Helping Others to Stand in The Community

                Life is unexpected.  As we go about our daily routines issues arise which need to be addressed.  We often must stop, take an inventory of what is happening around us and then take care of the hiccups that get in our way from time to time.  However, for some individuals life is full of more than just hiccups.  Some have experiences that will knock them off their feet and make it difficult, if not impossible, for them to stand on their own.  It requires others to step in and help lift them to their feet and then provide continued support until they are able to stand again; on their own. (The image of the Twelve Stones of Pentre Ifan comes into mind here).   It is for these individuals that my emphases focused on. 

                I am working on an Integrated Studies degree with an emphasis in Accounting and Community Health.  There are several ways that these emphases can resemble standing.  In accounting you must take a stand for what is ethical as opposed to what is desired.  You provide reports and financial statements that stand for the financial status of the company.  You can even assist in making financial decisions that help a company to continue standing and remain stable.  Community Health can help people in their ability to stand on their own literally, as issues of health are resolved and individuals are able to overcome illness and health issues that had them down in bed.  People are also assisted in their education of health risks and needs through community education programs that teach us how to care for our bodies and become healthier.  There are health centers which provide vaccinations to avoid disease and testing for possible infection.  The community also has programs that help people to stand on their own through food stamps, WIC, CHIP, and other programs that provide nourishment, health assistance, insurance, and basic necessities for individuals who have fallen on hard times.

                In 2010 Deseret Media Companies (DMC) started an initiative to help individuals in the community to be able to stand on their own financially, focusing mainly on women, to gain financial independence and the ability to manage and control their finances better.  DMC started the “Imagine A Happier You” campaign with the following:

“Weighted down by debt or worried that your retirement planning has fallen flat?  We’d like to help.  The Deseret Media Companies – Deseret News, Deseret Book and KSL-TV and Radio – are looking for three Wasatch Front women who’d like a financial makeover.  You open your books and show us your struggles and we’ll connect you to expert mentors who, for a year, will help you figure out how to get back on track and brighten your future.  You’ll blog as you learn and we’ll also feature your story periodically as you tackle your money dilemmas.  It’s a chance to straighten out your finances and also help other women worldwide figure out what to do.” (Collins, 2010)

DMC partnered with AAA Fair Credit, Merrill Lynch, and Zions Bank to help in the process of educating these women.  Each of the 3 partners provided one representative who spent a year with the woman assigned to them, in helping get them back on their feet financially and in providing a stable financial foundation in which to move forward.  Each of the women came from different backgrounds and circumstances but all of them were similar in the fact that they felt they were falling financially and needed help getting back on their feet and being able to stand financially independently.  Part of the campaign was in an effort to help women learn financial planning in an effort to help better educate children on how to become financially stable in the future.  Jennifer Rohn of AAA Fair Credit explained, “Rohn’s hope for the project is simply that people will think more deply about their own financial situation and learn new skills and habits that will help them walk a path that their children can see and emulate themselves – and then pass on to their own children.”  It is an initiative to help build financial understanding for generations.  As the three women who participated in the campaign spoke of their experiences and the things they learned, the metaphor of standing kept coming up.  They spoke of “stress level drops”, “paying down debt”, using emergency funds and then rebuilding them, and being able to “knock down” debt. (Collins, Regaining control - 'Imagine a Happier You' campaign helps 3 women, 2011)  As these women were taught how to become more financially stable, others were able to watch their stories and learn from them as well.  This enabled many to be able to stand more financially independent.  In response to the viewed success of the initiative Mark Willes, President and CEO of Deseret Media Companies stated, “We are proud of the work they have done in creating a program which educated, elevated, and connected women throughout the year.” (Collins, Regaining control - 'Imagine a Happier You' campaign helps 3 women, 2011)

In a different but similar way The Center For Women & Children In Crisis (CWCIC) is also helping to get people standing on their own.  When women and/or children find themselves in an abusive or unsafe situation the CWCIC can help provide safe shelter, therapy and support, and material needs such as food and clothing.  The CWCIC also provides educational programs for the community which can help teach people about the harms, signs, and options for domestic abuse, rape, and other violent situations.  (The Center for Women & Children in Crisis)  The CWIC is taking individuals who have been knocked off their feet, pushed down, and who are unable to stand on their own, both physically and metaphorically at times, and helping to stand them back up.  They are giving individuals a safe place to get back on their feet, the means to survive for a short period of time, the education to rise above their situation and make a better life for themselves and those who are with them, and the confidence to stand on their own and know that they are capable and able to do so.

