over population essays

over population essays The population of our planet will quickly reach a point where there will not be adequate amount of resources to support life on Earth. Population control must be enforced to avoid such a catastrophic occurrence. Many economic, social and environmental problems are either affiliated with or are increased due to overpopulation. With an exponentially increasing world population, the problems created by overpopulation grow correspondingly. In order to stabilize the massive population, the world must work together to maintain population stability. One of the main reasons is due to the fact that Man treats his surroundings, for example like his land, his environment, his atmosphere, his waters and other life forms as merely objects. Man utilizes, destroys and discards them when hes finish. If Man does not respect his planet, there will be nothing left except for a dead, barren wasteland. We must act soon or better yet, now. The earth does not have enough resources to supply the current enormous population growth. In many areas, there is simply not enough food to feed the growing populations. 150 million children in the world suffer from poor health due to food shortages. Alongside with food, there is another resource that cannot keep up with the increasing population, that is water. Our supply of fresh water is very essential to life and limited. Eventhough, our earth is covered with 2/3 of water and 1/3 land, converting salt water to fresh water can be expensive. In addition to depleting resources, overpopulation increases environmental problems. Polltion is an environmental problem whose magnitude is increased by overpopulation. With more drivers on the road, more electricity consumed, more trash, and depleting trees, the environment problems that exist will exponentially increase. But as more people such as ourselves pollute, massive problems occurs. Pollution is magnified in developing nations. Unfortu...

Statistics from the War on Drugs Tell a Story

Statistics from the War on Drugs Tell a Story In 1971, President Richard Nixon first declared a national â€Å"war on drugs,† and greatly increased the size and authority of federal government drug control agencies. Since 1988, the U.S. war against illegal drugs has been coordinated by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). The director of the ONDCP plays the real-life role of Americas Drug Czar. Created by the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988, the ONDCP advises the President of the United States on drug-control issues, coordinates drug-control activities and related funding across the Federal government, and produces the annual National Drug Control Strategy, which outlines Administration efforts to reduce illicit drug use, manufacturing and trafficking, drug-related crime and violence, and drug-related health consequences. Under the coordination of the ONDCP, the following federal agencies play key enforcement and advisory roles in the War on Drugs: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services AdministrationFederal Bureau of InvestigationBureau of Justice AssistanceDrug Enforcement AgencyUnited States Customs and Border ProtectionNational Institute on Drug AbuseU.S. Coast Guard Are We Winning? Today, as drug abusers continue to flood America’s prisons and violent drug crimes devastate neighborhoods, many people criticize the effectiveness of War on Drugs. However, actual statistics suggest that without the War on Drugs, the problem may be even worse. For example, during fiscal year 2015, Customs and Border Protection alone reported seizing: 135,943 pounds of cocaine;2,015 pounds of heroin;6,135 pounds of methamphetamine; and4,330,475 (Yes, 4.3 million) pounds of marijuana. During fiscal year 2014, the Drug Enforcement Agency seized: 74,450 pounds of cocaine;2, 248 pounds of heroin;6,494 pounds of methamphetamine; and163,638 pounds of marijuana. (The discrepancy in marijuana seizures is attributable to the fact that Customs and Border Protection has the main responsibility for intercepting the drug as it flows into the U.S. from Mexico.) In addition, the ONDCP reported that during 1997, U.S. law enforcement agencies seized an estimated $512 million in illegal drug trade-related cash and property. So does the seizure of 2,360 tons of illegal drugs by two federal agencies in just two years indicate the success or utter futility of the War on Drugs? Despite the volume of drugs seized, the Federal Bureau of Investigation reported an estimated 1,841,200 state and local arrests for drug abuse violations in the United States during 2007. But whether the War on Drugs has been a smashing success or a dismal failure, it has been expensive. Funding the War In fiscal year 1985, the annual federal budget allocated $1.5 billion to fighting illegal drug use, trafficking and drug-related crime. By fiscal year 2000, that figure had increased to $17.7 billion, increasing by almost $3.3 billion per year. Jump to fiscal year 2016, when President Obama’s budget included $27.6 billion to support the National Drug Control Strategy, an increase of $1.2 billion (4.7%) above fiscal year 2015 funding. In February 2015, U.S. Drug Czar and director of the Obama administration’s ONDCP Michael Botticelli attempted to justify the expenditure in his confirmation address to the Senate. â€Å"Earlier this month, President Obama in his 2016 Budget requested historic levels of funding including $133 million in new funds to address the opioid misuse epidemic in the U.S. Using a public health framework as its foundation, our strategy also acknowledges the vital role that federal state and local law enforcement play in reducing the availability of drugs another risk factor for drug use,† said Botticelli. â€Å"It underscores the vital importance of primary prevention in stopping drug use before it ever begins by funding prevention efforts across the country.† Botticelli added that the expenditure was intended to remove the â€Å"systemic challenges† that had historically held back progress in the War on Drugs: Over-criminalization of illegal drug use;lack of integration with mainstream medical care;lack of insurance coverage for drug abuse treatment; andlegal barriers that make it difficult for people once involved with the criminal justice system to rebuild their lives. A recovering alcoholic himself, Botticelli urged the millions of Americans in substance abuse recovery to â€Å"come out† and demand to be treated like people with non-abuse related chronic diseases. â€Å"By putting faces and voices to the disease of addiction and the promise of recovery, we can lift the curtain of conventional wisdom that continues to keep too many of us hidden and without access to lifesaving treatment,† he said.

Budget for Apple Vision Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Budget for Apple Vision - Research Paper Example Quantifiable Elements for Evaluating, Monitoring, and Controlling Marketing Plan The effectiveness of marketing plan can be controlled, evaluated, and monitored via various quantifiable elements within the market scenario. Despite the fact that such quantifiable elements differ from one product to another and from one firm to another, there are those that are universally applied in achieving the objective. The following discussion identifies some of the quantifiable elements that can be used in monitoring, evaluating, and controlling the effectiveness of marketing plan. Market Share: There is need for one to study the market share of the compare before the introduction of Apple Vision as well as after the introduction of the product. Market share measures the number of customers that buy and use a particular product. In this case, the number of consumers of Apple Vision will represent the market share of Apple, Inc (Kotler & Keller, 2009). Nonetheless, since Apple Vision is a new product there is a serious need to identify previous market share of Apple, Inc (Kerin, et al., 2009). The figure should be measured against the market share after introduction of Apple Vision. If there is a positive change in the market share as portrayed by the two figures then there is enough evidence to believe that Apple Vision has attracted more customers into the business. Therefore, this is one of the quantifiable elements that can be used in measuring, evaluating, controlling, and monitoring whether the marketing plan is effective. Revenue: Another quantifiable method of measuring, evaluating, monitoring, and controlling the effectiveness of the marketing plan is through revenue. ... Item 2011 2012 2013 Total Revenue 365,000 435,000 432,100 922,100 Profit margin 25% 91,250 108,750 108,025 230,000 Costs Advertising 50,000 50,000 50,000 150,000 Promotion 10,000 10,000 10,000 30,000 PR 20,000 20,000 20,000 20,000 Personal selling Total 80,000 80,000 80,000 200,000 Quantifiable Elements for Evaluating, Monitoring, and Controlling Marketing Plan The effectiveness of marketing plan can be controlled, evaluated, and monitored via various quantifiable elements within the market scenario. Despite the fact that such quantifiable elements differ from one product to another and from one firm to another, there are those that are universally applied in achieving the objective. The following discussion identifies some of the quantifiable elements that can be used in monitoring, evaluating, and controlling the effectiveness of marketing plan. Market Share: There is need for one to study the market share of the compare before the introduction of Apple Vision as well as after the introduction of the product. Market share measures the number of customers that buy and use a particular product. In this case, the number of consumers of Apple Vision will represent the market share of Apple, Inc (Kotler & Keller, 2009). Nonetheless, since Apple Vision is a new product there is a serious need to identify previous market share of Apple, Inc (Kerin, et al., 2009). The figure should be measured against the market share after introduction of Apple Vision. If there is a positive change in the market share as portrayed by the two figures then there is enough evidence to believe that Apple Vision has attracted more customers into the business. Therefore, this is one of the quantifiable elements that can be used in measuring, evaluating,

How and to what extent performance management in the public sector has Essay

How and to what extent performance management in the public sector has changed under contemporary managerial reforms Identify a - Essay Example In pursuit for reforms in the management of the public sectors, there have been radical changes in the last two decades on how governments do their management; there has been outsourcing of those management practices and techniques from the private-for –profit sectors with the purpose of reforming the government (public) sector. Since then, several countries have adopted these practices; Australia, New Zealand, and UK are some of the countries that have adopted the practices in the public sector management (Aulich, Halligan and Nutley 2001, p.46). Even though the system is widely believed to be associated with the developed countries, in the recent decade, its application has been witnessed in a number of the transitional and developing economies. These contemporary techniques and practices sourced from the private sector to the public sector are referred to as New Public Management, NPM (Eliassen and Sitter 2008, p.58). Pressures for Change NPM adoption came with the rising p ressure from other quarters; it is a change process that has been adopted because of agitation from several sectors and interested groups. Some of the reasons that led to the adoption of the new strategy of public management included; Fiscal and Economic Pressure on the Governments This problem was first witnessed in the developed countries before spreading to the developing countries of Africa and Asia, lately; it was also witnessed in the Asian tiger Economies. There were fiscal stress that was necessitated by enormous public sector deficit, spiraling indebtedness, and unfavorable balance of trade. This fiscal problem made it possible for the reconstruction of the public sector through rethinking, reshaping what the role of the government is, to counter the problems that were facing the public sector, drastic measure of privatization, contracting, and downsizing became the available options (Bovaird and Loffler 2009, p.37). There was also public outcry on the leathery and the bure aucratic nature of the old order, the increased criticism from the public on the ineffectiveness and inefficiencies associated with public delivery of services occasioned the need for change. The old order was criticized for its slow and unresponsiveness that is driven by the established rules rather than its performance. The international consultants on management ideas advised most of the government on the need to change the management of the public sector by integrating some of the management tools from the private sectors (Ferlie, Laurence and Christopher, 2005, p.84). Finally, for the transitional and developing countries, there change has been necessitated by the donor agencies; it has been one of the conditions for lending form the international financial institution like the World Bank and the IMF. Changes Noted in the Public Sector following NPM As stated above in introductory part there was need for more efficient and effective of the public sector resources, in this regar d several tools used in the management have been used that are sourced from the private sector to improve the performance of the public sector organization following the failure of the traditional systems used. In effecting this, several changes have been seen from the traditional order of public sector management, these changes have been

