Boundaries by Bethany Thornton Reading Response

Boundaries by Bethany Thornton is summarily an interesting read about emotional and psychological trauma and victimization children from single parented families pass through. The most detailed paragraph that directly connected with the title of the article is the second one that gives the reader a clear description of the boundary on the Lelands lawn. Thornton uses the description further in the third paragraphs metaphorically to mean that boundaries are areas forbidden to be crossed by others failure to which there are severe consequences. The area in the essay that I felt was lacking was an explanation on how the father of the two characters in the story supported the mother. In spite of the writer pointing out the aftermath of the divorce was the children father leaving a good house in a good school in an elite neighborhood, the boundary that Thornton tries to explain in relation to this relation is unclear.

The story begins with using a direct definition of a boundary to employment of allusion. Thornton uses allusion to challenge the reader to connect the direct meaning of boundary to the emotional ones described at the end phases of the essay. He aims at instigating thoughts of the importance of maintaining emotional boundaries to avoid hurting others. To elaborate this, Thornton uses the main protagonist when her friend informs she invitation denial to a classmate party was due to the brokenness of her family. This steers up the conversation on how far people should go questioning how others live and the sanity of the same as perceived in our societies. The arrangement of this story in this chronological order is effective as it makes the reader interested in reading the happenings in the next phase of the story.

The paragraph that begins with I sensed the uneasiness of people around me is the beginning of the boundaries explained in an allusion. When reading this paragraph, I am surprised that people can put such boundaries to an innocent kid who has nothing to do with her parents divorce. It is not a surprise that people are ignorant of the psychological trauma embedded in a child through external discrimination and victimization. Although I cannot relate to this, I think civic education helps learn that the principles of the best interest of a child in the legal arena should be adhered to for healthy growing generation devoid of depression. I think this is the main reason the author shares this narrative. To condemn bullying and discrimination of children from different settings of families by adults who influence their kids to do the same. Therefore, the target audience are both adults and children.

My favorite part of the narrative is the manner the protagonist mother handles the discrimination situation. Despite her struggles as a single mother, she managers to convince her daughter that her family is not broken as her age mates allude due to the divorce. She takes her two children to the movies just to reinstate normalcy, a value that shows the importance of a mother figure in a family. I believe that the tears that she shed when the protagonist said see we are not broken at the end of the story were tears of joy signifying satisfaction for being able to convince her daughter that they were a normal family. The aftermath is a lesson that no matter what we go through, it is the attitude we handle the situation with that enables us overcome the challenge or obstacle. A positive attitude always prevails.