August 5, 2014
The Walls family had a different lifestyle far from a 'normal' family. Also, Jeannette had a special tolerating and understanding way about her. The Walls' lifestyle seems to be set on the 'sink or swim' method, which is not always the best one for children to grow up with their whole childhood. On page 66, Jeannette learns how to swim from her dad throwing her into the water, relying on her to keep herself from drowning. She sinks at the beginning but learns as she keeps on getting thrown in. By the end she can keep herself afloat, however with a traumatic experience. Furthermore, throughout the book the Walls family was always encountering the 'sink or swim' experience, mostly all because of the father. Rex Walls, the father would get a steady job, paying well, supporting his family finally; then he would blow it in some way or just quit because he didn't like it. The family seemed to be swimming for some time, then in no time right back down to bare-bottom, sinking. With this type of family children and mother have to be tough in every way, as was Jeannette. Jeannette's tolerating characteristics are expressed also on page 66. Jeannette has always grown up with the idea of her father always being there for her and him saying "have I ever let you down?", so it was embedded in her head that he was almost like her savior. After being thrown in the water almost drowning several times, Jeannette was still on her dad's side thinking it was normal for this type of occurrence to happen; that her dad was always right and knew what he was doing. This idea seemed to always come up when her father did something wrong or bad.
In the beginning of the memoir, when Jeanette was three she burned herself cooking hotdogs on the stove. This turned out to be a very bad incident and had to have plenty of medical attention. This event is similar to Jeannette learning how to swim in that, her parents were not very cautious or beneficial towards the situation. The events are also similar because they were both quite life-threatening for Jeannette.
Jeannette and her father have a special relationship. Jeannette always trusted and had faith in her father, when everyone else did not. Jeannette describes and sees her father as a person not to mess with, and someone who will always have her and her sibling's backs. This information comes from page 24, "but he assured us that as long as he was around, we wouldn't have to defend ourselves..." Jeannette is one of the only family members that has always trusted her father. She always thought that because he was her dad that he was reliable and trustworthy. An example of her expressing this trust is from page 66, "Once I got my breath back, I figured he must be right. There was no other way to explain it." This passage is after Jeannette learns how to swim by the 'sink or swim' method. She realizes that her father must have done this for a reason, and that it actually worked and she now knows how to swim so it has to be okay.
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