The first impression of Jeannette’s mother is very conflicting. It is hard to believe that she is describing her mother. When she describes her emotions and the way she sees her mother going through garbage, one wonders if she is talking about her mother or someone she just calls “Mom”. When she says how she is hiding in the seat, as to not be seen by her mother, it is possible to see that she is ashamed of her. But also the reader finds out that the woman she is referring to as Mom takes some form of enjoyment in her actions. Then Jeanette mentions that it is her big secret and that she has tried several times to talk to her mother and father and change their lives for the better. And later it is possible to see that they are the ones who voluntarily chose this sort of life and feel quite happy about it. She begins her memoir in this way, to give the reader the present side of the story. It also creates a wrongful impression, so that later this can be explained and added to, in a form of her parent’s earlier life and behavior. For Jeanette’s parents “skedaddle” means to hastily move away from one place to another or far away and it is used in a humorous sense. There are moments when it has to be done very quickly and it seems that the reasons should be discussed later as if anyone can come in one day and say “we have to skedaddle, now.” They constantly move in a search for a better place to live and for jobs. Her father has plans to perfect a gold mining mechanism and has high dreams of building a “Glass Castle.” In reality, he is drinking and gambling, spending the last money saved and at one point even stealing from his daughters’ “piggy bank.” The constant moving has a great influence on the children. They are unable to start a life anywhere and are always bullied at school. They see it as a form of adventure when they are younger but when they get older, they realize that they must find a way to move out and make their own lives possible.
Moving is always a stressful and new experience. The person gets used to the place they live and so it is hard to leave it. When this happens at a younger age, it is not as hard but as the person gets older it becomes a life-changing process. When I moved away from my childhood home, it was not very traumatic. I was about 6 years old and we had to move out of the city because there was a nice place just outside of it, where there was a forest and a lake. It was a new experience and I enjoyed the movie. As I got older, I started missing the place that I grew up in. All my friends stayed there and sometimes I would go to visit. In childhood every corner and every place of play seems very native and familiar and you get attached to them. Later, when all my friends left that place, I would still go there and walk around, remembering the great times I have had there.