This semester we have looked at what it means to stand and how the process of standing makes a difference in who we are, what we do, and how we do it.  As we have discussed the idea of standing I couldn’t help but take the metaphor and internalize it according to my experiences and thoughts personally.  I have gained a new appreciation for the metaphor of standing and what it means to me.  I stand because it is my way of existence.  I don’t mean standing physically, but rather mentally, emotionally, and verbally.  If I desist from standing then I have given up and no longer have value and purpose in my life.  Through personal experiences I have known what it was like to be knocked down verbally and emotionally.  I have lost the ability to stand on my own and be who I was.  I was made to believe that I was not good enough to stand and was therefore pushed down time and time again in an effort to keep me down for good.  However, after having been removed from that situation I have fought to be able to stand on my own again and the only reason I can determine, from talking about the metaphor this semester, that I am fighting so hard to stand is because I know that if I can’t stand on my own emotionally and mentally, then I have no purpose anymore, I have lost the ability to truly live and exist, and that thought terrifies me.  Therefore, every day I make efforts to gain back my ability to stand on my own, stick up for myself, be my own person, and be able to believe in myself and believe that who I am is good enough despite being knocked down so many times before. 

I feel that both of these programs I mentioned above, “Imagine a Happier You” and the Center for Women & Children in Crisis are wonderful examples of how my emphases are utilizing the standing metaphor in helping individuals be able to stand tall, erect, and proud of who they are and the life they are building.  There is not better gift than the gift to STAND.

Works Cited

(n.d.). Retrieved April 22, 2012, from The Center for Women & Children in Crisis: http://www.cwcic.org/cwcic_about.php

Collins, L. M. (2010, June 20). Debt Free: Let DMC, experts help you manage your money. Retrieved April 22, 2012, from Desert News: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/print/700041851/Debt-free-Let-DMC-experts-help-you-manage-your-money

Collins, L. M. (2011, September 25). Regaining control - 'Imagine a Happier You' campaign helps 3 women. Retrieved April 22, 2012, from Deseret News: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/print/700182402/Regaining-control-2-Imagine-a-Happier-you-campaign-helps-3-women.html

Standing Up to Avoid Defeat

                As humans, we can’t help but build.  We are in a constant process of standing things up.  Whether it be objects, words, or ourselves, we seem to have the innate need to create, build, form, and erect.   We build monuments as a representation of ourselves.  Our creations are erected throughout our lives as a reflection of who we are, what we represent, and our ideals.  However, no matter how much effort, material, or work we put in to our creations, there is a time when they will eventually fall unable to withstand the elements and time.  Yet despite knowing things will inevitably fall, we continue to build, erect, and stand things up because it gives us a sense of purpose.

                I liked Wendell Berry’s poetry, “The Farmer, Speaking of Monuments” because it takes something that seems commonplace and shows the magnitude of the process.  Most don’t think of crops as something to praise unless we are in the process of enjoying their flavor and freshness.  However, a farmer knows that his harvest is a reflection of his hard work and sacrifice.  As Berry states, “he remains in what he serves by vanishing in it, becoming what he never was.”  To me, he becomes an artist, a builder, a sculptor.  He creates a monument to himself.  Every spring he buries his seeds which will mature throughout the summer, “standing for him” in the fall for only a short time before he must cause them to collapse in order to harvest and sell his monument in pieces to others. 

                Three things struck me with Berry’s poem.  First, I find it ironic that in order to stand up his monument, the farmer must first bury his seeds.  Typically the process of burial relates to the permanent falling of something so I have to wonder if the farmer is symbolically falling himself, putting aside his carefree days of winter in order to immerse himself in his erection of crops until they will fall.  It is interesting to see that this is a process that beings with a fall and ends with a fall.  Second is the realization that at the height of his accomplishment, when the crops have reached their full potential and are ready to be harvested, no one sees his fully erected monument but himself, the farmer.  Third, although no one sees the monument at its pinnacle many will benefit from it even to the extent that it could be considered critical for those who are fed by the farmer.  A monument that seems so temporary and must be rebuilt at the beginning of every season is seen in a much more magnificent light and I begin to realize that “in autumn, all his monuments fall” but the work of a farmer is always standing.  His fields remain as a representation of who he is.

