And here we are....

So I'm going to type up a little summary of part 4 to help me remember what it was on and hopefully remind you guys too...

(1-3) Hank asks for time off so he can go to the racetrack to make more money. He starts to win often and always has a drink. He always goes to a fancy resturant to eat dinner and tries to find a motel to stay at.

(4-6) He starts talking to a hot lady (Mary Lou odd right? lol) and thinks she's going to be his next gf. They go back to the place she's staying at and almost gets killed by her partner Hector. Apparently it was a set up cause Hank had money.

(7-9) The racetrack starts to get boring and it's time to go back to work. He meets Fay who is a "writer" and against the war. Hank starts to complain about how his back is starting to ache and it's becoming harder to work. We have a story about how he gets stuck in the stairwell, and learn in 9 that Fay is pregnant. We also are introduced to the 'miscellaneous crew' who are built and talk about sports.

(10-11) Hank visits doctors for his dizzy spells. We see him working with the 'misc. crew'

(12-14) Fay delievers the baby. The baby girl's name is Marina Louise.

(15-16) Hank goes back to work, but riots are happening. Those who live near the riots don't have to go to work, so Hank doesn't go to work because that's his area. He goes back to work after riots and still gets dizzy spells. He gets in trouble for going to get water because he was gone for '40 min' (but he was only gone for like 10 min). Chambers is the one giving him this problem and two days later at the race track, Hank spits in his direction, apperently he hasn't given Hank a problem since.

(17) Hank spends more time with his daughter and the mother. Fay and Hank decide it's time for Fay to move out and live on her own with marina. Hank's ok with this as long as he sees the girl. Fay meets a man and moves away with him to New Mexico with the baby and is sent a picture the baby drew for him.

woo, now i remember what part four was on, but i now don't know what to say about it. i guess i'll start by saying how cool it is that hank lives life day to day, not really planning ahead or giving himself high expections to fill. i'm kind of tired from writing all this out, so i'll post more later. xoxo

that must've taken you ages to type up!
heres what i got from part 4..

i think its interesting how he calls Marina 'the 'girl' like he has no emotional attatchment-shes just another mouth to feed, but i think he acts like that with a lot of girls in the book. eg, when Betty died he was very emotionally stable and after almost being killed himself. he doesn't let his emotions get in the way at all. in my notes i took, i wrote he's almost like a drone..his life is so routined sometimes, he doesn't get very excited or sad and everything is just another hurdle.
When marina was born he didn't show very much love toward her in his narration but i think the book shows Marina is some stability for him, because he goes around to play with her, and says he will be alright as long as he can see her.
i think what i'm trying to say is he shows how he feels with his actions more than the language in the book.

i totally forgot to mention that when he saw his daughter for the first time, he was checking out the nurse, 'she had great legs, ok butt..something something' i can't remember exactly, i thought it would be fair to leave a detail like that out, but apparently not because it goes along with what you were saying...

it's true that he has no emotional attachement to the women in his life...but in a way, i saw there was attachement, just not as visible..something between the lines...

what i mean by this is that he doesn't really leave the women, the women have to leave him, examples: betty had to throw him out, his wife divorced him, Fay left him with his daughter...his attachement doesn't seem apparent because he doesn't chase after them..but then again, he never leaves them, they leave him and he just kind of accepts it...again, taking life as it is...

i never really thought about that before..that was such a cool thing to mention.

i've also noticed that they all seem to leave him. he takes it all very well. he seems to just move on. i think thats a good quality.

i felt kinda sad about marina. it seems that all the women in his life always leave. the only thing he wanted was to see her every now and then and she ended up moving to new mexico.

i feel like mary lou and hector had some sort of hidden meaning. (just taking my thought on the incident) i think the moral is when you have something there will always be people waiting to take it away.

i did not like mary lou and hector. i think thata is how she gets her money and that is so messed up. it was a cray little part.

when marina was born, it was so him to check out the nurse, but then it was kind of like 'oh come on! not at THIS part!' you know? haha

i think he really did love Marina. i agree that he seems to show how he cares by him trying to help the women and not leaving them, but he doesn't really say it or whatever.

