When Dreams Don't Come True

     I can't be the only one who thinks that chapter two of "Spring" in The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison is one of the most (if not the most) saddening chapters we have come across in this novel so far. We get a name and a backstory to the character we had only known as "Mrs. Breedlove", Bad Mother and Wife. This adds new depth and dimension to her character, a woman whose tragic past has now been made clear to us.
     We all know what it's like to have a dream. Pauline dreamed for "a someone" (113), someone who "understood" (113) and would "lead her away ... forever." (113) Her dream was realized by Cholly Breedlove, and they "loved each other" (115). It was seeing this dream come true, a dream that Pauline had yearned for for years, then slowly get taken away, that was so sad for me to read, and really helped me understand the place she is in when we see her in "Autumn".
     While reading this chapter, I also noticed a similarity between Pauline and the mother from The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls. Both mothers had a dream, one that was taken away from them. And while I don't agree with the way they treat their children, is it really that hard to understand where they're coming from? Is it that hard to understand how Jeanette's mom hid the "huge family sized Hershey chocolate bar" (174)  for herself, or how Pauline kept her life as a servant "for herself, a private world" (128)? Because sometimes, when things don't go the way you intended them to, when your dreams are in no way getting fulfilled, the small victories like chocolate or a clean house mean everything. And when you're living a life like that, sometimes you need to keep those small victories to yourself, so that you do not fall apart completely.

Carl from "The Walking Dead" clearly isn't living the life he had wanted to as a child- he's in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. Here, he celebrates a much needed victory, however small, by eating 112 oz of chocolate pudding all by himself.