Ms. Quinson\'s Period 5 Blog 2008-09

The chapter that comes before this is “Mango Says Goodbye Sometimes”. This chapter is called “The Plan”.
As you may know I have decided to get away from Mango Street. This place that I myself do not belong to. I will come back for the others but I need to figure out a way to get out and be free of the influence of this place. I do not want to be like those few who wait around to have someone set them free. I have to do this on my own. I tell Nenny what I am planning to do but she doesn’t believe me. Too ignorant to see that we do not belong in this place. I cannot tell Mama or Papa about this plan to get away for they may not want me to go but when the time comes I will leave and they will not be able to stop. I will study hard and stay in school, unlike Mama, and I will learn how it is to have a life to my own where no one decides how to run it but me. My husband, if I get a husband will look at me as his equal and I will refuse to be one of those women who are always looking out the window. I will take others advice occasionally but in the long run they aren’t going to provide the action needed to be taken. Afterall one can lead a horse to water but they cannot make it drink. As I have said before I like to write stories and poems. I will write about my experiences on Mango Street and publish a book on. This book will serve as a guide to those who have lost hope in the effort to escape the hardships that they have faced. After all, throughout my time on Mango Street, though short, I have come to see that the only way to make your dreams come true is to follow them alone and never let anyone interfere with your quest. I have to be better than what I am now. I have told myself over and over that all I wanted was a friend. I still do want a friend but now it seems that all I have is my family and even they are not enough to support me. I can only trust those that want the same thing I want because they know what it is like to have nothing. To be alone in a world where the people like me are the underdogs who cannot come out on top. I am going to prove those who say that wrong. When they see me walk in the streets they will admire what I have been through and what I will become. This is my plan to become what I want to be. I will be the one who revolutionizes the way people look at the American dream. Now I know what my name will truly mean. It will not be remembered as too many letters but a name that provides hope to all.

Ten years ago, I once lived in that house on Mango Street. The most shameful house to live in, I lived there. First it was Loomis on the third floor, and before that we lived on Keeler. Before Keeler it was Paulina, and before that I can’t remember. After Mango Street I went away.

 I left with books and paper; everyone wondered why Esperanza left win tons of books and paper. I went off to a girl’s school far away, and nobody ever knew what happened to me. She died, someone said. Or she was stolen by pirates to go work on their ship, said one little boy. But no, I went off to school. This school had dorms, and every dorm was different. Nobody could make fun of an ugly dorm, because they were all the same.

Mama, Papa, Carlos, Kiki, and Nenny moved out of our ugly house on Mango Street, and they moved to a house on the other side of town. The house wasn’t any bigger, it wasn’t any cleaner, and it wasn’t any dreamier. It just didn’t have a bad reputation of being the ugly house on Mango Street. I don’t like this house, it’s nothing special, and it has no personality.

I returned to the house on Mango Street, the house that taught me so much. This house taught me how to work hard, hard enough to get the house of my dreams. The house listened to my stories, and read my poems. This house knows what I’ve been through. This house is where I live.

The day of my arrival, neighbors were asking me where I was moving. I answered them by pointing to my house, and saying that I live there, I live in that house. I’ll never forget how their faces were trying to hide their disgust. I laughed to myself, because that was my reaction to when I first saw this house.

And now I finally live in my dream house, the house that I’ve always wanted, the house that taught me so much, the house on Mango Street.

INTRO: This vignette was made to follow the very last one in The House On Mango Street [Mango Says Goodbye Sometimes].

 It was early in the morning that day. A Thursday… Or was it Wednesday? I don’t know why I looked out the window to see the stars beginning to fade as the godly rays from the sun overpowered them, making their luminosity inferior. I don’t know why I grabbed my rucksack that I filled with paper and pens and leftover arepa from my birthday yesterday and all the money I had.. Why did I do this? I do not know. But I did know that I had to leave. I slid out of the window that Sire accidentally broke when he threw rocks at the house to get my attention the week before. When I ran to find glass and a rock in the shape of a heart on the ground, all I heard was Be mine! And the sound of feet shuffling off of what we have to call a front yard. Mango Street was always filled with this madness. I just never noticed it. When my dangerous task of getting from my window to the ground was solved, I began the long walk. Birds began to chirp as I passed by Sire’s abandoned bicycle, soaked from last night’s thunderstorm. All of a sudden, a large truck that read Fajardo’s Frijoles – On the Go sped pass, soaking my most simple, but best attire, which consisted of a pink skirt and a white short-sleeved button-up shirt. I kept walking. When I got to the corner, I saw Rachel and Lucy’s house. I have only been there twice before. Once for the funeral of their baby sister and another for the vervena two months ago. It was the first time that I had ever felt my eyes be stroked with the black paint that I remember Sally used in school. It tickled. Don’t blink so much! Shouted Rachel as she dipped the tiny paintbrush and aimed for my eyelid. When she was done, Papa told me that I looked like Cleopatra. I thought of Sally. I made a right turn and was on Papaya Avenue, where the buses were parked. The first one that was leaving Mango Street was departing. vervenaI handed the bus driver ten cents and she nodded when I got onto the bus. There was a baby and its mother, a man, two homeless people, and a wealthy woman. I sat in the back of the bus. I opened my bag, took out paper and a pen and started writing about my experience in Mango Street.

