The House on Mango Street (vol. I)

Human beings are a unique species in their vast ability to learn. Which is to say that humans readily change their behaviors or thinking patterns based upon new experiences. In many ways, that’s what humans are: a summation of experiences. Throughout a person’s life they weave together a quilt of life made of threads of experiences. Funny though, that sometimes we are so unwilling to participate in sowing. Indeed, this is precisely what is at the heart of Ciseneros’ work: a young girl attempting to forge an identity in a world she doesn’t want to belong to. In ways I could relate to the work as a child who spent my entire life moving from place to place. Each time reaching back to something previous to find identity. “No I’m not from Iowa or even like it, I’m from Texas,” I would say. But then after a while you wonder how much you can relate to where you came from. My grandparents were first generation Americans so if I went to Mexico I’m a “gringo.” We are people without a home. Travelers who are forced to find our identity in the travelling, in the struggle. While I’d never consider myself a Yankee or even Southern (there is the Republic of Texas and everybody else), I cannot deny that my time in the North shaped me. These experiences some good, some bad, some I’d like to forget have all become a part of who I am. Esperanza has to mature to understand the same and embrace the experiences on Mango Street as a part of who she is, something that goes deeper than where she came from.