As I get further into Shuggie Bain I notice parallels between the characters and certain people among my own life, making the book a bit more emotional and interesting for me as a reader. Growing up, my mom was a single mother raising four kids, myself being the second oldest. My older brother, much like Catherine, took the first opportunity presented to him to move out and start his own life with higher aspirations for his potential. My mother was never an addict or really anything like Agnes, but they both had faced many hardships among their lives especially in terms of raising their children. My younger brother is only 13 years old and has had two brain tumors and two brain surgeries. Because of this, he has missed quite some time in school and has always been a bit behind in his age group, constantly feeling separate from the other kids in his classes.
Growing up, my sister and I would often play dress up with him and give him makeovers, which he loved. In Shuggie Bain, there’s a part in the book where Shuggie secretly tries on Agnes’ mascara. Agnes shifts in her sleep and Shuggie panics, trying to hide the mascara before she can see it. My little brother, Owen, would now react in the same manner Shuggie did if we had tried to dress him up or put makeup on him today, versus when he was four or five.
Another example of the similarities between Owen and Shuggie lies within the type of toys the two think it is “normal” to play with. I remember when Owen had invited his first friend over in the first grade. This friend of his was on the football team and was considered to be more popular than Owen because Owen didn’t play a sport. I will never forget this: Owen asked his friend if he wanted to color a picture with him and his friend responded with “um, I’m a boy. I don’t like to color.” In the book, Shuggie, after being picked on and beaten on the playground at school, is “saved” by a girl in the grade above him. She takes him back to her house after school and her and Shuggie play with plastic ponies. Shuggie is a bit skeptical at first and eventually panics, (much like he did with the mascara – almost as if he is coming to his senses), throws the ponies down and storms out of her house. The way the author wrote this section almost forces the reader to feel the level of embarrassment we can assume Shuggie is feeling.
This made me think about what the real drive of shame is for these two boys and it only leads back to the feeling of being an outcast or a “trader” to their gender. If I asked Owen to play dress up with me now, his response would be “no, that’s a girl game,” or “no, that’s what girls do.” This is to say that there are certain activities or interests that are gender specific. I think these gender norms are introduced to children at such a young age, especially with toys, that any society really struggles to separate from them. Boys are popular when they’re big, manly, athletic and fearless. Girls are popular when they’re small, dainty, clean, kind and quiet. Shuggie gets picked on and viewed as an outcast for following the girls social norms closer than the boys, but all of these adjectives individually have zero tie to gender in any way, shape or form.
Overall, I think this concept of gender norms is part of what makes this novel so special. It forces the reader to recognize the problems within society, extending even further than sexuality.
