A Worn Path

When I read this story I was thinking that maybe Phoenix, the protagonist in the story, was on a journey toward the end of her life. She is old and the obstacles that she is up against seem to wear her down as the story goes on. She has a vision after crossing a log and sits down to rest, she sees marble-cake and a little boy. The marble-cake gives a symbolic point of view with the chocolate of the cake representing African Americans and the vanilla or white portion of the cake representing white people. This starts to show that maybe this story is about the segregation, slavery, and poverty of the African Americans in the South. When Phoenix stealthily picks up the nickel so that the hunter doesn't notice, you know she is poor because its just a nickel. I found the fact that Phoenix wanted her shoes tied once she was in town, she wanted to look "proper" in the city amongst all the white people at Christmastime. The fact that it was the Christmas season foreshadows the free medicine given to Phoenix for her grandson, a handout that was the main reason for the long journey into town in the first place. She forgets what she is going to town for periodically, "...[i]t was my memory that fail me. My little grandson, he is just the same, and I forgot it in the coming" (Welty 454). I wondered if her grandson was the reason that she kept pushing on with her life, to make sure that he had his medicine to make him feel better.