The Center of Everything
The Center of Everything written by Laura Moriarty is her very first book. The setting is in Kansas and it is during the Reagan Administration. Moriarty vividly describes one girl’s hardship in growing up with a single parent and the troubles of trying to stay positive in a negative environment. Her mother is not quite the role model to look up to but she stands to persevere. I am only half way through the book, but so far this child (Evelyn) has to deal with being so poor that her mother can even purchase her shoes. She is a smart and happy girl but is stuck in a horrible situation that her mother has placed them in. I would feel that this book would want its readers to try to look through the eyes a child and how poverty can influence the decisions that this child has to overcome on a daily basis. Readers will talk about the mother and her choices that she has made, such as sleeping with a married man, whom she hopes that by doing so this guy will leave his wife (who can’t bear children for him) for her. He doesn’t though. And Evelyn’s mother gets pregnant and when she finally notices that she is it is too late to abort. She is deathly sick throughout the pregnancy and the baby is born a preemie with a lot of birth defects. Evelyn describes this moment of her life as a line on a map. One that separates the states yet is invisible and she states that with what her mother has done…lying…hiding…and depression, Evelyn has drawn an imaginary line between her mother and herself.
As single parent myself, I feel that Evelyn’s mom, Tina, doesn’t care about anyone but herself. It shows. She thinks that the only strength that she has going for herself is her looks when she should try other venues. But she doesn’t, she just digs herself a bigger hole. She doesn’t notice her daughters needs and she is placing more stress and responsibility on her little girl. Evelyn is only in fourth grade and had to take care of herself for more than three days when her mother became depressed and stayed in her room. She lived off cereal and TV those three days and when the milk ran out she had to wake her mother out of the funk that she was in. This is so wrong on so many levels. A child should never be subjected to that type of parenting, and be forced to grow up and teach themselves and live on their own while there is an adult present but still absent.
In this book, Evelyn was introduced to the title of Welfare Queen and she is trying to understand what this concept is and why it isn’t good. The government was allowing people who are in low incomes to apply for cash assistance, Evelyn has to go with her mother after the depressing news of her being pregnant and try to apply for help. But her mother blows this opportunity as well, by getting mad at the lady who asks her who the unborn child belongs to. So once again Evelyn is embarrassed by her mother actions and reactions. The police had to bring them home because she flipped out in the heat of the day and laid down on the lawn in front of the highway. She was baring it all and causing a scene. The police officer brought them home and the next day Evelyn had new shoes…because the day before she was forced to go to the welfare office without shoes.
When I was a child, I grew up in such circumstances and so much worse than that of what Evelyn had to go through. I was homeless several times as a child with my parents and knew all about the Welfare System and Medical and food stamps and AFDC. Not fun going through school as a child who is aware that you are poor and need a lot of help. But I was a special child, one who got all A’s and skipped a grade such as Evelyn who was succeeding in her school as well.
I bought this book at a yard sale some four years ago and the reason I bought it was the fact that it was describing a story of a single family home and the trials and tribulations that she and the child had to go through. I never finished though. So I am hoping that I finish it now.
When it comes to literature, I would think this book falls into the category of New Realism due to the fact that it shed light on situations or events that most children are unaware of because adults try to censor it from them. When in actuality more and more kids are subjected to this type of poverty and situations with out an escape or a way to talk about it. This way the book can be used in a manner of a way for them to talk about it openly. This type of reading mirror’s real life situations that people face on a day-to-day basis. It is hard to read sometimes because of the truth that is underlined by what this child has to face. So it will be a book that I will finish before the summer ends.