Letting Go My younger brother, Allie died of leukemia three years before I left Pencey Prep. Allie was an extremely friendly and redheaded young boy. He never got mad at anybody. People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily, but Allie never did. According to me, he was also the smartest of all us Caulfields. He was terrifically intelligent and his teachers were always writing letters to my mother telling her what a pleasure it was having a boy like Allie in their class. He was the last person to deserve cancer, but life has a funny way of screwing with the nicest people in the world. It really does. I am constantly tormented by Allie’s death and to cope, I carry around a baseball glove that Allie used to write poems in. Allie's glove is a symbol for my emotional expression. I keep it hidden because it is precious to me and I hold it very close to my heart. Allie's glove has poetry written in it with green ink. He wrote them on it so that he'd have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up to bat. Since Allie isn't around anymore, I keep the baseball mitt with me to keep my deceased brother alive. Though Allie isn't physically around, he still helps me when I am feeling alone. He helps me just as the mitt helped him in his times of loneliness. Recently, I have been more troubled by Allie's death. I told you that I carry around Allie's baseball glove and this is because I don't like dealing with serious things. I never really dealt with the death in an adult fashion, so I never let him go in a mature way. I tried to give myself some sort of closure by writing my roommate's paper for him. The paper had to be about something very descriptive. I wrote about Allie's catcher's mitt. I wrote an essay about my feelings for the loss of my brother and the importance of the mitt. But when Stradlater found out, I tore it up. I tore it up because e insulted not only my paper, but my brother as well. That's when I snapped. I packed my bags and left Pencey forever that night. My dead brother helped me to leave the place I hated from the minute I arrived. I thank him for that. If the essay was turned in, maybe a teacher would have seen that I was still having problems with the death and gotten me help. But I destroyed it. I destroyed my chance to leave the past behind and move forward to the future. I chose to continue holding on to the past and continue holding on to my brother. Allie has affected my life so much, and I am grateful because of it. Though I would prefer him alive, he still has helped me immensely and I wouldn't be the person I am today if he hadn't been in my life. If it wasn't for Allie, I might still be sitting alone in my dorm room waiting to catch a train to my parent's house. I wouldn't be in New York living life like an adult. Allie helped me become an adult. If he were still here, I would tell him thank you.
Letting Go
My younger brother, Allie died of leukemia three years before I left Pencey Prep. Allie was an extremely friendly and redheaded young boy. He never got mad at anybody. People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily, but Allie never did. According to me, he was also the smartest of all us Caulfields. He was terrifically intelligent and his teachers were always writing letters to my mother telling her what a pleasure it was having a boy like Allie in their class. He was the last person to deserve cancer, but life has a funny way of screwing with the nicest people in the world. It really does.
I am constantly tormented by Allie’s death and to cope, I carry around a baseball glove that Allie used to write poems in. Allie's glove is a symbol for my emotional expression. I keep it hidden because it is precious to me and I hold it very close to my heart. Allie's glove has poetry written in it with green ink. He wrote them on it so that he'd have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up to bat. Since Allie isn't around anymore, I keep the baseball mitt with me to keep my deceased brother alive. Though Allie isn't physically around, he still helps me when I am feeling alone. He helps me just as the mitt helped him in his times of loneliness.
Recently, I have been more troubled by Allie's death. I told you that I carry around Allie's baseball glove and this is because I don't like dealing with serious things. I never really dealt with the death in an adult fashion, so I never let him go in a mature way. I tried to give myself some sort of closure by writing my roommate's paper for him. The paper had to be about something very descriptive. I wrote about Allie's catcher's mitt. I wrote an essay about my feelings for the loss of my brother and the importance of the mitt. But when Stradlater found out, I tore it up. I tore it up because e insulted not only my paper, but my brother as well. That's when I snapped. I packed my bags and left Pencey forever that night. My dead brother helped me to leave the place I hated from the minute I arrived. I thank him for that. If the essay was turned in, maybe a teacher would have seen that I was still having problems with the death and gotten me help. But I destroyed it. I destroyed my chance to leave the past behind and move forward to the future. I chose to continue holding on to the past and continue holding on to my brother. Allie has affected my life so much, and I am grateful because of it. Though I would prefer him alive, he still has helped me immensely and I wouldn't be the person I am today if he hadn't been in my life. If it wasn't for Allie, I might still be sitting alone in my dorm room waiting to catch a train to my parent's house. I wouldn't be in New York living life like an adult. Allie helped me become an adult. If he were still here, I would tell him thank you.