Author Archives: Zoe Sellers

The Ghosts Return

Throughout the novel, Diaz, and many people in her life struggle with suicidal thoughts and many including herself have attempted suicide. After Mercy committed suicide Diaz began to reflect on how many people in her family have committed suicide or have tried to, “and then there is this: suicide was our family legacy” (Diaz 259). The last section was highlighted with happy and relieving moments from the later part of Diaz’s life. She talks about her graduation, “I can’t stop smiling. I am overwhelmed with happiness, with love, with hope” (Diaz 278). But even with these moments of immense pride and happiness Diaz still found herself struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts. “One night after not sleeping for days, I find myself sitting on the kitchen floor with a knife, not remembering how I got there, but trying to build up enough courage to slit my own wrists” (Diaz 286). This brings to light the question of whether Diaz will ever be able to fully move past the things that happened in her childhood.

Throughout the chapter “Returning,” Diaz returns to Puerto Rico and Miami several times. She thinks about her childhood and her teenage years. She loses friends from childhood during this time, reconnects with childhood friends, watches them raise kids and get married, and watches the health of her mother decline. Although Diaz is older, she is still trapped in the cycle of caring for her mother, self-destructing, and trying to find ways to cope. Except, as an adult, she finds a passion for writing, puts herself through school, and then graduates. Diaz will always have her past and therefore she will always have to deal with the ghosts of her past, but she has found purpose and she has friends that she cares for deeply.

A picture of a ghost representing the feelings of Diaz when returning to the places of her childhood.

Citations

Díaz Jaquira. (2020). Ordinary girls: A memoir. Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill.

McGrath, Patrick. “‘Ghosts: A Natural History,’ by Roger Clarke.” The New York Times, 24 Oct. 2014, www.nytimes.com/2014/10/26/books/review/ghosts-a-natural-history-by-roger-clarke.html.

The Pride of Survival

After years of instability and violence the pain and struggle caught up to Diaz. After another violent fight with her mother, Diaz took her mother’s pills in an attempt to commit suicide, but her mother found her and called an ambulance. After realizing she was still alive she said, “I am eleven and I am alive”(Diaz 149). The fact that Diaz was so young when she first tried to take her own life illustrates the impact the instability of her life was having on her mental health.

 The second suicide attempt was also due to an argument Diaz had with her mother. In the heat of the fight her mother said, “you are small, you are nobody, you are nothing” (Diaz 185). When Diaz began taking all of her mother’s pills her mother did not notice. This story shows both the fragile mental state of Diaz and of her mother. Her mother was having a schizophrenic episode and Diaz had a fragile state of mind that was pushed over the edge after her mother began both verbally attacking her and then physically attacking her with a steak knife. 

The years of instability from her mother’s condition and the violence led to Diaz dropping out of high school and moving out. When she realized she, “was failing at life” (Diaz 212) she decided to join the military. After her time in Boot Camp she felt true pride and accomplishment for the first time in the midst of a chaotic past. “The pride I felt when I crossed that finish line. How until that moment, I didn’t know I could be that strong, didn’t really believe I could be saved” (Diaz 228). 

Citations

Díaz Jaquira. (2020). Ordinary girls: A memoir. Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill.

Wikimedia Foundation. (2021, October 29). United States Navy. Wikipedia. Retrieved November 9, 2021, from https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Navy. 

 

The Illusion of Control

Growing up as a woman of color Diaz was faced with varying forms of oppression from society and her own family, as was seen in the first section of the reading. The second reading began to explore her experiences with violence as a woman and how these experiences made her feel powerless. As Diaz was growing up in an unstable, violent environment she began to take back control with her fists, “just itching for a fight, begging for it…all those years of beat-downs barreling against me” (Diaz 116). Through the years of fighting with her brother and being slapped around by her mother, the anger began to build up and during late middle school, early high school, Diaz began fighting as a way to express her power. This can be seen when J.R. was antagonizing her in the hallway, “I was not and would never be, the kind of person who got bullied or made fun of…” (page 127). Diaz knew that she could not control her mother’s actions, but in that moment of powerlessness, she showed J.R. her power through violence.  

Diaz’s therapist tried to help by explaining that control could not be conquered in all parts of her life, but certain actions, smoking, and skipping, for example, could be controlled on her part. The lack of control that was felt in Diaz’s life was due to the instability of her mother. She describes her and her sister sleeping fully dressed in case an incident occurred. Diaz also feared her mother, “my greatest fear, the thing that scared me the most in the world, was my mother” (Diaz 89). She feared her mother’s sudden outbursts, her violence, the embarrassment of her asking her friends for money, but more than anything else, she feared being like her mother. Going from her father’s house where she was constantly in fistfights with her brother to her mother’s house where she was constantly on edge ultimately left Diaz looking for a way to exert power and gain control and she found this through fighting.

