Martinez 1

Nathalie Martinez
Eng 113B
Professor Beadle
28 March, 2016
Project Text
Imagine waking up in a different body every day and not knowing our true identity since
the day we were born. It must feel really lonely knowing one is alone, having no family and
friends. In the book Everyday by David Levithan talks about a person named A who
switches bodies every single day and stays in them for a full 24 hours, till the next day he wakes
up in a new body. Throughout this switch of bodies A ends up falling in love with a girl named
Rhiannon. His love for her becomes very complicated considering the fact that he is a new
person each day and she does not know who he will end up in, A could end up being in either a
male or female. A first meet Rhiannon when he was in the body of Rhiannon boyfriend and he
just instantly fell in love with her. Each time he or she switches bodies, A would think of her. A
would go through so much trouble just to go see Rhiannon and he would succeed in that. In order
for him to build a relationship with her he or she would have to start by telling her the truth about
his strange life. It would not be easy to explain to her, which is why he faces a lot of challenges
along the way with Rhiannon. A has a different perspective on love. The way how he sees it, is
explained in this upcoming quote. "This is what love does: It makes you want to rewrite the
world. It makes you want to choose the characters, build the scenery, guide the plot. The person
you love sits across from you, and you want to do everything in your power to make it possible,
endlessly possible." (Levithan 175). As is in love with Rhiannon, but he has a different
perspective on love cause of his experience. A's perspective of love is formed from appearances,

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personalities on how they vary from body to body, and challenges such as the twenty four hour
time constant and the requirement of staying locally, which all play a role in A's love life.
As perspective on love is formed from appearances. Whenever A goes to see Rhiannon,
he is in a new body with different appearances. It is very difficult for Rhiannon to have a mental
picture of A with all the changes appearance he has. Appearance matters a lot to Rhiannon,
especially when A is a female. It makes her feel very uncomfortable and does not want A to pull
a move on her. "There is none of the giddiness of the earlier kiss. This is definitely weird,' she
says. 'Why?' 'Because you're a girl?"(Levithan 132). In this quote it shows how Rhiannon
expresses her feeling towards A when he/she is in a female form. It also shows that appearance
does matter to her. Not only does it matter to Rhiannon about appearances, but it also matters to
almost everyone. In the article My Hips/My Caderas by Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez explains about
how she was not happy with her appearances, mainly of her hips. She would get so much
attention over them especially towards men, she wanted to shrink the size of her hips. According
to Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez Jack in the box on one corner, me on the splintered wooden bench
with a Three Musketeers bar, tight shorts, a hot summer sun and those catcalls and woof-woofs
like slaps. I was 12. My best friend Stacey and I set out dieting right away that summer, to lose
our new hips (Valdes-Rodriguez 74). This quote is a perfect way to describe how the author feel
about her hips and it also shows that appearance does matter to people and the attention of
others.
A also has a lot of personalities that he has to face each day. Each body that he is in, A
has to figure them out so he could play the role of the persons life. He has to be them for the day
and in order to do so he analyzes their rooms and goes through their memories. A always meets
new people in those bodies form, but he never get to build a relationship with them or ever gets

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to see them again. When he meet Rhiannon it made have to choice to connect or disconnect from
her. Meaning is he willing to put in the trouble and effort just so he can be able to see her in other
peoples bodies. As A says "I have spent years meeting people without ever knowing them, and
on this morning, in this place, with this girl, I feel the faintest pull of wanting to know. And in a
moment of either weakness or bravery on my own part, I decide to follow it. I decide to find out
more." (Levithan 6). A decided yes, he is willing to go through all that trouble just to see her
despite some of the consequence it causes.
As he goes through his day he also faces a lot of challenges. Whenever A is in a body he
has to be careful and not leave evidence around where the owner of the body would see them,
Such as logging into emails or leaving notes. One challenge A went through was when he/she
woke up in a gay boy body and he was attending to a gay pride parade with his boyfriend Austin.
He told Rhiannon he was attending on going there and was hoping she would show up. A was to
focus on searching for Rhiannon through the crowd that he totally forgot that he had to play the
role of the body he was in. The boyfriend of the gay guy noticed something different about him
and A almost costed them their relationship. "He has every right to be proud, to enjoy this day.
It's not his fault I'm so distracted... I'm looking for Rhiannon in the crowd. I can't help it. Every
now and then, Austin catches me." (Levithan 142). This quote explains how A was distracted that
day all because of Rhiannon. The challenge here was that A had to pretend to like the boyfriend
of the person whose body he was in. Even though he did not feel comfortable about it, he had to
do so to not ruin their relationship. Another challenge would be whenever A goes off on his own
just to see Rhiannon. Every time he or she goes out to see it is always a risk because he cannot
leave any evidence behind on what he did with the body. He once made a mistake by leaving his
last body form in the middle of the street inside the car and got into hot water. The owner of the

