"Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"

Before our group discussion I had not realized half of the unworded happenings in Joyce Carol Oates's "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?". I, at first, viewed Connie as a stuck up, conceited, bratty, but normal teenage girl. Once we talked it over as a class I realized that this really could have just been a front around her family, trying to uphold the personality that her mother insists she holds. "Why don't you keep your room clean like your sister? How've you got your hair fixed-what the hell stinks? Hair spray? You don't see your sister using that junk" (Oates 509). This is a statement that Connie's mother makes, which describes the fact that Connie is always being compared to her sister by her mother.

Connie is shown as just a self absorbed, pretty girl and it is apparent that her mother does not like that. "If June's name was mentioned her mother's tone was approving, and if Connie's name was mentioned it was disapproving" (Oates 511). This statement implys that Connie was not good enough in her mother's eyes and at that age you need supportive parents, not parents who are going to repeatedly bring you down. There are some indications that her mother may be jealous of Connie, such as "Her mother had been pretty once too, if you could believe those old snapshots in the album, but now her looks were gone and that was why she was always after Connie" (Oates 509). I agree with those who said that her mother is simply trying to keep her daughter level headed. I don't think that she is going about the situation in the correct way, but I can see where her mother is coming from.

As far as Arnold Friend is concerned, I am still wondering if he is even real. I found all of the hidden messages on his car very interesting and obviously relative to her. "Now these numbers are a secret code, honey" (Oates 513) he says right before he reads off the numbers thirty-three, ninteen, and seventeen. The secret code is never officially said, but we discussed in class that they could be related to either the bible or to their ages being added up together. I never would have thought much into those numbers before class, but now that we have discussed their importance it makes a lot more sense.

Even after the group discussion I feel that Arnold was a figment of Connie's imagination. He seems to solely represent her desire to escape her mother. We all know what it is like to be a teenager and those are some pretty difficult times. I think she just needed to feel like she really did get away from it all, even if it was only her mind.