Book 3 Listicle

5 Reasons Arnold’s Life Sucks

Arnold’s Life isn’t just bad, it sucks! I don’t know how he can put up with all the misfortunes he has been dealt.

1.    Arnold is a Hydrocephalic:

Hydrocephalus is a condition when a child is born with excess cerebrospinal in their brain. This condition causes the head to swell and causes many problems including mental disabilities. This condition “Mucked up the works” and caused Arnold to talk with a stutter and a lisp. Because Arnold talks funny, he is picked on and beaten mercilessly. He became an outcast of the outcasts as Native Americans were shunned from society anyways.

2.      Arnold is Extremely Poor:

The worst part is that being poor is out of his control, it ran in the family. He states that his parents “came from poor people who came from poor people who came from poor people, all the way back to the very first poor people.” And now there is Arnold who came from those poor people. He is so poor that when his dog is suffering from heat exhaustion, his dad has to shoot the dog in order to avoid paying the vet bills. In fact his entire reservation is poor. In his school on the reservation, his geometry book is the same one used by his mother over 30 years ago!

3.      Arnold is Shunned for being Indian:

When Arnold asks his parents “Who has the most hope?" they both respond at the same time saying “White People.” Indians are outcasts in many places of society. They are poor and they are different. On his first day at his new school in Reardan, a middle class white town, everyone stares at him. He looks like he doesn’t belong. He feels like he doesn’t belong. The only other “Indian” there is the school mascot! This causes Arnold to be picked on a lot by his classmates.

4.      Arnold is Shunned by his own tribe:

As if it’s not bad enough that Arnold is an outcast at his new school and is shut out of modern society, he is shut out of his own home! Arnold throws his Geometry textbook in a fit of rage after he finds his mother’s name in it and ends up hitting his teacher, Mr. P, in the head. This causes Arnold to be expelled from the school. After Arnold leaves the reservation to go to his new school, his friends feel as if he betrayed them. Rowdy, his best friend, felt so betrayed that he punched Arnold in the face! Arnold felt like he “was the kind of idiot that got punched hard in the face by his best friend.” After that the two become enemies even playing each other in a game of basketball. In their first game Arnold is booed by the crowd and knocked unconscious by Rowdy who hit him in the head! I guess it was payback for hitting Mr. P.

5.      Arnold’s life is ravaged by Alcoholism:

His mother is a former alcoholic. His father is a current alcoholic. His grandma is run over by a drunk driver. His father’s best friend is shot in the face and killed by one of his friends “who was too drunk to even remember pulling the trigger,” while fighting over the last sip of alcohol.  His sister and new husband both die in a house/camper fire after drinking too much. That sucks!

 

Arnold’s life sucks. Born both poor and hydrocephalic. Shunned by both the outside world and his home. Alcoholism plagues his life. But aside from all this, he somehow manages to keep up hope. Hope for the future and hope that he will make it out ok.