Elegendmom In October

In October we chosed the book  'Island of the Blue Dolphines '.

It is a story about a girl who left alone in a small island called the Blue Dolphines.

The story has a historical background that a girl survived for 18 years by herself and was rescued. She is called the Lone Woman of Sna Nicolas.

But as Lois Lowry wrote in the Introdution of this book, I'd like to remember this woman as 'Karana', the name that Scotte O'Dell gave to her.

I think that the author was deeply moved by her whole life.

And he wove the fragment of  facts about her into a beautiful story.

Living alone a deserted island was surprising, but something more impressing to me was her way of treating the nature, especially the way how she built the friendship with animals.

She lost her little brother, Ramo by the attack of a wild dog. He was the one and only human in the island with her. She made a vow to kill the wild dog with yellow eyes and all his pack.

She prepared weapons for the revenge, which she reluctantly did because of the tribe's taboo.

With all her effort and waiting, she got the chance to kill the wild dog and shot the arrow in his chest. The wild dog finally fell down but it didn't make him dead. She could have shot another arrow, but she didn't. She carried him to her house and healed his wounds instead.

She wouldn't kill any animals only for her own needs. She guessed that her father and her sister would have laughed at her. But she became a part of her island and the nature surrounding her.

She thought - actually the author thought- that

'Without animals the earth would an unhappy place'.

We talked about the protagonist's 'feeling when she lost her family members and lived all by herself, especially the way she shared her feeling with animals like otters, birds, sea elephants etc. She didn't consider Mother Nature as the object she must conquer for her survival.

She chosed to live happily together with animals.

EunJung said she recently had a hard time because of the realtor when she bought a house.

She believes if she is good to others, they would be good to her too.

However she said it didn't always work that way.

Sometimes the relationship with people disppoints us.

That's why we read books like  'Island of the Blue Dolphines '.

And we talk about it and share feelings and get some healing.

We all dream a happy life. Reading is one of the healthy ways to get it.