Opening
An extended flashback drops us into the first time Jackson and his family lose their home. Squeezed into a minivan, Jackson engineers a cardboard “cocoon” to solve the “feet problem” while nights of burnt pancakes, library refuge, a stolen purse, a kind policeman, and street-corner busking culminate in Jackson’s Dad crying in the rain. The sequence paints an intimate portrait of pride, love, and survival amid Poverty and Homelessness.
What Happens
Chapter 21: Feet Problems and Cardboard Cocoons
Jackson rewinds to the family’s first stint living in their minivan. He narrates in precise, observational detail: the cramped air, the smell, and the “feet problem”—everyone’s toes far too close to his face. To carve out privacy, he claims a big cardboard box, slides it into the van, and turns it into a room-within-a-room. He decorates it with red dogs and blue cats and scrawls “kep out jacksons rum” across the top, a fortress with a misspelled sign.
Inside the box, Jackson regains what the van takes away: quiet, order, and a boundary. He coolly notes that they’re “lucky” to have a large minivan, that a box in a car beats a box on the street, listing facts the way he lists science observations. His matter-of-fact acceptance contrasts his father’s reframing—calling their situation “car camping”—a hopeful rebrand that can’t erase the reality pressing in on all sides.
Chapter 22: Burnt Pancakes and Library Havens
Their first night in the van begins with a moment of wonder. Parked near the Golden Gate Bridge, the family stares up at a sky powdered with stars—until a security guard taps the glass and orders them to move along. They end up in a Denny’s parking lot, where the cook who knows Jackson’s Mom slides them a plate of burnt pancakes that tastes, to Jackson, like rescue.
The next day unfolds at the public library, which becomes sanctuary: air-conditioning, soft chairs, charging outlets, and—most sacred—clean bathrooms. Jackson remembers the old days of bathtub “Will It Float?” experiments and realizes how far away his mess-making freedom feels now. A librarian quietly shares her lunch with him and his sister, Robin, transforming the library from a building into a lifeline—proof that small kindnesses can steady a child’s world.
Chapter 23: Ratman and the Policeman
Crisis spikes when Mom’s purse—holding most of their cash—is stolen. At the station, a policeman asks for their address. Mom answers with a careful truth: “We are between addresses.” The officer recommends shelters, but Dad turns them down immediately; families get split up there, and animals aren’t allowed. Keeping the family together matters more than a bed.
Jackson steers the conversation sideways, telling the officer about his teacher’s pet rats learning to play basketball. Instead of brushing him off, the policeman listens, starts calling him “Ratman,” and afterward discreetly gives Jackson a twenty-dollar bill “for your dad,” knowing Dad’s pride won’t accept it openly. The moment plants two facts at once: the shelter system’s limits, and the way quiet compassion can thread its way through bureaucratic indifference.
Chapter 24: Singing for Supper
The family spends a grinding day filling out forms at Social Services and hunting for jobs. Their food situation shrinks to stale bagels Mom brings home from work. Dad decides to busk—“singing for our supper,” he says—reaching back to the life he and Mom lived as young musicians, framing it as work rather than begging.
They debate how to ask strangers for help. Mom suggests adding “God Bless” to the sign; Dad refuses. He writes “THANK YOU” on cardboard in a rush. Jackson, precise as ever, notices the slipping penmanship: at a glance it reads “THINK YOU.” Pride, hunger, love—they all rub against each other in the cramped space between marker strokes.
Chapter 25: A Concert in the Rain
Rain needles down as Dad plays on a street corner beside the soggy sign. After an hour, he has seven dollars and an engine’s worth of car exhaust clinging to his clothes. He slumps back into the van, defeated, and the family sits in the heavy quiet that follows a plan that doesn’t work.
Jackson cannot stand the silence. He tears a panel from his cardboard cocoon, sketches a smiling fish in a canoe, and prints a new message: “ID RATHIR BE FISHING.” When he shows it to Dad, Dad steps out into the rain, leans on the hood, covers his face. Jackson tells himself the wet on his father’s cheeks is only rain, but he knows better. The sign opens a small, luminous space where father and son meet—pride bending, love speaking without saying a word.
Character Development
Across the flashback, the family’s roles sharpen: a boy who thinks in facts, a father who clings to dignity, and a mother who keeps them tethered to reality.
- Jackson
- Builds a cardboard “room” to regulate chaos and anxiety.
- Learns to translate care into action—his fish sign is comfort disguised as humor.
- Maps survival through observation, solutions, and a quiet willingness to carry emotional weight.
- Jackson’s Dad
- Reframes hardship as “car camping” to shield the kids and himself.
- Rejects shelters to keep the family together and preserve the family dog.
- Reveals vulnerability in the rain, letting the cost of his pride finally show.
- Jackson’s Mom
- Pushes for assistance and job applications, facing facts head-on.
- Balances pragmatism with gentleness, respecting Dad’s boundaries while nudging toward help.
- Secures small lifelines—connections at work, steadiness for the kids.
Themes & Symbols
The flashback embodies Poverty and Homelessness at child-height: sleep measured in inches of legroom, hygiene reduced to the availability of a public restroom, meals dependent on the kindness of one cook or one librarian. Every scene records a small dignity lost and a small dignity reclaimed. The system offers options that fracture families; strangers offer help that keeps them whole.
Family loyalty becomes the engine of survival, underscoring Family and Resilience. Dad’s rebrand—“car camping”—reveals the tension between love and truth, staging the larger conflict around Honesty and Communication: what parents say to protect their children versus what children already know. Jackson’s logic isn’t cold; it’s a coping tool that lets him solve problems without drowning in them.
Symbols crystallize these themes:
- The Cardboard Box: a portable bedroom and a child-sized boundary, restoring privacy, imagination, and control.
- The “ID RATHIR BE FISHING” Sign: an inside joke about better days and a tender offering to Dad, blending humor and hope.
- The “THANK YOU/THINK YOU” Sign: a visual stutter of pride—trying to ask without really asking.
Key Quotes
“kep out jacksons rum” This misspelled warning crowns Jackson’s cardboard sanctuary. The childish spelling preserves his identity as a kid even as he adapts to adult-size hardships, showing how imagination becomes armor.
“car camping” Dad’s euphemism tries to recast emergency into adventure. The phrase protects the kids from shame while revealing his own fear of naming what’s happening.
“We are between addresses.” Mom’s answer tells the truth without surrendering dignity. It acknowledges homelessness while signaling motion—between, not stuck—keeping hope linguistically alive.
“singing for our supper” Dad frames busking as work and tradition rather than begging. The phrase maintains pride and places the family within a story of artistry and effort, not failure.
“ID RATHIR BE FISHING.” Jackson’s sign is a love letter in block letters. It offers Dad a way to smile at himself and the situation, turning helplessness into shared humor and connection.
Why This Matters and Section Significance
This flashback forms the novel’s emotional backbone. It explains the family’s current fears and Jackson’s vigilance, setting the stakes for the present: they know exactly how bad it can get, because they’ve lived it. It also clarifies why Crenshaw reappears now—not as whimsy but as a necessary strategy for Coping with Stress and Trauma. By grounding magic in memory and hardship, the narrative shows how a child’s mind builds tools—facts, jokes, cardboard walls, imaginary friends—to hold a family together when everything else falls apart.