Young Doctors And Michael Christian example essay topic

At first reading, this story seems to be a little discouraging. The boy telling the story, the main character Michael Christian, and the other children reside in this home where the Old Head Nurse oversees and there only link to the outside world is a black and white cracked Zenith television set with no knobs, a dime stuck in the channel selector and the sound and picture work at different times. There was the Human Skeleton that would bite people, the Big Boy who ran away every night, and the guy locked away on the sun porch who the Young Doctors were taking apart an arm and a leg at a time. It looks as if there is no hope for these kids. The segregation between the children in the ward and the nurses is established early in the story.

When the Old Head Nurse suggests watching more appropriate holiday programming like Frosty the Snowman Michael Christian responds, "Fuck Frosty!" He wants to see "The Birds". I think this segregation is further emphasized by the fact that words like "Old Head Nurse" and "Young Doctors" are capitalized; it generalizes the authority figures in this story and conglomerates them all into one group. Michael Christian displays an attitude that doesn't exactly correspond to his name throughout the story. He has dreams of one day being able to do a split onstage like his idol James Brown, so he practices singing and buds an afro. These dreams are initiated and fueled the Young Doctors and Michael Christian embraces them as his hope, that and yearning to see "The Birds".

The young man that is telling the story is Michael Christian accomplice in the common desire to the see "The Birds". He obsesses about this movie during the entire story, but I think he has reason to. He's in a bleak situation; he's been at this establishment for many Christmases and he has seen many kids ask for gifts and get disappointed including him; the Head Nurses treat him as a loud nascence, but he is tired of getting ball point pens, he wants something different and so he hopes to see "The Birds" this year for Christmas and make his desire vocally know. I look deeper into this story and I see the symbolism.

The only actual tie these children have to the outside world is this cracked Zenith that has been twice handed down. It's as if the author was trying to convey that these children were placed at the bottom of the barrel. They couldn't even get a hand me down, instead they receive hand me downs that had already been handed down; third hand. I think this was also how these children were seen by the community that they lived in. Ballpoint pens, recycled, already been played with toys, and almost unachievable aspirations like becoming James Brown is what these children were given for Christmas. It was more or less out of sympathy that people like the society ladies and Practice Preachers would visit these children for Christmas.

Hearing the story of the Nativity told by the Practice Preachers, Michael Christian motioned the plucking out of his own eyes; an action I think conveys the degree of lowness that he felt. "Why pluck out someone else's eyes? They have more hope of getting out of here than me", is what I think he was probably feeling. But hope lied in his desire for "The Birds".

A man named Sammy came to visit the children and when he first comes he is drunk and wearing a dirty Santa suit; handing out Timex Junior wristwatches to all the kids. When the reader describes this scene he states he still has his watch, somewhere. This shows how he felt about the wristwatch, it was dispensable and unimportant and I don't think that it was because he didn't like the wristwatch, but because it came from a blubbering slob. Who wants a gift that came from someone who doesn't really care about them or himself for that matter? Sammy asks the children what they want for Christmas and they answer him without enthusiasm or hope. The night porter lets him out through the sun porch.

I see the actual setting of the home as a heaven and earth; they are equal in a sense and the sun porch is a kind of Purgatory. As people pass through the sun porch they enter the home, earth and try to do their good deeds. For the society ladies, they spend time with the children, the Practice Preachers read them the story of the Nativity in an attempt to expose the children to some form of God, and for Sammy he renders gifts as his good deed. All of them come in from the outside, heaven, through the sun porch, Purgatory, and into the home, earth and they leave in the opposite fashion.

They leave earth through Purgatory and into heaven to the outside. This is a little ironic, the outside may be seen as a type of heaven; freedom to the kids trapped inside the home, but in actuality the outside is an even harder type of living than the one that they have been exposed to. As long as they are in the home they never have to worry about their basic needs not being met, which to me seem like a type of heaven. Everyone else is well aware that things such as poverty and war exist on the outside, not exactly heaven.

In the end I think that there is a sense of hope. Michael Christian eventually gets what he wants for Christmas and though he doesn't say much during the movie I think in the end he is grateful. He is different; he's quiet like the Shepard's when they saw the angels for the first time. They were sore afraid, and although I don't think that Michael Christian is sore afraid I think he is in a state of awe. He thought he'd never get a Christmas wish fulfilled here in the home and because he does, the emotional wall that he has had during the story is broken down by the act of kindness shown by the old head nurse. This is further emphasized by the fact that author of the story uses lower case at the end of the story in the title of the old head nurse.

The segregation between the authority figures and the patients is non-existent for the moment in time where Michael Christian's attention and everyone else's attention is on "The Birds". At the movies end, Michael Christian buries his head in his pillow. He no longer has to sustain his false image, the wall is gone and he can be himself, not the loud, angry, James Brown impersonating boy that he was and the afro doesn't matter anymore. It is disposed of like the emotional wall.

He is changed.