I know what you are thinking, out of all of the places that the characters visit in the novel, why would I pick Babies R Us? Well for one, I didn't want to pick another damn casino and more importantly, I believe that this particular place represents a pivotal moment in the book for Allison Johnson.
As children, the majority, if not all, of us have probably ventured inside a Toys R Us, whether it was against our will or not, and explored all manner of fluffy objects and Lightsabers. But to Allison Johnson, it was a different experience entirely - sobering if not traumatic. Looking over all of the products, the families with their babies, and finally coming to a rest outside of the store on a bench, she cannot help but envision her baby son coming to the store with his new parents, what he must look like, and how much he must be growing.
This moment in the novel is a melancholy one, however, amongst a plethora of bad choices that Allison has made throughout the story, this one puts a break in that trend as allowing her newborn son to be put under the protection of other parents was probably the best decision she could have made in her condition.
If there's anything that ensures a bright side to any seemingly depressing or mundane situation it's the idea of new life, whether it's in human form or not, and I love how Willy Vlautin inserts these bits and pieces of hope and joy into the text of Northline; they add depth and meaning not only to the characters, but to the overall storyline.
Below is a link to the Google Maps of the Babies R Us I visited off of Kietzke:
https://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=babies+r+us+reno&fb=1&gl=us&hq=babies+r+us&hnear=0x809940ae9292a09d:0x40c5c5ce7438f787,Reno,+NV&ei=QZmgUOXiMsi1iwK0i4CIBw&ved=0CLwBELYD
No comments:
Post a Comment