                Maria Melendez also discusses the monuments that we build to represent ourselves in her piece of work "A Chicana Writes to Rilke".  However, her monument seems more personal.  She does not want a monument that is tall and erect.  She says, “might, in me, is not erected, but absorbed.”  I feel she is building a monument that is not for the world to see, but rather for her.  A representation of who she is for self reflection.  Her creation is built of elements which have made her who she is, such as masa.  Her statue is much more internal and personal.  I also believe it is like the farmer’s because it changes just as her life and experiences change who she is.  She talks of “an interior grinding stone to scrape the realm of concept completely” which suggests that the process of building is an evolving one that is always chipping away to shape us.  In the end, the monument is very personal, not some large erection that represents her but rather is “cobbled within.”

                In the "Twelve Stones of Pentre Ifan" Leslie Norris writes about a monument created by another that has seen time and the elements take its toll on the ability of the twelve stones of “Pentre Ifan” to stand.  However, his poem seems to bring life to the stones and actually make them stand taller.  He talks of a “nameless” people whose survival was a struggle.  Yet despite the difficulty of their existence they were able to rise above it and build a monument “taller than any man who will ever stand where I stand, lifting their hope.”  The monument represents the ability in each of us to stand throughout our lives, to build our existence, and to fulfill our purpose.  It is also a reminder that there will be times when we will have difficulty standing on our own yet there are those around us we can lean on who can provide the stability we need until we are able to stand on our own, “as a man, leaning in, supporting.”  Norris reinforces to me that the monuments we build throughout our lives are built with the support of others and that we are not alone although our creations we build are our own.

                Of course, we know that all things must eventually fall, we as humans will fall when we die.  Likewise, monuments also have their duration.  There is a time when, despite the process of building and creating, those statues that have been erected will crumble to the ground.  The elements of the earth and time both play a role against our monuments.   Percy Bysshe Shelley discusses this corrosion of our erections in "Ozymandias".  Shelley tells of a monument that, at one time, depicted a great king.  However, the statue which was erected in honor of this king has now fallen and is covered with sand in the desert.  All that can really be seen anymore are the “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone” signifying that although the legs are still there they no longer hold up the rest of the sculpture, nothing else is left standing.  I can’t help but compare the “wrinkled lip, and sneer cold command” from the half buried face of Ozymandias to the political statues of Stalin and Lenin and the prideful way in which a monument was erected to establish power and control which eventually fell, as did the power of the men themselves.  This process of falling is different because it is not the physical falling of an individual but rather the fall of an ideal for a greedy purpose. 

                I have to wonder why we try so hard to build, erect, and create if we know that it is not lasting and will someday crumble to the earth.  I conclude that the process is a representation of who we are.  We stand as a way of showing strength, power, and life.  Therefore, we spend our lives building around us, standing things up to help reiterate the fact that we too are here, and standing.  It is innate in us.  We cannot tear down without rebuilding because to tear down and leave alone would signify defeat.  As humans we cannot bear the thought of defeat.  Therefore, we begin the process of building in order to ensure that we are still standing in the monuments we erect.  All monuments eventually fall, but what they represent can continue to stand long after they are gone.

The Erection of Life

                To me, a poet’s work is about building or erecting an artist’s representation of something.  That representation is very similar to a metaphor.  Poetry allows us to see things in a different light with a new understanding.  I believe it was Dr. Scott Abbot who said that poets can take words that mean one thing and use them in a way which creates a whole new meaning.  I suppose this can be partly why poetry is difficult to understand sometimes, because we want to use the literal meaning for words yet it doesn’t fit with the context because the poet has changed the meaning to create something new and different with it.

                Rainer Maria Rilke is a great example of creating his own language with words.  There is such power and beauty in the metaphors used to build an explanation of our human existence.  Rilke's “Duino Elegies” , as with other poetry, are created structurally just as monuments, statues, and buildings are erected.  There is a foundation, a basic message, that must be expressed in a way that the purpose or idea can be told.  Rilke splits that structure into 10 Elegies that each build upon the last one and take the next step towards the ultimate message or purpose of the poetry, which to me is life and the purpose of life for us.  It is the process of beginning life, building who we are, what we will become, dying, and leaving a monument of ourselves erected for those we leave behind.  Rilke builds this life throughout the elegies and takes us through the process.  In The First Elegy there is talk of springtime which is the season of birth; it is the beginning of the life cycle.  This is the elegy that also mentions enduring “as the arrow endures the bowstrings tension, so that gathered in the snap of release it can be more than itself.”  To me, the beginning is the moment when we have the most potential, when everything is possible, just like the moment of suspension for an arrow.  The fact that this comes at the beginning of the “Duino Elegies”, in the first elegy, is no coincidence because the rest of the elegies that follow will show that potential and fulfill the possibilities.

