"Everyday Use" By: Alice Walker #2

While reading this story for the first times, I found Dee to be completely unsympathetic and I resented her for the way she treated her family like they were disposable trash. While re-evaluating the story, I did find some sympathy for Dee because I realized how sad and incomplete her life must be in the way she is leading it. She has no real family as she rarely sees her mother and sister. She also is trying very hard to be someone whom she is not and is trying to create a life that is not hers. In this way, I find sympathy for how sad and incomplete Dee's life is. I believe the mother's victory over Dee is a victory because it put Dee in her place and ended her control over Maggie and her mother. I believe that as shown on page 179 by Maggie's reaction to Dee asking for the old quilts, "I heard something fall in the kitchen, and a minute later the kitchen door slammed," Maggie would have been upset if the quilts had been given away. If the mother had not denied Dee, Maggie's confidence would have been smashed yet again. I saw emotional ambivalence in the final scene because although Maggie and the mother share an emotional moment, there is nothing said and it almost seems that everything goes back to normal when the narrator says "until it was time to go in the house and go to bed." It almost seems that the mother and Maggie put the whole event behind them, but I also believe that this event reshaped their relationship into one of strength and quality.

"Everyday Use" By: Alice Walker

In this story, the mother makes a dynamic change when at the end of the story, she chooses to stand up for Maggie and refuse Dee's demand. The mother's refusal to allow Dee to have the quilts marks a permanent change in her character. I believe this because she realizes that it is Maggie who truly loves her and understands her and her heritage, not Dee. I believe she had never done anything like this before because she always dreamed that her and Dee could eventually relate in some way. For example, on page 174 (second paragraph) she has the dream that one day she and Dee will go on a talk show and have an embrace in which they will both cry. These are all just hopeful wishing because she knows deep down that her and Dee have nothing in common. I believe she finally stands up to Dee because she realizes that she does not really care about her or Maggie and their heritage. She only cares about her appearance and what she believes to be "heritage." I also believe she realizes how important Maggie really is in her life and this is shown by the little side comments of how Maggie kindly offers that Dee can have the quilts and the way in which Maggie carries herself when she realizes Dee will get what she was promised. There are a few events in the story that foreshadow the mother's refusal to Dee. For instance, on page 180, paragraph 71 the mother asks what Dee would do with the quilts and italicizes you showing that whatever it is that Dee would do with the quilts would be odd and absurd.