When reading the novel this passage stuck in my mind most vividly. A quite long passage,
I felt it necessary to include the entirety of it to grasp the true meaning. When dissecting
the first part of the passage, there are strong scents of symbolism. The “net” captures what
all the lake has seen over time from Ruthie’s perspective. From a train derailment to a
woman floating along in stolen boat, memories play a key part in the plot of the entire
story. Going back to chapter 3, when Sylvie struggles to remember Ruthie’s mother, “It
is…difficult to describe someone, since memories are by their nature fragmented, isolated,
and arbitrary as glimpses one has at night through lighted windows” (53). This theme is
present throughout the entirety book as the Ruthie and Lucille grasp on to distant
memories of their parents. Ruthie’s memory of her mother becomes so skewed she states
in the passage, “Add to them the swimmers, the boaters and canoers, and in such a crowd
my mother would hardly seem remarkable” (90). Long lost was Ruthie’s mother, and also
her memories, but she still values them enough to pick Sylvie’s brain. The other symbol is
the lake and what it has seen and what it has remembered. The lake still carries the
“paleolithic and neolithic frequenters,” showing all the Ruthie may falter in memory, the
memories still stand true somewhere, even if it’s at the bottom of a lake.