                We continue on from the birth in The Second Elegy which talks about “early successes”.  This is beginning to form the accomplishment of possibilities and build from the first elegy.  It talks of creation and also finding our place in life, where we belong.  It is the process of becoming and establishing our existence.

                In The Third Elegy our purpose is seen and begins to push forth, unable to be held back any longer, and drives us to stand.  As is stated, “Ah, where are the years when you shielded him just by placing your slender form between him and the surging abyss?” we are beginning to lose our protection from the world and are starting to become exposed to the cruelty of life.

                As we progress into The Fourth Elegy we are taken further into the loss of protection as we start to feel conflict with our purpose and ask the question, “Am I not right?”  We recognize the innocence of our childhood, the days when we couldn’t wait to be older, to be able to drive, to be independent and in control of our own lives, and we start to long for those days again as we begin the process of moving from the unconscious state of childhood to the conscious state of adulthood. 

                We continue to build our lives as we enter The Fifth Elegy.  Duration is introduced to us, the ability to stand despite the world around us and all the times we will inevitably fall with the pains of life.  We move past stella, as Dr. Abbott referred to it -  the place in between, as we become fully conscious and aware of our being.

                As life continues on we move into The Sixth Elegy which talks of the fig tree which drops its blossoms and produces fruit.  “We enter the overdue interior of our final fruit” longing for youth and childhood and the innocence that accompanies them.

                In the Seventh Elegy we begin to see what we have been building throughout our lives and as we move into the Eighth Elegy we are able to reflect more upon our life and what has been done.  “Who has twisted us around like this, so that no matter what we do, we are in the posture of someone going away?  Just as, upon the farthest hill, which shows him his whole valley one last time, he turns, stops, lingers -, so we live here, forever taking leave.”  We begin to summarize our lives, to see what we have built, what has fallen, and what has been re-built.

                In The Ninth Elegy Rilke talks, again, about endurance.  It seems to be the last chance to make an effort to achieve our purpose.  “And so we keep pressing on, trying to achieve it, trying to hold it firmly in our simple hands, on our overcrowded gaze, in our speechless heart.  Trying to become it. – Whom can we give it to?”  This not only shows the idea of trying to desperately complete the process, but also the recognition that when our life is over, it is over.  We cannot take with us what we have built, so who will be left with our legacy that we leave behind and what will that legacy be? 

                The Tenth Elegy is the final phase of our life.  It is the completion of our purpose. “Alone, he climbs on, up the mountains of primal grief.  And not once do his footsteps echo from the soundless path.”  We move on from this life leaving behind all of the monuments that we built throughout our existence for those who will stay behind.  This is the point when, after a lifetime of trying to stand, we finally fall.

                John Ashbery talks about the moment in “the middle of the journey, before the sands are reversed” as the “place of ideal quiet.” (Three Poems)   I see this place as the moments in life where we have built something and it has yet to fall.  It is the peak of a relationship, when admiration, trust, loyalty, and love are at the highest point before life creates moments of mistrust and doubt that creep in.  It is the moment of achievement after we have worked so hard but before our minds begin to question.  It is the moment of ecstasy before reality comes back.  Ashbery also talks about photographs and capturing that moment in stillness.  He talks about life and that point when you decide for yourself what you want your life to be.  That moment is another one of his moments when the sands are still and have yet begun to reverse where everything stops and stands still.

                T. S. Eliot also discusses theses moments when he talks about “the still point of the turning world…Where past and future are gathered.  Neither movement from nor towards, neither ascent nor decline.  Except for the point, the still point.”(Four Quartets)  This is the moment when time comes together and no longer seems to exist. 

