Status is not the be-all of greatness. Beauty, money, and power aren’t either. Look at Janie. She was married off so she could live comfortably. She ran away because she was miserable. But Jodie was suffocating her and made her feel less than what she was. So when he died she felt great and free. We should all feel free. If we don’t then we can’t possibly be happy.

The idea of “happy” is greater and stronger than the idea of money and other superficial dreams. Happiness is worth everything. Money can only give you so much. It can give you power, but power can give you enemies. It can buy you an attractive exterior, but that can only give you enemies or the Barbie Doll look. No one is jealous or hateful over happiness. They only want to be happy themselves.

“Janie had robbed him of his illusion of irresistible maleness that all men cherish, which was terrible…” (79).

Janie deserves greatness and I was happy she achieved it by standing up to Jody (even if she embarrassed him). She deserves a man that can be free with her. Jody is too busy running a town to care what is going through his wife’s mind. He didn’t treat her right or respect her. She had too much spunk in her for him. He isn’t worth the ground she walks on, because of how controlling he is. This is so frustrating for me to read, because of how much more Janie can do for herself.

At this point I’ve read past Jody’s fate. Secretly, I’m gloating in it. However, now there is a bigger fish to fry.

“Janie’s first dream was dead, so she became a woman.” (25)

I remember the first big dream I had that soon became a non-reality. It was in that moment of sudden realization that part of me was thrust into a new sense of maturity. I was 16, like Janie. Looking back to where I was just a year ago, I can honestly say I was happier and more carefree then. I didn’t have a future to consider as seriously as I do now.

I grew up when I understood my biggest dream had slipped away into a dark abyss. It’s tough to wake up minus a dream, because you feel a bit deprived of life. I felt naked minus my ambition, like the single thing that defined me was gone. I found a new dream, but it’s a “safe” dream. It’s not risky or out there. If anything it’s reality. It’s fascinating, yet uncomfortable when life wakes you up. You know that there isn’t as much possibility as you originally conceived before.

I can relate to Janie searching for more. I understand how discontent she is with life. Joe was a promise for the old life she wanted once upon a time. I suppose our dreams can catch up to us, even after we give up. Or they can stay away forever if we keep certain ambitions at bay. It really depends on the dream. As for marriage, it has to do with love most of the time. Sometimes people marry for other reasons, but I’m in no position to judge what I don’t know about. All I know is I would take a page from Janie’s book any day. It’s great to be safe, like how Janie was with Logan, but if safety confines you it’s just as dangerous. I would lose my soul in a tight, loveless relationship. I’d rather live, then live without love.

Go to any group of females no matter the ages, and you’ll be in the thick of gossip. I’m a victim to the madness as much as I am a perpetrator. It is true some individuals gossip more than others, but it is equally true even the most innocent people have something to say about someone else:

So long as they get a name to gnaw on they don’t care whose it is, and what about, ’specially if they can make it sound evil. (6)

Janie is absolutely right. People, especially women, love to talk. Maybe it’s satisfaction from hearing their own voices or maybe it’s innate insecurity that creates an impulse to gossip. The gossip isn’t sweet either. Gossip is harsh and cruel. It normally is everything you wouldn’t say in front of someone, but exposed behind their back. It really is as evil as the name it’s painting.

Does discussing human nature’s tendency to expose dirty laundry in turn make the discussion its own kind of dirty? I don’t think so. This isn’t a gossiping book or pointing fingers. It’s a contradiction to slander that taints all lives. It’s truth in the roughest form. The only way to dry laundry in the antebellum south is to air it. It was not Hurston’s fault that the laundry was dirty.

I read about Daisy and in my head I thought, “What does she have to offer?” She was annoying, ignorant, and really oblivious. She let Tom cheat on her, didn’t watch her own child, and did nothing all day. And yet, she thought she had a tough life. The problems she had, she helped cause.

If she ever stood up to Tom I don’t know what would happen. Maybe he would have hit her like he did the former Myrtle. Maybe he would listen. If she threatened to leave, maybe he’d change. I don’t know what the outcome could be. But neither does Daisy, because she never tried to change her fortune.

Is she really worth having as a wife? Gatsby and Tom think so, but I greatly disagree. Consider what Jon Limjap said to Connie Veneracion:

My wife sometimes asked me if I would’ve married her had she been a fling or a one-night stand. My answer was “of course not!”

Marriage is reserved for people worth marrying. Anything less is a broken family in the making.

