reality

[Brandi]

The farther along in the book I get the more themes become apparent. Smoking and alcohol are present in almost every story. It's very common for someone to be smoking anywhere. This stands out to me because it's not accepted to smoke in buildings and no one that I know smokes in their house. Alcohol is an 'anytime of day drink' which is different for me also. I have never drank before the evening with anyone. I feel the purpose of the drinking is to bring out some comfort in actions or words for the characters, which is something I can relate to or rather have been surrounded by. Alcohol is said to be liquid courage and that seems to be its main purpose for these characters, that and to forget something. These stories are very real but them seem to highlight the depressing parts of an average persons day-to-day life. It's almost like pointing out the negative or even the scary sometimes. It's not typical but anyone could find a dead body out in the woods or have a friend that's a little more crazy than expected and find out they up and killed their spouse and them-self. It's reality. But it's very negative. Not that I don't enjoy it but I tend to be a positive person so this is a different approach on what I would look for to write about as far as day-to-day experience.