The Joy Luck Club - Waiting Between the Trees

"I became a stranger to myself. I was pretty for him. If I put slippers on my feet, it was to choose a pair that I knew would please him. I brushed my hair ninety-nine times a night to bring luck to our marital bed, in hopes of conceiving a son."
     Ying-Ying St. Clair talks about her early life as a newly married woman in this chapter. She opens her segment hoping that her revelations will bring some wisdom to her daughter who she feels has become shallow and too American materialistic. Ying-Ying's quote (as shown in the opening) embodies the relationship between her and her husband. Her story is laced with references to how she changed herself to please him and how she lost herself in the process. I think that it greatly relates back to the first time the author introduces Ying-Ying. In the first story, Ying-Ying recalls in the Moon Lady her experience falling off the back of her family's yacht. I think that both of Ying-Ying's flashbacks are related. In both experiences, she found herself lost and struggling in unfamiliar territory with no one to pull her back. I also think that both circumstances made her stronger as a person. The fact that Ying-Ying can look back at her marriage and recognize that she changed herself to please another person means that she was able to move on in a positive direction after the experience. In many ways it relates again to the beginning of the book with the formation of the Joy Luck Club and how its members brought their stories of despair as well as stories of triumph. The Joy Luck Club marked the new beginnings of the lives of its members in America as well as their personal journeys to learn from their pasts in China.