Moment 7 - Boat Excursion

Question 1

“It should have been you two…I kept you apart. I’m not asking you to forgive me for that…. What I want is for you to put it right. Put right what I messed up for you.”

Answer 1

Ruth admits that she kept Kathy and Tommy apart from one another intentionally. Her speech is candid and straightforward, directly taking responsibility for manipulating Kathy and Tommy, which she has not done in the past.

This moment affirms that Ruth, flawed as she may be, continues to have a deep well of decency and goodness within her. It also shows her ongoing sense of hopefulness, and her desire to believe in possibility. Although the open-plan office once represented Ruth’s hopes for her own future, it now represents her hopes for Tommy and Kathy. Stopped under the billboard, Ruth exposes her belief that there is still time to make things right. She is about to give them Madame’s address, hoping that Tommy and Kathy will use it to pursue a deferral.

Question 2

“How could he possibly know what Chrissie would have felt?…It wasn’t him on that table, trying to cling onto life. “Ruth

Answer 2

Ruth calls attention to the flawed logic of empathy; no one can ever understand what another individual goes through.

Anger at own situation and pain of upcoming donation.
Invites a more sympathetic reading of Ruth, whose behavior may have been motivated by emotions to which readers are not privy.

Question 3

• “Is that right, Kath?”
• “You didn’t say”
• “We began gently guiding her towards the fence”

Question 4

• “just how frail she was”
• “her breathing was getting quite laboured”
• “Yeah, okay, we don’t need to hear every last thing about her”

Question 5

• “its paint was cracking … the timber frames … were crumbling away”
• “It’s really beautiful”
• “I could see rubbish floating by … It was nice and tranquil”

Question 6

• “open, featureless countryside”
• “it grew quite dark and the ground became more and more marshy”
• “ghostly dead trunks poking out of the soil”

Question 7

• “How would you know? … How could you possible know? You’re still a carer”
• “She wouldn’t know, would she, Tommy?”
• “I was like you, Tommy”