Middlesex: #1: B

In this section of Middlesex we are introduced to the main characters. First the speaker, also the main character, introduced herself as a normal field hockey playing, lab guinea-pig. “I was first one thing and then the other.” (3) From the beginning of the first section, the narrator projects herself as an insecure, violated, and ever changing individual. The beginning of the novel we meet an eager couple who are ready to have a second child. Because of a vision that the father had received during a dream he was pulling for a girl. So in turn he consulted the neighborhood doctor to see what could make this more likely.. As a family tradition the grandmother predicts the sex of the baby inside, with a silver spoon. As the homeland driven woman eager watch the spoon swing next to the mother’s stomach, the spoon did not move. This was extremely unusual from the normal swing. But as some time past, the spoon swung to show the prediction of a boy. But finally when the baby came, the grandmother’s traditionally correct prediction was proved false. The couple had a girl but there was a shocking future surprise in store for all. This in some way would prove god fearing grandmother to be amazingly and incredibly correct. “They wrapped me in a blanket and put me on display among six other infants, four boys, two girls, all of them, unlike me, correctly tagged.” (18) But before the speaker could tell more about her life, she started to rewind her past all the way back to where her problem started, Greece.