Stress Related Factors in Different Types of Schooling Essay Example for Free

Stress Related Factors in Different Types of Schooling Essay Abstract The purpose of this research is to determine the advantages and disadvantages of students who attend on ground schools or online schools and to understand the cause and effect with different levels of stress in students who attend both types of schooling. Common stress in students who attend both types of schooling are feeling intense pressure to achieve high grades, trying to establish a romantic/social life, and dealing with the costs of college. Stress in college students can cause negative effects toward grades, health and relationships if it is not managed properly. The advantages and disadvantages of attending either school type depend on a student’s self-perception, personality, learning skills, weaknesses and strengths. A common advantage when attending an online school is that you are able to wear whatever you want, and set your own schedule. A common disadvantage when attending on ground school is rearranging your schedule to fit in and arrive to classes on time. Stress Related Factors in Different Types of Schooling Stress is the bodys way of rising to a challenge and preparing to meet a tough situation with focus, strength, stamina, and heightened alertness. Every individual will stress at some point in their lives. When dealing with education, there are several causes for a student to become stressed. No matter how you choose to obtain your education, stress is inevitable. There are two main ways to receive an education. A student can choose to attend school online, which consists of relying on technology to do research and complete assignments. Another alternative for a student to attend school is the most common among young students. A student can attend school on ground, which is also known as on campus, consists of having interactions with their instructors and peers. However, for each schooling type, the reasons for stress may differ: a student’s ability to handle or manage stress is based  on their personality, strengths, and weaknesses. With stress also come advantages and disa dvantages when attending both types of school. The stress involved in each type is determined more or less stressful based on how a student interprets and deals with the situation. On ground schooling allows for students to experience several situations and factors that could cause stress. This type of schooling involves face to face interaction with teachers and peers. The most common stressor for a student when faced with social interaction deals with social issues. Worry of making friends, fitting in, being judged, and or their appearance can cause a student to have stress which could result in low grades, participation, and attendance. Students that usually have issues with social interactions, usually benefit more when attending online classes. Going to school online has limited to no face to face interaction and allows anonymity. If a student is shy or unable to share an opinion because of time restraints in a traditional classroom, online courses make it possible for all students to participate in discussions. (College Atlas 2004-2011) A student that decides to attend online schooling may have less stress because the lack of social interaction, but could experience drawbacks with not having it as well. An online student receives little or no traditional participation and no interaction with the teacher or their peers. Students who learn by hands on or face to face interaction lose all of this when they take classes online since you can’t physical meet with you teacher or peers. (UK essays 2003) When a student has a question or needs an explanation, they do not have the benefit of simply raising a hand and instantly receiving an answer. Instead, an online student must either e-mail, post on a discussion board or if possible call the instructor. Students could determine whether working at their own pace or working by a set schedule is more beneficial to their learning skills. Depending on the student and their learning abilities, determines which type of schooling would better aid them. Online schooling is more seen to have a self-paced curriculum. An advantage to having a self-paced curriculum is flexibility which allows a student to set their own study time. This could mean after work, at night, before the kids get up, or during your lunch break. Even if you need to log in to the campus Web site at 3 a.m., youll still be able to complete your work. (Amy Brantley 2003-2012) When students follows a set schedule, many of them may find the  structure and regularity found at an on ground school beneficial, as opposed to a self-paced type of curriculum that makes up an online school program. (Degree Directory.org 2003-2012) Though, some students excel better with having set their own schedule this type of schooling allows for procrastination to be more common. When a student follows a set schedule, they are required to attend classes and turn in assignments on the dates and times given by their instructor. Depending on an individual’s preferred type of learning skill will determine which type of schedule is easier or more beneficial for them. When attending an on ground school, a student might be required to work in a group, participate in a class project, or contribute to a knowledge-building enterprise, uses dialogue, hands-on learning, or context. (Marcy Driscoll, 2011) Online schooling does not require a student to learn in these ways, seeing as they are only possible when being physically present. Instead, online students may be required to participate in discussions, complete lab work, or research information on the web. On ground schooling uses more learning activities that involve student and teacher interaction, whereas online schooling uses more independent activities. Choosing to attend school online requires having proper up to date technology and know-how of using this technology. (Education Portal 2003) Many schools offer tech help regarding their online classes and most do have basic help desk support available to distance learners having trouble with an online course or hardware. Failure to meet these requirements could cause stress for the student because their grade/s are given based on completion of the assignment/s. For example, not having internet access will affect your ability to turn in an assignment, which could result in a failing grade. When attending on ground schools, technology is not usually required in order to complete assignments. If and when it is, the technology is made available for use for the students. The advantage to having this technology offered to an on ground student is that there are people there who will help a student better understand how to use the technology if needed. There are different amounts of stress between on ground and online schooling that are primarily based on different forms of teaching and the different causes of stress in each type of schooling. These reasons differ from how a student is taught, how they study, how assignments are completed turned in and instances and occurrences they may encounter  when at school on ground or at school online. A way of doing something is considered stressful to one person, but may be considered less stressful to another. Organizing time, maintaining healthy habits, setting realistic goals, developing good coping mechanisms and seeking help if needed can help a student deal and manage stress when attending either online or on ground schools. References Tan, J., Yates, S., (2009, May 23) Academic Expectations as Sources of Stress in Asian Students Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezp00vi9.lirn.net/psychology/docview/887954857/13A9A6956F874EA0FDC/1?accountid=40833 Rukhsana, K., (2010) Perceived Stress, Academic Workloads and Use of Coping Strategies by University Students –Journal of Behavioral Sciences. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp00vi9.lirn.net/psychology/docview/612887679/13A9A6956F874EA0FDC/2?accountid=40833 College Atlas ‘A World to a Higher Power’ (2004-2011) Retrieved from: http://www.collegeatlas.org/why-online-learning.html Advantages Disadvantages of Classroom Learning and Online classes (2003) Retrieved from: http://www.ukessays.com/essays/education/advantages-disadvantages-of-classroom-learning-and-online-classes-education-essay.php Brantley, A.,(2003-2012) Advantages and Disadvantages of Taking Classes Online Retrieved from: http://colleges.collegetoolkit.com/guides/onlinedegree/advantages_and_disadvantages_of_taking_clases_online.aspx What Are the Advantages of Campus-Based Education Vs. Online Education? (2003-2012) Retrieved From http://degreedirectory.org/articles/What_are_the_Advantages_of_Campus-Based_Education_vs_Online_Education.html

The Similarities And Differences Of Batistas And Castros Affects O :: essays research papers fc

Although it is certain that Fidel Castro and Fulgencio Batista would not have been able to peacefully sit in the same room together, they are alike in more ways than either man would ever have liked to admit. When reviewing the effects they had on Cuban history, many similarities could be noted. At the very start of each man's political career, he overthrew his predecessor using some sort of militant force. In Batista's case, this was achieved by staging a coup with military backing. For Castro, he was a main figurehead in the Cuban Revolution who eventually emerged as Cuba's leader for many years to come. At the onset of both leader's career's as Cuba's leader, Batista and Castro were admired by the majority of the public, but they went on to establish dictatorships and suspended the constitution, thus were later disliked by many.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Both Batista and Castro contributed to the extremism of Cuba's military/political history. As many Cuban leaders had done before him, Fulgencio Batista was part of a militant movement that overthrew his predecessor, Carlos Manuel de Cespedes y Quesada. During this movement, Batista was chief staff of the army, which eventually led to his attaining control of Cuba. In a similar manner, Fidel Castro overthrew Batista. Instead of staging a coup, Castro was the leader of the best organized force of anti-Batista groups during the Cuban Revolution. Because of the guerilla warfare that Castro and other groups were waging against Batista, he eventually resigned from office and fled to the country.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Cuba's political history carries a pattern: when the masses are disillusioned by the current ruler, they turn to a young, strong-willed leader-of-the-people as their new ruler, only to become disillusioned to that ruler when he becomes too oppressive. It has seemed a never- ending cycle. Batista and Castro were both well-regarded leaders initially who appealed strongly to the masses and common citizen. Later, both established dictatorships and lost the support of many of those that they governed. Castro and Batista are each guilt of repression and corruption within their governments. For example, at some point under each regime, the constitution was either suspended or not followed at all. Castro did, though, make one very important contribution to Cuba's political system: Socialism. For the first time, Castro and Che Guevara a socialist plan called the New Man theory which called for developing an ideology amongst citizens that would call for working not for pers onal enrichment, but for social betterment.

