Pedros Education

Literary Analysis Paper
Pedro’s Education
Pedro went through a lot while dealing with the fact that he was HIV positive. At first he was a little ashamed about it but then came to a point where he took the negative and turned it into a positive. He realized that he really didn’t know too much about the disease he suffers from and he had to allow others to educate him about it. After being educated, Pedro came to a time when he didn’t want to just suffer from this disease, he wanted to be able to do something about it and what he chose to do was to educate others about HIV and AIDS.
When Pedro first found out that he was HIV positive, he really didn’t know how to react. As shown on pages 47 and 48, Pedro is driving around in his car and thinking to himself. “Why is this happening to me?” He doesn’t understand why something like this would happen to him, “I am a good kid. I am clean-cut. I don’t drink. I don’t smoke. I’m good to my family. I do well in school. I’m a jock. I am an honor student. Things like this don’t happen to me. I don’t get AIDS.” Pedro is very confused about the news he had just received, he was very uneducated about the truth of HIV and AIDS. On page 47 when Pedro is driving around in his car, the entire page is filled with little snap shots of Pedro and his car. The sadness in his eyes and how much is going on in the one page signifies how important this part of the novel is. The following page Pedro believes he has come to the realization that he has AIDS and he is going to die.
After Pedro’s’ first outbreak of shingles from having HIV, he experienced a change of heart. When Pedro looks at himself in the mirror, he sees his HIV staring right back at him he must face the truth. “I am sick now. I am going to get better but it doesn’t change the fact that something is wrong with me. I should stop denying that and start doing something about it.” This is one of the major turning points that Pedro experiences. He then gets hooked up with an...