                Rilke, Ashbery, and Eliot all seem to not only talk about that moment when everything is still, but all of them also write about life from different perspectives.  They seem to all present the idea that there is a purpose, something that we are striving for and building as we live.  And perhaps for each of them, their poetry became their purpose.   Poetry is like life, a building up of ideas in order to create something that can remain once the poet is gone…their own monument to the world in words, rather than stone or marble, but with a foundation that will remain.

Rising to the Potential Within Us

                Although times have changed and ideas are evolving, in the past there has been a sense of familial structure that was acceptable to society. The father was generally seen as the one that led the family, making the decisions, and ensuring order and success.  The mother was the caregiver of the children, the nurturer, and the one who maintained the daily running of the household.  It became a bit fuzzier with the children because there hasn’t been a set structure for children aside from the fact that they were to be obedient to their parents and help pull their weight within the household.  However, what weight they were expected to pull was usually left to interpretation within each familial structure.  There have been times, way more often than we would hope and more than anyone wants to admit, when the accepted cultural structure of a family has not conformed or has become disrupted for whatever reason.  We saw three very good examples of this disruption in our readings this semester.  I would like to break down the components of the family and focus on each individual and how they were represented in each reading.

FATHERS

                The fathers showed up in some very different ways.  The Commandant in “The Marquise of O-” written by Heinrich Von Kleist, appears to be a very strict father with high expectations for his family, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, nor is it a surprise when you consider the position he held in society.  He had a reputation to uphold when it came to his family and their place in higher society.  When the socially acceptable order of his household was disrupted by a pregnancy out of wedlock by his daughter he becomes furious.  Knowing how this will affect the whole family, he banishes his daughter and disowns her because he does not believe in her claimed innocence.  As he is trying to protect the reputation of his family and maintain the structure that has been established, he is very strong and stands erect trying to maintain what he has fought so hard to build within his family and in community.  He will not sit by and let an act by his daughter ruin their standing in society. 

                In contrast to this familial structure where the father takes such a leading role we have the father in “The Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka.  In this family, the father starts out as someone who does not take his role as father at all.  He does not work, and in fact, it seems that he rarely even stands erect.  He sits around eating and reading the newspapers all day in his robe and requires his son to take his role as patriarch and support the family.   He provides no support to the family financially or in any other way.  However, after his son’s metamorphism, making him unable to provide, the father picks up his role and begins to work and assume the natural structure of the family as a provider.  He begins to stand up for his family and in fact, at one point Gregor, the son, realizes that roles have changed when he sees his father in his uniform he wears for work and has to look up, tilting his head back, in order to look at his father.  He describes his confusion at seeing this man who used to always be either sitting or lying down and “being quite incapable of standing up” but now “stood quite steady” while in turn, he, Gregor, is now the one creeping around close to the floor, unable to stand erect.

                Mark Jarman's story of “Iris” lacks the typical familial structure.  Although there are men who play the role of husband and father, they come and go and there is not a stable figure.   There is one reference that I believe created a great deal of influence on Iris, and that was the man that she was married to for 4 years who beat her.  I also believe that Iris’s childhood was filled with different husbands and boyfriends of her mother’s, and this would have played a large role in her feeling that life had always been “attained through horizontal movement.  Flight was escape, and rescue and escape were Iris’s religion.”, even though the men weren’t around long.  Without the stability of a father figure or male role, I can imagine the feeling of insecurity and lack of safety that Iris might have felt her whole life, always running to get away from them.  I also feel like that might be why she became so entrenched in Robinson Jeffers and living vicariously through his poetry.  He became a male figure she could relate to and go to when she needed guidance.  Everyone needs to feel safety and security and without a male figure in her life, she sought it out in her readings and felt that connection with Jeffers.

MOTHERS 

                The mothers of these stories also had unique roles.  In “The Marquise of O-” the mother is one who seems to stand up to her daughter and can be very aggressive and demanding of her, however, she is down on her knees a lot when she is around her husband and begging for the sake of the daughter.  She is very nurturing and wants to do what she can to allow her daughter to return back into the family structure after she has been banished, however, she is also conniving in trying to trick the daughter into admitting her secret.  I see the mother as bouncing back and forth between her allegiance to her daughter and to her husband.

                In “The Metamorphosis” the mother seems to be slightly nurturing when Gregor is thought to be sick in the beginning but once she discovers he has changed she loses the ability to look at him, see him, or interact with him.  Her concern seems to be more about the structure and order of the family and what will happen now that he is no longer providing.  However, similar to the father, the mother rises to the occasion and takes her place in the family structure when it is required.  They let the maid go and the mother assumes the responsibility of cooking and also begins sewing to help bring in financial support as well. 