Black House Chapter Eight

8 TWO TELEPHONE CALLS and another, private matter, one he is doing his best to deny, have conspired to pluck Jack Sawyer from his cocoon in Norway Valley and put him on the road to French Landing, Sumner Street, and the police station. The first call had been from Henry, and Henry, calling from the Maxton cafeteria during one of the Symphonic One's breaks, had insisted on speaking his mind. A child had apparently been abducted from the sidewalk in front of Maxton's earlier that day. Whatever Jack's reasons for staying out of the case, which by the way he had never explained, they didn't count anymore, sorry. This made four children who had been lost to the Fisherman, because Jack didn't really think Irma Freneau was going to walk in her front door anytime soon, did he? Four children! No, Henry had said, I didn't hear about it on the radio. It happened this morning. From a janitor at Maxton's, Henry had said. He saw a worried-looking cop pick up a bicycle and put it in his trunk. All right, Henry had said, maybe I don't know for certain, but I am certain. By tonight, Dale will identify the poor kid, and tomorrow his name will be all over the newspaper. And then this whole county is going to flip out. Don't you get it? Just knowing you are involved will do a lot to keep people calm. You no longer have the luxury of retirement, Jack. You have to do your part. Jack had told him he was jumping to conclusions, and that they would talk about it later. Forty-five minutes later, Dale Gilbertson had called with the news that a boy named Tyler Marshall had vanished from in front of Maxton's sometime that morning, and that Tyler's father, Fred Marshall, was down there right now, in the station, demanding to see Jack Sawyer. Fred was a great guy, a real straight arrow and family man, a solid citizen, a friend of Dale's, you could say, but at the moment he was at the end of his rope. Apparently Judy, his wife, had been having some kind of mental problems even before the trouble started, and Tyler's disappearance had driven her off the edge. She talked in gibberish, injured herself, tore the house apart. And I kind of know Judy Marshall, Dale had said. Beautiful, beautiful woman, a little thing but tough as all get-out on the inside, both feet on the ground, a great person, a tremendous person, someone you'd think would never lose her grip, no matter what. It seems she thought, knew, whatever, that Tyler had been snatched even before his bicycle turned up. Late this afternoon, she got so bad Fred had to call Dr. Skarda and get her over to French County Lutheran in Arden, where they took one look at her and put her in Ward D, the mental wing. So you can imagine what kind of shape Fred's in. He insists on talking to you. I have no confidence in you, he said to me. Well, Dale had said, if you don't come down here, Fred Marshall is going to show up at your house, that's what'll happen. I can't put the guy on a leash, and I'm not going to lock him up just to keep him away from you. On top of everything else, we need you here, Jack. All right, Dale had said. I know you're not making any promises. But you know what you should do. Would these conversations have been enough to get him into his pickup and on the road to Sumner Street? Very likely, Jack imagines, which renders the third factor, the secret, barely acknowledged one, inconsequential. It means nothing. A silly attack of nerves, a buildup of anxiety, completely natural under the circumstances. The kind of thing that could happen to anybody. He felt like getting out of the house, so what? No one could accuse him of escaping. He was traveling toward, not running away from, that which he most wanted to escape the dark undertow of the Fisherman's crimes. Neither was he committing himself to any deeper involvement. A friend of Dale's and the father of a child apparently missing, this Fred Marshall, insisted on talking to him; fine, let him talk. If half an hour with a retired detective could help Fred Marshall get a handle on his problems, the retired detective was willing to give him the time. Everything else was merely personal. Waking dreams and robins' eggs messed with your mind, but that was merely personal. It could be out-waited, outwitted, figured out. No rational person took that stuff seriously: like a summer storm, it blew in, it blew out. Now, as he coasted through the green light at Centralia and noted, with a cop's reflexive awareness, the row of Harleys lined up in the Sand Bar's parking lot, he felt himself coming into alignment with the afternoon's difficulties. It made perfect sense that he should have found himself unable well, let us say unwilling to open the refrigerator door. Nasty surprises made you think twice. A light in his living room had expired, and when he had gone to the drawer that contained half a dozen new halogen bulbs, he had been unable to open it. In fact, he had not quite been able to open any drawer, cabinet, or closet in his house, which had denied him the capacity to make a cup of tea, change his clothes, prepare lunch, or do anyt hing but leaf half heartedly through books and watch television. When the flap of the mailbox had threatened to conceal a pyramid of small blue eggs, he had decided to put off collecting the mail until the next day. Anyhow, all he ever got were financial statements, magazines, and junk mail. Let's not make it sound worse than it was, Jack says to himself. I could have opened every door, drawer, and cabinet in the place, but I didn't want to. I wasn't afraid that robins' eggs were going to come spilling out of the refrigerator or the closet it's just that I didn't want to take the chance of finding one of the blasted things. Show me a psychiatrist who says that's neurotic, and I'll show you a moron who doesn't understand psychology. All the old-timers used to tell me that working homicide messed with your head. Hell, that's why I retired in the first place! What was I supposed to do, stay on the force until I ate my gun? You're a smart guy, Henry Leyden, and I love you, but there are some things you don't GET! All right, he was going to Sumner Street. Everybody was yelling at him to do something, and that's what he was doing. He'd say hello to Dale, greet the boys, sit down with this Fred Marshall, the solid citizen with a missing son, and give him the usual oatmeal about everything possible being done, blah blah, the FBI is working hand in glove with us on this one, and the bureau has the finest investigators in the world. That oatmeal. As far as Jack was concerned, his primary duty was to stroke Fred Marshall's fur, as if to soothe the feelings of an injured cat; when Marshall had calmed down, Jack's supposed obligation to the community an obligation that existed entirely in the minds of others would be fulfilled, freeing him to go back to the privacy he had earned. If Dale didn't like it, he could take a running jump into the Mississippi; if Henry didn't like it, Jack would refuse to read Bleak House and force him to listen instead to Lawrence Welk, Vaughn Monroe, or something equally excruciating. Bad Dixieland. Years ago, someone had given Jack a CD called Fats Manassas & His Muskrat All Stars Stompin' the Ramble. Thirty seconds of Fats Manassas, and Henry would be begging for mercy. This image makes Jack feel comfortable enough to prove that his hesitation before cupboards and drawers had been merely a temporary unwillingness, not phobic inability. Even while his attention was elsewhere, as it chiefly was, the shoved-in ashtray below the dash has mocked and taunted him since he first climbed into the pickup. A kind of sinister suggestiveness, an aura of latent malice, surrounds the ashtray's flat little panel. Does he fear that a small blue egg lurks behind the little panel? Of course not. Nothing is in there but air and molded black plastic. In that case, he can pull it out. The buildings on the outskirts of French Landing glide past the pickup's windows. Jack has reached almost the exact point at which Henry pulled the plug on Dirtysperm. Obviously he can open the ashtray. Nothing could be simpler. You just get your fingers under there and tug. Easiest thing in the world. He extends a hand. Before his fingers touch the panel, he snatches the hand back. Drops of perspiration glide down his forehead and lodge in his eyebrows. â€Å"It isn't a big deal,† he says aloud. â€Å"You got some kind of problem here, Jacky-boy?† Again, he extends his hand to the ashtray. Abruptly aware that he is paying more attention to the bottom of his dashboard than to the road, he glances up and cuts his speed by half. He refuses to hit his brakes. It's just an ashtray, for God's sake. His fingers meet the panel, then curl under its lip. Jack glances at the road once more. Then, with the decisivesness of a nurse ripping a strip of tape off a patient's hairy abdomen, he yanks out the sliding tray. The lighter attachment, which he had unknowingly dislodged in his driveway that morning, bounces three inches into the air, greatly resembling, to Jack's appalled eye, a flying black-and-silver egg. He veers off the road, bumps over the weedy shoulder, and heads toward a looming telephone pole. The lighter drops back into the tray with a loud, metallic thwack no egg in the world could have produced. The telephone pole swims closer and nearly fills the windshield. Jack stamps on the brake and jerks to a halt, arousing a flurry of ticks and rattles from the ashtray. If he had not cut his speed before opening the ashtray, he would have driven straight into the pole, which stands about four feet from the hood of the pickup. Jack wipes the sweat off his face and picks up the lighter. â€Å"Shit on a shingle.† He clicks the attachment into its receptacle and collapses backward against the seat. â€Å"No wonder they say smoking can kill you,† he says. The joke is too feeble to amuse him, and for a couple of seconds he does nothing but slump against the seat and regard the sparse traffic on Lyall Road. When his heart rate drops back to something like normal, he reminds him self that he did, after all, open the ashtray. Blond, rumpled Tom Lund has evidently been prepped for his arrival, for when Jack walks past three bicycles lined up next to the door and enters the station, the young officer takes off from behind his desk and rushes forward to whisper that Dale and Fred Marshall are waiting for him in Dale's office, and he will show him right in. They'll be glad to see him, that's for sure. â€Å"I am, too, Lieutenant Sawyer,† Lund adds. â€Å"Boy, I gotta say it. What you got, I think, we need.† â€Å"Call me Jack. I'm not a lieutenant anymore. I'm not even a cop anymore.† Jack had met Tom Lund during the Kinderling investigation, and he had liked the young man's eagerness and dedication. In love with his job, his uniform, and his badge, respectful of his chief and awed by Jack, Lund had uncomplainingly logged hundreds of hours on the telephone, in records offices, and in his car, checking and rechecking the often contradictory details spun off by the collision between a Wisconsin farm-insurance salesman and two Sunset Strip working girls. All the while, Tom Lund had retained the energetic sparkle of a high school quarterback running onto the field for his first game. He does not look that way anymore, Jack observes. Dark smudges hang beneath his eyes, and the bones in his face are more prominent. More than sleeplessness and exhaustion lie behind Lund's affect: his eyes bear the helplessly startled expression of those who have suffered a great moral shock. The Fisherman has stolen a good part of Tom Lund's youth. â€Å"But I'll see what I can do,† Jack says, offering the promise of a commitment greater than he intends. â€Å"We can sure use anything you can give us,† Lund says. It is too much, too servile, and as Lund turns away and leads him to the office, Jack thinks, I didn't come here to be your savior. The thought instantly makes him feel guilty. Lund knocks, opens the door to announce Jack, shows him in, and vanishes like a ghost, utterly unnoticed by the two men who rise from their chairs and fasten their eyes upon their visitor's face, one with visible gratitude, the other with an enormous degree of the same emotion mixed with naked need, which makes Jack even more uncomfortable. Over Dale's garbled introduction, Fred Marshall says, â€Å"Thank you for agreeing to come, thank you so much. That's all I can . . .† His right arm sticks out like a pump handle. When Jack takes his hand, an even greater quantity of feeling floods into Fred Marshall's face. His hand fastens on Jack's and seems almost to claim it, as an animal claims its prey. He squeezes, hard, a considerable number of times. His eyes fill. â€Å"I can't . . .† Marshall pulls his hand away and scrubs the tears off his face. Now his eyes look raw and intensely vulnerable. â€Å"Boy oh boy,† he says. â€Å"I'm really glad you're here, Mr. Sawyer. Or should I say Lieutenant?† â€Å"Jack is fine. Why don't the two of you fill me in on what happened today?