Conflicts in the story "Firefly" by Bernie Tan

CONFLICTS IN “FIREFLY” BY BERNIE TAN
One major theme, and also the major conflict that occurs that we can see in this story is the conflict within Bernie in dealing with loneliness. Bernie Tan is struggling with loneliness ever since she was six-years-old. Born as the youngest child in the family, she is often left out by her other siblings due to age factors and thinking that she is the pet of their parents as she gets to sleep in their parent’s bedroom.
She is also a victim in between the parents rivalry. Her parents fighting with each other also confuses the her and adding more to her depression, desperation for attention and loneliness as she wrote,
“I couldn’t understand why my parents hated each other. I didn’t know what to say to her. At that point I didn’t know whether to love my mother more and my father less.” P. 14
Her loneliness is also contributed by her mother, who is a busy woman, often neglected her emotionally as she gets her time divided between her responsibility as a wife, mother and a teacher and therefore couldn’t spare much time with her. Most of the time, the precious time that could be spent between them snatched by her mother’s obsession towards her career. Her mother’s lack of communication skills with the children only help to make Bernie feel even more depressed with loneliness as she couldn’t find solace in a person that would stand by her and support her throughout her life.
Bernie describes one of the conflict afflicting her is the conflict between the mother and the daughter. Bernie clearly points out the problem between her and her mother is her mother’s attitude towards her career as a teacher. She describes the character of her mother in the story as a woman with high commitment to her work and I would term as ‘workaholic’ as shown in the story in p. 13
“Back home, she would cook, wash, mark books prepare charts – stacks of them – and quarrel with Pa. I would go to sleep alone, tired of waiting up for her. She was always so busy and so worn out.”
She also describes her mother as versatile as she divided her time and attention in doing her things. Bernie whom is lonely from waiting for her all day in school is frustrated from not gaining the attention that she needs from her mother as described in page 12. The attention that she wants is being divided between her and other chores that her mother did.
“She’d have her Pepsi, feed me, mark books and chitchat with other teachers – all at the same time. Mom was very versatile and that was annoying. I wanted her to pay attention to me.”
The mother’s character in this story is also described as an ‘authoritatarian’ type of mother where she would give orders and will not accept any excuse not to do it and will not explain the reason as well. She is very punitive and strict in giving orders, ‘do it or else’ type of attitude. She did not allow any comments from the children and have very little communication with her children as illustrated by the author,
“But my mom was a tyrant. With all of us…. Once mom made half boiled eggs. Paul and Augustine refused to eat it. They hated half boiled eggs. Mom screamed at them and… the eggs landed on their heads and they had to stand in front of the house in their school uniforms with eggs dripping down their faces.” p. 8
Since she is so absorbed with her career and responsibility at home, she does not have much time spent with her own children. Added with her strict and authoritative character, communication between her and her children is very little and there is very small bond exists between them. Bernie describe her character during her childhood as ‘a beat-up, frightened child.’
Bernie is also having conflict in becoming the child of a teacher and as a headmistress. She bears the high expectation of her mother to be the best students and to follow suit like her brother and sisters. Besides as a teacher and later as the headmistress on her, in the class and even in the school she is pressured by the expectations to be the best in the school and to show the best examples to others. She hated those expectations out of her and again hated being evaluated by people and the community around her. She only wished to be herself as quoted,
“… Mom expected me to be the best student. I attempted to answer every question… Mom knew I like to use big words, so she purposely made me spell ‘giraffe’ in front of the whole class.” P. 14
And again in page 19.
“Every time someone giggled, I would think they were giggling at me. I was suspicious every time I heard my name mentioned. I hate being called Mrs. Tan’s daughter. I wanted to be just me, Bernadette and not the headmistress’s daughter.”
She did have some close friends and nuns as teachers that are close to her that help ease her need for an attention and alleviate some of her loneliness. Unfortunately, her friends only came by her in a brief moment during school days and once the school days are over, she is again overwhelmed with loneliness. The depression caused by the loneliness that afflicts her later give breed to a new conflict with drugs and alcohol. The loneliness and pressures that she had to bear later leads her to find comfort in abusing alcohol and drug because it frees her temporarily from her cage and pressures as quoted,
“Alcohol seemed like the answer to my deep introversion. I could get out of ‘my cage’ anytime and not be afraid.”
Her addiction to drugs and alcohol is a place for her to find solace. Drugs and alcohol are also serves as the only way for Bernie to gain attentions from her parents. Unfortunately, her cries for attention from abusing drugs only gained attention a brief moment but the drugs later torn her life apart. Again, everyone will desert her and she is again left with loneliness again but this time it is taking toll on her sanity and health.
Conflict in this story is mainly the conflict within herself as she struggles to cope with loneliness due to her mother’s attitude, her parent’s rivalry, siblings isolation, the pressure to fulfill the expectations by her mother, and the major one, with drugs and alcoholism.
As a conclusion, from reading all three texts, we realize that all three texts have shared some common conflict. The conflict starts within the person itself. Whatever conflict might have created deep inside a person, will later sparked into other parts of his or her life and might later inflict others. Conflict can be viewed like fire. An unresolved dissatisfaction, anger or trauma may grow from tiny bits of sparks into a full blown raging fire and this is what happen in all three stories. We believed that the author in all three book intentionally would like to convey the message of how conflict might have affected us and people around us in real life if it is not distinguished through love, devotion to god, being forgivable and compassionate to other human beings and animals.