Bokhadour 1 Abdulmohsen Bokhadour Professor Moharreri English 113A 11 May 2015 Final Draft 728 “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” is a short story that was written by Joyce Carol Oates. The story goes through various types of cycles and at the same time shows the importance of the nature and the things that we think about. It is like the author talks about a character named Coonie and who were fifteen. By giving this age the author describes a teenager and about how exactly a teenager thinks certainly about a few things that would make the person understand and relate with the life. The authors point about showing the way teenagers think is absolutely correct as it exposes how a teenager would think when they are restricted about the things that they do. Coonie was a person who was always restricted by her mother from admiring herself in the mirror, “Why don’t you keep your room clean like your sister? How’ve you got your hair fixed-what the hell stinks? Her spray? You don’t see your sister using that junk”(Oates). It explains the way that teenagers think, it is something like one cannot underestimate their thinking level as it is a process that one thinks about. It can be seen that a person in that age would definitely think over things, as she knows everything. Almost every teenager in his or her teenage life would think that they know everything and would hate it from the heart if were asked to do something about it. At the same time by giving her example of her sister made her even angry. Her sister’s name was June and she was nine years elder to her. “She makes me want to throw up sometimes”(Oates), it shows that she was completely not liking the fact that she was constantly being given an example to be like her own sister. It is something that the teenagers usually do and would not allow this to be a part of their life, as all of the teenagers at a certain age would definitely want to be unique. It at the same time showed that “Their father was away at work most of the time and when he came home he wanted supper and he read the newspaper at supper and after supper wen to the bed.”(Oates). This shows an important factor about parents, it is their duty to divide and at the same time give equal amount of time to their family, as work is something that is important but at the same time if proper care is not given to the family it would take them apart and make them believe like they are being pressurized by the parents to do certain things. “Coonie had long dark blond hair that drew anyone’s eye to it” shows that Coonie was an attractive young girl (oates). It is like at the young age, the girls look very beautiful and are flirted by the guys who would like to flirt with them or something like that. The author makes a point here that she was attracted and would easily get influenced by the guys that surrounded. This lead to an incident in the parking where a person in a convertible tried ...

1. Bokhadour 1
Abdulmohsen Bokhadour
Professor Moharreri
English 113A
11 May 2015
Final Draft
728
“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?”
“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” is a short
story that was written by Joyce Carol Oates. The story goes
through various types of cycles and at the same time shows the
importance of the nature and the things that we think about. It is
like the author talks about a character named Coonie and who
were fifteen. By giving this age the author describes a teenager
and about how exactly a teenager thinks certainly about a few
things that would make the person understand and relate with
the life. The authors point about showing the way teenagers
think is absolutely correct as it exposes how a teenager would
think when they are restricted about the things that they do.
Coonie was a person who was always restricted by her mother
from admiring herself in the mirror, “Why don’t you keep your
room clean like your sister? How’ve you got your hair fixed-
what the hell stinks? Her spray? You don’t see your sister using
that junk”(Oates). It explains the way that teenagers think, it is
something like one cannot underestimate their thinking level as
it is a process that one thinks about. It can be seen that a person
in that age would definitely think over things, as she knows
everything. Almost every teenager in his or her teenage life
would think that they know everything and would hate it from
the heart if were asked to do something about it.
At the same time by giving her example of her sister made her
even angry. Her sister’s name was June and she was nine years
elder to her. “She makes me want to throw up
sometimes”(Oates), it shows that she was completely not liking

2. the fact that she was constantly being given an example to be
like her own sister. It is something that the teenagers usually do
and would not allow this to be a part of their life, as all of the
teenagers at a certain age would definitely want to be unique. It
at the same time showed that “Their father was away at work
most of the time and when he came home he wanted supper and
he read the newspaper at supper and after supper wen to the
bed.”(Oates). This shows an important factor about parents, it is
their duty to divide and at the same time give equal amount of
time to their family, as work is something that is important but
at the same time if proper care is not given to the family it
would take them apart and make them believe like they are
being pressurized by the parents to do certain things.
“Coonie had long dark blond hair that drew anyone’s eye to it”
shows that Coonie was an attractive young girl (oates). It is like
at the young age, the girls look very beautiful and are flirted by
the guys who would like to flirt with them or something like
that. The author makes a point here that she was attracted and
would easily get influenced by the guys that surrounded. This
lead to an incident in the parking where a person in a
convertible tried flirting with her by telling “Gonna get you,
baby” it shows the way men or in fact boys think about a young
girl. They want a girl to be giving them attention (Oates).
The author gives out a message towards the end about a person
who can easily be influenced by others. The main important
thing that I feel in the story is the relationship with the father, it
is like one of the most important things that a person should
look for as it allows the person to understand and at the same
time build a mark in their life. At a young age kids do commit
mistakes and then instead of regretting those, they should learn
about the mistakes and should promise not to make it happen
again. Just like in the end “so much land that Coonie had never
seen before and did not recognize except to know that she was
going to it.” this explains that there could be good things that
could happen and at the same time there can be bad things that
would happen.

