Something about Mary Robison’s “Yours”
struck me. Maybe it’s because I love autumn and Halloween so this makes me
think of candy corn, pumpkin pie, the changing of the leaves, and the warm
smell of cinnamon. Unfortunately, this piece exudes none of that coziness, and
instead leaves you with the taste of sour, rotting apples.
At first I didn’t give much thought
to the fact that the story is set during the autumn, and now I realize that it
is the most fitting. It is a time of endings, though not yet the finish that is
winter. It is the coming of the inevitable: trees losing their leaves, the end
of a cycle. What adds to the intensity of this is that “most leaves had been
blown away already”; time is up and nature is signaling it. Also, the image of
pumpkins is a fleeting one. They only last a short while before they begin to
rot. Both of these autumnal images help to indicate the coming of an end.
There is one other image that just struck
me as I was re-reading the piece: the “yellow vigil candles”. Candlelight
vigils are typically held in remembrance of a lost life. Allison and Clark use
vigil candles to light their pumpkins, and before they retire to bed Allison
tells Clark, “‘Don’t blow out the candles. I’ll put in new ones tomorrow’”.
This statement is tragic in that she cannot put new ones in tomorrow. All night
these candles held a silent vigil for her.
I really like your interpretation of the "yellow vigil candles" in that Allison holds her own vigil by not blowing out the candles. This makes me wonder whether Allison knew she was going to die that night or if it just happened. Throughout the story, Allison's sickness is hinted at but never directly stated. For example, the first line mentions "Allison struggled away from her white Renault". This 'struggle' could be interpreted as the heavy pumpkins weighing her down or it could refer to her own weakened state. Likewise, there is mention of her wig. And eventually, the author comes right out and says Allison is dying. Clark and Allison spend the entire night carving pumpkins as obvious tension erupts between the couple. It is almost as if the pumpkins are just something to due to occupy their hands and keep the sparks of an all out feud from exploding. So, my question then becomes, if Allison has some inclination that she is dying, why would she rather engage in this tense stand off with her husband than spend her last few hours "getting drunk" as Clark puts or really anything besides this?
ReplyDeleteI really like how you found the parallels between the changing of the seasons with the closing of life. The foreshadowing that you associated with the candlelight vigil is something that i overlooked my first time reading this story. I also found the mention of the wig to be incredibly deceiving because i first took it as simply meaning she was dressed for Halloween. Although I think my favorite line of the story was when Clark expresses his final wish to get drunk once more with Allison. I personally found that comment insightful to the mechanics of their relationship possibly meaning that their best times together were when neither of them even felt like they were truly there at all.
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