And Again...

... again I look back on some past writings, this time, the whole year's worth.

Wow, where do I start? The year is almost over, having passed in an unbelievable blur of action and emotion. There were essays, textbooks, sports, and friends to deal with, and many, many, blog posts to do. So now the question is: what the heck do I want to say in my final? There are so many different prompts to choose from, 11 of them to be exact. I suppose that, after some though, I’ll choose prompts, 11, 10, and if I have time, 5.

So what exactly are the prompts? Here, have a comprehensive list to go along with your reading:

5. What's my usual revision/editing process? How do I go from rough to final draft?
10. Where do I get my ideas for blog post topics? What inspires me to write?
11. How is the open-ended writing I do on my blog different from the more structured academic assignments I write?

Shall we continue?

So, I’m gonna be awful and go backwards, starting with question 11. My more open-ended writing is much like this post, more flowing and imbued with my voice (whether that is good or bad is neither here nor there). Whereas my more formal academic posts are stiffer, use more “big words” and tend to be (honestly) a bit boring. Don’t believe me? Take a look for yourself:

“What does it mean to be college ready? I believe that it’s basically being able to function in higher-level classes, meaning that you know the basic skills for each subject you take, and aren’t afraid to put them to use. Plus you’re mature enough to get along with people you wouldn’t usually interact with, and able to schedule and prioritize. “ (from this post)

Now tell me my posts aren’t boring... and if you STILL disagree... well... then you’re weird. Anyway, what I’m trying to say here is that in academics, my voice becomes too formal and I lose a bit, or a lot, of who I am. I lose my humour, I lose... well, I’ve run out of ideas, but you get the point.

Summary:
My more academic posts and free posts differ in that one is more structured, with less of my voice and a more formal tone (academic) while the other posts are more... me. They have my sense of humour and a voice I think I’d actually speak in (free).

And so here I go jumping around again. Following question 11, we jump to question five:
What's my usual revision/editing process? How do I go from rough
to final draft?

I tend to follow a more unconventional writing process. For posts such as this one, where I need to have various quotes and such, I start with the filler, then the commentary, THEN I go back and add in my quotes. After all of that, I got back and tweak it here and there before proclaiming it acceptable. Basically, I work better backwards. I can use this post as an example, I started with my questions, my basic skeleton, then I added in what I wished to say about my writing, before adding connecting paragraphs and now I’m adding in my quotes. Until I add my quotes, in my drafts, you usually find this:

“(insert quote here)” (example in this post)

What happens is that as I write each  post, and the commentary, I have a quote, or section of the book in mind, and until I say what I want to say, I don’t know quite what quote I want, what section of the text I need. Usually, after I find the quote, it all flows quite well and I’m happy with it.

And for my favorite question, #10, what inspires you to write?

Well, a lot of things inspire me to write. Though I don’t have any particular quotes from my works on this blog, I do have some examples for you.

I write about anything that comes to mind, be it something from class discussions, like my post on Evolution... or something like articles I found online. Now, these two are very old posts, posts that I actually mentioned in LAST semester’s final, I talked about them being sloppy and unprofessional. Which is ironic in some ways, because in this post, I’m talking about making my speech LESS professional and more me.

Some more older posts that come to mind when I think of various inspirations are posts like the one on writing style, or the one about movies. Both came from some everyday observations I made. You know, observations are most commonly where I get my inspiration, sometimes, when I’m by myself, or my friends are talking to other people, I sit back and marvel at how people interact with each other, how we talk, walk, everything. People are fascinating, So commonly, it’s people that inspire me to write.

Something else that I actually find hilarious, is what inspires the titles of these blog posts. Some of them are seemingly random, having no rhyme or reason to them, other than that fact that I was lost as far as titles and named them after the first thing I saw.
Such examples include: Oh Look, The Bird's Eating Again and The Cat With The Crossed Paws.

Both are definitely random, and not necessarily my finest moments.

In some other posts, I’ve complained about class discussions, drama, substitutes, and even religion. Most, if not all of the above posts relate to the school discussions and goings-on in some way.

And, my most favorite post of all, my post on the prisoner’s dilemma.

And right about here is where I should wrap all this up.
In conclusion, this year’s writing has been interesting, to say the least, varying from class works to impromptu writings on whatever happens to cross my mind. My writing style is a little, well, a lot, all over the place. And my style changes a lot depending on the subject, and how tired I am at the time. So that’s it... perhaps I’ll see you all over the summer or something, when I finally get bored enough to pick up writing again. It shouldn't take too horribly long for that to happen.

Finding Some Solace

 Being as fond as I am of avoiding any and all formality, I will simply introduce the following speech as my speech for the "Season of Nonviolence" speech contest.

Good Afternoon Ladies and Gentlemen. My name is Mercedes Thorne, and I am currently a freshman at Alameda Science and Technology Institute. I would like to thank you for being here today.

