With this session being the last as we finally reach the ending of Ordinary girls I find myself having mixed feelings about the book. I found reading through her past experiences enjoyable however the time skips and flashbacks do get pretty confusing and hard to keep track of with Jaquira referring to the future or the past multiple times during one point. Another gripe i have with Ordinary girls was many things were left in the air and were not concluded on such as her relationship with her brother or the sexual assault she dives into at the end of the book or even regarding her mother and their relationship. However Ordinary Girls still help me captivated and interested as i wanted to know more about her experiences and how she dealt with them.
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Jaquira’s adolescent
Throughout the pages of 142 between 247 we see more and more of Jaquira’s life growing up while she really goes where she pleases between her psychotic mother and her father who seems to not care. Throughout the reading Jaquira skips school, drinks, and fights. This is all due to the fact that Jaquira feels as though the adults in her life simply do not care about her. Seen in page 194 “Until the effect wore off and we were ourselves again—reckless, and unafraid, and pissed off at our parents for not caring that we spent most of our time on the streets or drunk or high, for being deadbeats and scutterheads.” Jaquira wishes for her father’s attention, for him to be proud of her, and wants her mother back to the way she was before her diagnosis. Reading these pages makes me feel sympathy for Jaquira for feeling as though her only chance to be free or escape was through fights and drugs. However while feeling this way I also feel she had many chances to change her ways, this is something Jaquira tells the reader as well. The countless amount of times she told her father she would change but never did. People like her grandmother, Mrs. Gold, or Paula all were there available for Jaquira to reach out to. However seeing things from Jaquira’s point of view she may have ashamed or disgraceful when it comes to talking about her experiences so far. As I read further along Ordinary Girls im hoping to see Jaquira’s path to change.
Jaquira and her relationship with her parents
For session 2 of the blog post we are told to read from pages 63 to 142, in these pages we see Jaquira’s life take a hard turn. We see her father and mother’s relationship turn even more bitter as her mother’s schizophrenia starts to effect the whole family. Her mother and father are always fighting, now to the point where her mother is physically. The reader can see Jaquira become terrified for her and her sister’s own safety especially as Jaquira learns more about the baby lolipop case. Where a deceased 3 year old baby boy was found hidden in a bush. More information about this case comes out and Jaquira learns from the news that the own baby’s mother murdered him(p128). She becomes fearful of her mother especially as we see her mother talk to herself and even get more physically abusive. However when she turns to hee father for help, the one Jaquira looks up to and puts on a pedestal, he simplies turns a blind eye. Heartbroken, Jaquira realizes that her own father will not fighting for her or her sister for custody and she has to eventually go back to fearing for her and her sister’s own safety.
New ordinary girls
a big part of life is about new beginnings, and the memoir of Diaz’s book is no exception. in this section we get a glimpse of how Diaz adjusts to her new life in Luquillo and how that it’s not only affecting her but her family as well. speaking of family we also get a deeper dive into how her family works, their dynamic. How it changed after certain events like before the parents’ divorce or after Alaina was born. To people who experience sudden changes to their families status quo at any point in their life Diaz writes this section as a way of telling those readers that they are not alone in this aspect. That the unordinary is technically ordinary in a way. She talks about her experience using words and phrases like “except in my versions the hero was always an eight-or nine-year-old curly-haired Puerto Rican girl traveling through time,” (Diaz,69). in the second paragraph of page 69 Diaz explains how she imagines herself or her own characters in her favorite books and movies as a way to cope with her life in that moment, except she goes way above beyond script even in her imagination simply because she can. Its an abnormal way of going about it but at the same time being abnormal about it is what makes it normal. Especially for those who use this same way of over imagination when coping with time.
Mental Illnesses in Hispanic Families (Ordinary Girls)
These comments are based on pages 63-142 of Ordinary Girls.
During these passages, Diaz shared parts of her childhood including her complicated family life, difficulty with dealing with her mother’s mental illness, her time in jail, suicide attempt, her sexuality and sexual assault.
All of these are very tough subjects, and this book is packed with emotions. In fact, I had to stop reading a couple of times to take a breath and empathize with her. What I admire is that she does not write in a way that makes us pity her, but understand her struggles.
“Maybe the thought that my mother had done this to herself was less frightening than the idea that madness was something that could just happen to you, as it had to my mother, as it had to Mercy before her, as it had to Mercy’s father” (pg. 63 )
From this quote (and other passages), it seems like there is no true understanding of Mental Illnesses in her family, in fact she often referred to her mother’s sickness as being “crazy” and “madness”. One thing I have noticed from hispanic families is that we fail to get educated on the matter, which leads to false stereotypes.
My question to you is, how much do you think your parents/grandparents/aunts/uncles know about mental illnesses? Is there a stigma for those who do try and seek help?
