I feel like Brion is writing some sort of very heavy allegory where this couple represents something or other. But every time I try to puzzle out what Bern, May, and Polly is supposed to represent, I wind up with a headache instead.
My best theory?
- May represents love of self. She a kind of grey character, down to her costume choices. Similar to Gaara in Naruto, she's not totally suited for company. But Bern has decided to love her anyway.
- Bern represents virtue, which is why she's frequently super-moral, and her willingness to sacrifice and put herself second often gets her into trouble.
-And Polly represents vice. This is not to say that she's wrong for Bern. She's actually an okay person. But she's kinda like that person you meet who has been abused in the past and has traces of toxic behavior. You sorta see this in the Arena where she is willing to torture people, and can't understand Bern being unable to do so.
Update: Omg, is that ever true. About not being able to say what you wanted to say.
My best friend and/or crush has been talking for years about buying a house and moving to the big city. Having made numerous trips over the years - South Africa (including both safari areas and cities like Cape Town), UK, Ireland, China, and much of the mainland US - I can honestly say that I'm pretty well disgusted with travel. So basically it feels like a slap in the face to everyone who cares about her when she basically decides that her family is cramping her style (more about this later), and yes there is a creepy guy in town that probably needs locking up as a sex offender. This totally justifies moving to the city when people like me and her were able to make poverty wages, and she might wind up without any friends and stranded. With just an apartment, I had issues with bad housing. With a real house, if things go south, you have to sell it. Nevertheless, I like her alot, and I wanna try to be supportive, even though I am really worried about the success of this. And also really worried that she's gonna save for years on it (as a librarian, she has part-time hours), putting aside happiness she could have made for herself actually trying to go out and enjoy what thw town has to offer.
She does have a great deal of stress, to be clear, since her sister has two children but is one of these deadbeat moms that either has an even worse deadbeat husband who doesn't earn enough so she works full-time, or maybe she thinks it's responsible to be a full-timer when you let your sister be your nanny. And the house is crowded and noisy, and she's all thinking that they never treat her right, but I have never seen her stand up for herself. So what, she hates living with her folks which is rent-free, so she's gonna pay property tax in the city, plus utility, plus food, plus likely to commute everywhere even to meet friends. Yes, some ppl do live in the city just fine, but if you can manage with your family, you can manage without. If you can't, problems will probably recur. If you at least live nearby, ppl can help out! Sigh...
Honestly, I do not think she'll afford most houses, but still the idea of her moving away is very sad, because she is one of the first ppl who actually made me really feel like I belonged here, and there's not much to replace her.
Today, I decided to help her look at one of those catalogues, and I think I got kinda too nosy. Even wanting to help her and stuff, not so much.