i feel bad that Fay had to move. it was one thing for her to move out, which he was fine with b/c he just wanted to visit his daughter, but then she had to go and move!! and even before that, he tried to visit marina a lot and fay was hardly ever home.

i think it's good that hank can move on from things well, but i also think it's sad that he can't just have this nice life. the women keep leaving him, and he really doesn't respect women well. he loves them and treats them well, but it's not like he sees one and its' different from all the others you know? one can leave and he'll just go and find another.

i agree with mary lou having a purpose for being in this story...i also saw her purpose to show that there's always people that will take it away, but to expand on that, the world isn't perfect and everyone runs into a bad guy here and there...

i also agree with hank treating the women right, but not giving them respect...completely true because he'll try not to argue with the women, he'll let them have it their way..but then the only reason he let's them have it they're way is cause he wants to sleep with them...kind of not respecting them as an equal to himself, he puts himself first before a woman...

jickety06: I like your comment about the drone .. he does seem very detached from society, but isn't everyone to a certain extent ... we may not show it as often, but we all are in some way

annie: hmm i like how you pointed out that the women all left him ... that was a very interesting way to look at it ... you could argue that he drives them away in a sense though

xMrs.UrieX: i agree i was sad when the daughter was taken to new mexico

Lauren: I agree that part did scare me too ... it is very awful to think that someone would do such a thing for a few measly hundreds. I think he loved Mariana too, I can see a slight emotional attachment to his daughter ... it isn't that big, but he says that he is happy as long as he gets to see her

Personally I think it is very sad how detached he is from society, his friends and his relationships. Life has very little purpose when you have no one or nothing to live for.

I never thought about all of the women in his life leaving him. Going with the fact that he goes back to the post office for stability, maybe another reason for him always being with another woman is that he wants to feel like he has a normal life, where he goes to work every day, and comes home to a wife or girlfriend. and that might be why he never breaks up with them, but when they do with him, he doesnt seem to be upset.

However, he didnt act that way with Marina. If you compare the way he was trying to see her with the way he acted when the other women left him, i think theres a very big difference.. I was dissappointed when she left for new mexico too..

I like what's been said, so I won't go write a whole thing.

I'm giving him a congrats on his child. But it was sad her mother took her away from him.

The Mary Lou thing was crazy. I'd be scared like anything.

His view on women is...different, I guess. And it always seems to be something he does to mess up the relationship. (Kind of? I guess? Maybe?)

Um yeah. I'm blanking on more stuff.

ok so heres my first post on the book hehe


Well, i totally agree with jickety06 when she said that he feels more with his actions...i think you saw that a few times in the book when betty died and when the old guy G.G was all sick and he was like the only one who cared.

I love the way he's just so laidback about everything like oh shes gone.....oh shes pregnant.....oh im in trouble who cares?? but mayb he does care mayb it'll all catch up!

I thought that mayb when he had a child he might kind off change but he just didn't seem to really mind when the baby wastaken away although he did want to see it which was different i guess quite different to when the oder woman left but still not upset or troubled.

Melinda: it's very true. if you don't have anyone in your life, that's kind of a sad life to live. I don't think he really cares when the women leave him, except for with his daughter..but i do agree with what braxton said. he seems to want a normal life that everyone else has.

i don't know. i think it's good he's laid back about things, but i also think he needs to take more control of his life and who he's with and figure out what he really wants.

i admire him for being so laid back. i wish i was like that. but i do think he should care more about the women he sees. he seems to not mind whether they're there or not.

very true. i agree.

i wonder if to some extent that all guys are like that...

i mean it seems as though only girls will care about how their hair looks, how fat they look, if someone forgot something semi important, and hold grudges...most guys for some reason seem to be more laid back and go with the flow, so maybe to some extent the author was trying to share the pressures women put on men but men just kind of shake it off and accept things...but then again, some/most guys can act the same or even worse than women...