In The Time Of Butterflies By Julia Alvarez

What is the significance of a notable event if it does not change a person’s life? The story, “In the Time of Butterflies” by Julia Alvarez portrays the Mirabal sisters as typical girls who grew up in the 1950’s and 60’s on their family farm in the Dominican Republic. The Mirabal sisters had the same hopes, dreams, insecurities, and aspirations of girls in their country, yet the path they each eventually chose for themselves lead them to revolutionary outcomes. Each girl possessed a unique personality and each girl called into civil disobedience came from a unique mindset. Despite and because of their varied experiences each sister chose to join the revolution when each of their most dominant core values were called upon or challenged. Many

She highly valued her quest for love, and in time this quest leads her to join the civil disobedience. The moment Mate sensed an opportunity for a deep personal romance of her own; it was a primary factor in her decision to join the revolution. There were many instances where Mate wrote about the boys and finding the love of her life in her journal even at the young age of nine. When she was staying with Minerva in the city to help Minerva with her marriage and child, she met Palomino. Palomino was making a delivery for the revolution, and he asked Mate, “You aren't one of us, are you?”(142) Mate described him as the “sweetest man's face"(141) she had ever seen, and she thought to herself, “I didn't know what he was talking about, but I knew right then and there, I wanted to be a part of whatever he was.” (142) Mate has always been a romantic so she thought by joining the revolution she could be with Palomino. A demonstration of Mate’s guileless is when she told herself, “I don't want to be babied anymore. I want to be worthy of Palomino.”(142) The revolution was an opportunity for Mate to become closer to Palomino and prove she was more capable than just being a loyal little sister. Alvarez uses journal entries to show Mate’s young and romantic mindset and taps into her core value of finding romantic love as a reason to support and work for a Dominican