The Importance of Catcher in the Rye

I really enjoyed reading this analysis. It made me realize how ridiculous it is to ban this book and any others that have been banned in the past. Most of the books are reality and something that probably should be read. This analysis mentions that Holden is a bad role model and would therefore promote bad behavior. Just because you read something about a bad kid doesn't mean that you are going to turn into a bad kid that breaks the rules all the time. You become who you want and it usually doesn't depend on what you are reading. If every book was banned because there was a poor role model in it, we would have very little to read these days. This book is reality. Some kids deal with the same things that Holden does. This book lets them know they are not alone. Not every one's life is picture perfect.

Color

I believe that everyone has shown each of the colors in their personality at one point or another. There are just some colors that represent us more than others and are therefore shown more frequently. Blue is the color that is shown more in me. It is a peaceful, calm color. There is also the depression factor involved with this color but I do not find that that part represents who I am.

A few weeks ago some of my friends and I were driving to the Willow Brook Mall. My friend was driving. None of us had ever driven in this area and we were trying to follow two different sets of directions. We took a wrong turn and were lost. We were on the highway traveling back home. We all panicked at first. My friend that was driving was on the virge of tears. However, I remained calm and we were able to pull over for directions. We pulled into a florist. The lady was really nice but a little crazy. She gave us great directions. She told us we needed to think to ourselves that we could get there. My friend was still really anxious though. The rest of the way I had to keep telling her that everything was going to be fine. It turned out that we were only about five minutes from the mall. We made it there fine and had a great time. On the way home, we once again got lost. This time we only made one wrong turn. We weren't on the highway and I knew exactly how to get home. My friend freaked again. She thought we were really lost. She kept telling us nothing looked familiar. I kept telling her we only made one wrong turn but she didn't believe me. I stayed calm and navigated us back to our destination. No matter what kind of situation you are in it is crucial to stay calm and think positively.

Significant Object

I have a baby doll that I have had since I was a year old. I got it from my grandmother my first Christmas. My doll is a Cabbage Patch Kid. Her name is Georgina. She came with a birth certificate and I remember thinking that was the coolest thing. She has a large, round head with no hair. She wears pink pants that are supposed to be shorts and a white tank top with pink flowers. Normal doll clothes are too big for her because she is a small doll compared to most. Her feet look like stubs but are cute and her hands are really fat. She has a dimple in her right cheek. When I was younger I use to change her outfit on a regular basis.
The reason I got this doll was because she kind of looked like me when I was a baby. I have a dimple in my right cheek and was bald until about the time I was two. I was premature when I was born, so I was a very small baby.
I used to carry her around everywhere. She would come to sleepovers with me. I would bring her on vacation. I would carry her around the house. I never brought her to school though, except for show and tell sometimes. When I was younger I use to sleep with her every night. I could not fall asleep without her. Since then I have grown up and no longer need her with me all the time. I would never think of throwing or giving her away, I just don't need her all the time. When my bed is made she sits on the bed. When it is not made she lays on a pile of pillows that belong on my bed. I can remember a time when I thought I lost her. I was devastated. My brother kept telling me that I could just buy a new one, but I told him that nothing could ever be the same as her. She was irreplaceable. I eventually found her in the basement and was absolutely thrilled.
She is a security blanket for me. I know that I will always have something. I will never be alone. She makes me feel safe. I feel like I have some kind of protection with her. Surprisingly, she is in pretty good shape for being eighteen years old. She had been through a lot and even though there have not been many difficult times in my life I still consider myself a strong individual. Baby dolls seem to represent a sweet, innocent, affectionate object and I feel as though I can be described as that as well.

Book Review, In My Hands

In My Hands
By Irene Gut Opdyke with Jennifer Armstrong
Illustrated. 263 pages. Dell Laurel-Leaf. $6.99

"You must understand that I did not become a resistance fighter, a smuggler of Jews, a defier of the SS and the Nazis all at once. One's first steps are always small: I had begun by hiding food under a fence" (back cover). When World War II broke out in Poland, Irene was ready to help in any way that she could. Help was an understatement to what she actually accomplished.

When the war started Irene was just seventeen years old and a student nurse. She jumped the gun and was willing to help with the first shipment of people. She was forced to grow up and mature at such a young age. She had to be strong for the family she had left and for all the people she was going to help. At her age she should have been falling in love and starting a family, not saving lives.

Irene had a will to never give up. She was separated from her family so many times and no matter how long it took and what she had to go through she always tried to find them. Never did she give up on her Jewish friends. They were scared for her and did not want her to risk her life for theirs. She did not care and was willing to do anything to help save them. Not once did it cross my mind that Irene would give up on these people. They were what she lived for. She had no one else to rely on.

Courage and bravery play a huge role in this memoir. Irene never let fear get in her way. She would not have been so successful if she had been afraid. The things she did were a capital crime and she could have gotten killed had she been caught. That had crossed her mind but it just made her more careful in how she did things. She was always able to keep her cool in complicated situations.

The setting is in Poland which has been taken over. The basement where the Jews are living is in a Nazi officials home. The conditions were good for them but not something you would want to live in. There is a part in the book where the Jews are hiding in an air conditioning vent. It is small and crowded and I could get a sense of how they were living and what it was like. The book has pictures in it so you are able to see the outside of the Nazi officials home where the Jews were hiding.

I really enjoyed reading the book. It just boggled my mind as to how Irene was able to do all of this. I know that I could not and I see her as such an amazing person. It makes me think that there are actually people in this world that will help complete strangers at the risk of losing your own life. The book was not humerous in its content. It was however funny that twelve Jews were able to hide under a Nazi officials home.

In My Hands

"Moral courage is a more rare commodity than bravery in battle or great intelligence." Robert Francis Kennedy

This quote is saying that doing the "right thing" is often harder and less heard of than doing a physical act of bravery. Throughout the book Irene trys to make the right choice to do what is right no matter how much trouble she might end up in. Helping the Jews could have easily gotten you killed during that time. Irene sees the people in the ghetto and feels for them. She wants to help them. Though it might get her in trouble, it is the right thing to do. She begins to help them by placing a box of food under the fence everyday. If at anytime she got caught she could end up dead or as a prisoner. That didn't seem to matter to her as much as helping those people. Irene also recommends that people from the camps come and work in the laundry room so they have a better working environment. She begins to leave food for them in laundry baskets so they can eat. She gets extra blankets from Schultz so the Jews can make winter coats for themselves. She also goes into the ghetto to get Fanka out of there alive. Though all of these things were techinally the wrong thing to do, she new in her heart that it was the right thing to do. Her moral courage overpowered any fear that she might have had of getting caught.