This story “Raymond’s Run” is about a girl who is confident and compassionate. Hazel Elizabeth Deborah Parker known as Squeaky has an extreme amount of confidence in her running abilities and takes a big responsibility of taking care of her brother, Raymond, who has mental disabilities. She makes sure no one bullies him. This story is written by Toni Cade Bambara. This book is called Raymond’s run. The main character is Squeaky. The major conflict of the story is when Squeaky runs into Gretchen and gets into an argument about who shall win the Mayday race. During the course of the story, Squeeky changes from being selfish and self centered to compassionate and caring. Squeaky takes responsibility over her big brother and makes sure …show more content…
When the race ends, Squeaky is thinking of how she would give up her own career as a runner to concentrate on coaching Raymond, rather than listening for the announcement to see if she is this year’s May Day running champion. Because she already has a room full of trophies and ribbons, and Raymond has nothing. She starts to change her attention from herself to her brother. As she hears her name announced as a champion, she is already focusing on Raymond’s future. Although Raymond was not actually in the race, this was really his run. When Squeaky realizes winning isn't everything, she sees Gretchen as a person who also works hard to achieve her aspirations. She looks at her rival, thinking that perhaps she would be the type of person that would help coach Raymond. At the beginning of the story, Squeaky was totally focused on herself. She wanted to be the fastest runner and beat her rival Gretchen in the May day race. She also wanted to be the winner of the spelling bee. However, as the story progresses, Squeaky becomes more compassionate and caring towards others. Squeaky develops confidence and strength. Meanwhile she becomes loving and caring towards Raymond. Squeaky realizes winning isn’t everything in life and starts to care about others