This year's theme is "Security Within Your Community". But what is security? There are many ways we can define this word, and each definition changes our approach in radical ways. Where do we start? Sometimes, we need to work backwards, from a solution to our question.

To achieve security in a community, a family, or in any situation or circumstance, there are three rules we should follow. They are not easy to abide by but are nevertheless important. These rules are as follows:
1) See things how they really are and not how you want to see them. 2) See what needs to be done. and 3) DO IT

The first rule is the hardest to follow. Seeing things how they really are is one thing, but learning to see past the lies we tell ourselves everyday is something entirely different. Every day we tell ourselves lies. We say things such as “oh, it can’t really matter that much” and “ that won’t cause me any problems” when we know for a fact that that’s not the truth. One of the things we frequently choose not to see is bullying. When we see someone being bullied,  we tell ourselves that it’s how the world works, that it doesn’t matter that much. We know this is a lie, and yet we listen to ourselves, and over time, our judgment becomes clouded by such lies, to the point where it becomes a challenge to see things how they are. It’s like sugar-coating absolutely everything.

But if a single individual were to stop lying to themselves even half the time, the fog surrounding their life would thin, allowing them to see everything at face value. And as soon as this cloud begins to thin, it won’t stop. Of course, it may be impossible to be completely honest with yourself all the time, and that every now and again there is that one unavoidable lie you tell yourself. Like the lie I told myself moments ago, "I'm not nervous.” But to the extent we can learn to be true to ourselves, we’ll be in a better position to keep our communities secure.

The second rule builds on the first, as we can only see what needs to be done if we can see everything clearly. However, seeing what needs to be done can be very difficult. Most will see two paths, the one where you do the right thing and one where you do what’s easy. For example, our society allows us to overlook bullying, despite what everyone says about stopping this disturbing trend. A teacher can see a child under verbal or physical abuse from another child and can look past it because they don’t want to deal with calling any parents, arranging detentions, talking to the administration, etc. So they see what needs to be done, and they take the easy way out, convincing themselves that “boys will be boys”. or “it’s just kids messing around”. When if fact, there may be something more serious happening. However, we must keep in mind that sometimes it actually is just kids messing around. This is where this rule ties into the first. We have to see the situation for what it is.

And finally our third rule is the easiest to understand of all three. Do what needs to be done. This is where the rules tie most into today’s theme. If we can see the problem clearly, see how to deal with the problem, and then choose the right path, then our communities will be safe enough for us to be who we choose to be.

Mahatma Gandhi once said "we shall begin with the children... [because of their] natural innocence... [and] peace"

If what Gandhi said is true, then I think this is a task for all of us. The children of my generation, their parents, their little sisters and brothers need to see the world as it really is and realistically judge our progress. To see what needs to be done and find the courage to do it

If we can follow these rules, and take down many of society’s issues with them, our community will become much safer, more secure, and more tolerant.

Thank you.

Finally the Final

 Here we go! The final book review is done!

The book I have chosen for this particular round of reading is called The Tar Man, a historical fiction novel by Linda Buckley Archer. The Tar Man is the sequel to the book Gideon the Cutpurse, and starts up where the prior book leaves off, with one of the main characters Kate, back in our time, after a trip back in time to the 1700’s. Unfortunately, her friend Peter, who was thrown back in time with her, has become trapped in the past with Gideon Seymour, Cutpurse and Gentleman, while his “slot” in the future has been filled by a terrifying villain named The Tar Man, sometimes referred to as Blueskin. Blueskin, a glorified street thug in the 1700’s does no better for himself in the future, gaining a guide to his new world as well as allies in the London underground, while the story jumps back to Peter, who has been trapped in the 1700’s for perhaps 30 years now and has become a true gentleman of the times, guided and raised by Gideon. Using the antigravity machine to travel back to rescue Peter, they accidentally damage the machine, and are then forced to traipse across France during the French Revolution to fix it. eventually they return to their own time, with the original young Peter, but not before the Tar Man causes unknown damage to our current economy.

The questions I have chosen for this book are as follows:

1. For what audience(s) is this book intended, and how can you tell? (In other words, for whom would you recommend this book?)
2. What are the weaknesses of this book, in your opinion?

1) This book is intended for an audience of young adult readers (i.e., Middle School/High School). It’s fairly easy to tell by the language the characters use, which at time can be very formal in an 18th century way, which at times can be immensely confusing. Especially for someone younger than this age range. The wording is brilliant, and can convey more than one emotion at once, which is important in a book like this. For example:

“ “Who’s next?” he asked in a low, gentle voice.

The leader of the gang, white-faced, turned to the girl and hissed, “This isn’t the end of it...”

…

She watched, bewildered, as the Tar Man laid out the young man’s body, as if to make him more comfortable. Then she saw him manipulating his arm. Slowly, she became aware that there was something horribly wrong with it and she watched as the Tar Man heaved and pushed as if he were trying to force the arm back into the shoulder socket.

