Decisions (Pg. 140-152)

This chapter is conspicuously long, I think that the editor of the book dropped the ball here because the tone and ‘plot’ of the chapter abruptly switch around pg. 142, I would have broken it off there but maybe the next chapter would have been too short? In either case all it means for us is that this entry may take longer than usual, I don’t know because as this is the first paragraph I haven’t written it yet.

“Making decisions was the painful part for me, the part I agonized over,” isn’t this is the case for everyone? To remind the reader Bella has just had her faith struggle with whether or not Edward is a creature not human. She’s decided that no matter what he turns out to be she’s going to stick with him…obviously. Thomas Harris wrote in the book Hannibal that decisions aren’t made in momentus sequences. They are made almost instantly from the point where the decision is first pondered. Everything else is just posturing or fictional.

The whole reason Bella ducks into the forest to make a decision is for dramatic device. She knew all along whether or not she cared what Edward turned out to be. The only reason that anyone needs to indulge themselves in such activities is to back up the decision that they have already made. They need to convince themselves to do what they want to do, that isn’t making a decision that’s working up nerve. Harris’ detective in Florence at least confronted the idea of taking a bribe honestly.

That’s why Bella finishes her sojourn into the woods with this, “This decision was ridiculously easy to live with. Dangerously easy.”

“Dangerously”? I’m still trying to work around the progression of the story. When the last section ended Bella wasn’t positive what it was that Edward happens to be, so what is so dangerous about the decision? If you put yourself into her shoes, at this point the only thing you have decided is that you are going to stick with this guy (if he’ll have you, he is still ambivalent about that) even if he is possibly something other than human. Which, for Bella, is a hope shrouded in a fear.

So, living with her-hard-to-make-but-easy-to-deal-with-decision (wow just like Heidegger) she goes back to sketching out her Shakespeare paper for the English class we know nothing about. I mentioned before, and this will be the last time, but since English class isn’t the crux of the relationship between Bella and Edward it’s not important for us to know about it. The plot Meyer has established so far means that as far as the reader is concerned Forks HS, should contain a cafeteria, Biology, and Gym. Even gym is a stretch, but Bella’s clumsiness must pay off later since she’s stressed it so much. Bella’s homework should be Bio, and it should be about blood typing since that was the last time she was in class. Like the doomed fat guy pilot at the end of A New Hope, we need to stay on target.

The only point to mentioning English class is to show once again that Bella is smarter than anyone else in the school. This does become the running theme of the end of the chapter though, while emotionally she’s completely out of touch Bella is going to over compensate by lording her intellect over us the reader. She however must think we’re idiots. First off she’s at the school, early, by herself obviously trying to catch the Cullens coming in.

“My homework was done—the product of a slow social life—…” This is just a flat lie. What more does she want in her social life? She’s the newest kid in the school, been invited to the dance by three different people, went to the beach party, and has a good deal of friends,* and sits at a reasonably popular table in the lunch hall. In prison terms, she’s part of a decent gang. She sits down to work on her trig and Mike comes to flirt with her.

No matter how much I try, I just can’t hate Mike. He’s wearing shorts and a rugby shirt because the temperature has spiked to 60, we call that early summer in the North. He speaks to her a little bit, they talk about English class. Even though it comes up again, and is now part of the super trite side plot involving Mike and Bella, it still should have been about, again Biology. Since Bella fainted and Mike carried her out of the room, it makes it seem like there is a legitimate connection between them even if Bella doesn’t think so. Plus it gives Mike a great opener, “here’s the notes/assignment you missed when you fainted…”She’s finished the Macbeth paper, Mike hasn’t started so he asks her the topic. Which, is groan inducing but here it is, “Whether Shakespeare’s treatment of female characters is misogynistic.”

Based on Macbeth!? Not get all Assistant Professorly on her but the only conclusion that she can really draw is “no.” The only female characters in Macbeth are the murderous then remorseful wife, the witches, and then Hecate. All of them pull the strings for the title character, I guess they’re the ultimate villains but the only point for Bella to be writing that paper is for the author to make the character a feminist. Which would be oddly contradictory for her since she spends all of her time pining over Edward and never once really asserting herself. Currently, she only defines her life by the guy she wants to date, I’ve known many feminists and I think they would consider her not among them. Though, if I were to be honest I would like to read that paper.

Bella turns Mike down, but instead of asserting herself she deflects, “Really Mike are you blind?” She tells Mike to go out with Jessica, and Mike seems perplexed. Apparently he hadn’t read the guide to women yet (it’s on my list), or he had, noticed that Jessica liked him but wanted Bella more. Never mind, that minor plot detail is now settled. Mike is with Jessica and Bella who is alpha ascendant in their group can go back to having no social life.

This is a two pronged section which has nothing to do with Bella’s confrontation with herself in the forest. The first is to deal with Mike once again showing that Bella is supremely intelligent. That, however, didn’t need to happen on its own. It could/should have taken place at the beach where it wouldn’t seem so out of place. Take it out and nothing changes. The second is to set up the trip to Port Angeles to buy dresses for the dance that she isn’t going to with the girls that aren’t her friends further establishing the utter lack of social life that she experiences.**

There’s an odd couple scenes with Charlie that I’m skipping discussion about now, but reserve the right to bring up later. It concerns their interaction as Bella acts like mother to him and it begins to progress beyond her advanced maturity.

She grabs a book, which is of course “The Collected Works of Jane Austen.” I tend to pick on English majors just because I’m in Philosophy but the women tend to fall into a stereotype that I just love to exploit. The biggest one is that they love love love Jane Austen, and it’s such a clichéd stereotype that I’m guessing that Bella has a collection of Buckowski right next to it.

Ultimately she decides after her second incursion into nature to go along with the girls to get the dresses. The motivating factor behind this is that she sees the Cullens aren’t back from their camping trip and she needs to get out of town to keep from looking for Edward all of the time. Feminist indeed.

*Not to her, because she must maintain the loner persona, but everyone else would think she was rather popular.

**Your sarcasm detectors should be in the red right now.