Chapter 7-9

I can't help myself girls. Last night I got home from a Christmas party, started reading Chapter 7 in bed, and before I knew it, I was at the cliffhanger of an ending on Chapter 9. To be honest, I probably could have read the entire book last night before I fell asleep. But I made myself stop before the next section. And that is why I bring to you this post about chapters 7-9. My heart is racing just thinking about it.

Chapter 7 - Katniss brings Gale out to the house by the lake to tell him everything and ask him to run away, failing miserably; She asks Peeta to go, and he accepts without a second thought; they are walking home together, when they get to the crowd in the square; <3 Gale <3
Chapter 8 - Gale at the whipping post (my throat starts to close up just thinking about it); the new head Peacekeeper in town; Peeta and Haymitch standing in the way of Gale; Katniss's family tending to Gale, Kat's outburst; Haymitch and Mrs. Everdeen remarking about "it's starting again, like before"; Kat puts herself in Gale's shoes for the first time
Chapter 9 - Changes in district 12: new peacekeepers, new weapons, new punishments, longer hours, less food, less money; the Capitol is lashing out to make sure there isn't another rebellion like in District 8. The next mockingjay run-in.

"A mockingjay is a creature the Capitol never intended to exist. They hadn't counted on the highly controlled jabberjay having the brains to adapt to the wild, to pass on its genetic code, to thrive in a new form." (p 92)

Well if that doesn't just scream metaphor for the entire existence of Panem, I don't know what does. I remember reading it and almost chuckling to myself. I thought "well thank you for summing up your entire book series in these two sentence."A creature the Capitol never intended to exist, highly controlled, adapt to the wild, thrive in a new form...

Gale just broke my heart at the cabin. I knew as soon as he got so happy and so excited that Katniss wanted to run away that he was getting the wrong idea. Clearly he thinks (that at least) she wants to run away and be with him until the end. Possibly he's gotten the idea in his head that she is back to being rebellious? Then he tells her he loves her (my heart melted...and then exploded because I knew what was coming from Katniss). After his dreams have been dashed, Katniss lets it slip about the uprising in 8. Gale once again gets fired up and excited, but Katniss is just afraid. She wants to protect the people she loves. But I find myself thinking: how in the world was she expecting to protect at least 11 people in the wilderness in winter. And expect them all to get along. It's like she was living in a fantasy land.

"What about the other families, Katniss? The ones who can't run away? Dont you see? It can't be about just saving us anymore. Not if the rebellion's begun...You could do so much...I changed my mind. I don't want anything they made in the Capitol." (p 100)

It is so easy to forget that Katniss is just 16 in these stories. She is so young and dealing with so much. I was just thinking to myself about how Katniss seems to have lost her center. But...aren't children always self-centered? You think that the world revolves around you, to a point. That the whole world is exactly the way yours was while you grew up. You just want to have yourself, your family, people that you care about. A lot of this stuff about self-sacrifice, helping out in society, looking out for the greater need... all that is stuff that I am still learning. Always my first reaction is still to protect myself and my interests first. To people I love, I am very giving. But even at that, it is usually after I've reprimanded myself for not thinking about others first. I don't think that I am as naturally good as I think that you two are. I have to stop, think about it, and make a decision about how I want to act. Which almost always the opposite of my first instinct.

All that jabbering is my way of saying: I keep feeling like Kat loses herself and then has to find herself again. But really she is 16. She is still developing. She is still discovering who she is. I identify a lot with that. Because it seems like a lot of her motivation comes from that place of self-preservation. It doesn't come from looking at the whole picture and doing what is actually ethically/morally the good or right thing to do.

Another quote:
"The berries. I realize the answer to who I am lies in that handful of poinsonous fruit. If I held them out to save Peeta because I knew I would be shunned if I came back without him, then I am despicable. If I held them out because I loved him, I am still self-centered, although forgivable. But if I held them out to defy the Capitol, I am someone of worth. The trouble is, I don't know exactly what was going on inside me at that moment." (p. 117)

Last think I want to say is: all in chapter 9 the Capitol seems at work. Making living conditions near to unlivable, enforcing strict law and control. I can only wonder how long that will last until everyone is dead or until everyone decides they have had enough.