Samantha Who Is Like Me

(between Four Skinny Trees and No Speak English)

            Samantha lives far far down on Mango Street, all the way on the other side. But she is old, old like Alicia, and maybe even older. She is done with school, but she doesn’t have a husband, and lives all alone. A house all of her own.

 But her house is beautiful. It stands tall and proud against the sky, its yellow glow grinning happily down at all the sad houses. But it does not make them ashamed, I can tell. Its glow makes them more beautiful, and brings joy to the houses on Mango Street, this house all of her own.

Samantha lived in Mango since before I came here. She is hard working and I don’t get to see her much. Nenny and me once went into her house when Lucy and Rachel were home sick on Saturday, and we had no one to play with. The yellow house had pulled me to it with its glow. Samantha was waiting outside on her steps.

Hello, she says, cheerfully like her house.

Hello, I say back, is this your house, a house all of your own?

Yes it is, she says, and then she asks if I want to see it, and I say yes. Of all the women on Mango, only Samantha has a house of her own. I want to be like Samantha, with my house just for me. She, like me, doesn’t need a man to run her house.

When I look into her house I see my house all around me. Not my house on Mango, but my house in my dreams, the house I one day know that I will have. She has her own furniture, her own pillowcases and paintings, her own wallpaper, and her own rugs. It’s all hers.

Did you pick this out? I say excitedly, pointing at furniture. And this? I say, pointing at a lamp. And she nods, but gives me a funny look. I walk around like I’m in a fairytale, looking at all of her things, asking more questions.

Why did you choose this? I would ask, and she would say that she liked the color, or that she thought it matched with something else, and I would nod and agree and move on. And all the while she watched me, with her funny look.

            What about this? I pointed to a countertop.

            I’ve always liked marble, she says with her smile. Why do you ask such strange questions? She gives me her funny look, and now I know why.

            I turn away from her now, because I am embarrassed and want to hide my face. I don’t answer her. But she doesn’t think this is strange and we finish the tour of her house, and I stay silent. When I go back outside, I see Nenny waiting for me on Samantha’s steps, and I feel ashamed that I forgot her.

            As I walk home I think about Samantha and her house. If Samantha was really like me, why would she let Mango Street keep her, grab her with its wide arms and never let her go?

(after No Speak English and before Rafeala Who Drinks Coconut and Papaya Juice on Tuesdays.)

Rosa sits on the tree everyday. Rosa come down from that tree says her mom. But she doesn’t listen. She sees and sees until there is nothing left to see. She breathes in the morning air and closes her eyes until I fall asleep watching. I think she sees more than Mango shows. Up, she goes. Up and up over the sky she goes until Mango is gone.
Little kids cry and men run to work. But Rosa does not see. She stays put in that world away from Mango.

Rosa where’d you go?
I went away
Where is away?
Gone.
But where is gone? Can I come?

And then Rosa is gone.

When she is in school everyone laughs at her. Alone she sits by the soggy napkins. They say Rosa why are you so weird? Rosa you need to be more like us. Stop climbing the tree, you freak. You’ll never get out of here. I hope you fall someday. Your clothes are in that funny brown bag and your shoes are dirty. You’re rope hair needs to be shorter. Let’s cut those snakes. Then come the scissors. Snap. Now they’re lifeless strings on the floor. I want to yell and tell Rosa to look! Rosa, look at your hair! They laughed and laughed and I wanted to help but then I think what happened last time I wanted to help and my throat is dry.

But all the while Rosa’s eyes are somewhere else. Rosa is a statue. She looks far away at something deep. Something important. One time I tried to look in the same direction but saw an empty pickle jar. My breath is caught. Rosa Rosa Rosa. They’re hurting you. Rosa, look. Rosa, don’t you care?

And then I think about what it would be like to not care… to not care about what anyone else thought or said… just to live freely in Mango. She would be happy to let me breathe in her trees and I would be happy to be there. I wish I could talk to Rosa so she could teach me how to climb a tree. Maybe that’s how she does it so well. She escapes. The tree pushes her up with his steady arms, up to somewhere else. Somewhere magic.

Rosa where are you? Can I come? I don’t want to care. The only thing is that I do.

