Conflict and Resolution

Author's Note: This piece is my conflict and resolution on "Touching Spirit Bear" and how it is Person vs Nature.

The book "Touching Spirit Bear," is about a 15 year old boy named Cole Matthews, who was getting into fights for a very long time, but the last time getting caught smashing a boys head into the ground was the last straw. They had to do something about it. He is offered to go on the island, Circle of Justice, to change the way he acts. Struggling to survive, things can only get worse by running into the Spirit Bear. Will he survive and learn to live on his own? Or will he just give up? This type of conflict is called Person vs Nature. This is because Cole is fighting the wilderness to survive.

 This conflict gets resolved, because Cole teaches himself how to build fires, how to hunt and many more things a survivalist would have to know. He gets help by a parole officer named Garvey. He helps him in many ways, to learn how to become a better person, to forgive, and best of all, control his anger he has with others. This conflict is similar to the conflict in "Hatchet," because Brain, on of the main characters, get in a plane crash and has to learn how to survive on his own.

Changing Characters

 Authors Note: In this selection, I am writing about, in Spirit Bear, Cole can change and help other people change.

Some people never change. On the other hand, people can change there lives for ever. For example, a fifteen-year-old  irresponsible juvenile from Minneapolis, Minnesota, arrives on a unproductive island near the city of Drake in Southeastern Alaska, in handcuffs. Not willing to change, the school, his parents, and much more, force him to live in an island, until he changes. This guy bullies, and bullies, kid after kid, leaving people in misery.

When Cole arrives on the island, he is consumed by anger, acrimony, and dissatisfaction, to change. As shortly as Edwin, a Tlingit elder, and Garvey leave, Cole sets fire to his constructed shelter and supplies, he tries jumping into the ocean to swim to freedom. Getting caught by the rising tide, he is incapable to escape the island. In his first few days on the island, he has several encounters with a magnificent, white bear called a Spirit Bear, and he is decisive to kill it out of anger. 

Some days later, he saw the bear, desperately in need for food, he tries stabbing the white creature with his knife and a makeshift spear. The bear is not only hesitant but instead fiercely attacks Cole, breaking his hip and right arm as well as knocking him out. Left to die after the attack, Cole comes to realize his own liability and need to change quickly. A while after the attack, the Spirit Bear obediently approaches and comes within inches of Cole’s face. Cole  reaches out to touch the bear and grabs a tassel of white hair from its back. Cole is overwhelmingly moved by the bear’s serenity. Edwin and Garvey back to find Cole close to him death, with mosquitoes and putrefaction all around him.

Back on this small island, Cole is forced to build his own shelter, and Edwin teaches him a series of rituals that will tolerate his healing and forgiveness progression throughout the year. He is commanded to take a bath in a freezing pond every morning to clear his mind of anger. Then, he must take a large rock called the “ancestor rock” up a hill, and then roll it back down as a symbol of releasing his anger. Just as he is growing in his own development of healing, Edwin tells him that Peter Driscal, the boy he had attacked, is not doing well. The boy has developed depression and has attempted suicide, twice. Cole insists that the best way to heal Peter is to have him come to the island and see how Cole has transformed. Peter’s depressed, but desperate, parents agree on the condition that Garvey stays with them on the island. Cole shows Peter the natural wonders of the island and his own healing process, which allow Peter to understand how to forgive Cole and accept that his life has worth as well. As the two forgive each other, they see the Spirit Bear one last time, peaceful as it watches the two former enemies now reconcile. 

See, everyone can change, I mean if the want to. I guess Cole really understood what he did wrong. We can't change on our own, we need friends, or family to help. We need to be surrounded by the people we love and the people that care about us. We need to get help by letting the anger out of us. Everyone needs to realize that the best thing on earth is to be happy. To actually have friends that like you for you. No matter how hard changing your life may be, never give up. Deep down inside you are a wonderful person. 

Prediction

Authors Note: In this section, you will see that it is a prediction and why I was right or wrong, and it's about a book we read.

My prediction is that when he smelled it, it wasn't strong enough to change him. I think that he will come by Molly and he will be the same person. He probably won't change a bit. Insidious is a movie that is kind of like this. I mean this kid goes up stairs in an attic at their new house and falls. Then he suddenly goes into acoma, then the devil possess him. My brain tells me that he won't be the same person at all. Like you don't just completely change. I was completely wrong. I was so wrong. He opened the jar and it like possessed him. Like took his personality. All his emotion is gone. He isn't the same. I think that when he goes by Molly, I think she will cry. I think she will be so sad that she goes and talks to the science teacher. I think she will find all the jars, and maybe she will try to somehow fix Troy so he is back to normal. She will probably break the jars. Maybe get all the people back to normal.