† Dale points toward a waiting chair; the three men take their places; the painful but essentially simple story of Fred, Judy, and Tyler Marshall begins. Fred speaks first, at some length. In his version of the story, a valiant, lionhearted woman, a devoted wife and mother, succumbs to baffling, multifaceted transformations and disorders, and develops mysterious symptoms overlooked by her ignorant, stupid, self-centered husband. She blurts out nonsense words; she writes crazy stuff on sheets of notepaper, rams the papers into her mouth, and tries to swallow them. She sees the tragedy coming in advance, and it unhinges her. Sounds crazy, but the self-centered husband thinks it's the truth. That is, he thinks he thinks it's the truth, because he's been thinking about it since he first talked to Dale, and even though it sounds crazy, it kind of makes sense. Because what other explanation could there be? So that's what he thinks he thinks that his wife started to lose her mind because she knew that the Fisherman was on the way. Things like that are possible, he guesses. For example, the brave afflicted wife knew that her beautiful wonderful son was missing even before the stupid selfish husband, who went to work exactly as if it were a normal day, told her about the bicycle. That pretty much proved what he was talking about. The beautiful little boy went out with his three friends, but only the three friends came back, and Officer Danny Tcheda found the little son's Schwinn bike and one of his poor sneakers on the sidewalk outside Maxton's. â€Å"Danny Cheetah?† asks Jack, who, like Fred Marshall, is beginning to think he thinks a number of alarming things. â€Å"Tcheda,† says Dale, and spells it for him. Dale tells his own, far shorter version of the story. In Dale Gilbertson's story, a boy goes out for a ride on his bicycle and vanishes, perhaps as a result of abduction, from the sidewalk in front of Maxton's. That is all of the story Dale knows, and he trusts that Jack Sawyer will be able to fill in many of the surrounding blanks. Jack Sawyer, at whom both of the other men in the room are staring, takes time to adjust to the three thoughts he now thinks he thinks. The first is not so much a thought as a response that embodies a hidden thought: from the moment Fred Marshall clutched his hand and said â€Å"Boy oh boy,† Jack found himself liking the man, an unanticipated turn in the evening's plot. Fred Marshall strikes him as something like the poster boy for small-town life. If you put his picture on billboards advertising French County real estate, you could sell a lot of second homes to people in Milwaukee and Chicago. Marshall's friendly, good-looking face and slender runner's body are as good as testimonials to responsibility, decency, good manners and good neighborliness, modesty, and a generous heart. The more Fred Marshall accuses himself of selfishness and stupidity, the more Jack likes him. And the more he likes him, the more he sympathizes with his terrible plight, the more he wishes to help t he man. Jack had come to the station expecting that he would respond to Dale's friend like a policeman, but his cop reflexes have rusted from disuse. He is responding like a fellow citizen. Cops, as Jack well knows, seldom view the civilians caught up in the backwash of a crime as fellow citizens, certainly never in the early stages of an investigation. (The thought hidden at the center of Jack's response to the man before him is that Fred Marshall, being what he is, cannot harbor suspicions about anyone with whom he is on good terms.) Jack's second thought is that of both a cop and a fellow citizen, and while he continues his adjustment to the third, which is wholly the product of his rusty yet still accurate cop reflexes, he makes it public. â€Å"The bikes I saw outside belong to Tyler's friends? Is someone questioning them now?† â€Å"Bobby Dulac,† Dale says. â€Å"I talked to them when they came in, but I didn't get anywhere. According to them, they were all together on Chase Street, and Tyler rode off by himself. They claim they didn't see anything. Maybe they didn't.† â€Å"But you think there's more.† â€Å"Honest to God, I do. But I don't know what the dickens it could be, and we have to send them home before their parents get bent out of shape.† â€Å"Who are they, what are their names?† Fred Marshall wraps his fingers together as if around the handle of an invisible baseball bat. â€Å"Ebbie Wexler, T. J. Renniker, and Ronnie Metzger. They're the kids Ty's been hanging around with this summer.† An unspoken judgment hovers about this last sentence. â€Å"It sounds like you don't consider them the best possible company for your son.† â€Å"Well, no,† says Fred, caught between his desire to tell the truth and his innate wish to avoid the appearance of unfairness. â€Å"Not if you put it like that. Ebbie seems like kind of a bully, and the other two are maybe a little on the . . . slow side? I hope . . . or I was hoping . . . that Ty would realize he could do better and spend his free time with kids who are more on, you know . . .† â€Å"More on his level.† â€Å"Right. The trouble is, my son is sort of small for his age, and Ebbie Wexler is . . . um . . .† â€Å"Heavyset and tall for his age,† Jack says. â€Å"The perfect situation for a bully.† â€Å"You're saying you know Ebbie Wexler?† â€Å"No, but I saw him this morning. He was with the other two boys and your son.† Dale jolts upright in his chair, and Fred Marshall drops his invisible bat. â€Å"When was that?† Dale asks. At the same time, Fred Marshall asks, â€Å"Where?† â€Å"Chase Street, about ten past eight. I came in to pick up Henry Ley-den and drive him home. When we were on our way out of town, the boys drove their bikes into the road right in front of me. I got a good look at your son, Mr. Marshall. He seemed like a great kid.† Fred Marshall's widening eyes indicate that some kind of hope, some promise, is taking shape before him; Dale relaxes. â€Å"That pretty much matches their story. It would have been right before Ty took off on his own. If he did.† â€Å"Or they took off and left him,† says Ty's father. â€Å"They were faster on their bikes than Ty, and sometimes they, you know . . . they teased him.† â€Å"By racing ahead and leaving him alone,† Jack says. Fred Marshall's glum nod speaks of boyhood humiliations shared with this sympathetic father. Jack remembers the inflamed, hostile face and raised finger of Ebbie Wexler and wonders if and how the boy might be protecting himself. Dale had said that he smelled the presence of falsity in the boys' story, but why would they lie? Whatever their reasons, the lie almost certainly began with Ebbie Wexler. The other two followed orders. For the moment setting aside the third of his thoughts, Jack says, â€Å"I want to talk to the boys before you send them home. Where are they?† â€Å"The interrogation room, top of the stairs.† Dale aims a finger at the ceiling. â€Å"Tom will take you up.† With its battleship-gray walls, gray metal table, and single window narrow as a slit in a castle wall, the room at the top of the stairs seems designed to elicit confessions through boredom and despair, and when Tom Lund leads Jack through the door, the four inhabitants of the interrogation room appear to have succumbed to its leaden atmosphere. Bobby Dulac looks sideways, stops drumming a pencil on the tabletop, and says, â€Å"Well, hoo-ray for Hollywood. Dale said you were coming down.† Even Bobby gleams a little less conspicuously in this gloom. â€Å"Did you want to interrogate these here hoodlums, Lieutenant?† â€Å"In a minute, maybe.† Two of the three hoodlums on the far side of the table watch Jack move alongside Bobby Dulac as if fearing he will clap them in a cell. The words â€Å"interrogate† and â€Å"Lieutenant† have had the bracing effect of a cold wind from Canada. Ebbie Wexler squints at Jack, trying to look tough, and the boy beside him, Ronnie Metzger, wriggles in his chair, his eyes like dinner plates. The third boy, T. J. Ren-niker, has dropped his head atop his crossed arms and appears to be asleep. â€Å"Wake him up,† Jack says. â€Å"I have something to say, and I want you all to hear it.† In fact, he has nothing to say, but he needs these boys to pay attention to him. He already knows that Dale was right. If they are not lying, they are at least holding something back. That's why his abrupt appearance within their dozy scene frightened them. If Jack had been in charge, he would have separated the boys and questioned them individually, but now he must deal with Bobby Dulac's mistake. He has to treat them collectively, to begin with, and he has to work on their fear. He does not want to terrorize the boys, merely to get their hearts pumping a bit faster; after that, he can separate them. The weakest, guiltiest link has already declared himself. Jack feels no compunction about telling lies to get information. Ronnie Metzger shoves T.J.'s shoulder and says, â€Å"Wake up, bum-dell . . . dumbbell.† The sleeping boy moans, lifts his head from the table, begins to stretch out his arms. His eyes fasten on Jack, and blinking and swallowing he snaps into an upright position. â€Å"Welcome back,† Jack says. â€Å"I want to introduce myself and explain what I am doing here. My name is Jack Sawyer, and I am a lieutenant in the Homicide Division of the Los Angeles Police Department. I have an excellent record and a roomful of citations and medals. When I go after a bad guy, I usually wind up arresting him. Three years ago, I came here on a case from Los Angeles. Two weeks later, a man named Thornberg Kinderling was shipped back to L.A. in chains. Because I know this area and have worked with its law enforcement officers, the LAPD asked me to assist your local force in its investigation of the Fisherman murders.† He glances down to see if Bobby Dulac is grinning at this nonsense, but Bobby is staring frozen-faced across the table. â€Å"Your friend Tyler Marshall was with you before he disappeared this morning. Did the Fisherman take him? I hate to say it, but I think he did. Maybe we can get Tyler back, and maybe we can't, but if I am going to stop the Fisherman, I need you to tell me exactly what happened, down to the last detail. You have to be completely honest with me, because if you lie or keep anything secret, you will be guilty of obstruction of justice. Obstruction of justice is a serious, serious crime. Officer Dulac, what is the minimum sentence for that crime in the state of Wisconsin?† â€Å"Five years, I'm pretty sure,† Bobby Dulac says. Ebbie Wexler bites the inside of his cheek; Ronnie Metzger looks away and frowns at the table; T. J. Renniker dully contemplates the narrow window. Jack sits down beside Bobby Dulac. â€Å"Incidentally, I was the guy in the pickup one of you gave the finger to this morning. I can't say I'm thrilled to see you again.† Two heads swivel toward Ebbie, who squints ferociously, trying to solve this brand-new problem. â€Å"I did not,† he says, having settled on outright denial. â€Å"Maybe it looked like I did, but I didn't.† â€Å"You're lying, and we haven't even started to talk about Tyler Marshall yet. I'll give you one more chance. Tell me the truth.† Ebbie smirks. â€Å"I don't go around flipping the bird at people I don't know.† â€Å"Stand up,† Jack says. Ebbie glances from side to side, but his friends are unable to meet his gaze. He shoves back his chair and stands up, uncertainly. â€Å"Officer Dulac,† Jack says, â€Å"take this boy outside and hold him there.† Bobby Dulac performs his role perfectly. He uncoils from his chair and keeps his eyes on Ebbie as he glides toward him. He resembles a panther on the way to a sumptuous meal. Ebbie Wexler jumps back and tries to stay Bobby with a raised palm. â€Å"No, don't I take it back I did it, okay?† â€Å"Too late,† Jack says. He watches as Bobby grasps the boy's elbow and pulls him toward the door. Red-faced and sweating, Ebbie plants his feet on the floor, and the forward pressure applied to his arm folds him over the bulge of his stomach. He staggers forward, yelping and scattering tears. Bobbie Dulac opens the door and hauls him into the bleak second-floor corridor. The door slams shut and cuts off a wail of fear. The two remaining boys have turned the color of skim milk and seem incapable of movement. â€Å"Don't worry about him,† Jack says. â€Å"He'll be fine. In fifteen, twenty minutes, you'll be free to go home. I didn't think there was any point in talking to someone who lies from the git-go, that's all. Remember: even lousy cops know when they're being lied to and I am a great cop. So this is what we are going to do now. We're going to talk about what happened this morning, about what Tyler was doing, the way you separated from him, where you were, what you did afterward, anyone you might have seen, that kind of thing.† He leans back and flattens his hands on the table. â€Å"Go on, tell me what happened.† Ronnie and T.J. look at each other. T.J. inserts his right index finger into his mouth and begins to worry the nail with his front teeth. â€Å"Ebbie flipped you,† Ronnie says. â€Å"No kidding. After that.† â€Å"Uh, Ty said he hadda go someplace.† â€Å"He hadda go someplace,† T.J. chimes in. â€Å"Where were you right then?† â€Å"Uh . . . outside the Allsorts Pomorium.† â€Å"Emporium,† T.J. says. â€Å"It's not a pomorium, mushhead, it's a em-poree-um.† â€Å"And?† â€Å"And Ty said † Ronnie glances at T.J. â€Å"Ty said he hadda go somewhere.† â€Å"Which way did he go, east or west?† The boys treat this question as though it were asked in a foreign language, by puzzling over it, mutely. â€Å"Toward the river, or away from the river?† They consult each other again. The question has been asked in English, but no proper answer exists. Finally, Ronnie says, â€Å"I don't know.† â€Å"How about you, T.J.? Do you know?