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The firemen wouldn’t let us go back into the house that night. It was still too dangerous. Dead or alive, I couldn’t imagine leaving without knowing about my cat. Regardless, I had to go. We piled into the car with just the clothes on our backs and a few of the firemen’s blankets, and made our way to my grandparents’ house to spend the night.
The next day, Monday, I went to school. When the fire broke out, I was still wearing the dress I had worn to church that morning but I had no shoes! I had kicked them off when I was doing my homework. They became yet another casualty of the fire. So I had to borrow some tennis shoes from my aunt. Why couldn’t I just stay home from school? My mother wouldn’t hear of it, but I was totally embarrassed by everything. The clothes I was wearing looked weird, I had no books or homework, and my backpack was gone. I had my life in that backpack! The more I tried to fit in, the worse it got. Was I destined to be an outcast and a geek all my life? That’s what it felt like. I didn’t want to grow up, change or have to handle life if it was going to be this way. I just wanted to curl up and die.
Explanation:
As it was extremely risky, the narrator and his mother were not allowed to enter the building. Despite having to depart, the narrator was concerned about his cat's condition. The narrator's heart ached to find about what had happened to his cat. He was concerned about his cat's condition, therefore it didn't matter if the news was of its death. Nonetheless, he had to depart from there.
When the narrator and his mother got into the car, they didn't have any belongings. Everything had been ruined by the fire. The firemen had offered them a couple of blankets. With that, the narrator and his mother drove to his grandparents' house to spend the night.
The next day of the fire accident, the narrator went to school. It had been a Monday. He was very upset since he felt his entire life had been ruined since starting at his new school. His only issue at first was adjusting to the new environment. But then his home was destroyed, as was his beloved pet cat. He couldn't figure out why he was having such a hard time in his life.
Most individuals, when something awful happens, tend to link following events to it and get concerned about why everything is going so terribly.
At the time of the fire, he was wearing the dress that he wore to the church on Sundays. He was not wearing his shoes. He had removed them and kicked them off when he sat to do his homework. They were burnt in the fire too. So, the narrator borrowed tennis shoes from his aunt. He did not want to go to school. But his mother forced him to go. He was embarrassed because his clothes were unusual, he did not have his school bag, books and homework notebooks. He thought that God wanted him to live like a person who was different from others and did not fit well into society.
The narrator's new school
The narrator was so upset that he wished to die, as he found it too hard to handle such an awkward situation.
Meaning of difficult words:
S.No | Words | Meaning |
1. | Piled | Things packed one after another |
2. | Casualty | A person or a thing killed/destroyed in an accident/war |
3. | Embarrassed | Feeling ashamed or shy |
4. | Outcast | A person who is no longer accepted by society or a group of people |
5. | Geek | A person who is willing to suffer the public humiliation for liking something strange |
Reference:
National Council of Educational Research and Training (2006). Beehive. A House Is Not a Home - Zan Gaudioso (pp.49-54). Published at the Publication Division by the Secretary, National Council of Educational Research and Training, Sri Aurobindo Marg, New Delhi.
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