Best Friend Award

Best Friend Award

Ben Tanner had just learned that his neighbor Haven Peck had just lost most of his land that he farmed, meaning that he had lost his job. He had heard this from his wife, Bess Tanner who was friends with Havens wife. The women had talked about how the government had noticed how Haven was not paying his taxes and so the government decided to take most of their land and the house. When Ben had first heard this he knew that he must help his neighbor out. He knew that he had to have been living off of the money that he had gotten from selling the animals that he had to sell because there wasn’t enough room for the animals that he owned. He just hoped that Rob was able to convince his father not to get rid of Pinky, the pig that Ben had given to Rob about three weeks before. He slowly walked to the house that the Peck’s were staying in for the time being, hoping that someone was home. When he reached the front door he was relieved to hear talking coming from inside the house. He knocked on the door loudly, anxious to speak to Haven. When Rob answered the door, Ben kindly asked to speak to his father. As he waited for Haven to come to the door, he was thinking about what had happened to the Peck family. When Haven got to the door the first thing that Ben noticed, was how the quality of his clothing had gone down. Sure his clothes were dirty and torn before but now they seemed to be not have been fitting. Ben guessed that it was because they were not making enough money to make or get their own clothes anymore. Ben asked how he was doing and how the family was and exchanged pleasantries. Then he asked if he would like a job at his farm. It didn’t take long at all for Haven to say yes and then they walked back to Ben’s house and sat down at the kitchen table to discuss details of Havens new job. Then after about four years of working and saving money, Haven was able to buy back the land that he lost and got his old job back.

The Clearing

The Clearing

Have you ever known a person that you didn’t like at all? Such as someone who you didn’t interact with other than in an argument? In the story The Clearing by Jesse Stuart is a great example of how something good can come from something bad.

Have you ever had a prolonged argument with someone? It is harder if you are friends with the person because you just want the thing to blow over so you can just be friends. But on the other hand, if you don’t like the person then you might not really care about the dispute. One example of an argument is in WWII. The U.S. had issues with Germany and Japan. We declared war on Japan after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and, on Germany because of the things that Adolf Hitler was doing to the Jewish people. That is an argument that affected a lot of people. In The Clearing the neighbors had an argument that was on for so long that the people didn’t know each other’s names.

While some arguments like wars can be violent, some could be very short and painless. If you have an argument with a friend then most of the time you know that in a while you will both be friends again so the argument is over quickly. Like in the book Tunnels by Roderick Gordon and Brian Williams the two characters, Will and Chester, are arguing over whose fault it is that they are captured and being tortured while they are underground. It was a very quick struggle with no winner.

Although some arguments may be very minor, every quarrel hopefully has a resolution sooner rather than later. In the story, the main conflict is resolved by one of the neighbors helping the other neighbor out, and then the neighbors who were helped before help the other neighbors out when something threatens both of their homes. Similar to the end of WWII when we ended the conflicts with those who we were fighting. We bombed Japan and, Germany surrendered during battle. Both of these things resolved the conflicts.

Examples of how good things can come from bad things are found in The Clearing. War and other stories, are similar to The Clearing in different ways.