen when the cart was released. After Eddie died, he was back at the amusement park. Eddie felt like he was never going to leave the amusement park. He was at Ruby Pier again to meet the first person in heaven. Eddie’s body felt childlike because he met this first person as a child. I felt bad for Eddie that he was back at Ruby Pier because he was so miserable. I think it is important Eddie is back at Ruby Pier because maybe God is trying to teach him a lesson. You can not escape the past.
7. Albom’s depiction of heaven is that you will meet five people whose lives were involved in yours for a reason. Each person will help you to understand what happened in your life. God gives you this gift of peace. After you meet these five people, you choose a place to live at that made you happy. You wait until someone whose life was intertwined in yours to come and meet you, so you can teach them a lesson. Albom’s depiction of heaven is very different than what I imagined. I always thought heaven would have a big golden gate and full of singing. Eddie meets the Blue Man, Captain, Ruby, Marguerite, and Tala. They each taught Eddie a lesson and had been involved in his life someway. Eddie knew the Blue Man when he was a child because Eddie’s father worked at Ruby Pier. The Blue Man participated in the show at the pier called The Curious Citizens. The Captain was Eddie’s leader during the war in the Philippines. Marguerite was Eddie’s wife, and Tala was a little girl who Eddie saw run into the barn and tried to save during the fire. Each person has a loving characteristic and try to explain to Eddie the low and high points in his life. For example, the Captain is straight forward and tells Eddie that he shot Eddie’s leg to save his life.
8. Eddie and his friends were playing baseball with Eddie’s new baseball he had gotten for his birthday. The ball went over Eddie’s head, and Eddie ran into the street to get it. The Blue Man was driving a Ford Model A and almost hit Eddie. The Blue Man was so shaken. He felt dizzy and almost collided with another car. “He skids along an avenue then turns down an alley. His vehicle rolls until it collides with the rear of a parked truck” (Albom 43). The Blue Man hits his head on the steering wheel, and it bleeds. The blood stopped flowing to his heart. An hour later a policeman finds him, and a medical examiner says the cause of death is a heart attack. When you look at the story from two different view points, Eddie was a careless child who didn’t know his actions affected the Blue Man’s life. I was driving home one day, and a lady almost hit me trying to get over in front of me. This event shook me up. The ladies view point of what happened is different from mine because she was acting careless. I don’t think people are aware of how experiences affect everyone differently. We are all concerned with how we feel first.
9.

Albom thinks that young men go to war sometimes because they have to and sometimes because they want to. War could bond the men together or break them apart. Eddie learned in the war how to pray quickly, whistle through his teeth, and smoke. “He learned in which pocket to keep the letters to his family and Marguerite, in case he should be found dead by his fellow soldiers” (Albom 63). Eddie came home a different man because he was taken prisoner in the war. He watched his friend Rabozzo be killed. Eddie had a limp in leg after being shot, and he was sad that he would never be able to dance or run. He felt like his life was over. The Captain shot Eddie in the leg to save his life. The Captain is trying to say that Eddie’s life is more important than his leg. Eddie learns from the Captain why sacrifice is not really a loss, but a gain. Sacrifice is a gain because you make sacrifices for the greater good of others. Eddie sees that the Captain sacrificed so much to save the soldiers lives.

10. I agree that you do have peace when you make it with yourself. If you are angry with others and refuse to forgive, then you will be unhappy in your life. When the old woman says, “things that happen before you are born still affect you. And people who come before your time affect you as well,” she is saying this to Eddie to explain to him why his father died. My great grandmother came before me and affected my life. She told my parents that as a baby my first outing should

be going to the church. My parents did exactly what she told them.
11. Eddie’s father was angry each time Eddie decided to make an independent move away from working at the pier. His father would say, “What? This job ain’t good enough for you?” Eddie felt trapped after his father died and was angry with his dad for leaving him this life working at the pier. Eddie covered for his father at the pier when his father became ill to protect his job. “The owners acknowledged his efforts, then paid him half of what his father earned. He gave the money to his mother, who went to the hospital every day and slept there most nights” (Albom125). Eddie continued to work at the pier even after his father had died. My parents made a decision that has affected my life for the better. They decided to raise me as a Catholic, and this has affected my life in a positive way. I go to church with my family on Sundays, and I made my Confirmation.
12. Ruby told Eddie that “we think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harm we do we do to ourselves.” Ruby’s husband, Emile, was in the same hospital room as Eddie’s father. After Eddie’s father died, Ruby asked about Eddie’s family. She felt awful when she learned that Eddie’s father had worked at Ruby Pier. Ruby wishes the pier had never been built because all it did was hurt people. It is important Eddie understands what Ruby is saying because Eddie must forgive his father to move on. This lesson is important for us all to understand because if we don’t forgive then we will not have peace within ourselves.
13. Marguerite wanted to be in a place where there are only weddings because weddings never change. She says, “Oh, Eddie, it never changes, when the groom lifts the veil, when the bride accepts the ring, the possibilities you see in their eyes, it’s the same around the world. They truly believe their love and their marriage is going to break all the records” (Albom 157). Eddie and Marguerites’ love conquered the wounds of loosing the chance to adopt. Eddie loved Marguerite dearly and was devastated when she had been diagnosed with a tumor on her brain.
14. Eddie was angry at his wife for dying so young because he felt she had left him too soon. Marguerite tells Eddie how love never dies, and love takes the form of memories. She says this to Eddie to let him know love is eternal. I think Eddie understood what Marguerite was saying. She told Eddie that she felt his love even in heaven. I agree with Marguerite because your love for someone never ends. Even though my great grandmother passed away, I never stopped loving her.
15. Eddie realizes the children in the river were making sounds he would hear in his nightmares. “The sound, this screaming, whistling, thrumming screak, was merely the cacophony of children’s voices, thousands of them at play, splashing in the river and shrieking with innocent laughter” (Albom 181). The children were washing each other in the river. Eddie looks over at a bolder and sees Tala sitting on it. Tala told Eddie “you make good for me.” She was saying that Eddie keeps the children safe at Ruby Pier. He makes the park good for them. I don’t think Eddie’s life is a penance because he tried to save Tala. It wasn’t like he didn’t try to save her. I think Eddie blamed himself for events he couldn’t control. Tala pulling Eddie to safety after he dies signifies how Eddie tried to rescue Tala from the fire. It’s ironic Tala, a child, pulls Eddie to heaven and saves him because Eddie spent his whole life trying to keep the kids at Ruby Pier safe.
16. I would tell Eddie that he has accomplished a lot in his life. His job as the maintenance man was important because he made sure everyone was safe. He saved lives every day from disaster by fixing the rides when something was wrong. Eddie saved the people riding Freddy’s Free Fall, and saved the little girl, Amy or Annie, from being crushed by the cart. Eddie also helped devise a plan to escape the enemy camp with his fellow soldiers. He saved the soldiers.
17. The five lessons Eddie learns are everyone’s lives are connected to one another, life consists of sacrifices, to forgive, love is eternal, and his purpose working at the pier was to keep the children safe. The five people I would meet in heaven would be my great grandmother, both of my great grandfathers, my uncle, and my aunt. I think some lessons I would learn is to forgive others, forgive myself, live everyday happy, not to worry, and look forward to the future. I think The Five People You Meet in Heaven has provided me with a different perspective of life. I learned to not hold grudges like Eddie did and to forgive others. I also learned you are happier when you have peace within yourself.