English 11 Mr. Van Camp Rolf Gotzes                                                                        October 17^th 2014

Bluffing

The short story “Bluffing” written by Gail Helgason is about a couple encountering a bear in the woods and resulting in the boyfriend getting hospitalized with serious injuries. Liam, a man with “thick black hair as fashionably as ever” is not telling the truth to his girlfriend. He is lying because he is selfish and only wants to save himself which ultimately backfires on him ang gets him hospitalized with “skin [that] is all puffed up, mottled, with ridges of shiny, rubbery scar tissue crisscrossing like tributaries on a map”. He can be considered selfish because he lies to the other hikers that they meet, stating that it “might not be such a good idea” “[to go] up to the lake” because there is a “grizzly”. He does that just so he can have the lake for himself. Another reason showing that he is selfish is, that he “[spends] most of his money and outdoor gear” instead of sharing money with his girlfriend for “the lease”.  Another time where his selfishness shows is, when his girlfriend encounters the bear and instead of helping her, he runs “away as fast as he could”. Which means that he only cares for his own life and wants only his life to be safe. He doesn’t care what happens to his girlfriend at that time and he is running as if his life depends on it.

Remembering the old days

As Lucy exhales the smoke out of her mouth, she is relaxing and enjoys the day. She looks like an ordinary 86 year old woman that shouldn't smoke because it's bad for her health. But she does it anyway. That's what she looks like on the outside, but on the inside she is a different person, with and untold story. She only smokes one cigarette a day because she knows it's bad but she actually very lonely because she is very old and all her companions already died. Each time she takes a drag from the cigarette it’s like the smoke is telling a story. The cigarette is the only thing that she has left of her friends and that's why it's precious to her. It helps her remember the good ol' days with her friends. They always used to meet after work at the bonfire. There they would play music, eat dinner together, relax, talk about work or other important stuff. The most important part however was, that they always had a ritual that they would do together to show and proof their friendship. Lucy and her friends would always share the first cigarette of the night like a lion shares his prey with its cubs, so that everyone would smoke from it, as proof of their friendship. Nowadays that all of her friends have died, she is very lonely and smokes a cigarette a day to remember her days, that she shared with her friends at the bonfires.