† T.J. shakes his head. â€Å"Good. That's honest. You don't know because you didn't see him leave, did you? And he didn't really say he had to go somewhere, did he? I bet Ebbie made that up.† T.J. wriggles, and Ronnie gazes at Jack with wondering awe. He has just revealed himself to be Sherlock Holmes. â€Å"Remember when I drove past in my truck?† They nod in unison. â€Å"Tyler was with you.† They nod again. â€Å"You'd already left the sidewalk in front of the Allsorts Emporium, and you were riding east on Chase Street away from the river. I saw you in my rearview mirror. Ebbie was pedaling very fast. The two of you could almost keep up with him. Tyler was smaller than the rest of you, and he fell behind. So I know he didn't go off on his own. He couldn't keep up.† Ronnie Metzger wails, â€Å"And he got way, way behind, and the Misherfun came out and grabbed him.† He promptly bursts into tears. Jack leans forward. â€Å"Did you see it happen? Either one of you?† â€Å"Noooaa,† Ronnie sobs. T.J. slowly shakes his head. â€Å"You didn't see anyone talking with Ty, or a car stopping, or him going into a shop, or anything like that?† The boys utter an incoherent, overlapping babble to the effect that they saw nothing. â€Å"When did you realize he was gone?† T.J. opens his mouth, then closes it. Ronnie says, â€Å"When we were having the Slurpees.† His face pursed with tension, T.J. nods in agreement. Two more questions reveal that they had enjoyed the Slurpees at the 7-Eleven, where they also purchased Magic cards, and that it had probably taken them no more than a couple of minutes to notice Tyler Marshall's absence. â€Å"Ebbie said Ty would buy us some more cards,† helpful Ronnie adds. They have reached the moment for which Jack has been waiting. Whatever the secret may be, it took place soon after the boys came out of the 7-Eleven and saw that Tyler had still not joined them. And the secret is T.J.'s alone. The kid is practically sweating blood, while the memory of the Slurpees and Magic cards has calmed down his friend to a remarkable degree. There is only one more question he wishes to ask the two of them. â€Å"So Ebbie wanted to find Tyler. Did you all get on your bikes and search around, or did Ebbie send just one of you?† â€Å"Huh?† Ronnie says. T.J. drops his chin and crosses his arms on the top of his head, as if to ward off a blow. â€Å"Tyler went somewheres,† Ronnie says. â€Å"We didn't look for him, we went to the park. To trade the Magic cards.† â€Å"I see,† Jack says. â€Å"Ronnie, thank you. You have been very helpful. I'd like you to go outside and stay with Ebbie and Officer Dulac while I have a short conversation with T.J. It shouldn't take more than five minutes, if that.† â€Å"I can go?† At Jack's nod, Ronnie moves hesitantly out of his chair. When he reaches the door, T.J. emits a whimper. Then Ronnie is gone, and T.J. jerks backward into his chair and tries to become as small as possible while staring at Jack with eyes that have become shiny, flat, and perfectly round. â€Å"T.J.,† Jack says, â€Å"you have nothing to worry about, I promise you.† Now that he is alone with the boy who had declared his guilt by falling asleep in the interrogation room, Jack Sawyer wants above all to absolve him of that guilt. He knows T.J.'s secret, and the secret is nothing; it is useless. â€Å"No matter what you tell me, I'm not going to arrest you. That's a promise, too. You're not in any trouble, son. In fact, I'm glad you and your friends could come down here and help us straighten things out.† He goes on in this vein for another three or four minutes, in the course of which T. J. Renniker, formerly condemned to death by firing squad, gradually comprehends that his pardon has come through and his release from what his buddy Ronnie would call vurance dile is imminent. A little color returns to his face. He returns to his former size, and his eyes lose their horror-stricken glaze. â€Å"Tell me what Ebbie did,† Jack says. â€Å"Just between you and me. I won't tell him anything. Honest. I won't rat you out.† â€Å"He wanted Ty to buy more Magic cards,† T.J. says, feeling his way through unknown territory. â€Å"If Ty was there, he woulda. Ebbie can get kind of mean. So . . . so he told me, go downstreet and get the slowpoke, or I'll give you an Indian burn.† â€Å"You got on your bike and rode back down Chase Street.† â€Å"Uh-huh. I looked, but I didn't see Ty anywheres. I thought I would, you know? Because where else could he be?† â€Å"And . . . ?† Jack reels in the answer he knows is coming by winding his hand through the air. â€Å"And I still didn't see him. And I got to Queen Street, where the old folks' home is, with the big hedge out front. And, um, I saw his bike there. On the sidewalk in front of the hedge. His sneaker was there, too. And some leaves off the hedge.† There it is, the worthless secret. Maybe not entirely worthless: it gives them a pretty accurate fix on the time of the boy's disappearance: 8:15, say, or 8:20. The bike lay on the sidewalk next to the sneaker for something like four hours before Danny Tcheda spotted them. Maxton's takes up just about all the land on that section of Queen Street, and no one was showing up for the Strawberry Fest until noon. T.J. describes being afraid if the Fisherman pulled Ty into that hedge, maybe he'd come back for more! In answer to Jack's final question, the boy says, â€Å"Ebbie told us to say Ty rode away from in front of the Allsorts, so people wouldn't, like, blame us. In case he was killed. Ty isn't really killed, is he? Kids like Ty don't get killed.† â€Å"I hope not,† Jack says. â€Å"Me, too.† T.J. snuffles and wipes his nose on his arm. â€Å"Let's get you on your way home,† Jack says, leaving his chair. T.J. stands up and begins to move along the side of the table. â€Å"Oh! I just remembered!† â€Å"What?† â€Å"I saw feathers on the sidewalk.† The floor beneath Jack's feet seems to roll left, then right, like the deck of a ship. He steadies himself by grasping the back of a chair. â€Å"Really.† He takes care to compose himself before turning to the boy. â€Å"What do you mean, feathers?† â€Å"Black ones. Big. They looked like they came off a crow. One was next to the bike, and the other was in the sneaker.† â€Å"That's funny,† says Jack, buying time until he ceases to reverberate from the unexpected appearance of feathers in his conversation with T. J. Renniker. That he should respond at all is ridiculous; that he should have felt, even for a second, that he was likely to faint is grotesque. T.J.'s feathers were real crow feathers on a real sidewalk. His were dream feathers, feathers from unreal robins, illusory as everything else in a dream. Jack tells himself a number of helpful things like this, and soon he does feel normal once again, but we should be aware that, for the rest of the night and much of the next day, the word feathers floats, surrounded by an aura as charged as an electrical storm, beneath and through his thoughts, now and then surfacing with the sizzling crackle of a lightning bolt. â€Å"It's weird,† T.J. says. â€Å"Like, how did a feather get in his sneaker?† â€Å"Maybe the wind blew it there,† Jack says, conveniently ignoring the nonexistence of wind this day. Reassured by the stability of the floor, he waves T.J. into the hallway, then follows him out. Ebbie Wexler pushes himself off the wall and stamps up alongside Bobby Dulac. Still in character, Bobby might have been carved from a block of marble. Ronnie Metzger sidles away. â€Å"We can send these boys home,† Jack says. â€Å"They've done their duty.† â€Å"T.J., what did you say?† Ebbie asks, glowering. â€Å"He made it clear that you know nothing about your friend's disappearance,† Jack says. Ebbie relaxes, though not without distributing scowls all around. The final and most malignant scowl is for Jack, who raises his eyebrows. â€Å"I didn't cry,† Ebbie says. â€Å"I was scared, but I didn't cry.† â€Å"You were scared, all right,† Jack says. â€Å"Next time, don't lie to me. You had your chance to help the police, and you blew it.† Ebbie struggles with this notion and succeeds, at least partially, in absorbing it. â€Å"Okay, but I wasn't really flippin' at you. It was the stupid music.† â€Å"I hated it, too. The guy who was with me insisted on playing it. You know who he was?† In the face of Ebbie's suspicious glower, Jack says, â€Å"George Rathbun.† It is like saying â€Å"Superman,† or â€Å"Arnold Schwarzenegger†; Ebbie's suspicion evaporates, and his face transforms. Innocent wonder fills his small, close-set eyes. â€Å"You know George Rathbun?† â€Å"He's one of my best friends,† Jack says, not adding that most of his other best friends are, in a sense, also George Rathbun. â€Å"Cool,† Ebbie says. In the background, T.J. and Ronnie echo, â€Å"Cool.† â€Å"George is pretty cool,† Jack says. â€Å"I'll tell him you said that. Let's go downstairs and get you kids on your bikes.† Still wrapped in the glory of having gazed upon the great, the tremendous George Rathbun, the boys mount their bicycles, pedal away down Sumner Street, and swerve off onto Second. Bobby Dulac says, â€Å"That was a good trick, what you said about George Rathbun. Sent them away happy.† â€Å"It wasn't a trick.† So startled that he jostles back into the station house side by side with Jack, Bobby says, â€Å"George Rathbun is a friend of yours?† â€Å"Yep,† Jack says. â€Å"And sometimes, he can be a real pain in the ass.† Dale and Fred Marshall look up as Jack enters the office, Dale with a cautious expectancy, Fred Marshall with what Jack sees, heartbreakingly, as hope. â€Å"Well?† Dale says. ( feathers) â€Å"You were right, they were hiding something, but it isn't much.† Fred Marshall slumps against the back of his chair, letting some of his belief in a future hope leak out of him like air from a punctured tire. â€Å"Not long after they got to the 7-Eleven, the Wexler boy sent T.J. down the street to look for your son,† Jack says. â€Å"When T.J. got to Queen Street, he saw the bike and the sneaker lying on the sidewalk. Of course, they all thought of the Fisherman. Ebbie Wexler figured they might get blamed for leaving him behind, and he came up with the story you heard that Tyler left them, instead of the other way around.† â€Å"If you saw all four boys around ten past eight, that means Tyler disappeared only a few minutes later. What does this guy do, lurk in hedges?† â€Å"Maybe he does exactly that,† Jack says. â€Å"Did you have people check out that hedge?† ( feathers) â€Å"The staties went over it, through it, and under it. Leaves and dirt, that's what they came up with.† As if driving a spike with his hand, Fred Marshall bangs his fist down onto the desk. â€Å"My son was gone for four hours before anyone noticed his bike. Now it's almost seven-thirty! He's been missing for most of the day! I shouldn't be sitting here, I should be driving around, looking for him.† â€Å"Everybody is looking for your son, Fred,† Dale says. â€Å"My guys, the staties, even the FBI.† â€Å"I have no faith in them,† Fred says. â€Å"They haven't found Irma Freneau, have they? Why should they find my son? As far as I can see, I've got one chance here.† When he looks at Jack, emotion turns his eyes into lamps. â€Å"That chance is you, Lieutenant. Will you help me?† Jack's third and most troubling thought, withheld until now and purely that of an experienced policeman, causes him to say, â€Å"I'd like to talk to your wife. If you're planning on visiting her tomorrow, would you mind if I came along?† Dale blinks and says, â€Å"Maybe we should talk about this.† â€Å"Do you think it would do some good?† â€Å"It might,† Jack says. â€Å"Seeing you might do her some good, anyhow,† Fred says. â€Å"Don't you live in Norway Valley? That's on the way to Arden. I can pick you up about nine.† â€Å"Jack,† Dale says. â€Å"See you at nine,† Jack says, ignoring the signals of mingled distress and anger emanating from his friend, also the little voice that whispers ( feather). â€Å"Amazing,† says Henry Leyden. â€Å"I don't know whether to thank you or congratulate you. Both, I suppose. It's too late in the game to make ‘bitchrod,' like me, but I think you could have a shot at ‘dope.' â€Å" â€Å"Don't lose your head. The only reason I went down there was to keep the boy's father from coming to my house.† â€Å"That wasn't the only reason.† â€Å"You're right. I was feeling sort of edgy and hemmed in. I felt like getting out, changing the scenery.† â€Å"But there was also another reason.† â€Å"Henry, you are hip-deep in pigshit, do you know that? You want to think I acted out of civic duty, or honor, or compassion, or altruism, or something, but I didn't. I don't like having to say this, but I'm a lot less good-hearted and responsible than you think I am.† † ‘Hip-deep in pigshit'? Man, you are absolutely on the money. I have been hip-deep in pigshit, not to mention chest-deep and even chin-deep in pigshit, most of my life.† â€Å"Nice of you to admit it.† â€Å"However, you misunderstand me. You're right, I do think you are a good, decent person. I don't just think it, I know it. You're modest, you're compassionate, you're honorable, you're responsible no matter what you think of yourself right now. But that wasn't what I was talking about.† â€Å"What did you mean, then?† â€Å"The other reason you decided to go to the police station is connected to this problem, this concern, whatever it is, that's been bugging you for the past couple of weeks. It's like you've been walking around under a shadow.