#385 Jubilee- Kirsten Valdez Quade
Andrea has a big chip on her shoulder. She is the
eighteen-year old daughter of Mexican immigrants and finds herself going to a
fancy blueberry harvest at the farm of her father’s employers, the Lowells.
Although not strictly invited, she is welcome. She hopes to use this party as
validation of her becoming as successful or worthy of her wealthy acquaintances.
“She would show up full of breezy, sparkling confidence that
would startle these people. Andrea was an equal now, a Stanford student, poised
and intelligent, no longer just the daughter of one of their laborers…by her
very presence today, she would prove to them their snobbery and make them
ashamed of their entitlement and their halfhearted acts of charity towards her
family.”
Of course, as it often is with such things, those who are
the cause of resentment don’t harbor the same feelings of weight or importance
to those that feel the resentment. Andrea wanted to make a big deal of her
worthiness of attending a high-class function. Instead of getting a strong
backlash and a fight, she was welcomed with open arms as if she actually did
belong there. This drove her to even more resentment, and caused her to
embarrass herself.
The only person to whom she needed to prove her own worth,
was herself.