Once Rosa told me to remember the first tree. I thought that in Paulina there wasn’t a tree there was a house. But Rosa whispered to think harder. Trees that have angry roots stay with you longer. They leave a bigger impression. Don’t forget. Rosa, I said. But she was gone.
I thought about Mango. Ugly red house. Tight and frustrated and small but it is my home. It is my tree.

Maybe Rosa has a story to tell. Maybe life wasn’t all roses. There must have been some thorns.

The House on Mango Street My Very Own Dream

It’s amazing how different every child’s dream can be. As for me, I just wish for a normal life, a normal life with an ideal home. I don’t need the newest model bicycle, nor do I need the new fashionable shoes that all the girls would die for. I just want a place that I could call home. I dream of waking up in my very own room to the sounds of the blue jays chirping and to the smell of the hot, buttery biscuits my mama is making. I want my very own bathroom. I want to bathe by myself and I want to wear my own clothes instead of having to share them with Nenny, who is sadly the same size as me. I don’t think my dream is a big dream at all. After all, most girls my age seems to already have what I long for. Yes, it would be nice to live in a large, beautiful house, but that’s not what I really dream of. I just dream for a place that I can call home.

It’s not that I feel ashamed of who I am, but rather, who I’m becoming.  I don’t want to turn into the girl who feels embarrassed all the time of who she is. I want to gain confidence, not lose it. Can’t I just have a home, can’t I? And winning the lottery? That’s just a dream that no one ever talks about anymore. Mama and Papa seem to lose hope, and these days, it seems like their main goal is just to put food on the table. Even that’s not possible sometimes. I don’t even see ma and pa very often. They come home late at night and leave extra early for work when it’s still dark and cold outside. And when I do see them, they just look at me with those dreary eyes, telling me that they’re sorry for having me go through all this. I tell them it’s all right, but occasionally mamma looks at me and just weeps, crying out that she can’t continue to see her children live like this.

I feel like I’m living a life of pity, which just gets me upset and frustrated. Why me? I don’t even know what it’s like to live my vision of an ideal home, and oh how I want it so much! But that’s just a dream, an American dream. Dreams don’t come true very often. Well, at least that’s what I believe.

  Hairs

For the first time in years I am back on Mango Street. The three old sisters, the ones with the laughter like tin and the eyes of a cat and the hands like porcelain, were right. I escaped Mango Street when I was seventeen, but now am back, twenty years old.

            As I walk down the street I think that it all looks the same. Like a picture was taken, stored away, and now is taken out and put back, waiting for me to return. But as I walk I realize that it is not a picture. I have never seen the old man standing on the corner. I do not know the boys, laughing as they walk down the street.

I see little girls go by, and I remember my sister and my old friends. But there are only one, two, three. One small girl, leading the group proudly on her bicycle – Rachel. A bigger one, laughing, running by her side – Lucy. A small girl, struggling to keep up with the other two – Nenny. But where is Esperanza? She is nowhere to be seen.

I continue to walk, to remember, to think to myself. Remember Angel Vargas? He fell from that building there, trying to fly. Remember the Monkey Garden? It’s right past that old house, over there. I used to play there. I look at the Monkey Garden, and there was no one there. No kids jumping from car to car, no beautiful flowers, making us feel like fairies in a magical kingdom. Just weeds, growing, growing, killing other beautiful things so they can have some life of their own. I continue walking.

Finally I come to it, the house I remember most, the house I was so ashamed of. Not like the one in my fantasies, with flowers and a porch. No, this house had small steps and crumbling brick, just like I remember it. It still looks just as sad as it used to, sad that it is not as pretty as it could be, maybe, if it tried. Sad that it is small and the door is hard to open, sad that the garage behind it is still empty, after years of waiting to be a home.

I think about my house now, in New York City. It is a bit bigger – the door opens easily, and there are two bedrooms, although I don’t have anyone living with me. When I chose it, I needed an extra room, in case someone needed a home. They could live with me if they wanted. But no one has come to live with me yet – the men living on the streets seem too scary to live with me. I am afraid.

I continue walking, and a woman passes by me, but then turns to look again. Esperanza? she asks.

I turn, and look harder. Sally?

Esperanza! she says, and pulls me close, until I can feel the beating of her heart.

Esperanza, you’re back!

Hello, Sally. I am very polite. Nice to see you again. She has gotten a little taller since last time I saw her, the summer I was fourteen. Sally did not seem as beautiful as she used to be. She looked tired, like her life had been difficult, but she seemed happy. Like ice, when it melts, then freezes again. It is ice again, but still has the shape of the container it formed in.

Esperanza, I am getting married in two months. Please, come.

But you married a salesman. Remember? Back in seventh grade. Didn’t you?

Yes, but he was killed two years ago. He got in a car crash. But I am studying now. I saw you go, I heard about you. I know you made it. You live by yourself now, in New York City. No husband. Just college.

