The Smell Of Other People's Houses

“Statehood turned out to be not a new car but something much, much bigger, and Daddy had to fly to Washington, DC, to try and stop it—a place where he had to show his passport just to get off the plane, and nobody hunted or fished, and he had to buy new shoes to go to a meeting to talk about why Alaskans didn’t want statehood. Except for the ones who did, and they were not my daddy’s friends. He told me that most people didn’t pay that much attention to stuff that happened in Washington, DC, but Alaskans would be sorry when Outside people started making decisions for us. I didn’t know who these Outside people were, but I hoped I would never, ever meet them.”

Ruth as a primary narrator opens the story, and her prologue situates the narrative context. Alaska’s annexation to the United States is a key historical event that becomes a turning point for the young protagonists, as it creates a setting characterized by transition. Ruth sees her life dramatically change after her father’s death—he died in a plane crash on the way home from Washington, D.C., supporting Alaskan’s right to independence. Overall, the novel questions statehood regarding the issues of natural preservation and people’s economic autonomy against the power of a centralized government.

“Birch Park smelled like an old person’s house, something I’d never noticed when we only visited, which hadn’t been very often. There were no flowers in whiskey bottles, no fresh deer carcasses curing from the rafters. The only meat in the refrigerator was pale and pink, sitting limp on a foam tray and wrapped in plastic. The blood was completely drained out of it, which made me homesick and suspicious.”

The passage describes Ruth’s alienation after relocating to her grandmother’s house. The smell motif illuminates Ruth’s emotional state highlighting her loneliness in a strange environment and the nostalgia of her parents’ loving home. At this point, her relationship with her grandmother remains tense and foreshadows her struggles as she reaches adulthood. This quote highlights the theme of Coming of Age in Times of Change.