blog #4

Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
Chapters 15 - 19

The next morning, Holden goes on a date with Hayes. He then meets two nuns and contributes some money to their charity, but later on regrets that he should've paid more and concludes that money depresses people. After that, Holden again thinks about Phoebe and overwhelmingly compliments her. He says she can truly understand Holden’s feelings. After buying a theater ticket for the date with Sally, he meets this girl that knows Phoebe and where she was the day before. Although, a day has passed, Holden still goes to the museum, where he heard Phoebe was, reminiscing and saying that museum gives a feeling of change whenever he visits. Holden meets Sally at the hotel, and loves how she looks. In the theater, Holden criticizes on the “phoniness” of the actors. Afterwards, they decide to go ice-skating. He also finds Sally phony, but he likes her physical appearance, so he forgives her. They get into a fight, and Holden leaves her crying. Holden again called Jane, but she didn’t pick up her phone, so Holden called a guy named Luce who used to be the “big brother” to have a drink. Before he meets, he catches a quick phony movie. When he meets Luce, Holden asks sex questions Luce used to discuss a long time before. Annoyed, Luce leaves.

In these chapters, I have realized Holden Caulfield is beginning to use the word phony a lot. He thinks everything and everyone except for himself, Jane--who he loved, and Phoebe--who is his sister are all phony. I think this act of thinking so selfishly is kind of phony himself. His situation is actually phony, in my opinion because I have also noticed that whenever he wants to call someone up, it's not the right person who actually gets the phone, but always a person Holden does not really like. Despite his dislike, though, he still meets them up because he has no other option to choose from. I think Holden has to realize that if it weren't for the "phony" people like Luce, whom he met, he would've probably been in the hotel being beaten up by the elevator operator.