“An Ounce of Cure” Writing Assignment
Rough Draft # 2

In Alice Munro’s “An Ounce of Cure”, the protagonist’s obsession with a boy leads into a life-altering experience that teaches us important lessons about unrequited love. Throughout the novel, the narrator is shown fantasizing lustfully over a boy named Martin Collingwood – As she leaves kisses on her own face without washing up, and daydreams for hours on end about him. This is purely puppy love, a seemingly intense but relatively shallow romantic attachment. Many teens face this in their early years, as they pursue “love” with no basis / maturity whatsoever. True love is born out of mutual understanding and trust for one another – not fueled through lustful sexual desires. As a result, this incited painful emotional conflict within the protagonist in her short lived experience. Not only does one have to understand what love really is, but they must also be prepared for it. As many teens nowadays have trouble controlling their emotions / actions, whatever happens after a relationship ends may concur detrimental results, if he / she is not emotionally prepared for the outcome. As in the novel, the narrator tries to commit suicide using aspirin pills, as well as foolishly trying to drink her worries away. This is kind of stupidity and arrogance that young people carry in such a generation – that they go in and out through such a defining moment in their lives with no troubles whatsoever. One of the major lessons that we can learn through the protagonist’s experience with unrequited love is that – Adolescent dating is much more susceptible to symptoms of depression and moodiness. Not only is depression not healthy for the