Their parents had told her and the other children which someday they would move into a house that would be their own. This gave the children many expectations. The house was supposed to be white. With two stories and a big unfenced yard. The result was that the house on Mango Street was not anything like the narrator imagined.
The things that we dream of having one day are not always what the reality will be. The family’s first home was located on Loomis Street. They lived in an apartment on the third floor where the “water pipes broke and the landlord wouldn’t fix them because the house was too old” (147). It seems as though the landlord has no consideration for the basic needs the family, so they had to leave the home. They lived uncomfortably and “would have to use the washroom next door and [carry] water over in empty milk gallons” (147).
* poem "drifters" about a family who continuously pack belongings and move, to mothers disapproval * mother dreams of settling down, building a house she can call home. but each time that they move, part of this dream dies. "she won't even ask....wish". * tone used in quote regret. mother regrets leaving house because she wants to settle down but she is also getting sick moving around and has given up hope starting new life.
She describes the house on Mango Street as sad, dark and uninviting. She shares a bedroom with her father, mother, two brothers and little sister, which leaves no room for privacy. Esperanza has hopes, plans, and dreams to buy the idealistic home she always dream of. Esperanza often observes the women that live on Mango Street. She views them as trapped or isolated by their loved ones; fathers, spouses, or children.
As the trip is under way she believes she is in another state, and mistakes a road for another one. She tells her family how there is a large house, with pillars on the front porch and how she’d love to visit it once more. As they head to the house, the cat she had snuck into the car, leapt from the basket and into the front seat causing the wreck. If she would have either not gone, or just left the cat at the house, nothing would have happened. “…she was hiding a basket with Pitty Sing, the cat, in it.” (O’Connor 368).
When other families in their barrio find out about this they begin to resent the family. For a Puerto Rican woman going out and getting a job is not normal. Esmeralda explains how the other families in the barrio react to this. “The women in the neighborhood turned their backs on her when they saw her coming, or, when they talked to her, they scanned the horizon, as if looking at her would infect them with whatever had made her go out and get a job” (122). A normal Puerto Rican women stays home to clean, cook, and watch their children and since this is not what Esmeralda’s mother was doing so the other women showed hatred towards Esmeralda’s family.
The have to move from Brooklyn, to a house on Hemlock Road because their older sister doesn't get into a decent private school. Now their life is going to go through some major changes that they are not ready for. Hannah and Anna move to a house they are renting until the house they bought is ready. There are bats in the attic, mysterious winds, and a haunted closet. The twins want to use the houses' mysterious qualities against Selena, their older sister.
He moved her away from her friends and family into a small country home with bars on the windows, set by her husband for her own safety. He left her by herself so the she can “cure” herself; as if the isolation would do her some good. By her being alone she does not a connection to the outside world. All she had were her thoughts and the ugly yellow wallpaper with "pointless patterns," "lame uncertain curves," and "outrageous angles". Even though she often expressed the desire to move to a room that was much more pleasant and better suited for her needs.
The cat symbolizes the things in life that the wife wants but something is keeping from them. The idea of the cat being caught in the rain represents her dreams and wants being put on hold. When she goes out into the rain the cat has disappeared within a matter of minutes. This symbolizes her dreams constantly being pushed away by her husband. At the end of the story the maid brings a cat to the room; however, we do not know if it is the same cat that she saw in the rain.
This leaves the wife feeling empty and lonely, her desire to take care of something, anything is overwhelming. Their marriage is obviously in crisis, and that crisis in my opinion is the lack of fertility, “which is symbolically foreshadowed by the public garden (fertility) dominated by the war monument (death).” [Hagopian, 221] From her window she sees a cat who “was trying to make herself so compact she would not be dripped on”; the American wife immediately says “I’m going down to get the kitty.” Her word choice in even describing the cat as “kitty” is very telling, it’s like she has already assigned affection to a foreign object. To me that says that she is so filled with love and affection but with no where to direct it. The American Wife walks downstairs, passes the innkeeper with whom she reveres in almost a fatherly way, and makes it out to the square where she had seen the cat; the cat is gone. It is interesting to note that once she realizes the cat is not there, Hemingway no longer describes her as the American Wife but as the ‘American girl’, “it is almost as if she were demoted in femininity by failing to find a creature to care for.” [Hagopian, 221] The American Wife/girl, is very vocal with her wants, she says she wants to grow her hair long and wear it in a bun, she wants to have a cat