Childhood to Adolescence

       11/15/10
           Childhood to Adolescence  
                Short story by Sandra Cisneros response by Jonathan Guzman

The story The Monkey Garden by Sandra Cisneros is a short story about a mature women’s point of view who is speaking of her past and the innocence she had as a child. She soon creates a garden (in a vehicle), replacing a lot. “Things had a way of disappearing in the garden, as if the garden itself ate them”. This quote says that this garden had an energy that captivated people and was a world of piece. She has a problem of having fear of going towards adolescence and she is not ready to mature yet. This “Monkey Garden is the place she can really stay away from the adolescence”.  

The thesis is the transition from childhood to adulthood and the difficulties for some people to decide to change to the adolescent thoughts, life, acts, etc. The Turning Point was when she was forced to play a game she did not want to because of the fact that it is doing something that “only” adults do. She thinks that kissing the boys would change her completely and that everybody would consider her an adolescent. She doesn’t want to be called an adolescent, at least not until she decides which way she will drive her life.When she was in the garden it was all different. “This I suppose was the reason why we went there. Far away from where our mother’s could not find us”. This is the quote that proves that she feels calm and not pressured by any people around her.

The plot was all basically adolescence versus immatureness.  In the beginning she is happy that the monkey’s next door moved away to Kentucky because they were annoying to her at night when the screamed. Then the “garden” is built in a vehicle where she felt that she was comfortable in a place where she is not surrounded by adulthood. “This is where I wanted to die and where I tried to one day but the monkey garden had me”, this meant that she felt comfortable and where she wanted to spend the rest of her life. Next she was forced to play a “game” because her keys were stolen and she was to kiss a man of her choosing to get her purse back. Then she continued to live in the world of adulthood. Finally she was able to realize that she really does not know weather or not she wants to be immature or have adolescent thoughts.

The Setting was in her home, garden, and at street. The characters were Sally, friends,etc. The Conflict was basically the fact that everybody she knows are becoming adolescents and she is still stuck being a girl and wanting to stay away from “growing up”. The main point of the conflict is that she is expected, and pressured to act like and adult. She is pressured by her mother, friends, and family. Basically she is being separated and torn away from her relatives.