My Ten Mile Radius

Everybody has routines and places they go. When I lived in Ft. Lauderdale I had about a three mile radius where I could shop, dine, party, swim in the ocean, see a theater performance, catch an Imax and everything else I needed, even the Art Museum. My office was a 1 mile commute and that's pushing it. I loved it, but life happens.

So now I live in a sleepy bedroom community (pop 25,000) with not too many of the above amenities, I have about a ten mile radius now. I still can't do all the things I could in Ft. Lauderdale, but I'm adjusting. One thing that is the same is that you get to know people, your favorite clerk at CVS, the nice lady at the bank who loves Hello Kitty as much as you do, and a street urchin who is always in Cocoa Village

The Street Urchin fascinates me, I spot her everywhere. She is clearly not well mentally. I have seen her on meds, I have seen her off meds. When she is on them, she can read eloquently, hold a conversation, eat and dress in only a single layer of clothes. The cops don't know what to do with her anymore, she won't stay for too long at any safe haven or state run facility after she has been on meds for awhile. So, it's back out to the streets, bumming a smoke, looking for a free cup of coffee and a place to rest her head. I'm pretty sure she is a drug addict as she works the streets for money, but that's not the point. The point is what happened to her? Is she so broken that she can't be fixed with some care and attention? Sometimes, when I see her I want to pull over, buy her lunch and let her talk, maybe there is help for her if she would accept it. I don't do this because she is very volatile, sometimes she is wailing like a banshhee and crying and talking to herself, other times she is laughing and talking to herself and as I've said sometimes, though rarely she can hold a normal conversation. I don't have what it takes to make her better, and you can't give away what you don't have. So basically, I just keep an eye on her in case it's one of those days where she's lucid and wants help. Chance are not only has she had a rough life, but she is probably suffering from severe mental disease, and an addict. A dual diagnosis on
the DSM-IV. If not a triple whammy.

THERE BUT FOR THE GRACE OF GOD GO I

Fantine As Innocent
Desperate, passionate, innocent: the Fantine pictured above seems to be all of those things. The picture does not depict Fantine as a prostitute who "has become marble in becoming corrupted" (Hugo, 163). It illustrates the scene in Les Miserables which Fantine "had again become beautiful," as she begs Javert for her freedom (Hugo, 167). In other novels of nineteenth-century France, the prostitute would not be depicted as a fallen saint, but as a lowly criminal. Victor Hugo, however, belonged to the Romantic school-of-thought, which was rapid in France in the mid-1800s. He believed in the instinctive good of the common man, a theme that is prevalent in Les Miserables.
Since the picture is an illustration of Hugo's words, it is an illustration of the Romantic view of the urban poor. Although we do not know whom the actual author of these sketches is, we can view them as the work of a Romantic Hugo. At first glance, Fantine appears to be a virtuous lady, her dress seeming of high quality, not worn from wear and tear. The candlelight illuminates our heroine: it's as if she glows with innocence, while the harsh government (Javert) and cruel society look down on her.
Before her fall into prostitution, Fantine was the ideal Romantic woman: virtuous and uneducated in life. Even after she falls into poverty and is forced to prostitute herself, Hugo continues this romantic depiction of Fantine as a woman of virtue, which can be seen in the illustration. Hugo used his novels to challenge the traditional perceptions of an honorable woman, and the urban class in general.
The Romantic period in literature, politics, and society viewed the French classe populaire as the heroes, not as the criminals. As a Romantic, Hugo used Les Miserables to show that the destitute in France are not impoverished because they are evil, but because society has forgotten them. With his depiction of Fantine, and other low-class characters in his novels, Hugo shows that the dangerous classes are not so corrupt.