America Is in Crisis. That's Not New for Many of Us | Time
Jaquira Diaz at 14 years old.

Díaz, J. (2020, June 25). America is in crisis. that’s not new for many of Us. Time. Retrieved November 2, 2021, from https://time.com/5859204/america-in-crisis/.

Díaz, J. (2020). Ordinary Girls: A Memoir. Algonquin Books.

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Belonging in the Face of Oppression

While reading the first part of Ordinary Girls by Jaquira Diaz there was a recurring idea of belonging. Diaz explored her feelings of belonging in childhood through telling stories in relation to gender and race. The lack of belonging that Diaz felt in her family occurred when she was compared to her brother. In comparison with her brother, she often felt isolated because she felt that he was often favorited due to his gender. The connection that she felt with her father during childhood was complicated by the secret trips her father would take her brother on to La Plaza. He would not allow her to go to La Plaza because she was a girl and this reasoning caused a fit of anger and left her, “longing for something to lift this burden of girlhood” (Diaz 9). The strong bond that she felt with her father was hindered due to his beliefs about what girls should and should not do.

The lack of belonging in her family was also felt because of her race. Diaz often felt disconnected from the stories she read and the movies she saw. “I’d lie in my own bed, imagining myself in those movies, writing revisions of them that included characters like me” (Diaz 42). The characters in the stories were people that did not look like her and therefore she struggled to see herself in the stories and connect. This feeling was reinforced by the racist comments that were consistently made by her grandmother. When giving her a haircut, her grandmother cut her hair short like her father’s hair and antagonized her with comments about not being able to look like her white mother. “It wasn’t the haircut, she said, chuckling, it was my bad hair…Your father’s fault. Your father and his black family” (page 50). While her Abuela proudly displayed her darker skin tone and hair, her grandmother put her down and made her feel like she was less than. Diaz’s lack of belonging has a strong connection to the intersection of multiple forms of oppression, and in this section specifically, it was sexism and racism.

Citations

Díaz, J. (2020). Ordinary Girls: A Memoir. Algonquin Books.

Grande, R. (2019, October 29). Abused, Addicted, Biracial and Queer: Jaquira Díaz Is Anything but

               ‘Ordinary.’ The New York Times.https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/29/books/review/ordinary-girls-jaquira-diaz.html

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Getting To Know Jaquira Diaz

In June 2020, Jaquira Diaz published an article, “America Is in Crisis. But Some of Us Have Never Known Anything Different.” In the beginning of this article Diaz gives a first-hand account of getting pulled over by a police officer as a woman of color. She explains that her fear of police is rooted in her childhood. She says, “we learned to avoid them, and when we saw them, to hold out loved ones close.” She then talks about what it is like being a part of the LBTQ community and the difficulty of simultaneously navigating her race and sexuality. She has struggled with finding a community that accepts her as a Black Puerto Rican woman and a member of the LGBTQ community. In terms of the relevance of this piece, Diaz gives information about her background and life which aligns with my purpose of finding information that will expand my understanding of her work. Therefore, this source is reliable. 

Díaz, J. (2020, June 25). America is in CRISIS. that’s not new for many of us. Time. Retrieved September 13, 2021, from https://time.com/5859204/america-in-crisis/. 

Hopeful Expectations

Dear Class,         

Throughout this English class I hope we can build a strong, trusting, and respectful relationship that allows for everyone to share their experiences and thoughts in a comfortable way. Communicating through the computer does put obstacles in the way of achieving this goal due to distraction and lack of ability to form strong connections, but I think with our in-class sessions in combination with the online sessions we could build a strong community.

I expect my classmates to fully participate in discussions and do the readings. Throughout high school when I would come to class for a discussion there was a large number of people who did not do the reading and therefore could not contribute to the conversation. I think that because everyone is coming from a different background and has had a different upbringing, we can learn from each other’s different perspectives.

I expect the professor to encourage difficult, controversial conversations throughout the course. During high school, my teachers would guide us through Socratic Seminars, but also let people express their ideas freely. In my senior year of high school, my English class read the book, Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley. Throughout the discussions, everyone was able to really learn about the complexity of the monster. For example, I saw the actions of the monster as something that was inexcusable, but throughout the conversations, I was able to grow my thinking and start to think about Victor’s responsibility. The teacher would keep the conversation on the right track, but also encourage people to discuss varying ideas and opinions.

I expect myself to stay committed to my goal of becoming a clearer writer. I will be able to achieve this by spending more time on writing and giving my full attention during revision. I also expect myself to share out differing opinions and perspectives during class discussions.

Overall, I hope this class allows everyone to learn more about difficult subjects and be able to discuss differing opinions in a respectful manner.

Sincerely,

Zoe Sellers