This Boy's Life (57-106)

Summary
Marian, Kathy, and Rosemary(Toby's mother) all decided to rent the house together. Rosemary picked the place. The yard was high in weeds, there was a collapsed barn. When Kathy and Mariam were flabbergasted when they saw the apartment. Soon, they did some repairs so the apartment would look descent. On Halloween, Toby, Silver, and Taylor broke some windows of the school cafeteria. When they got away with it, that causes the trio to do some more crimes like damaging street lights, opened the doors of cars and releasing the emergency brakes so they be smashed with the other cars and stealing. Meanwhile, Marian tried to fix up Rosemary with a man she can be with. After all the men Rosemary interviewed, she finally found a man who was descent whose named was Dwight. Dwight had 3 other children Pearl, Skipper, and Norma from a previous marriage. He lives in a place called Chinook, 3 hours north from Seattle and kept driving down to Seattle to visit Rosemary every other weekend and eventually every weekend.

Sometimes, Toby, Silver, and Taylor would hang out in the bathroom, smoking. Toby showed his rifle to his friends. While Toby was in the bathroom, he scratched  f*** you with his comb into the soft paint of the wall. Soon, the vice-principal was 100% sure that it was Toby who wrote the profanity on the bathroom wall. When his mother was called up, Rosemary did not believe a single word that the vice-principal was saying. As a result, Toby was suspended for only 1 week. Later on in the novel, Dwight has the baddest attitude toward Toby. Mariam told Dwight that Toby was making fun of him by mimicking his attitude when he (Dwight) drinks. When Toby stays over Dwight's home, he works hard on chores as a slave, then Toby makes up lies to his mother that him and Dwight are quality time together. Toby knows how much Dwight means to his mother so he keeps his slavery a secret.

Quote:
"My mother had faith in me. She didn't have faith in discipline. Her father, Daddy, had given her plenty and she had yet to see the profit from it" (Wolff 59).

Reaction:
At first, I didn't believe that quote. Maybe Rosemary doesn't want to discipline his son hard because she does not want to turn into her own father. Rosemary's father was really strict and he spanked her every night even if she did not do anything wrong. To think that parents completely trusts their children with no doubt on the back of his/her head, that is hard to believe. I had that thought until the profanity incident. When, the vice-principal AND the reader knows that it was Toby who put that profanity on the wall, the mother bravely went against the vice-principal's word and actually trusts his son. When Rosemary asks Toby if he did the crime, he said no and she thought that was the end of discussion. While I was reading that part of the novel, I asked if Rosemary had a doubt in her head. Also, I'm asking if she showed any discipline to Toby because in my opinion, he should not be let off the hook that easily. I wonder if the discipline towards Toby will begin when Rosemary and Dwight officially gets married and Dwight is the new step-father. The author of the book makes it seem that Toby is kind of in charge of his mother because she wants to make her son happy, no matter what and Toby takes advantage of that. I just hope that advantage doesn't go too far.