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Post by Won Young Seo on Dec 9, 2015 16:22:20 GMT
It's a well-written story, but the biggest question here seems to be whether the man and wife truly love one another. I do think they love each other but they're just tired of everything. They've been battling opposition for years and just when everything seems like it settled down, the wife becomes sick. The fact that the man actively takes care of her and does all she requests and stays by her side shows that he cares for her, but he's clearly tired by everything, especially her lashing. The wife does sometimes show that she appreciates his efforts and feels guilty and sorry for dragging him down and caging him, but the pain and mental stress and exhaustion often leads to her lashing out at him.
The final image of the woman lying still in bed with her eyes closed and the flowers on her chest brings up an image of a dead person lying in a coffin. It's interesting that she ends up dying when "spring" comes to their house in the form of the flowers as opposed to the dying dahlias that represented her and the man's lives all throughout winter. The new flowers seem to mark new life: now that she has passed away, the man can start his life anew and free himself from the tether he was on.
Discussion Question: Do you think the husband should have left her? Did he gain anything from taking care of her?
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Post by Airy Yeh on Dec 9, 2015 19:48:26 GMT
I do not think that the husband should have left her and rightly so because he still cared for her and wanted to help her for whatever reason. I think this story depicted the couple's grieving process in the wife's death. The process of grieving occurs while she is still alive, and I think it was a positive situation for him to stay with her and go through it because he and the wife were able to come to terms with death while they were still alive and accept it. It could have been much worse where the wife dies suddenly and the husband is left to deal with his grieving by himself and long after her death. I think their relationship through the illness was strong because of the husband's patience and care, and the wife appreciates him. I think they both gained strengths and deeper connection to each other at the end when they are content and enjoy the flowers.
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Post by Alexis Iguina on Dec 10, 2015 4:06:02 GMT
I think the husband did the right thing by staying by her side. For one, she would probably have no one to take care of her. In order to be together they had to battle her family. And when his mother died, they were alone together. Thus she probably had no one to take care of her. For another, as Airy mentioned since they were grieving together while she was alive, it would be easier for him to come to terms with her death. There is a marriage vow that goes "Till death do us part." For me this couple really embodied that.
I think by taking care of her, the husband gained a good character. His patience was tested throughout the story and although at times he verbally displayed his negative feelings, he never stopped taking care of her. He continued to rub her belly when it hurt and read to her. Eventually his negative feelings faded until he "they waited together" like "two linked stems of a flower". In other words, their relationship strengthen to the point where even pain brought them together.
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Post by Cindy Xia on Dec 10, 2015 6:51:21 GMT
I don't think the husband should leave her because I still think he loves her very much. Although it seems as though he hates nursing her, that is not the case. Even when he's exhausted, he'd try his best to comply to her demands. If he decided to leave her he would have done it in the beginning when they found out she had the disease. I agree with Airy when she said that their relationship was still strong when the wife is ill. By taking care of her through the harsh times so how much he loves her and how much he's willing to sacrifice for her.
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Post by Wan X. Wu on Dec 11, 2015 6:50:20 GMT
I don't think the husband "can" leave her because his emotions for her are so strong. Before the wife getting sick he always felt jealousy, jealousy is a very strong feeling and it shows how much he cares about her. After she got sick and he was taking care of her, he found closure to the feeling of jealousy and worrying. Although they had arguments, he found peace with his old feelings and developed new positive feelings later on. After hearing from the doctor about his wife's situation, he developed appreciation for his wife.
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