I’m not blaming Daisy on her failure of a life, but I don’t think she was ever really worth marrying and building a wife with to start with. She couldn’t decide who she loved or the extent of love she possessed. She married for money. Loved for money. Lived for the life money could buy. When she tasted something real she ruinedit. I think she was a bit self-destructive. Desirable as a damsel in distress, but contagious as a viper.

Jim went on to say people worth marrying were responsible. Daisy was reckless with everyone’s heart. She toyed Nick around, played with Gatsby’s emotions without conception of results, and when did she ever think about her child? She never ever put her daughter into consideration when she helped destroy her home life. She was irresponsible to the core, as well as completely selfish. She was decent to look at, I bet. I can see her as the image of a cloud (she wears enough white), but like a cloud she’s up in the air.

What is in the air isn’t worth catching sometimes. Once it comes down to earth it’s just not the same.

It’s obvious Tom and Daisy are wealthy and pretty focused on the material side of life. However, when they leave their comfortable life on the East Egg, those materials no longer hold as much value. Everything hits the fan in this chapter. Emotions run high and strong.

Nick, Jordan, Tom, Daisy, and Gatsby all decide to hang out one day. Big mistake, guys! Tom uncovers the truth about Daisy and Gatsby. After sitting on the truth, he declares his knowledge of the subject with rage and sadness. Daisy responds with just as much passion. Readers get to see them fight, love, and lose.

So, what does this have to do with the West and East Eggs? I’ve concluded once out of sheltered East Egg life, inhabitants return to their original selves. They have emotions and convictions, thoughts not based on money, but on feelings, and determination for more than their status. Family, friends, life and love all have new meanings. Once they cross the Long Island Sound to the West Egg, or even further, they are subject to real life. It’s not perfect. It’s ugly. But it’s real and what’s real cannot be helped:

“Self-control!” Repeated Tom incredulously. “I suppose the latest thing is to sit back and let Mr. Nobody from Nowhere make love to your wife. Well, if that’s the idea you can count me out. . . . Nowadays people begin by sneering at family life and family institutions, and next they’ll throw everything overboard and have intermarriage between black and white.”

Flushed with his impassioned gibberish, he saw himself standing alone on the last barrier of civilization. (Great Gatsby, p. 130)

This outburst from Tom greatly altered my perception of him. He was a real person outside his fidelity, abuse, and secrecy. He could fight for the wife he cheats on. He could grow tired of the facade. He could come out of his perfect world to challenge what’s wrong in place of what’s right. He could change. But only outside the East Egg.

The East Egg is a different life. In NYC, where the fight between Gatsby and Tom occurs, the rules East Egg dwellers play by no longer exist. Quiet fights become outright arguments. Doormat wives become tormented victims. Cheating husbands become heartbroken victims to Karma. The East Egg lifestyle doesn’t exist elsewhere.

I really liked Val’s analysis of this chapter. It’s really accurate, but also insightful to what is the “American Dream” so many hopefuls aspire towards. He was very “self-inspired” (Val’s blog, http://vgolf360.edublogs.org/), which fits the standard archetype of “American Dream” survivors. One needs to be motivated and inspired by poverty in order to overcome it. Gatsby did just this and well, let’s face it, he came out pretty well in the end. Minus the ending.

According to Aaron Peeples, “Achieving the dream takes hard work, dedication, and even a little luck.” Gatsby worked until he died. He worked on his image, his “friends,” his career, and Daisy. This consistent hard work is the dedication required. As for luck, that’s Nick. It just so happens Nick became his neighbor for a summer. Vwala!

One of the aspects that define American society are those true “American Dream” survivors. I’m using “survivors,” because it’s not an easy journey from nowhere to somewhere. There are many backstabbers, lies, black-market gimmicks, and other illegal, immoral acts that can be associated with success. Few people reach the top on decent, moral terms. They stepped on someone at some point to stand taller. That’s how it is. That’s America.

Maybe this is coming out harsh. It’s not meant to. I’m just saying, the “American Dream” is a dream of almost every American, but those who carry through to the end often lose the pure ambition. The purity is filled with corruption and deception, instead. Like Gatsby, the “spring” into a new form of themselves. The reinvention begins well, but life changes who you are. The “American Dream” isn’t a year-long adventure. It’s a life sentence. Anything lifelong will inevitably change you.

West Egg versus the East Egg. What’s the symbolic difference. Well, having come far enough in the book to know the characters motives, feelings, and desires I managed to come up with a decent one. But it was proved in the end of the chapter.

