As I read this story, I was able to imagine how the main character, Phoenix, looked like and the type of setting the story was in, thanks to the descriptive words Eudora Welty used. I like to read stories where it is easy to create a picture in my mind of the events that are happening.
Another thing I enjoyed about this story is how realistic the character and settings were. I was able to feel what Phoenix was going through and was experiencing. I felt sympathetic for the old women as she struggled through her journey to the medical clinic. This story was being told in a third person perspective where the narrator new what all the characters were feeling. This helped me understand and see the story from different points of view. I was able to see what Phoenix was thinking as she walked through the woods, as she hallucinated, as she forgot why she was going to the medical clinic. I was also able to see how the nurses in the clinic felt sorry for Phoenix.
In a greater understanding, Eudora Welty wrote this story to portray the life of a black women and how black people faced segregation in that time. They struggled with being rejected by white people, they struggled financially, and they had too fight and endure to make a living. Beyond all the struggles the black people faced, they found joy in the most simple ways, for example, in this story Phoenix was happy to see the Christmas lights as she entered the town, she was happy when she was going back home to her grandson with medicine and a couple of cents to buy a gift for him. This made me realize that black people were able to find joy despite the struggles they faced in those tough days. 
Carmen Elena Galvan 