Raymond's Run Essay

I think that one of the themes in Raymond’s Run by Toni Cade Barbara is putting family first. I think this because squeaky defends Raymond, she throws hard work away for Raymond, and she teaches Raymond.
“Or sometimes if you don’t watch him he’ll dash across traffic
to the island in the middle of Broadway and give the pigeons a fit. Then I have to go behind him apologizing to all the old people sitting around trying to get some sun and getting all upset with the pigeons fluttering around them, scattering their newspapers and upsetting the wax paper lunches in their laps.” ‘“What grade you in now, Raymond?” “You got anything to say to my brother, you say it to me, Mary Louise Williams of Raggedy Town, Baltimore.” “What are you, his mother?” sasses Rosie. “That’s right, Fatso. And the next word out of anybody and I’ll be their mother too.”’ These two quotes show how Squeaky covers for Raymond when he can’t, or doesn’t realize what he did. In the first quote, she is apologizing to elderly people for Raymond disturbing the pigeons. In the

second quote, Squeaky is defending her brother from Gretchen and her friends.
“And on the other side of the fence is Raymond with his arms
down to his side and the palms tucked up behind him, running in his very own style, and it’s the first time I ever saw that and I almost stop to watch my brother Raymond on his first run.” “Or sometimes if you don’t watch him he’ll dash across traffic to the island in the middle of Broadway and give the pigeons a fit.

Then I have to go behind him apologizing to all the old people sitting around trying to get some sun and getting all upset with the pigeons fluttering around them, scattering their newspapers and upsetting the wax paper lunches in their laps.” The first quote shows how she almost stopped for Raymond, as it says “I almost stop to watch my brother Raymond on his first run”. This shows her throwing all of her practise away for a once a year thing, just for Raymond. Then, this quote shows how she throws away any work that she put into her reputation away, as the elderly would now associate her with the “stagecoach

driver”.
“And I look over at Gretchen wondering what the “P” stands for.
And I smile. Cause she’s good, no doubt about it. Maybe she’d like to help me coach Raymond.” “Doesn’t he always keep up with me on my trots? And he surely knows how to breathe in counts of seven cause he’s always doing it at the dinner table, which drives my brother George up the wall.” Ok. So what? The first quote says “she’d”. They haven’t taught Raymond yet. They plan on it. But even though they haven’t taught Raymond, he learned. The second quote says that he has trained with her and knows her techniques. As I have already said, she will teach him. Will is future-tense. That also means that she and Gretchen will be putting in a lot of time and effort to do that.
Family first. If Squeaky didn’t do this she wouldn’t be anything like she is in the story. She probably wouldn’t have been so humble either. Values are an important part of everybody, and they affect how people see you and how you see people.