I thought the West Egg represented emotion. Notice how those who live at the West Egg have emotion (Nick and Gatsby)? Conversely, Tom and Daisy from the East Egg seemed to have no emotion. Just their lust for more money and power. This lust that divides the two “eggs” is represented by the Long Island Sound that separates them. Sound decent enough, right?

Well, I never got the chance to develop it further because at the end of chapter 5, it was evident how much emotion Daisy still had. She hadn’t gone cold yet. There was still some young, ambitious, loving teenager from pre-Tom days inside her: “…they looked back at me, remotely, possessed by intense life” (96). Clearly Daisy is at Gatsby’s level of infatuation and love. They are together “possessed” by emotion. If Daisy can match Gatsby’s emotional level, then my explanation of the East Egg cannot simply be, “it is a cold place.” However, I’m going to work on this further, because I think there is some truth to my theory. Maybe it needs fine tuning.

I plan to refurnish my idea and put it in my essay. It’s about the money aspect to American society. If I can somehow state accurately the difference between the East and West Eggs comes down to emotion versus wealth, then I can relate that to characters. By relation to American characters, I can inversely reflect the nature of American capitalism.

“‘Gatsby bought that house so Daisy would be just across the bay.” (78)

How many nights had Gatsby just looked out across the bay, like at the end of Chapter One? How many attempts did he make to see her? How many plans had gone astray? How sick in the head is he really?

I love that after Jordan Baker confides Gatsby’s secret to Nick he is shaken by the “modesty of the demand” (78). What about the absurdity and intensity of Gatsby’s infatuation? Wouldn’t that scare you witless? I wouldn’t have mind capacity left to be shaken by modesty. My mind would be consumed by worry for my cousin. Gatsby may seem all quiet and proper, but we all know it’s the quiet ones you have to worry about. He may have some panther in him.

In a pretty world, what Gatsby did is romantic. But we’re not in a pretty world. We’re in a real world, far from pretty and safe. Gatsby is doing one act short of stalking. He’s an obsessive man compelled by a distant memory five years past. He can’t move on. Can’t think clear. Can’t be his own person minus Daisy. Clearly, something is wrong.

According to Dana Peach, Infatuation has stages:

1) Love Stricken … Gatsby was there 5 years ago (and still is)

2) Intrusive Thinking …

Every experience you now have seems interwoven with their qualities, every shared moment weighted with new meaning. When apart from them, you review and relish each moment spent in their presence and ruminate on their flavor. In fact, many infatuation informants report spending 80 to 100 percent of their time compulsively trying to crystallize the vision of their new love, living in vigilant expectation of the next contact. (Peach, Infatuation)

3) Idealization … Gatsby is quite blind to Daisy and her faults.

4) Roller Coaster of L-O-V-E … “combination of hope and uncertainty” (Peach, Infatuation).

So just in case you didn’t believe that Gatsby was sketchy or infatuated, here’s all the proof you need. He really is in a state of awe, but the kind that leads people to live for someone else. Not good.

Do you ever think that you have the most gifted blog, or prettiest hair in your class, or even the most easy-going personality? Maybe you think, “Wow, that was really insightful of me. I’m pretty smart!” Maybe you think you’re the most modest person in your group of friends. Or maybe you think, like Nick, you are honest. In some way, shape, or form we all perceive ourselves as pure in one respect. It is our one undeniable virtue.

Outside our own narcissisms (we all have at least one), how accurate is our memory? Nick thinks he is completely honest. Well, let’s analyze his own bias towards himself. It’s possible, if not probable, that he has a bias geared toward believing his honesty is accurate. Note he doesn’t mention how exactly he defines honesty. To him, honesty could be to tell the truth most of the time and not all of the time. Or maybe honesty is telling the truth only about him. In that case his neglect to argue that Daisy was indeed not a Catholic, would be acceptable. My point is this: We have a bias and that bias is strongly reflected on how we define something.

From a scientific article I read I’ve discovered the origin of most biases: Positive events are recalled more accurately than negative ones. The emotional connection, whether it is good or bad, strong or weak, is important to how something it recalled. Therefore, Nick cannot justifiable say he is or isn’t honest. He is the most biased and critical of his life (obviously), so his interpretation of the past will inevitable sway to one side. With sway, certain facts are eliminated. Without facts, there isn’t accuracy. Without accuracy Nick is wrong to state himself “honest.”

Just saying, we can’t just call ourselves something. We don’t remember all the facts and without them we are unjustifiable in a conclusion. It’s important to note we have faults in our own memories and perceptions. It would explain how there are two sides to every argument, as well as two interpretations.