3. Bokhadour 1
Abdulmohsen Bokhadour
English 113A
11 May 2015
Final Draft
598
Clara The New Yorker
The main character in Roberto Bolano’s story is Clara, a
girl who is faced with a myriad of challenge some of which
include obtaining certification from a good college,
concentration on painting, music and finally getting peace of
mind. “She used to dream about rats” The story depicts the
persona of a man who has been friends with Clara for a long
time. The man is somewhat friend-zoned by Clara since she
partially reciprocates his love for her with benefits, but then
again refuses to move in with him in Barcelona. Both parties
According to the story, Clara, and her male admirer have felt
deep affection for each other at some point.
The narrator said, “I don’t know why I fell madly in love with
her, but I did, and at the start, I mean for the first days, the first
hours, it all went fine” (Bolano). Evident in the story is the fact
that women will quickly lose their attraction to a man who
overtly portrays his affection for them without tinges of
subtlety and indifference. If perhaps Clara’s lover had been
aloof about his deep love and indifferent to her actions, he
would have had a better opportunity with her. Clara refuses to
commit to her friend when he asks to move in with him in
Barcelona. In her rejection letter, she highlights the “intolerable
pressure” that the moving in the suggestion is putting on her.
Before she rejects him, everything is okay between them
because they spend time doing fun things and also make love on
several occasions. Their bone of contention arises when the man

4. wants to change the dynamic of their relationship.
Clara is challenged by psychological problems for a
reasonable period of time throughout her life. “She used to
dream about rats; at night she would hear them in her bedroom,
and for months” (Bolano). The nightmares she has every now
and then about rats take a heavy toll on her. She is so seriously
affected that she develops some sort of obsessive-compulsive
disorder that makes her avoid her bedroom and sleep in the
lounge.
Nonetheless, “Luis was a sensitive guy” (Bolano). Luis
breaks up with Clara she lapses to depression once more. Clara
had never been left in her life by a man, and when Luis ended
their marriage, it was not easy for her. To mitigate her trauma,
she starts to see a psychiatrist and takes an anti-depressant
prescription. The story shows how Clara takes her frustrations
seriously such that she becomes unhappy in life. She seeks inner
peace for a long time now; sometimes Clara thinks she would
find it if she is able to travel and paint as much as she wanted.
The story is about dysfunctional relationships and midlife
crises. First we are able to meet Clara, who has had a number of
unsuccessful unions with men. Moreover, the man who Clara
made love to for the first time remains hung up on her for the
rest of his life. He never moves on, and this is evident because
he keeps initiating contact with her; an inherent need to keep
tabs with what transpires in Clara’s life. Clara is bothered about
the paintings she has not been able to do, the places she is yet
to travel to. This is a midlife crisis on her part. Unfortunately, it
is one of the reasons for her depression.
Work Cited
Bolano, Roberto “Clara.” The New Yorker. 04 April 2008. Web.

5. 10 May 2015.
< http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/08/04/clara-2>.
Bokhadour 1
Name: Abdulmohsen Bokhadour
Prof Ata
English 113A
February 25, 2015
Improvement begins with I
This is a quote by Arnold H. Glasow. The quote tells us that the
best form of improving anything is first improving our own self.
The author Arnold H. Glasow is a famous business and a
humorist. His is famous for his inspirational quotations. In this
quote he tells us about how we should be responsible of our
work and be mature enough to understand what has gone wrong
where and what we can do to improve it. It us that we should
start looking at when it comes to counting and naming fault.
Blaming other people will only make things worse for both the
sides. Life is not an easy journey. Problems can come whenever
and wherever. But we shouldn’t let them change anything for
us. We should always learn from our mistakes and make it a
point not to repeat them the next time we do the same thing.
Self-improvement is the major part of anyone’s character
to live a fulfilled life. As a human in today’s world we need to
be up to date about the things that are happening around us. So
we should always try to improve our knowledge about things
even though they are not related to what we do.
For me personally, self-improvement is a major part of how I
live my life right now. I’m never satisfied with what I have and
I always want to learn more things that are helpful and that can
help me understand things better. The most important change
that I got in me was reading books. Since childhood my teachers
complained that I never read books and hence my vocabulary
and grammar wasn’t up to the mark but I realized that I need to

6. change that for me to become a become student. Thereafter I
started collecting book and reading them to such an extent that
now I love reading books of all kinds. Be it a novel or a
magazine or a journal or encyclopedia. I love reading and it has
really helped me grow more a s student of English class.
Self-improvement for me it become a major method by which I
am able to achieve my goals in life. The best part about it is
that you don’t have to point fingers at someone for something
that went wrong. If you take the blame yourself for something
you did, then life becomes much easier and things become
smoother. Blame your own self and learn from your mistakes
and try not to repeat them and try to improve yourself on that
thing. That’s all it takes to makes things right. And this is not a
difficult task as well.
There are people in our lives that help us make things right and
make our job and life easier. But those people aren’t going to
stick around us forever. We should grow up and take
responsibilities and manage our work by ourselves and try to
make it a point to keep improving from what were before. This
progress will definitely have it fruits in the future for us. Being
dependent on other will make things worse for both of us and
that is one of that reasons that people don’t take a step forward
in doing anything productive. Real life experiences will teach
us a lot of lessons and we should go back and analyze our faults
and rectify them. We should always have faith in what we do
and what we’re going to do.
We should always think that ”I can make things right” and
shouldn’t say that things went because of so and so person. That
is not the attitude that will make successful. Self-improvement
is not only for our personal potential growth but for living a
fulfilled life. Being independent of things will make us better.
Living on someone else’s idea is not good. We should have the
knowledge to learn things. We shouldn’t just be ourselves. We
should be our ‘best’ self and only then we will grow as an all
round individual.