Educated Post 1

Educated is about a girl, named Tara Westover, who lives a very sheltered life in the Idaho mountains with her very paranoid parents. In this cut off existence, Tara sees beauty in the natural world, even in the most simple plants, such as sage bushes and conifer trees. She views wild wheat as “a corps de ballet.” Above all things, she sees beauty in the peak of a mountain, of which her father told her that the mountain is like a cathedral, calling it “the Indian Princess.” The problem Tara has is that her parents are incredibly paranoid, thinking the world will end and they will survive by being cut off from the rest of the world. Thus, though Tara can appreciate the natural world, she cannot learn about the beauty she enjoys. I relate to the appreciation of nature Tara has; I enjoy hiking, biology (specifically botany), and camping. Unlike Tara, however, I do these things voluntarily, rather than living by the insane way of life of a family. Tara also has a love for knowledge because of her appreciation of beauty of the natural world. Whenever something new is introduced to me, I like to learn all I can to satiate my need for something stimulating. In this capacity, I also relate to a character of Agatha Christie, Hercule Poirot, a private detective. Without something stimulating to think of, such as a jewel robbery or a murder case, he claims his “little gray cells will starve and die” (Jewel Robbery at the Grand Metropolitan). To think of something stimulating is like exercise for the mind or perhaps food for thought; without such things, your brain will degenerate, forget, and eventually stop working all together. This is Tara’s plight; she has nothing to stimulate her and probably never will as long as she is living with her family in the mountains.