SSRJ#1: Chopin

My curiosity was captured just after reading the first paragraph of Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour”. I wanted to know how her husband died and why it was important to point out that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a “heart trouble”. As Mrs. Mallard received the news and “wept with sudden, wild abandonment” I felt her pain and loss. My chest grew tight and heavy with sorrow as I understood this tragedy could be mine. I noticed I was holding my breath, reading as fast as I could to reach what I hoped would be a happy ending. Before I knew it my grieving was over, I had accepted my/her fate as she/I began to see that we would survive, in fact, survive in a way that we never had before. We were going to be okay! Mrs. Mallard was in fact going to have opportunities she never thought were possible for her time and my life could continue on a similar but different path. Just as I was feeling confident and safe knowing I would be okay, Mrs. Mallard was feeling assured and almost excited at new possibilities. My mind raced ahead, planning and preparing for my future as Mrs. Mallard did the same. I realized how deeply sad I would be surviving such a tragedy and how lucky I would to be surviving it in the world I live in today. Mrs. Mallard was realizing a powerful new freedom that could only come at the expense of losing her husband. I, on the other hand, have those freedoms’s she so much desires. How would I feel differently in her time? Would I too feel the same guilty excitement? Given the same heart affliction would my heart fail at the sight of my living, breathing husband?