Post 5 - Chapters 13-15 - Aunt Alexandra

Journal #5
Chapters 13-15
Perspective: Aunt Alexandra

Wow. Atticus asked me if I could live with them for a while to help Jean Louise. I couldn’t believe it, after all of these years he finally asks me to try to help Jean Louise become a proper young lady. That’s going to be a tough one. Jean Louise doesn’t even act like a girl! She gets into fights, she curses and she dresses in overalls! If she wants to be a young lady she has to talk properly, walk properly and most of all dress properly. She will have to be nice and clean everyday and not play dirty and I’m pretty sure that’ll never happen.
Atticus doesn’t raise his children correctly. If he did, Jean Louise and Jeremy wouldn’t be a disgrace to our family. Atticus should’ve married or hired a nanny after his wife had died so then Jean Louise could’ve been influenced to be more like a lady or at least a little girl. For Christmas Atticus got her an Air Riffle! What kind of present is that for a little girl? He should’ve got her a tea set or a nice dress or something. If he wants her to start acting like a lady he has to start treating her like a lady… not like a boy!
Sometimes when I had some company over at Atticus’s house I would see Jean Louise running in and out getting some water. I was able to see that others saw her too so I asked her to come and say hello. I regretted that so badly. Jean Louise was wearing overalls and she was covered in dirt and her hair didn’t even look like it was combed. She said hello and left and the others giggled at the sight of her.
I sort of liked living with Atticus and his family. It was different and I fit right into Maycomb. I made many good friends and I see them daily. But something disturbed me about living with Atticus and his family. They were too close with their maid. One day Jean Louise asked Atticus if she could go and visit Calpurnia. I was astonished, she actually wanted to go visit Calpurnia! I replied “You may not.” Jean Louise decided to talk back to me and she told me “I didn’t ask you!” If Atticus wants me to help get her more ladylike, she’s got to get rid of that attitude. That was no way you should speak to an adult… ever! And when she “apologized” I was able to tell that she didn’t mean it at all. I tried to talk Atticus into letting Calpurnia go for a while but he just wouldn’t give in. He said that Jeremy and Jean Louise were really attached to her and he didn’t know what he would do without her.
On that same night a kid named Charles Baker Harris (Jean Louise and Jeremy call him Dill) was found under Jean Louise’s bed and it turned out that he had ran away from home. He was such a filthy kid. When we first saw him he was all dirty and he was covered in dirt. He was also starving so Atticus gave him something to eat. Charles didn’t have any manners at all and he was just eating like a pig. He was Jean Louise and Jeremy’s friend so of course they didn’t care about how he ate because they ate the same way… it bothered me.
About a week later people came to the house and they wanted Atticus. I was able to tell that they were talking about the Tom Robinson case and I was able to see that Atticus was going to be in a big mess that he will soon regret… I told him not to be in that case… but he didn’t listen.