19.

While others might say that fire is the only motif in Jeannette Walls’s memoir, The Glass Castle, it isn’t.   Other motifs include the Joshua tree, Jeannette’s collection of rocks, and stars.  However, fire is a very important component of this story. Starting off the book with a memory of her catching on fire at age three, while cooking hotdogs and being neglected, her audience begins profiling Walls as a Lone Ranger right off the bat.  This unfortunate encounter with fire causes Jeannette Walls to become fascinated by fire for the rest of her life.  Jeannette Walls enjoyed feeling control over the fire because she never had any stability or control over other aspects of her life.  She liked how she could control the fire by, “pulling off some toilet paper, lighting it, and when it started burning, I throwing it down the toilet.” (Walls 20).  She had complete authority over the fires she made, “I was torturing the fire, giving it life, and snuffing it out.” (Walls 20).  But Jeanette soon learns that even she couldn’t have absolute dominance while playing with fire.  This activity was a lot like playing on a slot machine in a casino; she learned this lesson when a fire burned down the hotel she and her family were staying at one night and caused a lot of chaos.  The fire started while her family was sleeping and Jeannette was so frightened by the fire that she could not even scream for help.  From this experience, she realized that she, “lived in a world that at any moment could erupt into fire.” (Walls 21).