Reading: This Boy's Life; pages 16-50, By Tobias Wolff

SUMMARY:
    On page 16, Roy is introduced back into the story. I failed to mention in my earlier post, but Roy is the man that Toby's mother ran from in Florida. Roy lives with the two once again and begins to develop an urge for Uranium himself. Roy is skeptical about Toby's mom due to the fact that she left him in Florida so Roy decides to follow Rosemary (Toby's mother's name) home from work without her knowing. One day, however, Roy waits outside for Toby's mother to come out of work, but she never shows. Roy then proceeds in driving down the road and eventually ending up back home to find Rosemary cooking dinner on the stove. He then asks her how work was and she replies that it is busy. Roy gives her a cunning smile and says " Even the boy knows what you are up too" and with that remark he leaves the room.
    Next, Toby is baptized and faced with the obstacle of confession. Lacking anything to say, Toby leaves his first session with the priest and talks to Sister James who told him that when she was little she used to steal money and talk bad about people behind their backs. Toby then cunningly goes into the confessional and tells the priest that he steals money from his mother and also talks badly about people behind their backs. Toby finishes his confession and leaves.
    In the next scene, Toby receives a .22 rifle for his Easter present from Roy. Toby loves the rifle and although he is not allowed to get it out when Roy and his mother are gone, he does it anyways. At first, Toby used to just clean the gun, but overtime it turned into Toby masquerading around the apartment in Roy's army gear and aiming at potential targets outside the window. One day, Toby was playing this game and saw Sister James approach the apartment. She came up to the door and slipped an envelope addressing Toby's mother since Toby had not been going to archery. Taking precautionary actions, Toby burns the letter and rinses it down the drain, and says that he never saw Sister James again.
    One day, Roy left for a fishing trip, and when Toby came home after school his mother already had all the bags packed. Toby and his mother departed for Seattle that night. Toby describes his boyhood in Seattle, and he describes that they now live in a boarding house with only two other women in the complex Marian and Kathy. Toby bets in the wrong crowd with two boys Terry Taylor and Terry Silver. They would go around breaking windows and dropped eggs at cars over buildings. Toby lived two worlds by being the semi bad kid with his friends and the good child with his mom.

RESPONSE:

    This book is great. Its a nonfiction memoir but it reads like a fantasy story. I thought it was quite comical when Toby listened to Sister James and then used her old sins as his sins for his confession. This was the first glimpse at Toby's swindling side who enjoyed cleverly tricking others and preforming illegal acts. I was thrown off by this side of Toby because before this I saw him as a good mom's kid, but when this scene happened it made this book a lot more enjoyable and a quicker read. Great book so far.