Vignette Assignment # 4

Vignette Assignment 4          



              Yancy was a little frightened to be released from the hospital. He did not know how the Cherokee tribe would receive him. With his deep nearly healed burns, would they see him as a devil?



         Sara sensed how the boy felt as she walked with him in the hall. “Yancy, I bet you are ready to leave this stuffy hospital.” Sara said trying to feel out what the boy was thinking.



         Yancy looked down at his wrapped feet covered in modified moccasins. His bearskin shoes were only soles wrapped with strands of the hide so that they could be removed easily to treat the burns.



         “I guess so.” He answered. He did not know how he would feel when he would live with his mother's tribe.



         “You know that you do not want to be here any more.” Sara reaches for the child's uninjured hand.



         “I don't know what is out there for me.” He replied beginning to look toward Sara.



         “You have family. Majag has been by your side everyday, and he has gone today to let everyone know that you are coming.” Sara tried to confront the nervous child.



         The two friends walk to Yancy's bed where she cleaned and wrapped the burns. “They are looking so much better.” She said.



         Yancy had a hard time falling to sleep this night because of thinking about going to a place to call home. His mother's family. His mother's home. Would he be excepted?



         Magaj walked into the room where Yancy sat waiting nervously with his few belongs he collected in the hospital in a small bag.



         Magaj was not alone. He had Berry Blossom with him. Berry Blossom was a sister to his grandfather Rising Son. Yancy nearly cried when he seen this woman who he once knew as his aunt looked like an older version of his mother.



         Berry Blossom glances at Sara who was standing behind a wooden chair that had large wheels attached. “This is Yancy?” Berry Blossom asks.



         Yancy begins to be worried. Not even his favorite aunt knew him. She walks over. “Let me see. I don't think this is the same little boy who chased Ole Bug, the stray dog in the tribe, with those sticks.” She she helps him cover his face with protective cloth from the sun he would encounter out side the hospital. “You are half grown.” She smiles at Yancy, nods to Sara that they were ready to make their way from the hospital, and follows behind the chair.



         When they reached the camp, Yancy became more quiet. He looked straight in front of him. He imagined what the others were thinking. The children who he used to play with must have thought that he had been killed in the fire.



         “Yancy!” a cry came from the crowd that was gathering as they got closer to their home. Yancy gave them no response. He knew that they were unable to see his face through the cloth that veiled it, but he did not want recognition.



         “Yancy,” the child yelled again. He did not respond.



         “Yancy,” Berry Blossom spoke calm and angelic as she placed his belongings on the dirt floor. “This is your family, and they have been worried about you. You do not have to do anything that is not in your own time. They will still be here when you need them.”



         Yancy felt foolish, but he was not ready yet. He had to find his own way out of this war that he fought inside his own head. He knew that this was his family. “How will I answer questions from my friends and family? I  do not know the answers himself.” he thought.



         Long seconds turned into minutes. Minutes turned into hours. Hours into days. Then days to weeks. Then Yancy walked out through the yard. He decided to gather berries by the river's bank.



         He looked down at his reflection in the water. There he only saw the cloth that protected his face from the sun. Yancy wanted to see his own face. The sun had gone down, and he decided to remove the cloth. There he gazed on a nearly healed face. There were no oozing, and all the raw scars were all that was left of the house fire.



          Yancy looked at himself, “You are strong. You have the spirit of the turtle to guide you through life.” It must have been his imagination, but the reflection was not scared. The skin in the water's image had no blemish. Then it spoke to him. “Scars are only skin deep. Courage to be who the Great Spirit created you to be, is a path beyond any flaws in the skin. You have to use the internal gifts he gave to work.”



         He turned and walked back toward his tent. He walked without the protective cloth. The other members of the tribe went on about their work as they normally do. Then he realized that their were children on down the stream. He decided to walk to them.



         They took notice. Each child slowly begin to ask questions.



         “Do the scars hurt.” One asks.



         “It used to hurt so bad that I could not speak. The white doctors gave me liquid that made me sleep.”



         “Why did one hand get burned and the other was not?” Another asks.



         “I am not sure. I think that I may have been laying on one. My body probably protected it from the flames.”



         Then one little girl walked up and touched his face. She was around the age of his sister when the fire took her life. “Don't you miss your mom?” She was stared into his lash-less eyes.



         Yancy smiled with tears still in his eyes. “I do miss my mom, but when I sleep, I feel her close to me. You look like my little sister.” He added.



         She reached up and help his hand. “Can I be your little sister? I have no brothers.”



         He knew that she gave him a reason to be the best big brother that he can be.





DId I answer these questions?



Does the CC begin to experience an identity crisis?



Yancy realizes that his scars will be the first thing that others see. He is faced with how to use this emotion. He can become bitter, or he can use it to give him strength.



Is he/she at war with themselves, his/her own worst enemy?



I believe that Yancy is his worst enemy because if he chooses to give up and become bitter, he wont be able to make any differences in the world.  On the other hand, he has to fight the thought that the scars will define him to be weak.



Show how the CC's actions spark a crisis.



Yancy becomes more withdrawn when he is released from the hospital. He sees family that knew him before he was burned. He imagined how they were seeing him.



Is this one the smallest of the ones to follow?



This is the beginning. It is the smallest to snowball.



Do you show the beginnings of a meltdown?



Yes, the beginning of his melt down was when the children of his tribe asked him questions that he did not know the answer to.



Does the CC begin to question where the story is leading?



He begins to wonder what to do with his life as he begins heal living in his mother's tribe.



Does the vignette show the CC caught up between what he/she thinks is important as opposed to what really is?



By the end of the vignette, Yancy realizes that his scars are only skin deep. That at some points it gave him an advantage of fright. There were times that his foe would think him much more menacing than he really was.