Octavia Butler states “If we’re not your animals, if these are adult things, accept the risk. There is risk, Gatoi, in dealing with a partner.” I interpreted this quote as if I am not socially inferior to you I understand the risk of working alongside a partner. The responsibility that comes from becoming an adult comes with risks, however these responsibilities might come with many risks but there are rewards with working with a partner.
When Octavia Butler states “There is risk, Gatoi, in dealing with a partner”. It makes me think of many relationships that one might form with people. For instance When you begin a friendship with someone, the basis to that friendship is trust and getting to know them over time so that you can trust them with what might share or how you might act. When you enter a romantic relationship with someone, the basis is trust but, at times both individuals fear the idea of weakened trust. This damages a friendship or relationship severely. Trust in this romantic relationship is the risk because once your secrets are voluntarily exposed to a close companion there is a form of trust that has to be solidified with you and the other person before those secrets are brought into the light. However the reward in this relationship is the matter that you have a partner in which you can enjoy and confide because exposing yourself to other form deeper and meaningful relationships.
Another type of partnership that brings many risks are partnerships involving a classmate or academic peer because when collaboration is part of a project grades are really dependent if your peer carries their own weight. Your peers in an academic or professional setting are difficult to trust and take risks with because, you don’t always know them at all. A professor or manager can place you with a group of strangers for a project and then, you are expected to work with them without fear. Fear is a concept you can include since we are talking about risk taking and working with a partner you don’t necessarily know is an intimidating task. In such a situation, having to work with a new person is risky because it is vital to your success academically or professionally because your partner may contribute to your success or inhibit it.
For the other half of the quote “If we’re not your animals”, it makes me think of a students younger academic career in high school, teachers tend to remind you to turn in assignments where as, in college, professors don’t because you as an adult are responsible for your own work. Plus, this type of responsibility is important to understand that people must carry such skills with themselves into adulthood and throughout their career because you won’t always have someone to remind you to do things. Essentially teachers held students hand through most of their lower education academic career, by giving students small responsibility. In addition, there was also a hierarchy in high school. This hierarchy in high school, ingrained this thought in students that teacher are the superior in class setting because they know more and they are teaching students the material. However in college this far from the case because you could form relationships with your professors and collaborate with thoughts by bouncing off each others’ thoughts. This new status is what most college students struggle to understand because the lower education system has really deep-seated this hierarchy in the classroom inhibiting them in the college to form relationships with their professors.
When I first came to college I was excited to be on my own because the thrill of being responsible for myself was always exhilarated thought. However my enthusiasm quickly converted to anxiousness, by the sheer fact that I had to meet new people. My anxiety played into this fear of taking this risk because friendships I’ve entered usually ended on bad terms. Already having that thought in my head, hindered my ability to form meaningful connections because I didn’t want to ever risk being vulnerable to another person. Which was a huge set back, however through coming to terms with myself I found myself taking the risk because I knew there would be a reward by other person to trust.
“If we’re not your animals, if these are adult things, accept the risk.” another thing this quote made me realize how I have matured in setting certain goals because as a kid entering adulthood, The realization that I have to set more goals that push me to work toward the man I envision myself to be.The goals that I set for myself as an adult versus a child allowed me to be realistic/truthful with myself and kept me on task to improving the skills I wanted to work on. For instance I know get distracted in class and sometimes I lose focus so I set a goal to go to office hours when my professor offers them. Also another goal that I set is, I want to be able to have an intellectual conversation with people that are more practiced in their field, hoping to learn something valuable through those conversations. The risk in these goals is the fact that I’ma have to retire my shy quiet self and talk to my professors and other experienced people. Despite that risk, there is a huge reward of learning and developing a stronger connection and valuable relationship to my professor.
In conclusion, the way I interpret our epigraph is that every relationship has a risk and when reaching adulthood there are new responsibilities that require you to be in a partnership, whether in a professional, academic, or personal. In addition to having these responsibilities as an adult you become a better person because you set goals for yourself and are able to learn from peers. Although there are a lot of risks in working in partnership the rewards that can come from partnerships could be valuable lessons.