Week 5, Post 2: Mrs. Dalloway

I feel like Mrs. Dalloway had many different feelings for the characters in the book. Although she is married to Richard, it seems as though she has the least feelings for him. They seem to have grown apart over the years, which she seems perfectly fine with, but it is also odd that she would want to marry him and stay with him for so long knowing things have changed. She talks about two other people that she has had feelings for in the past, that she still seems to have feelings for. The first one she talks about is Peter and how he was an ex lover, that asked her to marry him, but she said no. She talks as though she still has feelings for Peter, wanting him to follow his dreams in life and live. Peter seems to always be in the back of her mind. Then she thinks that she had fallen in love with a girl named Sally, but she is still kind of unsure what the whole deal with Sally was. She speaks of her highly, and says that her feelings for her were completely different from feelings of any man. It's a little confusing because it doesn't seem like Mrs. Dalloway knows what she wants, but at the same time she seems perfectly content with the "relationship" that she is in.

Then there is Septimus and Lucrezia, it's kind of sad to see what Septimus had become after fighting in the war. The shell shock sometimes gets the best of him and makes him look like a mad man. It sometimes seems like his wife is always taking care of him, telling him what to do. Lucrezia still stays by his side through all of the screaming and yelling, but at one point she doesn't understand his yelling because I believe a doctor told her that nothing was wrong with him.

Later Peter comes to the house and Clarissa and him talk for a while about the memories they used to have and what they used to do. Thinking back to all of those times Clarissa starts to wonder why they never married. It makes me think that Clarissa has always had a thing for Peter. I just don't understand why she married Richard and still continues to be with him although there is barely anything left. Of course Peter asked if Clarissa was happy being with Richard, but Peter never got the answer because Elizabeth came through the door! But Clarissa made it very clear that she wanted Peter to attend the party she was going to be having.

Peter obviously still has feelings for Clarissa, but it all seems complicated.

They use the word queer a lot, when they think something is odd. We hardly ever use the word queer these days, it seems to be a harsh word now that the younger generation has turned it into a hurtful word. I also thought it was cool that Peter puffed rings when it smoked his cigar. Seems like that trick has been around for at least 100 years! Of course they used to smoke a lot more than that, it makes me wonder if they used to do other smoke tricks the kids do these days. I mean I'm guess they had to learn them from somewhere but I wouldn't think that parents these days would be showing their kids how to blow smoke rings or French inhale. It just seems a little odd to think a parent would teach their kids smoking tricks, but I guess that is from my point of view. My parents don't smoke.