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body, Nathan, woke up without remembering anything last night and was well convinced that he
was possessed by the devil. This accusation went all over the news and became worldwide. The
devil among us. Its Nathan story but it is not only Nathans story. This time there are five or six
other people from the area claiming to have been possessed by the devil. Much to relief none of
them besides Nathan are familiar to me (Levithan 139/140). This quote explains how this news
was exceeding even through other people.
All of these three things play a role in As love life. Most of these roles comes with
consequences. For example, one day he woke in male body named Nathan, and A found out
Rhiannon was going to a party and he or she was desperate enough to go see her. Only issue is
he ninety minutes away from Rhiannon, A went anyways. Knowing the fact that Nathan is not
the type to be going to parties he or she made a sacrifices to take his body and drive all the way
down there. As A arrived, he or she directly went to Rhiannon and introduced himself as gay, so
her boyfriend would not get upset that she is talking to another guy. As the night continued he
realized it was almost twelve and he had to leave the party already. A was not able to make it
back home on time, so he had no choice but to leave the body in the car on the side of the street.
In this quote, it explains how A felt for leaving Nathan body abandon. "Now I'm letting my life
hijack these others lives for a day. I am not staying within their parameters. Even if that's
dangerous... [Nathan] is going to wake up on the side of an interstate, an hour away from his
home... I am a monster for doing this to him." (Levithan 68-75). A had no choice but to leave
him there, this is one example of the consequences he or she had to go through all because of
love. A always pictured love as a fairytale where one wins a girls heart and would live happily
ever after, but he realized that it takes two to make the effort for love to work. For example in
this quote "I wanted love to conquer all. But love can't conquer anything. It can't do anything on

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its own. It relies on us to do the conquering on its behalf."(Levithan 281). A compared love as a
weapon and realized after all he or she has gone through with Rhiannon, that their love just does
not work out. She cannot love him or her the same way as A loves her. The only way their love
can conquer is as if Rhiannon felt the same way as A did. Another way A describes love as is,
This is what love does: it makes you want to rewrite the world. It makes you want to choose the
characters, build the scenery, guide the plot. The person you love sits across from you, and you
want to do everything in your power to make it possible, endlessly possible. And when its just
the two of you, alone in a room, you can pretend that this is how it will be. This quote is
basically his definition of love and how it makes him feel. A realizes his or her own meaning of
love and it accepts that he or she cannot be with Rhiannon. He had to make a sacrifice and let her
go. In the article The Power of Love by Ellen McGrath explains about the psychological of love.
In this quote Most of us get our ideas of love from popular culture. We come to believe that love
is something that sweeps us off our feet. But the pop-culture ideal of love consists of unrealistic
images created for entertainment, which is one reason so many of us are set up to be depressed.
Its part of our national vulnerability, like eating junk food, constantly stimulated by images of
instant gratification. We think it is love when it's simply distraction and infatuation.(pg1) it
explains a lot about how A thought about love. In my opinion I believe A let himself feel love for
this girl because it gave him a purpose in life and something to hold on to, especially something
to look forward to the next day.
A lives an interesting life where he gets to be a new person every day and not have an
identity of his own. Throughout his daily changes of bodies he came across something very
powerful. Something that he or she likes to consider it as a weapon because it could either hurt
you or make you feel safe, which is love. Although he really loves this girl, Rhiannon, he sees

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love in a different matter. They are formed from appearances, personalities on how they vary
from body to body, and challenges such as the twenty four hour time constant and the
requirement of staying locally, which all play a role in A's love life.

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Work Cited

Leviathan, David. Every Day. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012. Print.
The Power of Love." Psychology Today. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Apr. 2016.
My Hips My Caderas - College Essay - 843 Words." StudyMode. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Apr. 2016