Between the stages of birth and death, people open their eyes, walk around, chit- chat, eat and then go back to sleep. This routine is what we call life. However there are more layers to life than just eating and sleeping. A prime example of what life throws at you is Charlotte Emory, lead character in the novel, Earthly Possessions by Anne Tyler. We witness this woman playing out two lifestyles in the novel. Her first lifestyle can be construed as a “slow life” and the potential end result is a “slow death.” The second can be interpreted as a “fast life” or living wildly and ending perhaps in a “fast death.” Kidnapped by Jake Simms, Charlotte Emory lived in the fast lane at the present time. However her dull, woeful past comes back throughout the novel, telling Charlotte and the readers that you can never run away from your problems.    

     In Charlotte’s past, she had married a person named Saul Emory. Saul won Charlotte’s heart by promising to take her away from her hometown of Clarion, Maryland and her nagging disabled mother, Lacey Debney. These reasons for leaving were perhaps miniscule compared to the bombshell news that Saul had dropped on Charlotte. The words that threw their marriage off-track were when Saul simply stated, “I’ve been called to preach” (88). Charlotte felt betrayed by Saul because their plans of exploring the world together were now delayed. Saul’s profession of ministry profoundly fueled Charlotte’s need to get away from her mother and the town even more. His occupation irritated Charlotte because it gave a reason for her to not trust God. Although, Charlotte was never really a religious person, she might have construed that God could never be on her side. All of the events in Charlotte’s life so far has kept her contained in Clarion such as when her father, Murray Ames fell ill when she had just gotten into a distant college and now must come back to Clarion to care for her mother as well as her father. Through these tribulations, she will have questioned God on why her life has gone in this path. She had long a waited for a day when she could n’d herself from the sad routine of caring for a mother who she felt did not want her and a town that had grown too stale for her taste. Saul’s decision to stay in Clarion was the main reason why Charlotte let Jake Simms easily take her away from everything.    

     Perhaps Charlotte should send Jake Simms a thank you card for taking her away because she could now leave her old problems behind. When Charlotte was kidnapped, she never really had shown a strong emotion to be let go. For instance, Charlotte confided in Jake on her little fetishes of her “lucky medal.” She stated, “I took it as a sign. Not seriously of course. I just thought, what if this was trying to tell me something? Like to get on the road, not sit around any longer, take some action. I thought it was a sign to leave my husband” (24). By telling Jake about her deepest thoughts, kidnapper and hostage were able to build a relationship. Ironically, Charlotte was able to communicate with her kidnapper better than with her family, particularly Saul. Also, their conversation relieved Jake’s stress because now he felt that Charlotte wasn’t going to run away because he needed a companion although he would not admit it. After the conversation, Jake opened up to Charlotte even more and perhaps all the while instigating a friendship albeit dysfunctional. For instance, when they needed a means of transportation, Jake made Charlotte get the bundle of keys from the gas station clerk. The clerk believed Charlotte’s intentions for using the keys were for restroom purposes only but in this instance, she had shown her wild side. Jake was able to get a hold of one key to start a car thanks to Charlotte. Jake used Charlotte to do his criminal work and she got a good chuckle out of it. “Was that it. Simple as that? Well. My goodness, I never knew a life crime could be so easy” (43). In one instant, Charlotte had become an accomplice to a major crime. She could have told the gas station clerk that she was being held hostage but instead obliged to Jake’s commands. By letting Jake become the authoritative figure, she in turn let her past control her future. Although Charlotte desired having an exciting life outside of Clarion, she never relished the way Jake was constructing her path of life. If Charlotte wanted to be absolutely free of all obligations, she would have fled Jake and start her new life by herself, independently. Charlotte’s past dilemmas of Saul, her mother and the town of Clarion in general have all been buried during her adventures with Jake Simms. Nevertheless, Charlotte soon realized that now the problem lay within her because she wasn’t having such a good time in her travels with Jake Simms.   

     In comparison to Jake, Amos Emory, the brother of Saul emphasized the more eccentric characters in Charlotte’s life. Amos and Jake gave Charlotte a sense that there was more to life than her routines and debacles at home. The two exemplified life because they were able to accomplish so many things outside of the norm. Jake was able to escape from j all and rescue his girlfriend, Mindy. Amos, although coming back to Clarion, was young, exuberantly full of life and was a successful school teacher. This secondary character had an affair with Charlotte. Amos wanted to take Charlotte away after the death of her mother and Charlotte in her head thought that going away even during a time of crisis would be splendid. But these were just thoughts that she never acted out as she returned back to normalcy as Amos felt that she would never take that next step and leave Saul. Jake and Amos were very influential in the outgoing lifestyle that Charlotte had an infatuation for. Charlotte never made that risk of losing everything. Instead, Charlotte was forced by Jake to leave and in turn forced her to take a good look at herself.    

     In contrast to the outgoing characters, Saul, and Charlotte’s mother, Lacey Debney were very much alike. At the same time in their lives, the two really didn’t want to get out of their routines of brooding and anti-adventurous tasks. Their lives were like a slow death to Charlotte because she had ambition to be more than what they were. Charlotte believed that her mother didn’t really want her because she remembered Lacey telling her that she wasn’t her baby. This caused friction between mother and daughter ever since. Nevertheless, on Lacey’s deathbed Lacey affirmed to Charlotte that she was her real daughter. Charlotte finally has peace of mind as she stated, “more gently than I’d ever done anything in my life, I laid my cheek against my mother’s” (196). In realizing that she is the daughter of Lacey Debney, Charlotte felt more in tune with life as she now can let that bad childhood memory disappear.   

     The main reason why Charlotte came back was because she finally saw how she and Jake were scarily similar to one another. They both ran away from their problems. For Jake, it was prison and his girlfriend. For Charlotte, her husband and all the responsibilities that came with it. Jake, in the end, finally admitted that he couldn’t go on without Mindy, his girlfriend. He stated, “I was fixing to leave her ... but I can’t ... She’s right you know, I have some ties to her” (211). Charlotte, through seeing another couples dilemma, believed now that she could work it out at home in Clarion, Maryland, This location is where her daughter, Salinda, her adopted son, Jiggs and her husband, Saul would be waiting. This is her family and she is ready to restart her adventures with her family again.    

     Life is what you make of it. Charlotte, as a hostage of obligations to her old life, could never find peace of mind but through her experience as a hostage of Jake Simms, she found the true meaning of living. The kidnapping was a blessing for Charlotte because it forced her to confront her problems head on. Walking away from Jake’s way of life, Charlotte had a new found grasp of energy and courage to go back to her old life.  

Works Cited 

Tyler, Anne. Earthly Possessions. New York, New York: Random House Inc, 1993.