Change of heart

I just finished reading "their eyes were watching god". I won't ruin the ending for those that have not finished yet, but through the reading my initial feelings towards Teacake have changed. At first I thought he was no good because of the train yard incident. As I kept reading I was expecting to find other examples of abuse or neglect towards Jainie. When I didn't find these examples I had to rethink what Teacake was all about and how Jainie thought of him. There was only one other instance where Teacake was abusive. He slapped her around once to prove a point to the residence in the "muck". This was not a loving thing to do, but I feel that I can now properly put their relationship into context.

In that time and place in our history physical and emotional abuse was rampant and occurred on almost a daily basis. With today's laws and media coverage I would assume that physical abuse, while still occurring, has decreased significantly since that era. With said I think as a society we are more abusive than ever. We have diminished physical abuse and replaced it with emotional abuse.

With that said, I now feel that Teacakes failings were do to age and environment. This does not excuse his abuses, but in comparison to the norm of the their society he was near a saint. he was devoted to her and wanted her around all of the time. He survived a knife fight to bring back her money, he protected her through a hurricane, he never asked for or took her savings, and killed a dog to protect her. No one is perfect and Teacake is no exception, but he proved himself as the story went on and won me over.