Blog #4 5/13/09

For this blog, I wanted to do a connection from one of the characters, Jo from the book 3 Willows, to the real world. I would like to make a connection from Jo's parents divorce to ones that happen all across the world. Brashares describes, "Jo began to get a feeling, faraway but powerful, of just how unhappy they had been, how much had been sacrificed because of it"(Brashares, 248). This quote describes how Jo had known that after her brother Finn's death, they just weren't happy anymore and that it changed who they were. For example, her mom turned to cleaning and her dad to work, but they both were afraid to talk about it because it brought up to many memories. As in many divorces, they happen because of some sort of tragedy or misfortune, in this case the death of a son. Or, just because they don't love each other anymore. The divorce of Jo's parents affected her in more ways than just one. She lost touch with her dad, and her mom was always trying to be outgoing, being at party's all the time, as a way to avoid loneliness and the acceptance of loss. Also, the divorce affected Jo because she had to find a balance between seeing her mom and her dad on an alternating schedule, while they told her they were just "trying" it out. In effect, many divorced couples face issues of possession over children which can lead the children to be confused, lost, and hurt without anyone to talk to. The worst part about divorcees is that they tend to feed their children false hopes as if they were to mend things up. Moreover, it is not always best to blame the parents, but they should keep an open mind to their children and maybe invest some time into sessions to talk about what is really going on so that no one gets lost in translation.