Bret Harte's 'the Outcasts of Poker Flat'

This can't be happening thought Bill. Man I'm in so much trouble, there's no way I can get out of it. I'm stuck. Bill had just wrecked his parent's BMW in an accident, and they had no idea that the expensive car was even missing from the garage. And a terrible thing had happened as a result of the crash. A young woman lay dead in the passenger side of the vehicle, swarmed by medics. Bill had escaped injury, but as his body was still at the crash site, his mind wasn't. He was in total shock at what had happened. If I only left the car in the garage and didn't try to "borrow" it, Lisa might still be alive….Bill tried to imagine that it wasn't real, that he was in his bed dreaming, but no, he was responsible for the destruction of his parents' car and his the death of his girlfriend. It was as if his mind wasn't registering, as if it was in some far away place. He just couldn't come to grips with what had happened. This is a classic example of severe shock. The event that took place was so strong that the mind has trouble working. While in Bill's case where he had indeed had an accident, the realism of the situation dwarfs the mind as if a small comet hurtled towards a blazing sun. But this is just one aspect of realism. The whole of realism is made up of the fact that our lives, the world, the universe, it's all real. And as much as our minds would want to deny it, everything will stay real, and for most people they just make the best of it. But for the rest of the people, they invent new ways to get around the feeling that a wall has been placed in their path. All this goes to say that people must be original and "keep it real" to survive the physical and mental fatigue life throws at them and also that everything will always be real and we must be in touch with our minds to harvest the realness. Bret Harte tells of a story where a group is outcast into the world to fend for themselves during the winter season. After they have been exiled and are outside the city