The Outsiders: Week of 11/17/14

Pages: 1-118
Prompt: Can you relate yourself or the World to any of the characters in the book you are reading? If so, how?

     I just started reading The Outsiders this week, and I'm actually surprised by how much I'm really enjoying it! The characters are all very different and distinct, but they're all real and genuine; a quality pretty hard to create in fictional characters. There have been a few instances where I have found myself relating to certain characters, but maybe not the character themselves. This meaning, I could relate to one of their actions or something they said, not the character as a whole! There have also been a few instances where I found myself relating something a character said to the real World! I could apply a lot of what was said to real life, as a lot of the quotes really give us insight on how our World and the people in it, really work!

     The first character that I can find relation to is Cherry Valance. In the book, Cherry and Ponyboy were having a conversation about the Socs beating up his friend Johnny, a Greaser (two rival groups who refer to each other under these names). After that, Ponyboy and Cherry are talking to each other about how not all Socs and Greasers are the same, and may not all have the reputation that people believe. It says, "'I'll bet you think the Socs have it made. Rich kids, the West-side Socs. I'll tell you something, Ponyboy, and it may come as a surprise. We have troubles you've never even heard of. You want to know something?' She looked me straight in the eye. 'Things are rough all over.'" I think that a lot of people, don't realize this whole idea that everyone has problems! Just because things may seem perfect for someone, doesn't mean they are. I feel like I am someone who may be looked at like I don't have any problems. I'm a pretty nice kid, who gets really good grades, is a great dancer, gets to travel all over the World, has a tight knit family, is living above the poverty line, always has food on the table, and a bed to sleep in. I should have nothing to complain about, right? What else could I want? Well, I don't need anything else. I'm content with the life I live. I'm actually unbelievably grateful! Though, aside from having an amazing family, and food and water and shelter, I have a lot of stress. Keeping the grades I have and staying at the level I am in dance can be difficult and stressful sometimes. Actually, all of the time! Everything may look okay, or maybe you can see that I struggle sometimes. Though, I usually try not to show if I'm too out of sorts. I have problems just like everyone else, and I can really relate to what Cherry said at this part in the novel.

     The second character that I can find relation to is Ponyboy. In the novel Ponyboy, Johnny, and Dally are walking home with Cherry and Marcia. Being from different "social classes" it wasn't very common for them to be hanging out together. As Ponyboy it thinking about this, it says, "Maybe the two different Worlds we lived in weren't so different. We saw the same sunset." I think it's hard for people to look at the bigger picture of things in the World, because we are all so focused in our own little worlds. We tend to forget that we are not so different from everyone else in the World, no matter who or what they are. Yes, there is a difference in where you live, and how much money you have, and your gender, and your thoughts. Though in the end, we all see the same sunset (kind of; the sun doesn't set at the same time everywhere) we all see the same moon rise in the sky. There are little things in the World that bring us all together, and remind us that the differences that separate everyone, only reach a certain extent before we find all of the similarities! We all eat three meals a day, we all go shopping, and sleep, and read, and go swimming, and go to school; generally. Obviously people in countries that are not as fortunate and advanced as the U.S. don't have the opportunity to go to school, or go shopping regularly. Though, like it says in the book, we all see the sunrise. In the end we are not that different after all.

     One last character I can find relation to is Two Bit. Ponyboy, Johnny, and Dally were recognized in the paper for saving the children from the burning church, and they were described as heroes. Two Bit then says, “Y'all were heroes from the beginning. You just didn't 'turn' all of a sudden” I very much agree with this idea that you don't just turn into a hero all of a sudden, even if you show one amazing act of bravery and kindness. Becoming known as a hero, in my opinion, is a build up of all of the courageous and amazing things you've done in your life, to be able to earn that title. You could actually be a terrible kid, who is in gangs and commits crimes, but saves an elder from being hit by a car and is magically known as this "hero". He doesn't show any other heroic qualities. If it hadn't been for that single act of if bravery and kindness, he wouldn't be known a  hero. I think what Two Bit is trying to say, is that even though Ponyboy, Johnny, and Dally were in the paper for doing one courageous act of kindness, they were already heroes and kind people in the past. They just were able to show this for the first time in front of cameras. I think that a lot of people in the World see someone who has done something great that gets them publicity, so they think this person is "all that and a bag of chips," when really, they just got lucky that this act was caught on camera and shared. Ponyboy, Johnny, and Dally had already been great people, they didn't just get this title all of a sudden. They were just finally recognized.