Bad Boys ( 174-207)

Summary: As the novel comes to a close, Walter is asked by his doctor if he liked being black. At first he answered yes, but then as he thought about it more, he opened many new doors and looked at race and life in a very different perspective. He expanded on his thoughts of what it meant to be black and the difference that he saw when it came to careers and being a man. How who his ancestors were and what they did didn't define who he was. For example, " I wasn't born with a hyphen linking me to Africa"(Myers 177). This quote was very true and powerful because his ancestors past does not define who he is; like him playing basketball, writing stories and reading were activities that he chose and worked on developing. And how in Harlem, the "binding forces" were based on love and survival and not race. Meaning that some of the things that brought people closer were the love and survival that they shared amongst each other and not the type of color-shade that they had on their skin. After his strong perspective on "Race" and society, the attention was switched back to Walter and his life. He had stopped going to school, again and actually tried to go back this time, but found out that the school year had ended. This was a very sad time for Walter because he felt that the chance to bring his life back around had left him before he even got the chance to say goodbye. He was embarrassed and had a brief depression. Walter then enrolled himself in the army after his seventeenth birthday and decided to tell his parents a few days before he left. His father had favored the idea and thought that it would help develop Walter into a man. His mother on the other hand was sad and didn't want to let go, but Walter wanted to get away from Harlem and try to start his new life. After the army, Walter had returned to writing, he took a long break, but when he returned he couldn't stop writing. He  often sent his work to magazines or literary quarterlies would save the rejection letters to inspire him to improve in certain areas. Walter periodically visited his parents and when asked what he exactly he did, he would say that he was a writer. His parents weren't too happy about the subject, but later on Walter's mother had bragged about how he was a writer to her friends;  for some reason Walter felt that he had accomplished the one thing that he always wanted, which was to make his mother proud.


Quote:  " But it seemed to me that both of these concepts, career and maleness, were only subdivisions of the larger idea of race" (Myers 176).
-This quote was really relevant to everything that Walter was trying to explain. He was thinking about what his doctor meant when she asked him if he had liked being black. Walter then talked about how some one's career and maleness was completely different and usually when he thought of major careers he would think o white people instead of black. And then when he thought about maleness or what it meant to be a man, he would think about black people and their muscles and how they did all of the "bull work" to survive their lifestyle.


Reaction:
The ending of the novel was very powerful, i think that Myers did a good job with summarizing his thoughts on race in society. It was nice to see his deep perspective of the topic and how he did not identify himself as "white or black," instead he identified himself as an intellectual. This was a very powerful statement, because Walter had struggled with segregation before with his elementary/middle school teacher; she did not believe in Walter and often had him go into the Principal's office. She failed to seek potential, which is what Walter had all along; instead she tried to identify him and isolate him by punishing him based on her own circumstances. Another thing that was good to see was that Walter was finally getting used to being in his own skin. He referenced his relationship with Frank and how he was close to him because Frank was an alien on this planet, he didn't care what people thought about him, instead he just worried about himself and the things he needed to do to get by. Walter loved this about him and also wanted to think of himself as different like "different meant that you were not responsible for the normal things in life." (Myers 182). In this case Walter and the constant pressure he was under when it came to being himself. It was good to see that Walter had finally become comfortable with himself as well as confident. Especially the fact that his mother began to brag about him; this was a very important aspect in Walter's life because when it came to writing he was often put down. Very few teachers had believed in him and the fact that his father couldn't read and ignored all the stories that he gave to him made it worse. For the first time no one asked him what he was doing with his life in a manner that made him feel more ashamed than what he already was. This time he along with a key factor in his life, his mother, were proud of what he was doing with his life. Walter especially was proud, coming a long way, developing from a bad boy to a man; and accomplishing every obstacle to see his dreams of becoming a writer suddenly turn into a reality.