The Value of Love in "A Yellow Raft in Blue Water"
The Value of Love in "A Yellow Raft in Blue Water"
Everyday choices that we make are based on the values that we have learned throughout life. We learn these values from the most influential people in our lives, our parents. Our parents constantly teach us important life lessons, starting from day one. We watch, imitate, and dream to be just like them. We learn what is right and wrong from them, even though we try to cross the line from time to time. This line represents our values. The novel, A Yellow Raft in Blue Water, shows the values of one generation, and how they help create the values of the generations that follow. Rayona, Christine, and Ida, the three main characters, reveal similar values through the decisions they make. Though they all have their own unique values, the one value that they all display is love. This “love” is expressed as a fundamental or sometimes even an essential value.
Rayona finds herself yearning for the love of her family; this includes her father, other family that she is not close with, but primarily her mother. Rayona was born into a dysfunctional family. Her mother, Christine, is always in and out of the hospital due to her heavy use of alcohol, “In the last year mom has become a regular at Indian Health Service…she wakes wheezing from too much party or from passing out on top of the covers and the next thing she’s back in the ward for tests” (p 8). This causes Rayona to be the one who takes care of Christine, as if the roles were reversed. As for her father, he too is constantly in and out of her life. “[Rayona] I have tried things on Dad too…tears, good grades, writing letters, getting him presents…one time [Rayona] even hung around on the route he was delivering” (p 9). Her father seems to never put enough effort into trying to be with her. He also does not put out the “good husband” image, he is constantly cheating on her mother, but Christine won’t divorce him. Instead, she stays out late partying and drinking. Rayona has never really felt loved by either one of her parents, and it wasn’t until she ran away and found Sky and Evelyn that she finally did feel...