Coming Of Age . Greasy Lake By T.Coraghessen Boyle

People are different and their reactions to life’s events are different as well. There are two types of people: people who get life’s experience from somebody else’s mistakes, learning from those mistakes, and people who learn from their own experience, making their own mistakes. The last ones are stupid enough not to accept the life experience of others. To come to the realization they need something really bad, which is out of the ordinary, to happen to them. How different people come of age depends not only on age, but also on certain circumstances, such as having a family or being an orphan or previous life experience. Due to those factors different events might be significant for coming of age. In this short story the main characters are upper-middle class p

… quick with a sneer, able to manage a Ford with lousy shocks over a rutted and gutted blacktop road at eighty-five while rolling a joint as compact as a Tootsie Roll Pop stick. They could lounge against a bank of booming speakers and trade “man”s with the best of them or roll out across the dance floor as if their joints worked on bearings. They were slick and quick and they wore their mirror shades at breakfast and dinner, in the shower, in closets and caves. In short, they were bad.(35-36).

In his posting to his web page Boyle writes, “It’s dark side and the limitations of being bad” (a posting by T.C. Boyle ). So, the narrator comes to the realization of the negative side of being bad. He cannot manage this situation as a real bad character. To do that he should overcome his moral principles, but he cannot. He stopped halfway, because it is not his way at all. This is the moment of epiphany for the narrator and for his friends. They are ashamed because they realize they have hurt people who do not have to be hurt, because they are bad. After that, their behaviour changed. When two young girls suggest to them to have a party (exactly what they were looking for a few hours ago, trying to represent the image of real bad, greasy character) they refused. They even cannot think about it. “I was going to cry.” (Boyle 43). They have reverted to their natural selves.

This story reflects the process of the beginning of coming of age of the middle – upper class group of young people. As rebelling teenagers they chose the cool image of the bad, greasy character, which is totally different from their natural personalities. Trying to imitate, they acted without thinking, without realizing of the consequences of their stupid behavior. The lessons that were to follow are pretty harsh and cruel, like a remedy, which never is pleasant. Despite all this those boys are very lucky. Everything could be worse for them than it is in the end of this story. They have got the first, but more likely not last tough lesson from life, and they learned from this lesson.

eople, but they behave unlike upper-middle class people tr

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