† â€Å"Huh,† Jack said. â€Å"This problem, this secret of yours, takes up half your attention, so you're only half present; the rest of you is somewhere else. Sweetie, don't you think I can tell when you're worried and preoccupied? I might be blind, but I can see.† â€Å"Okay. Let's suppose that something has been on my mind lately. What could that have to do with going to the station house?† â€Å"There are two possibilities. Either you were going off to confront it, or you were fleeing from it.† Jack does not speak. â€Å"All of which suggests that this problem has to do with your life as a policeman. It could be some old case coming back to haunt you. Maybe a psychotic thug you put in jail was released and is threatening to kill you. Or, hell, I'm completely full of shit and you found out you have liver cancer and a life expectancy of three months.† â€Å"I don't have cancer, at least as far as I know, and no ex-con wants to kill me. All of my old cases, most of them, anyway, are safely asleep in the records warehouse of the LAPD. Of course, something has been bothering me lately, and I should have expected you to see that. But I didn't want to, I don't know, burden you with it until I managed to figure it out for myself.† â€Å"Tell me one thing, will you? Were you going toward it, or running away?† â€Å"There's no answer to that question.† â€Å"We shall see. Isn't the food ready by now? I'm starving, literally starving. You cook too slow. I would have been done ten minutes ago.† â€Å"Hold your horses,† Jack says. â€Å"Coming right up. The problem is this crazy kitchen of yours.† â€Å"Most rational kitchen in America. Maybe in the world.† After ducking out of the police station quickly enough to avoid a useless conversation with Dale, Jack had yielded to impulse and called Henry with the offer of making dinner for both of them. A couple of good steaks, a nice bottle of wine, grilled mushrooms, a big salad. He could pick up everything they needed in French Landing. Jack had cooked for Henry on three or four previous occasions, and Henry had prepared one stupendously bizarre dinner for Jack. (The housekeeper had taken all the herbs and spices off their rack to wash it, and she had put everything back in the wrong place.) What was he doing in French Landing? He'd explain that when he got there. At eight-thirty he had pulled up before Henry's roomy white farmhouse, greeted Henry, and carried the groceries and his copy of Bleak House into the kitchen. He had tossed the book to the far end of the table, opened the wine, poured a glass for his host and one for himself, and started cooking. He'd had to spend several minutes r eacquainting himself with the eccentricities of Henry's kitchen, in which objects were not located by kind pans with pans, knives with knives, pots with pots but according to what sort of meal required their usage. If Henry wanted to whip up a grilled trout and some new potatoes, he had only to open the proper cabinet to find all the necessary utensils. These were arranged in four basic groups (meat, fish, poultry, and vegetables), with many subgroups and subsubgroups within each category. The filing system confounded Jack, who often had to peer into several widely separated realms before coming upon the frying pan or spatula he was looking for. As Jack chopped, wandered the shelves, and cooked, Henry had laid the table in the kitchen with plates and silverware and sat down to quiz his troubled friend. Now the steaks, rare, are transported to the plates, the mushrooms arrayed around them, and the enormous wooden salad bowl installed on the center of the table. Henry pronounces the meal delicious, takes a sip of his wine, and says, â€Å"If you still won't talk about your trouble, whatever it is, you'd better at least tell me what happened at the station. I suppose there's very little doubt that another child was snatched.† â€Å"Next to none, I'm sorry to say. It's a boy named Tyler Marshall. His father's name is Fred Marshall, and he works out at Goltz's. Do you know him?† â€Å"Been a long time since I bought a combine,† Henry says. â€Å"The first thing that struck me was that Fred Marshall was a very nice guy,† Jack says, and goes on to recount, in great detail and leaving nothing out, the evening's events and revelations, except for one matter, that of his third, his unspoken, thought. â€Å"You actually asked to visit Marshall's wife? In the mental wing at French County Lutheran?† â€Å"Yes, I did,† Jack says. â€Å"I'm going there tomorrow.† â€Å"I don't get it.† Henry eats by hunting the food with his knife, spearing it with his fork, and measuring off a narrow strip of steak. â€Å"Why would you want to see the mother?† â€Å"Because one way or another I think she's involved,† Jack says. â€Å"Oh, come off it. The boy's own mother?† â€Å"I'm not saying she's the Fisherman, because of course she isn't. But according to her husband, Judy Marshall's behavior started to change before Amy St. Pierre disappeared. She got worse and worse as the murders went on, and on the day her son vanished, she flipped out completely. Her husband had to have her committed.† â€Å"Wouldn't you say she had an excellent reason to break down?† â€Å"She flipped out before anyone told her about her son. Her husband thinks she has ESP! He said she saw the murders in advance, she knew the Fisherman was on the way. And she knew her son was gone before they found the bike when Fred Marshall came home, he found her tearing at the walls and talking nonsense. Completely out of control.† â€Å"You hear about lots of cases where a mother is suddenly aware of some threat or injury to her child. A pyschic bond. Sounds like mumbo jumbo, but I guess it happens.† â€Å"I don't believe in ESP, and I don't believe in coincidence.† â€Å"So what are you saying?† â€Å"Judy Marshall knows something, and whatever she knows is a real showstopper. Fred can't see it he's much too close and Dale can't see it, either. You should have heard him talk about her.† â€Å"So what is she supposed to know?† â€Å"I think she may know the doer. I think it has to be someone close to her. Whoever he is, she knows his name, and it's driving her crazy.† Henry frowns and uses his inchworm technique to entrap another piece of steak. â€Å"So you're going to the hospital to open her up,† he finally says. â€Å"Yes. Basically.† A mysterious silence follows this statement. Henry quietly whittles away at the meat, chews what he whittles, and washes it down with Jordan cabernet. â€Å"How did your deejay gig go? Was it okay?† â€Å"It was a thing of beauty. All the adorable old swingers cut loose on the dance floor, even the ones in wheelchairs. One guy sort of rubbed me the wrong way. He was rude to a woman named Alice, and he asked me to play ‘Lady Magowan's Nightmare,' which doesn't exist, as you probably know â€Å" â€Å"It's ‘Lady Magowan's Dream.' Woody Herman.† â€Å"Good boy. The thing was, he had this terrible voice. It sounded like something out of hell! Anyhow, I didn't have the Woody Herman record, and he asked for the Bunny Berigan ‘I Can't Get Started.' Which happened to be Rhoda's favorite record. What with my goofy ear hallucinations and all, it shook me up. I don't know why.† For a few minutes they concentrate on their plates. Jack says, â€Å"What do you think, Henry?† Henry tilts his head, auditing an inner voice. Scowling, he sets down his fork. The inner voice continues to demand his attention. He adjusts his shades and faces Jack. â€Å"In spite of everything you say, you still think like a cop.† Jack bridles at the suspicion that Henry is not paying him a compliment. â€Å"What do you mean by that?† â€Å"Cops see differently than people who aren't cops. When a cop looks at someone, he wonders what he's guilty of. The possibility of innocence never enters his mind. To a longtime cop, a guy who's put in ten years or more, everyone who isn't a cop is guilty. Only most of them haven't been caught yet.† Henry has described the mind-set of dozens of men Jack once worked with. â€Å"Henry, how do you know about that?† â€Å"I can see it in their eyes,† Henry says. â€Å"That's the way policemen approach the world. You are a policeman.† Jack blurts out, â€Å"I am a coppiceman.† Appalled, he blushes. â€Å"Sorry, that stupid phrase has been running around and around in my head, and it just popped out.† â€Å"Why don't we clear the dishes and start on Bleak House?† When their few dishes have been stacked beside the sink, Jack takes the book from the far side of the table and follows Henry toward the living room, pausing on the way to glance, as he always does, at his friend's studio. A door with a large glass insert opens into a small, soundproofed chamber bristling with electronic equipment: the microphone and turntable back from Maxton's and reinstalled before Henry's well-padded, swiveling chair; a disc changer and matching digital-analog converter mount, close at hand, beside a mixing board and a massive tape recorder adjacent to the other, larger window, which looks into the kitchen. When Henry had been planning the studio, Rhoda requested the windows, because, she'd said, she wanted to be able to see him at work. There isn't a wire in sight. The entire studio has the disciplined neatness of the captain's quarters on a ship. â€Å"Looks like you're going to work tonight,† Jack says. â€Å"I want to get two more Henry Shakes ready to send, and I'm working on something for a birthday salute to Lester Young and Charlie Parker.† â€Å"Were they born on the same day?† â€Å"Close enough. August twenty-seventh and twenty-ninth. You know, I can't quite tell if you'll want the lights on or not.† â€Å"Let's turn them on,† Jack says. And so Henry Leyden switches on the two lamps beside the window, and Jack Sawyer moves to the overstuffed chair near the fireplace and turns on the tall lamp at one of its rounded arms and watches as his friend walks unerringly to the light just inside the front door and the ornate fixture alongside his own, his favorite resting place, the Mission-style sofa, clicking first one, then the other into life, then settles down onto the sofa with one leg stretched out along its length. Even, low light pervades the long room and swells into greater brightness around Jack's chair. â€Å"Bleak House, by Charles Dickens,† he says. He clears his throat. â€Å"Okay, Henry, we're off to the races.† â€Å"London. Michaelmas Term lately over,† he reads, and marches into a world made of soot and mud. Muddy dogs, muddy horses, muddy people, a day without light. Soon he has reached the second paragraph: â€Å"Fog everywhere. Fog up the river, where it flows among green aits and meadows; fog down the river, where it rolls defiled among the tiers of shipping, and the waterside pollutions of a great (and dirty) city. Fog on the Essex marshes, fog on the Kentish heights. Fog creeping into the cabooses of collier-brigs; fog lying out on the yards, and hovering in the rigging of great ships; fog drooping on the gunwales of barges and small boats.† His voice catches, and his mind temporarily drifts off-focus. What he is reading unhappily reminds him of French Landing, of Sumner Street and Chase Street, of the lights in the window of the Oak Tree Inn, the Thunder Five lurking in Nailhouse Row, and the gray ascent from the river, of Queen Street and Maxton's hedges, the little houses spreading out on grids, all of it choked by unseen fog; which engulfs a battered NO TRESPASSING sign on the highway and swallows the Sand Bar and glides hungry and searching down the valleys. â€Å"Sorry,† he says. â€Å"I was just thinking â€Å" â€Å"I was, too,† Henry says. â€Å"Go on, please.† But for that brief flicker of an old NO TRESPASSING sign completely unaware of the black house he one day will have to enter, Jack concentrates again on the page and continues reading Bleak House. The windows darken as the lamps grow warmer. The case of Jarndyce and Jarndyce grinds through the courts, aided or impeded by attorneys Chizzle, Mizzle, and Drizzle; Lady Dedlock leaves Sir Leicester Dedlock alone at their great estate with its moldy chapel, stagnant river, and â€Å"Ghost's Walk†; Esther Summerson begins to chirp away in the first person. Our friends decide that the appearance of Esther demands a small libation, if they are to get through much more chirping. Henry unfolds from the sofa, sails into the kitchen, and returns with two short, fat glasses one-third filled with Balvenie Doublewood single-malt whiskey, as well as a glass of plain water for the reader. A couple of sips, a few murmurs of appreciation, and Jack resumes. Esther, Esther, Esther, but beneath the water torture of her relentless sunniness the story gathers steam and carries both reader and listener along in its train. Having come to a convenient stopping point, Jack closes the book and yawns. Henry stands up and stretches. They move to the door, and Henry follows Jack outside beneath a vast night sky brilliantly scattered with stars. â€Å"Tell me one thing,† Henry says. â€Å"Shoot.† â€Å"When you were in the station house, did you really feel like a cop? Or did you feel like you were pretending to be one?† â€Å"Actually, it was kind of surprising,† Jack says. â€Å"In no time at all, I felt like a cop again.† â€Å"Good.† â€Å"Why is that good?† â€Å"Because it means you were running toward that mysterious secret, not away from it.† Shaking his head and smiling, deliberately not giving Henry the satisfaction of a reply, Jack steps up into his vehicle and says good-bye from the slight but distinct elevation of the driver's seat. The engine coughs and churns, his headlights snap into being, and Jack is on his way home.

