The Arena by Martin Golan

            We all experiences all sort of battles in our lives. Sometimes life might feel like an arena, where you need to fight your bad feelings and worst fears. When something bad happens, we are likely to stick in the past. But how do we get rid of these bad feelings and when will it happen? These issues are getting discussed in Martin Golan's short story called ''The Arena'' from 2008. .
             This short story is about a man which name we do not get to know. The short story goes by in one morning with a lot of flashbacks in time. It is about a man who is going to drop off his son at an arena where the son is going to get on a bus to attend a lacrosse game. On the way to the arena many mentally things happen to the man.
             All we get to know about him is that he once lost a son and got divorced from his former wife. He is living a new life now with a new son and a new wife. We do not know how they lost their son, but the text tells in p. 3 l. 122-123: ''We attended a group for parents of children who died in preventable accidents'' that it was not a natural death (it never is when children die), but it must have been a terrible accident when they could have prevented it from happening, and they must have a lot of bad guilt in them. That might be why the man has a hard time letting his past go. .
             He cannot let go of the loss of Willie, his former son. He keeps getting flashbacks from the other life he had. After the accident he and his wife got divorced because everything, they did just felt like they did it half. He keeps comparing his present life to the other. The text gives a lot of symbols of that; when he drives his new son to the arena, where the son is going to play lacrosse. He is looking much back in the mirrors of the car even though there is no traffic to notice since it is a very early weekend morning. He just cannot help looking back. That is a symbol of him looking back at the past.