Blog 4, Introducing Michael
The following paragraphs are from Chapter 1, Life Story, of The Cure:
"I can never forget the woman that looked
back at me that day. Her smile was breathtakingly beautiful, much more so than
mine would ever be; a smile that I had never been fortunate enough to see. It
was the only living memory I would ever have of her and I am never going to
forget it even if it was only my own reflection. It was my one and only moment
with her. It was not a photograph that my father had taken of her during a
romantic weekend away. It was not a photograph that a relative had taken of her
at a family event. It was not just another moment frozen in time. It was real.
It was a moment that I had experienced. It was a moment; my one and only moment
with her and I would always make sure that it was a moment that I would make
happen again and again in my mind.
And to my pleasant surprise it has always
been quite easy to do. I just have to stand in front of the mirror, close my
eyes and think of her and she reappears as the twenty-seven year old, her age
when she died, pale faced, which was slightly morbid looking but I always put
it down to the fact that in my mind she was dead and always had been dead to me,
with her beautiful smile and a perfect figure of my imagination. It seems weird
I know. But I do not have a memory of her as my mother. All I have are pictures
of her as a daughter, a cousin, a friend, a girlfriend, a fiancée or as a wife.
But there was not even a photograph of her when she was pregnant with me. There was no proof of her as a mother except
for me.”
Chapter 1 gets
straight to introducing Michael, the narrator and the central character of the novel.
Talking about his childhood and certain moments that will stick with him
forever, Michael is simply a normal 18 year old lad who is still uncertain
about who he is, what he stands for and, most importantly, he is absolutely
clueless about what he is capable of. Having lost his mother the day he was
born he dislikes being made a fuss of, especially around his birthday. He sees
nothing special in himself, he knows he has a lot to learn yet he doesn’t want
to fall in to some generic male stereotype. He knows he is different, he knows
that having grown up with no mother and being overly smothered by his father
because of this has moulded him. However, he fears it has moulded him for the
worse; he fears that he is not normal. He fears relationships as he fears that
he is completely clueless in the art of emotion. Yet at this stage in his life he
has nothing to fear but it will be his fears that allow him to grow. It will be
his fearless instincts that make him who he is.
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