Skunk Dreams

As I took my first glance at the title of this article, I was so confused at what I was about to read. I didn't know if somehow Erdrich was going to enlighten me on the possible dreams skunks could have, or even how she was going to relate her story to the title.

After I got used to the title, I dug in. The first few pages were such a difficult read, nothing could catch my interest. It wasn't until Erdrich started to compare the dreams and the stories in the article to obstacles in life that I started to zone into the reading.

The character in the story always wanted to get past the fence. It was her "obstacle". At the time it seemed nearly impossible to her because according to Erdrich the fence was, "chain-link in places, chicken wire, sagging X wire, barbed wire on top, jerry-built with tipped-out poles and uncertain corners nailed to log posts...". It seemed too difficult to get through, but she wanted to see the other side, and find the animals that are behind the fence.

Erdrich makes it clear that obstacles aren't ever easy to overcome. You are always going to desire something and it's in that desire where you find your obstacle. If you have a strong goal then you will push for it, but along those lines is another cliche that I found in Erdrich's article, you always want what you can't have.

In the article she wanted to see that horizon that she missed so much. She liked where she was living, but she didn't get the pleasure of seeing that horizon that she used to see everyday and because of that she had to settle for less than what she wanted.

I believe that Erdrich had some good points in her article, but I believe that she could have made the story a lot less confusing. It felt very scattered at first, and that made me lose a lot of my interest really fast. If I wasn't forced to read it, I don't think she would have sold me on the first page, and I would have given up. To add onto that  I think that it was quite strange that she had the skunk part in the story. I mean to a point I believe that it added good detail and she made use of it toward the end, but depending on how you took the reading I think you could have ended with different thoughts.

For the future, I think that this story could create a good class discussion. It has a lot of peculiar parts to it that could spark up a great conversation, or even allow other classmates to see something from the story that they might have missed.