Conflict Analysis Essay

‘When conflict arises, it is impossible not to take a side. Everyone has a role’ Expository Essay: One of the great myths of conflict is that is can always be contained. Whether it is encountered in the personal or political sphere, conflict will often spread beyond the main combatants. History demonstrates that wars escalate in a world where connections between individuals and states are so complex and it is so difficult to come to a definite conclusion. An argument between friends will generally force those on the perimeter to choose sides. Conflict by its very nature creates polarities. Even when conflict is internal, it rarely remains so. When a dispute begins, the world is viewed in black and white terms with no middle ground. Attempts to reconcile differences are often misinterpreted as tacit support for one side or the other. Conflict is defined by incompatible positions that force individuals to take sides. War constructs an environment in which on a political level, everyone is on a side. However, in another sense, everyone is doing what they can or must to survive in their particular situation. Throughout their time as prisoners of war, the women in the camp always disregard the Japanese as their enemy. For some, this is because of nationalistic allegiances, but for other it is because of the way they are treated. Their battle is not against Japan, but against humiliation and the use of brutality to degrade and harm others. The Japanese impose many acts of humiliation upon the women in the camp, such as forcing them to bow and scramble for food, to haul water for Japanese baths, to rise upon order and to assert the supremacy of the Japanese Empire over the British. This humiliation is explained as a reversal of the humiliation to which the Japanese felt the Europeans were subjected colonised Asian people. Hence, why divisions in individuals are experienced during war and consequently force oneself to choose a side. Conflict can rarely be contained and it inevitably spreads beyond the original dispute. Class prejudices often causes disputes between individuals  demonstrating how support and unity is essential in times of conflict. Sometimes the women in the camp are surprised to discover themselves degrading attitudes that they despise in their captors. Prejudices based on class and race must be confronted if conflict is not to destroy all hope and dignity. However, the women do not last long living under the pressures of camp life and soon they are all equal in scrambling for food and bowing to the Japanese flag. Cultural and educational backgrounds have a more profound impact on the relationships formed within the group and arguments raised between individuals. When a racially motivated fight breaks out over a lost bar of soap, it threatens to undermine the unity and strength of the women. This demonstrates the immense importance to disregard social class for these women. The middle ground can be the most dangerous place in a conflict because both sides may regard this position with suspicion. Margaret (Daisy Drummond) frequently seeks to mediate between the Japanese and their victims. Her bravery and compassion and her unshakeable belief in the basic goodness of individuals, puts her life at great risk. Her bravery is evident when she marches out with water for Susan who is weakening from her torture. This action may have led to similar punishment for herself. Sometimes conflict is like a bushfire it spreads and spreads until everyone is forced to take some kind of action. It does not respect those who wish to stay out of its way, anymore than it does those who try to encounter it head on. Arguments, disputes and battles of all sorts are an undeniable part of the fabric of human existence. The goal is always to look for a way to end the fighting and heal the wounds. It is thus crucial not to underestimate the momentum that develops so quickly when conflict arises. Persuasive Essay: We sang wonderfully today. The concert was a huge success! Even Captain Tanaka clapped at the end. This would have been unthinkable a few months ago. Maybe the Japs are beginning to think we are humans after all. Well I don’t think I could ever think of them that way. Adrienne and Daisy were talking about that after the concert. The interpreter asked them to perform a traditional Japanese song. Daisy looked like she was about to agree, but Adrienne said â€Å"NO!† straight away. Adrienne admitted she hates the Japs, but Daisy said the worse they acted the most sorry she felt for them. I’ve been thinking about that a lot. It seems Daisy doesn’t see things like most of us do. She doesn’t see us as innocent and the Japs as evil. She just doesn’t take sides like that. It is easer to wonder if Daisy is like this because she is just too soft-a pushover who will help anyone-maybe just to be liked. I knew some girls like that back at school, they’d get bullied all the time but still hang around with the bullies. But that’s not Daisy. She is the bravest of us all. She marched straight out in front of the soldiers with water for Susan that horrible day and she bargained for Susan’s release too. But that’s it, she wanted to help Susan, but she never wanted to hurt the Japs. For her it isn’t us against them, she feels compassion for everyone. That’s amazing but I don’t know anyone else like Daisy. Most of us are like Adrienne. We have to take sides because the war puts us on a side. I don’t understand how anyone could possibly feel compassion towards the Japs; they have put us through extraordinary challenges, where I personally have had to test my morals. But I have to put aside my morals for the time being, if I want to survive in this corrupt environment. I often relate my thoughts back to Daisy’s, she is so compassionate and highly respected though the camp. Does this mean she accepts the behaviours of the Japs, humiliating us? Daisy was in the missionaries, maybe she feels a sense of understanding towards the Japs? ‘When conflict arises, it is impossible not to take a side. Everyone has a role’ Expository Essay: One of the great myths of conflict is that is can always be contained. Whether it is encountered in the personal or political sphere, conflict will often spread beyond the main combatants. History demonstrates that wars escalate in a world where connections between individuals and states are so complex and it is so difficult to come to a definite conclusion. An argument between friends will generally force those on the perimeter to choose sides. Conflict by its very nature creates polarities. Even when conflict is internal, it rarely remains so. When a dispute begins, the world is viewed in black and white terms with no middle ground. Attempts to reconcile differences are often misinterpreted as tacit support for one side or the other. Conflict is defined by incompatible positions that force individuals to take sides. War constructs an environment in which on a political level, everyone is on a side. However, in another sense, everyone is doing what they can or must to survive in their particular situation. Throughout their time as prisoners of war, the women in the camp always disregard the Japanese as their enemy. For some, this is because of nationalistic allegiances, but for other it is because of the way they are treated. Their battle is not against Japan, but against humiliation and the use of brutality to degrade and harm others. The Japanese impose many acts of humiliation upon the women in the camp, such as forcing them to bow and scramble for food, to haul water for Japanese baths, to rise upon order and to assert the supremacy of the Japanese Empire over the British. This humiliation is explained as a reversal of the humiliation to which the Japanese felt the Europeans were subjected colonised Asian people. Hence, why divisions in individuals are experienced during war and consequently force oneself to choose a side. – Conflict can rarely be contained and it inevitably spreads beyond the original dispute. Class prejudices often causes disputes between individuals demonstrating how support and unity is essential in times of conflict.  Sometimes the women in the camp are surprised to discover themselves degrading attitudes that they despise in their captors. Prejudices based on class and race must be confronted if conflict is not to destroy all hope and dignity. However, the women do not last long living under the pressures of camp life and soon they are all equal in scrambling for food and bowing to the Japanese flag. Cultural and educational backgrounds have a more profound impact on the relationships formed within the group and arguments raised between individuals. When a racially motivated fight breaks out over a lost bar of soap, it threatens to undermine the unity and strength of the women. This demonstrates the immense importance to disregard social class for these women. -indigenous Australians. The middle ground can be the most dangerous place in a conflict because both sides may regard this position with suspicion. Margaret (Daisy Drummond) frequently seeks to mediate between the Japanese and their victims. Her bravery and compassion and her unshakeable belief in the basic goodness of individuals, puts her life at great risk. Her bravery is evident when she marches out with water for Susan who is weakening from her torture. This action may have led to similar punishment for herself. Daisy demonstrates that in times of conflict we can have courage to not comprise our convictions even in the direst circumstances. Her strength comes from her authentic faith. When the observation is made following an incident of nauseating brutality that she doesn’t hate the oppressors, Margaret responds, â€Å"I just can’t bring myself to hate people. The worse they behave, the more sorry I feel for them.† This powerful character illustrates that in times of serve conflict our morals do not have to be compromised if we have the strength to do so. Sometimes conflict is like a bushfire it spreads and spreads until everyone is forced to take some kind of action. It does not respect those who wish to stay out of its way, anymore than it does those who try to encounter it head on. Arguments, disputes and battles of all sorts are an undeniable part of the fabric of human existence. The goal is always to look for a way to end the fighting and heal the wounds. It is thus crucial not to underestimate the momentum that develops so quickly when conflict arises.

Heros Journey 101 Definition and Step-by-Step Guide (With Checklist!)