Yes, I do, I say.

Esperanza, I am doing that too. I want to be free. I will be.

But you are getting married, I say.

Yes, she says. But I will continue studying. I will become a nurse, care for the sick.

That is good, I say. Congratulations.

Thank you, Esperanza. For freeing me.

                                                                                                                                                                       SALLY’S HOUSE

That Ugly Little Bird
Between ‘The Monkey Garden’ and ‘Red Clowns’

There. Where? Right There! I say finger out-stretched to the groove of one of the four skinny trees. See it? I ask. Yes. Nenny says. Yes. Today I am telling Nenny of the little yellow bird that nestles into the branches of one of the four skinny trees. He sits there wrapped up tight by the strong arms of that skinny little tree. Wrapped up like a baby. Like a baby in the tender arms of a mother. You talk to that? Nenny asks, studying me with great intensity. Suddenly, I am shy. I don’t want to tell Nenny I talk to birds. She will laugh. She will tell Rachel and Lucy. She will tease and tease and tease me about it. And besides, I am the strong older sister. I cannot talk to birds! So I lie. Wow you will fall for anything! I laugh tossing my head back like sally does. Like I would really talk to BIRDS! Nenny only stares. Why would I talk to birds when I got friends like Sally? That’ll convince her that I don’t talk to birds. Except that I do. I talk to birds.
It is because Sally has been liking the boys more and more lately. When I have no friends, no one to talk to, I talk to that ugly little bird. I don’t know when he came. But he did. One day I was looking out to those four skinny trees for encouragement, when I saw him. He was small and yellow. Not a bright, summery yellow like the feathers of a finch, but a mustard yellow. Mustard yellow feathers drooping over his skinny bird bones. A gnarled cashew of a beak is crudely glued to his face. His milky gray eyes could not compare to the intense, beautiful coal black eyes the cardinal has. But I liked him. I liked him just the same.
I am hopeless! I tell the bird. He cocks his head at me. This I interpret to be bird language for ‘why?’ Because I am forever stuck here on mango street. Mango Street. A place where I don’t belong. He flocks his mustard feathers for me. That ugly little bird is a great listener. He never interrupts or walks away when I tell him my secrets. He just sits there. Nodding his head. Flocking his feathers. That ugly little bird.
Sometimes…Nenny begins. I talk to that stop sign. What? I gawk. There. Where? Right there! Nenny says. She points to the end of the street where a stop sign stands. Bent by too many un-careful cars. Faded by the moon’s crying. Why? I ask. Why to you talk to the stop sign? I am curious. Well, sometimes I am tired of Mango Street. She says, avoiding my gaze. I am ready to move to the house Mommy and Daddy always talk about. When we win the lottery we will get a big house on top of a hill. A lovely house. I cannot wait! I tell this to the stop sign. He listens, you know. He does not laugh at the things I say. He does not giggle and say Grow up, Nenny. That is my stop sign.
That ugly little bird. That bent and faded old stop sign. We are more similar than I thought. I take her hand and we walk down the street together. Yes. I think. We are more similar than I thought.

Alicia Who Sees Mice

Libros
I love books. Mama says I devour them. She did too when she was smart. Every weekend I can, I go to the local public library two blocks from Mango Street and read for hours and hours. Non-fiction, fiction, poems, fairy tales, everything. Sometimes I wish I could escape into a magical world and be a princess just like those girls in the books I read. But I wouldn’t have some boy change my life. No. I would change my life all by myself.
Sometimes I do escape when I’m in the library, surrounded by mountains and mountains of books around me. Books can sweep you away like a tornado into a new world where your imagination runs wild. I pretend I am a character in the book and cuddle on the seat below a small little window. I fell asleep one time. The librarian says, Little girl, do you have a home? I look to my ugly brown shoes and then all of a sudden remember where I am and who I am. No, I shake my head. Maybe I don’t, I say.

Darius and the Clouds

________________________________________________________________________

A House of My Own

My Family
In my house that’s all my own, far far away from Mango Street, I plan on having my own family. Maybe. Just maybe. I will have two children, one boy and one girl who I treat equally. I won’t be like Rosa Vargas from Mango Street. No. I’ll take care of my kids and tell them what Mama always told me. Study hard and get somewhere in life.
I won’t be a strict mama. I’ll let my children think. I will give them their own rooms with lots of books and a big window to look out at trees because that’s all I ever wanted. And on rainy days, I’ll let them snuggle up next to me. One on each side of the bed. Yes, and I will always point out the trees to them. I’ll say, Look at those beautiful trees extending into the sky. Yes, because that is what I remember most about Mango Street. The way I snuggled with Mama and the trees.

Mango Says Goodbye Sometimes