The Freedom Writers Diary: Part VI: Diary 91 Summary & Analysis

After giving a copy of their book to Richard Riley, the Freedom Writers hold a candlelight vigil for all the victims of violence they knew. Everyone walks in a chain toward the Washington Monument, holding up traffic in the process. This student feels that, in trying to communicate their message to others, they are actively working to change the world.

When everyone begins to sing around the monument, in honor of everyone who died, this student does not cry, as s/he does not want to relive the pain of losing so many friends to violence. When they return to the hotel, though, all that pain comes back and makes the student feel completely overwhelmed. S/he realizes that s/he could have easily been one of the victims they commemorated. Overcome with these memories of near-death experiences, s/he finds the strength to keep on fighting and surviving.

On the way home from Washington, D.C., this student reflects on the fact that this trip led him to ride an airplane for the first time in his life and, more generally, that Ms. Gruwell has changed his life. He describes his mother’s violent boyfriend, who used to abuse the student and use all the money his mother earned to buy drugs, once even locking the student into the trunk of his car for over a day. When he finally got out, his mother could only wash his urine- and engine-oil-soaked pants with cold water, because they didn’t have enough money for soap or hot water.

His mom then went to the hospital to deliver her baby, and the student was stuck at home with his mother’s violent boyfriend, who hit him all the time. When his mother came home, they were evicted from the house, because the boyfriend had sold all their possessions to buy drugs. For two years, they lived in a garage. When they finally could afford an actual house, the mother’s boyfriend slept in the bedroom while everybody else slept in the living room. After living in these conditions for so long, the student began believing the boyfriend in thinking that he wouldn’t never succeed at anything in life. However, Ms. Gruwell proved the contrary and assured him that nothing that happened to his mother was his fault.