Confinement

We have all felt inclosed, at one point or another, felt as if we are trapped with no escape. It's a common feeling in human beings; to feel as if you are confined in a space, mental or physical, with no escape. I know that before any big test, I begin to feel trapped in my mind as I continuously review subjects and become increasingly stressed out. There's no escape- I must sit in my pool of nerves and stress until that climax of stress, when it all combines to form a tumult of unease and disquietude. This is usually when I finish my test, hand it in, and finally feel the shroud of apprehension lift from my body. But what if there was no flight from the "box" you're encased in, what if it is not mental but physical, tangible? And what if this box you are in is not a box at all, but a real, palpable room in which you have spent your whole life?

In the book Room by Emma Donoghue, Jack has spent the first five years of his adolescence trapped, literally, in a room with his mother. I have only just begun the book, but I begin to see what is terribly wrong with this situation. The book is told from the perspective Jack, and though his description of the world may not be extremely graphic, we still understand that Jack and his mother are trapped in a room where they have lived for all of Jack's five years. A mysterious man named "Old Nick" comes every night and Jack must go in what he refers to as "wardrobe", where he sleeps and hides from Old Nick. It was my first conclusion that Jack and his mother were imprisoned in a jail, yet they seem to be the only ones there, besides Old Nick who only runs their errands and comes every night to Jack's mother, who loathes him. It is now my deduction that Jack and his mother are kept in this room by Old Nick, for whatever reason, and Jack's mother and Old Nick have a sexual relationship of some sort. Whatever the reason may be, something is terribly amiss if Jack has spent the first half-decade of his life trapped in a room, without seeing anything that may be outside of the room. For a room to be the only room he knows, and for his friends to be what he refers to as "Chair" and "Rug." If the only world a five-year old knows is a 121 square-foot space, I say there is something seriously flawed in his life.

In much the same way, a child's adolescence should not consist of wartime regimes, guns, and deaths. After researching child soldiers and making observations on their lives for the past few days, I can relate both Jack's life to the lives of the child soldiers worldwide. In fact, it is my belief that the lives of child soldiers and the life of Jack are on two ends of the "trapped in a box" spectrum. Whereas child soldiers are trapped in a world of battles, the witnessing of killings, and exposure to things way beyond their years, Jack is exposed to a universe of boring nothingness, and hasn't experienced enough of the world for his age. Both child soldiers and Jack will never truly escape their box; Jack will forever be scarred by his first childhood years in the room and will have difficulties adjusting to the outside world, and child soldiers will be forever on the battlefield, their development disrupted and their nervous systems maimed. To contain a child in any sort of box; be it mental, physical, metaphorical, is abuse. Children should not be left to roam free in the streets, without any parent to love them or any sort of guidance through life, yet they should also not be so restrained that they are mentally damaged. As with most things in life, I believe the key is balance and moderation. Although from time to time, we all find ourselves in a box.