Journal #5

Journal #5

Many decisions were made thought the story. Some decisions were wise and came with many benefit to the characters and moving the story along, while other were blood-curdling and life-threatening for some of our protagonists. I personally was moved by one of the most important events in the whole book, where Winnie took the Spring Water from the bottle and poured it on the toad. This decision definitely made us think about what Winnie’s perspective of immortality really is. I mean, she really did want to marry Jesse and run away with him and never age, never reach an end, but she also preferred a normal growing life instead of a life where you were stuck, a life where you are everlasting. The Tucks never knew about this until 60 years later, when they found Winnifred’s tombstone, that’s when Mae realized, that Winnie never chose to live forever, which would make Jesse and Mae heartbroken and sorrowful. Then we have Mae’s decision of taking Winnie with them, after she told her the Tucks secret. This decision affected Winnie and the Tuck both in positive and negative ways. The most important one, was the chance to meet Winnie, to be able to know her and love her like a child, and obviously the ability to gain her trust was one of the most beautiful moments in the book. Then there was the death that followed, the man in the yellow suit was willing to use something so powerful yet so dangerous for money, but the Tuck would not let him, and so death came upon him quicker than all they expecting, bringing greater consequences towards the Tucks and possibly making Winnie realize death is more traumatizing than expected.

When it comes to my choice, what would I do with those important decisions? As I mentioned previously, I am a coward, but when life does not give me the chance to run away from the problems, there is no other way, but to solve them. In Winnie’s situation, I would have given the water away, just not to a toad. I would never have drunk the water because, if four strangers had the time of the day to take me to their cottage, and tell me all the consequences about being immortal, I would listen to them. I know the toad is a very important symbol in the book, but I wouldn’t have given it to the toad, I would have just kept the bottle a secret, stays with me always, and every night when I lay awake, I contemplate the choice of drinking the spring water while the crystalline spring water dances up and down the bottle. To finalize, we have Mae, he had to make a challenging decision, which had even odds of turning out good or bad, unfortunately for the Tucks it resulted in nothing but disaster. I definitely understand where Mae is coming from, she has to keep the secret no matter what, and if it implied taking a child to their cottage, shell make the choice. Thought the novel Mae has many minor decisions that did not really change the course of the story, but one mayor decision she had, was defending herself from a man in a yellow suit, that abruptly ended in death. You see, Mae had every right to attack him or defend herself, but she could not kill a man, I definitely would not kill a man, never in my life would I want to do such a thing. Mae and Winnie showed a fierce attitude thought the story, their calm in the face of danger made them two of the most important characters from the story. I would never have been able to do such things, but I would have tried to act right in the spot and as smartly as possible.