Heros Journey 101 Definition and Step-by-Step Guide (With Checklist!) The Hero's Journey: an Author's Guide to Plotting Ever notice that many stories seem to have a similar pattern? There’s always a protagonist who goes on an adventure, makes new friends, encounters roadblocks, fights a bad guy, and returns home a changed person. In fact, we can sum it up for you in two words: Hero’s Journey.This story structure is as old as time. From Theseus and the Minotaur to The Lion King, so many narratives follow this pattern that it’s ingrained in our cultural DNA today. In this post, we'll show you how to make this classic plot structure work for you - and recap it all in a neat infographic. Ready to answer the call of adventure? Let’s cross the barrier.What is the Hero’s Journey archetype?The Hero's Journey is a classic story structure that's shared by stories worldwide. Coined by academic Joseph Campbell in 1949, it refers to a wide-ranging category of tales in which a character ventures out to get what they need, faces conflict, and ultimately triumphs over adversity. Here are the three stages of the hero’s journey:The Departure Act: the Hero leaves the Ordinary World.The Initiation Act: the Hero ventures into unknown territory (the "Special World") and is birthed into a true champion through various trials and challenges.The Return Act: the Hero returns in triumph.In 2007, screenwriter Christopher Vogler refined Campbell’s original structure in his book,  The Writer’s Journey.  In it, Vogler expanded upon Campbell’s three phases, defining 12 stages that make it up. (This is the version that we’ll be dissecting later in this post.) The Hero's Journey has its fingerprints in everything from The Lion King  and horror novels to Star Wars and Arrival. But keep in mind that you don't necessarily need to follow it beat by beat. You can instead think of it as a map: you can stray from the set path whenever you like. But when you’re struggling to figure out what should happen next, it can act as a narrative arc guide to suggest what the next milestone should be. What are the 12 stages of the Hero's Journey? The 12 Hero’s Journey StepsThe Hero's Journey is a model for both plot points and character development: as the Hero traverses the world, they'll undergo inner and outer transformation at each stage of the journey. The 12 steps of the hero's journey are...1. The Ordinary World 2. The Call of Adventure 3. Refusal of the Call 4. Meeting the Mentor 5. Crossing the First Threshold 6. Tests, Allies, Enemies 7. Approach to the Inmost Cave 8. The Ordeal 9. Reward (Seizing the Sword) 10. The Road Back 11. Resurrection 12. Return with the ElixirBelieve it or not, this story structure also applies across mediums and genres (and also works when your protagonist is an anti-hero!). To show you how it can be used outside of your average sword-and-sorcery books, we've adopted the 1976 film  Rocky as an example in each step. 1. Ordinary WorldIn which we meet our Hero.The journey has yet to start. Before our Hero discovers a strange new world, we must first understand the status quo: their ordinary, mundane reality.It’s up to this opening leg to set the stage, introducing the Hero to readers. Importantly, it lets readers identify with the Hero as a â€Å"normal† person in a â€Å"normal† setting, before the journey begins.Example of the Ordinary World: In the opening of Rocky, Rocky Balboa is introduced as a mediocre boxer and loan collector - just doing his best to live day-to-day in a poor part of Philadelphia.2. Call to AdventureIn which an adventure starts.The call to adventure is all about booting the Hero out of their comfort zone. In this stage, they are generally confronted with a problem or challenge they can't ignore. This catalyst can take many forms, as Campbell points out in Hero with a Thousand Faces. The Hero can, for instance:Decide to go forth of their own volition, i.e. Theseus upon arriving in Athens,Be sent abroad by a benign or malignant agent, i.e. Odysseus setting off on his ship in The Odyssey,Stumble upon the adventure as a result of a mere blunder, i.e. Dorothy when she’s swept up in a tornado in The Wizard of Oz,Be casually strolling when some passing phenomenon catches the wandering eye and lures one away from the frequented paths of man, i.e. Elliot in E.T. upon discovering a lost alien in the t ool shed.The stakes of the adventure and the Hero's goals become clear. The only question: will he rise to the challenge?Example of the Call to Adventure: Apollo Creed, the undisputed World Heavyweight Champion, decides to make a big fight interesting by giving a no-name a chance to challenge him. Intrigued by the nickname, â€Å"The Italian Stallion,† he rings Rocky up.3. Refusal of the CallIn which the Hero digs in their feet.Great, so the Hero’s received their summons. Now they’re all set to be whisked off to defeat evil, right?Not so fast. The Hero might first refuse the call to action. It’s risky and there are perils - like spiders, trolls, or perhaps a creepy uncle waiting back at Pride Rock. It’s enough to give anyone pause.In Star Wars, for instance, Luke Skywalker initially refuses to join Obi-Wan on his mission to rescue the princess. It’s only when he discovers that his aunt and uncle have been killed by stormtroopers that he changes his mind.Example of the Refusal of the Call: Rocky says, â€Å"Thanks, but no thanks,† to Creed’s invitation. He’s reluctant, given that he has no trainer and is incredibly out of shape. Follow Rocky as he traverses the Hero's Journey in this post 4. Meeting the MentorIn which the Hero acquires a personal trainer.The Hero's decided to go on the adventure - but they’re not ready to spread their wings yet. They're much too inexperienced at this point and we don't want them to do a fabulous belly-flop off the cliff.Enter the mentor: someone who helps the Hero, so that they doesn't make a total fool of themselves (or get themselves killed). The mentor provides practical training, profound wisdom, a kick up the posterior, or something abstract like grit and self-confidence.Wise old wizards seem to like being mentors. But mentors take many forms, from witches to hermits and suburban karate instructors. They might literally give weapons to prepare for the trials ahead, like Q in the James Bond series. Or perhaps the mentor is an object, such as a map. In all cases, they prepare the Hero for the next step.Example of Meeting the Mentor: In steps former boxer Mickey â€Å"Mighty Mick† Goldmill, who sees potential in Rocky and starts training him physically and mentally for the fight.5. Crossing the First ThresholdIn which the Hero enters the other world in earnest.Now the Hero is ready - and committed - to the journey. This marks the end of the Departure stage and is when the adventure really kicks into the next gear. As Vogler writes: â€Å"This is the moment that the balloon goes up, the ship sails, the romance begins, the wagon gets rolling.†From this point on, there’s no turning back.Like our Hero, you should think of this stage as a checkpoint for your story. Pause and re-assess your bearings before you continue into unfamiliar territory. Have you:Launched the central conflict? If not, here’s a post on types of conflict to help you out.Established the theme of your book? If not, check out this post that’s all about creating theme  and motifs.Made headway into your character development? If not, this character profile template and these character development exercises may be useful.Example of Crossing the First Threshold: Rocky fully accepts the gauntlet to square up when he crosses the threshold into his love interest Adrian’s house and asks her out on a date.6. Tests, Allies, EnemiesIn which the Hero faces new challenges and gets a squad.When we step into the Special World, we notice a definite shift. The Hero might be discombobulated by this unfamiliar reality and its new rules. This is generally one of the longest stages in the story, as our protagonist gets to grips with this new world.This makes a prime hunting ground for the series of tests to pass! Luckily, there are many ways for the Hero to get into trouble:In Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,  Spencer, Bethany, â€Å"Fridge,† and Martha get off to a bad start when they bump into a herd of bloodthirsty hippos.In his first few months at Hogwarts, Harry Potter manages to fight a troll, almost fall from a broomstick and die, and get horribly lost in the Forbidden Forest.Marlin and Dory encounter three â€Å"reformed† sharks , get shocked by jellyfish, and are swallowed by a blue whale en route to finding Nemo.This stage often expands the cast of characters. Once the protagonist is in the Special World, he will meet allies and enemies - or foes that turn out to be friends, and vice versa. He will learn a new set of rules from them. Saloons and seedy bars are popular places for these transactions, as Vogler points out (so long as the Hero survives them).Example of Tests, Allies, Enemies: Rocky continues to try and win over Adrian while making a dubious friend in Paulie.7. Approach to the Inmost CaveIn which the Hero gets closer to his goal.This isn’t a physical cave. Instead, the â€Å"inmost cave† refers to the most dangerous spot in the other realm - whether that’s the villain’s chambers, the lair of the fearsome dragon, or the Death Star. Almost always, it is where the ultimate goal of the quest is located. Everything you wanted to know about the Hero's Journey - and more! Note that the protagonist hasn’t entered the Inmost Cave just yet. This stage is all about the approach to it. It covers all the prepwork that's needed in order to defeat the villain.Example of the Approach to the Inmost Cave: The Inmost Cave in Rocky is Rocky’s own mind. He fears that he’ll never amount to anything - something that he reveals when he butts heads with his trainer, Mickey, in his apartment.8. OrdealIn which the Hero faces his biggest test of all thus far. Of all the tests the Hero has faced, none have made them hit rock bottom - until now. Vogler describes this phase as a â€Å"black moment.† Campbell refers to it as the â€Å"belly of the whale.† Both indicate some grim news for the Hero.The protagonist must now confront their greatest fear. If they survive it, they will emerge transformed. This is a critical moment in the story, as Vogler explains that it will â€Å"inform every decision that the Hero makes from this point forward.†The Ordeal is sometimes not the climax of the story. There’s more to come. But you can think of it as the main event of the second act - the one in which the Hero actually earns the title of â€Å"Hero.†Example of the Ordeal: The start of the training montage marks the beginning of Rocky’s Ordeal. He pushes through it until he glimpses hope ahead while running up the museum steps.9. Reward (Seizing the Sword)In which the Hero sees light at the end of the tunnel.Our Hero’s been through a lot. However, the fruits of their labor are now at hand - if they can just reach out and grab them! The â€Å"reward† is the object or knowledge the Hero has fought throughout the entire journey to hold.Once the protagonist has it in their possession, it generally has greater ramifications for the story. Vogler offers a few examples of it in action:Luke rescues Princess Leia and captures the plans of the Death Star - keys to defeating Darth Vader.Dorothy escapes from the Wicked Witch’s castle with the broomstick and the ruby slippers - keys to getting back home.Example of the Reward (Seizing the Sword): Rocky’s reward is the return of his faith in himself. He regains the self-esteem to realize that he has the stuff to take on Apollo Creed - win or lose.10. The Road BackIn which the light at the end of the tunnel might be a little further than the Hero thought.The story's not over just yet, as this phase marks the beginning of Act Three. Now that he's seized the reward, the Hero tries to return to the Ordinary World, but more dangers (inconveniently) arise on the road back from the Inmost Cave.More precisely, the Hero must deal with the consequences and aftermath of the previous act: the dragon, enraged by the Hero who’s just stolen a treasure from under his nose, starts the hunt. Or perhaps the opposing army gathers to pursue the Hero across a crowded battlefield. All further obstacles for the Hero, who must face them down before they can return home.Example of the Road Back: On New Year’s Day, the fight between Rocky and Creed is held. Rocky realizes the challenge that lies before him in the first few rounds, in which both men are more or less equally matched.11. ResurrectionIn which the last test is met.Here is the true climax of the story. Everything that happened prior to this stage culminates in a crowning test for the Hero, as the Dark Side gets one last chance to triumph over the Hero.Vogler refers to this as a â€Å"final exam† for the Hero - they must be â€Å"tested once more to see if they have really learned the lessons of the Ordeal.† It’s in this Final Battle that the protagonist goes through one more â€Å"resurrection.† As a result, this is where you’ll get most of your miraculous near-death escapes, la James Bond's dashing deliverances. If the Hero survives, they can start looking forward to a sweet ending.Example of the Resurrection: Rocky’s knocked down more than a few times as the fight continues. The entire fight winds up lasting 15 rounds and takes both men to the brink of exhaustion.12. Return with the ElixirIn which our Hero has a triumphant homecoming.Finally, the Hero gets to return home. However, they go back a different person than when they started out: they’ve grown and matured as a result of the journey they’ve taken.But we’ve got to see them bring home the bacon, right? That’s why the protagonist must return with the â€Å"Elixir,† or the prize won during the journey, whether that’s an object or knowledge and insight gained.Of course, it’s possible for a story to end on an Elixir-less note - but then the Hero would be doomed to repeat the entire adventure.Example of the Return with the Elixir: Rocky doesn’t win the fight - but he doesn’t care. He’s won back his confidence and beaten his mental demons. And he’s got Adrian, who tell him that she loves him.Free Infographic: The Hero’s Journey TemplateThe following infographic can be used as a hero’s journey template. Follow Bilbo along on each of the 12 steps of his journey - as you go through, plot your own character’s journey through the: Ordinary World, Call of Adventure, Refusal of the Call, Meeting the Mentor, Crossing the First Threshold, Tests, Allies, Enemies, Approach to the Inmost Cave, Ordeal, Reward (Seizing the Sword), Road Back, Resurrection, and Return with the Elixir! Looking beyond the Hero’s JourneyIt’s important to remember that this story structure was conceived as a way to better understand story structure. It’s just one helpful way to outline a novel and dissect a plot. For more longstanding theories on the topic, you can go this way to read about the ever-popular Three-Act Structure or here to discover Dan Harmon's Story Circle and  three more prevalent structures. Cool infographic alert! Analyzing the Hero's Journey: As Seen in the Hobbit Remember, rules are made to be broken. There’s plenty of room to play within its confines. Do you want to experiment with an abbreviated â€Å"Resurrection† stage, as J.K. Rowling did in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone? Are you more interested in exploring the journey of an anti-hero? It’s all possible. Once you understand the basics of this universal story structure, you can use and bend it in ways that disrupts reader expectations.Are you planning on using the Hero's Journey in your book? What's your favorite example of this structure? Let us know in the comments below!