Diving Bell & The Butterfly #5

a.) Bauby's situation is worse than Jean-Paul K. situation because Bauby is forced to live and deal with the soul crushing guilt of having a friend of his captured by Hezbollah, and the constant wonder that if he had not given up his seat, would anything have gone differently?

b.) Bauby got to know the people that take care of him and he half way becomes friends with them, and gives them nicknames, like "David Bowie". He begins to understand how people from the outside might not understand how he feels and perceives things.

c.) Bauby admires Oliver for his story-telling skills and ability to be lost in the story in which he weaves and his ability to capture those who listen to him in the story. Now that he is paralyzed, Bauby can not tell stories anymore and this part of him is lost forever.

d.) People often wait for the crescendo because people have a way of being self-delusional in terms of when their lives will get better and worse. People think the good times will last forever and the bad times drag on to infinity. People are rarely realistic when it comes to their lives. This chapter is placed at the end of the book because it is leading up to what Bauby and the reader know is coming. Bauby's death.

e.)Bauby is savoring the last week of summer because it is the last week of vacation and after that it will be fall and everyone will be busy working. It will be his first fall at Berck, and he begins to see that he is beginning to make his way out and he knows, deep down inside, that he doesn't have an incredibly long time to live. He knows he's mortal.