Accepting the Flaws of "He and I"

Well this certainly isn't a typical love story. One would imagine it is what happens after the end of the story book; real life, and real life isn't all that fun. Truly her husband got on my nerves as did she. He was seemed to be deeply critical of her every move and thought, and she was never sure about herself. Every time that she said he threw a temper, I got a little more aggravated. It would seem that her husband is controlling and demeaning and a jerk. He does have some good qualities, for he is open to many different types of culture and experiences, and drags her into them. She on that note follows, trying to be supportive. It just gets tiresome to hear that they argue about little things that could be passed over and are always critical of each other.

But this is close to a true life love story than most that are written. For even though they argue and criticize one another, they have been together for twenty years. That's hard to say for most couples, granted this was written in the 90s. Considering this, both husband and wife have learned to take the flaws in each other and live with them. Not just live with the flaws but learn to accept them. It seems as though the wife accepted her husband's flaws better than he with hers.

I don't think that I'd like a relationship like this. I've witnessed too many relationships in which the spouses argue. It disrupts the home and is just not pleasant to be in. There is a way to live in peace without arguing and still accepting flaws. I can't really say what that is since I'm not married, though my grandparents, who have been married for almost 50 years, claim that it is to cut each other a bit of slack especially when you are about to get mad. It seems like good advice to me, for we can't really help our flaws; they are apart of what makes us, us. So when we accept each other's flaws it's more of confirmation of accepting them.

Death and Actors...Tropmann

This essay was a bit different than anything that I have read before. It immediately reminded me of a behind-the-scenes type view of execution. Almost as if it were a play. Just the way that the people were showing up ahead of time and talking with the executioner as he was "rehearsing" and the small group waiting to meet Tropmann. It all seemed as though it was staged. Tropmann himself seem like an actor, he was too happy. The narrator even points that out.

I was also reminded of the book The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy; really it's just the beginning of the book that reminded me of this. In the book, there are executions happening in which people are gathered around as if it's a grand event. There are even women described, come to find out one is the hero dressed as a woman looking for information, that are sitting near the guillotine platform sewing and gossiping as if nothing unusual was happening. Granted Tropmann's death and The Scarlet Pimpernel weren't written or around the exact same time, 1870 and 1903 (set in 1792) respectively; but they do show similar themes. People like a show, they like to be entertained by a gruesome event. It's a sad thing to say but it seems to be true, for the most part.

Take when Saddam Hussein was finally captured and put to death; there were many that wanted to see his body die. That could partly be because of what he did and they wanted revenge but he was hung, there were most likely a large number of people that watched him die just because he was to die. There seems to be a correlation between death and the desire to watch life leave the body. I'm not saying that it's a psychopathic tendency and that everyone is going to go kill someone, but it may be a bit deeper than that. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that everyone dies and those that are living are curious about death and what comes after it. For death is truly a curious thing. People die, we know that but what happens when we die, what are the last stages of people's life, what do they do. These are aspects that are addressed by Turgenev.