In this chapter, Andrea starts by talking about the amount of control she has as a prostitute (which I can infer from the text she is selling her body and sexual favors for money and cocaine). She talks of "getting to the man" between the legs first instead of vice versa and how that gives her a sense of power. She mentions twisting and cement and blood and brick in repetition and talks about how God once again lets bad things happen to women. God lets women sleep in a position that is just asking for sex, putting the body in a position ready for sex. She talks of hating sleep because that's when men have come to rape her when she thought she was finally safe. Once again she questions Gods intentions if he has created the idea of sleep which is just another opportunity for a man to take advantage of a woman. She talks of wanting a woman who wants passion. Not a woman looking for food or looking for something material. She's so sick of giving herself to men, she wants to take pleasure in a woman. The waiter wants food from her and she aches for the woman because she wants something more than to be used again for sex. Andrea describes sex with a woman as freedom. Not feeling used but feeling empowered to enjoy sex the way it should be enjoyed.
When Andrea writes she almost has to rely on fiction to make things seem more normal. She can't write about rape with knives which is the true way her life has played out but instead writes about couples making love or teenagers having angst that was different from her own life story. Andrea talks of God creating the street light that makes the prostitutes look just inhuman enough that the men and young boys think they can do anything to them and it doesn't matter. This reminded me of when Andrea told her rapist her name to make her seem more human because often times rapists don't see their victim as a person and that's how they're able to hurt them so badly.
Andrea talks of using the knife on herself to take her own life but she doesn't seem to have the strength inside her to go through with it. It's interesting that men deem her worthy of using a knife on her but she doesn't think she can use one on herself to take herself out of her own misery. She talks of handling things just to get through life, "you handle it to stay alive". Near the end of the chapter Andrea once again turns to the role of God, asking him why God allows the big man that saves her to hurt her again. Andrea thought the big man saved her from the head of the gang but instead he wanted sex from her and she was hurt even more.
My heart breaks for Andrea because I don't know when she will ever get a break in life. It seems when she feels she is free of one bad situation she is thrown into another one that may or may not be worse. Andrea doesn't seem inherently religious but time and again she employs and questions the role of God and why he allows such awful things to continuously happen to her. Hopefully God will come to her aid in one of the next few chapters because I don't know how much more I can stand with Andrea continuously getting brutalized. It amazes me that she makes it out alive after every one of these experiences and I hope that in the upcoming chapters there is a chance for Andrea to become an empowered women who is no longer brutalized by men. I guess we shall find out…
No comments:
Post a Comment