You Can Run, But You Cannot Hide

Do you believe you make your own destiny, or do you believe the stars are written and your path has been chosen? If someone told you that you would die of lung cancer at the age of 30, what would you do? The most common choice for this would be to immediately stop smoking. If by doing so, you could alter your destiny.  Let us look at luck. Would you call it lucky if you chose to take an alternate route to work, and by choosing so, you avoided a major accident you would have surely been injured or killed in? Or would you call it fate/destiny that you had to make that extra stop while heading for work, and that delay in time is what saved your life?

Can we choose our route, or is it chosen for us? Also, can we choose to change ourselves to an extent that we change our destiny? In the novel Jasmine, by Bharati Mukherjee, the main character (Jasmine) struggles to find her identity. From the beginning of the story, she does not believe her destiny will be what it was written to be. An astrologer of the village tells Jyot, (Jasmine’s former name), of her “widowhood and exile” (3). Jyot replies with “You’re a crazy old man. You don’t know what my future holds!” (3).  This is Jasmines attitude throughout the story thus far. She wants to be in charge of her life.

  Burton in Artists of the Floating World, quotes Elizabeth as having the attitude of 'You can't push me around! I'm here, I'm gonna stay if I want to, and I'm gonna conquer the territory'" (89). After Jasmine’s incident with the astrologer, she went for a swim in the water. During her swim, she came upon the carcass of a dead dog. When she touched it, the dog broke into two pieces and released a foul odor. Jasmines states that the smell still stays with her through her adulthood. When she is about to consume water, she “fleetingly I smell it. I know what I don’t want to become” (5).  She doesn’t want her destiny to end up like this dog.

Jasmine transforms herself by changing her name.  From India, to Florida to Iowa, with each destination change comes a new name. She believes to embrace a new life, one must” murder” the former self. But does she really create a new life for herself? “In the white lamplight, ghosts float toward me. Jane, Jasmine, Jyoti” (21) Obviously her past lives are still haunting her. She hasn’t completely rid herself of them, and therefore does not have complete control of herself, of her destiny. To make matters worse, it is hard for Jasmine to seek her true identity because of these changes. "Once we start letting go--let go just one thing, like not wearing our normal clothes, or a turban or not wearing a tika on the forehead--the rest goes on its own down a sinkhole" (29).

Jasmines identity crisis can be seen in the lives of many people. Social expectancies and the general “norm” can influence many cultural identities. If you lose your culture, you lose a part of yourself. You can never run from who you are and who you will become. We only have the free-will to make desicions to better shape our destinies. To totally transform yourself with the intent to change youself into who you want to become, will only result in a feeling not belonging, as Jasmine is slowly discovering. She doesn't want to be stuck with her fate, that is why she runs.