                In “Iris” the role of mother is the most important role both with Iris’s mother and also with Iris as a mother.  Iris follows the example of her mother and just allows herself to latch on to whatever man is willing to help provide despite the dysfunctional relationship or dynamics of the family structure.  She is proud of the fact that her relationships at least lasted longer than her mother’s did.   As a mother Iris is very protective of her daughter and tries to provide for her.  I like the line “She had herself lifted her daughter up away from death, but as a mother cat mouths a kitten in its fangs and picks it off the floor.”  She knew that she had helped her daughter to rise above the difficulties of their life and had protected her enough to give her a better life.  I don’t believe there is a better depiction of a mother than one who can help her children rise above life’s trials. 

CHILDREN

                The role of children in these stories is interesting.  While Gregor is required to assume the role of the provider for his family in “The Metamorphosis” he is never really appreciated for what he does, and in fact, seems to be even looked at as holding the family back in some ways.  I was frustrated at the end of the story when it is discussed that now they can find a place to live that is not only cheaper in rent, since they can downsize now that Gregor is dead, but also has a better location and is more practical than their current living conditions, which Gregor had selected.  This implied, to me, that Gregor’s family viewed him as a hindrance that had not allowed them to be happy.  Yet, Gregor was the one that provided food on the table, shelter, and some sense of family order.  There were so many poignant moments in this story for Gregor.  Initially, when he goes through the transition of metamorphosis, it is so difficult for him to get up.  He struggles so much to get out of bed and it takes him a long time.  To me this was representative of his struggle to find a place and position in his family.  He had to work hard to become a traveling salesman and also to pay off his father’s debt and provide for his family.  He also had to work to establish a position within his own family which still seemed to be a struggle for him.    I felt the symbolism when he finally took the proper posture for a vermin and “flopped down upon his many tiny legs.  The instant this happened, he felt a physical ease and comfort for the first time that morning.”  I saw this as relief that he no longer had to stand and represent his family.  He was free of his responsibilities and it felt good and comfortable, which it should since he was not the father and should not have had the responsibility in the first place.  It felt comfortable because he was being allowed to assume the role of a son rather than the father and provider (despite the fact that he was now not even the son, but a pest instead).   It was sad that after all Gregor had done for his family the only time they noticed his sacrifice was when he had died and was no longer standing, even on his little legs.  Once he had been drawn completely down to the floor with no ability to stand in any form, then they noticed him and what he had gone through.

                The thing that struck me most with the Marquise in “The Marquise of O-” was how her stances changed depending on what role she was playing.  It seemed that as a daughter or sister she was always on her knees, or some other low position but whenever it came time for her to represent her own family, herself and her children, she would rise up, stand up for them, and let her stature show her position and role as a mother and widow.  For instance, when the father banished her from his house, “she had just thrown herself at his feet and tremblingly clasped his knees.” And then rose up to run from the room when the pistol went off.  However, just moments later as she is gathering her children and getting them ready to leave her brother appears and tells her that her father has demanded that the children stay with him in his home.  She comes to her feet and uses her erect stature to stand up for herself and her children and refuses to leave them there but instead insists that they will be with her, that her father cannot take them from her.  There is also the newspaper advert that the Marquise places in order to ascertain who the father of her child is.  She is willing to lose her social standing and be looked down on in order to protect her child and provide the proper family structure for that child when he/she is born.  This is a moment when I view her as standing erect and strong in defense of the unborn within her.

                I found the fact that once Gregors family had given up on him, he gave up as well and died shortly after. However, in contrast, when the Marquise’s family believed her innocence and came to her side, she was strong enough to establish a life for herself and stand up for herself and her children.  Likewise, with Iris, the fact that she believed in her daughter and tried to provide structure and stability for her enabled her as well.  I liked the idea that Ruth, her daughter, gets married in a hot air balloon, giving perfect meaning to the metaphor of rising above…she is rising above it all to build her own familial structure, thanks to the support of her own mother.  To me, all three of these stories emphasize the role that members of a family play, not only to the structure of a family as a whole, but also in the ability of individuals within that structure to be able to stand on their own within the family and  society.