…

“Doctor Adams always says that dislocating an arm is easy, it’s putting it back again that needs skill...” panted the Tar Man. “

This really shows how the way the text and duologue are used to show more human, overlapping emotion, rather than what most books do, which is generalise emotion into simple descriptions such as “She was mad”, instead of something along the lines of “She was in a state of internal turmoil, knowing that she was mad with him, but at the same time she couldn't be angry with him because she knew he did no wrong.” Doesn’t that sound much more human? I personally love it when books show you the more human aspect of the reality the author has created, because every world, real or fictional has to have rules and imperfections, so it only makes sense to let human flaws shine through as well.

This may be a bit of a side note, but one thing that really makes a good book is flaws. The characters aren’t perfect, the world isn’t perfect, their actions aren’t perfect, their mistakes aren’t perfect. And because of this, the book seems so much more realistic and so much easier to relate to, because the book has become reality in a sense, something of an alternate reality. And remember, in a book, we only see part of the world the author has created.

You can also tell by the age of the characters. Peter and Kate, the hero and heroine are both between the ages of 11 and 13, making it easier to relate to them for this particular target group. I suppose that this isn’t necessarily true however, because I’ve known adults who’ve read novels with main characters as young as this and it seemed to me that they were targets just as much the rest of us are. Figuring out target audiences isn’t quite as easy as it seems it would appear...

2) This is a good book, don’t get me wrong, but I found it frustrating how the characters interact while the group is in France. For example:

“He was Peter! He was! All at once she was certain of it. How could she have missed something so obvious? But what possible reason could Peter have for concealing his true identity so cruelly?”

I found it very frustrating that Peter decided to lie to Kate, that she figured it out, that she began to doubt herself, and then suddenly, there is almost no interaction between the characters on that level, on that particular subject.

Another fairly irritating point was that they didn’t revisit older Peter much at the end of the book. I think it would have been a fascinating subplot on the already twisty roller coaster of the main plot to have older Peter show up again. However, I have yet to read the third and final book in the series, so perhaps this particular plot twist will have to wait for book three.

That is one of the difficulties in writing reviews for books within a series, because you can’t necessarily claim issues with the plot unless you review the ENTIRE series, otherwise, the plot isn’t complete and you can’t really know if something you feel is missing will show up later on in the series.

A New Beginning? No, a book review draft.

 This is too short, this is also missing quotes from the book, but this is my Book Review Draft... Take it or leave it


The book I have chosen for this particular round of reading is called The Tar Man, a historical fiction novel by Linda Buckley Archer. The Tar Man is the sequel to the book Gideon the Cutpurse, and starts up where the prior book leaves off, with one of the main characters Kate, back in our time, after a trip back in time to the 1700’s. Unfortunately, her friend Peter, who was thrown back in time with her, has become trapped in the past with Gideon Seymour, Cutpurse and Gentleman, while his “slot” in the future has been filled by a terrifying villain named The Tar Man, sometimes referred to as Blueskin. Blueskin, a glorified street thug in the 1700’s does no better for himself in the future, gaining a guide to his new world as well as allies in the London underground, while the story jumps back to Peter, who has been trapped in the 1700’s for perhaps 30 years now and has become a true gentleman of the times, guided and raised by Gideon. Using the antigravity machine to travel back to rescue Peter, they accidentally damage the machine, and are then forced to traipse across France during the French Revolution to fix it. eventually they return to their own time, with the original young Peter, but not before the Tar Man causes unknown damage to our current economy.

The questions I have chosen for this book are as follows:

1. For what audience(s) is this book intended, and how can you tell? (In other words, for whom would you recommend this book?)
2. What are the weaknesses of this book, in your opinion?

1) This book is intended for an audience of young adult readers (i.e., Middle School/High School). It’s fairly easy to tell by the language the characters use, which at time can be very formal in an 18th century way, which at times can be immensely confusing. Especially for someone younger than this age range. The wording is brilliant, and can convey more than one emotion at once, which is important in a book like this. For example:

( quote Here)

This really shows how the way the text and duologue are used to show more human, overlapping emotion, rather than what most books do, which is generalise emotion into simple descriptions such as “She was mad”, instead of something along the lines of “She was in a state of internal turmoil, knowing that she was mad with him, but at the same time she couldn't be angry with him because she knew he did no wrong.” Doesn’t that sound much more human? I personally love it when books show you the more human aspect of the reality the author has created, because every world, real or fictional has to have rules and imperfections, so it only makes sense to let human flaws shine through as well.

This may be a bit of a side note, but one thing that really makes a good book is flaws. The characters aren’t perfect, the world isn’t perfect, their actions aren’t perfect, their mistakes aren’t perfect. And because of this, the book seems so much more realistic and so much easier to relate to, because the book has become reality in a sense, something of an alternate reality. And remember, in a book, we only see part of the world the author has created.

You can also tell by the age of the characters. Peter and Kate, the hero and heroine are both between the ages of 11 and 13, making it easier to relate to them for this particular target group. I suppose that this isn’t necessarily true however, because I’ve known adults who’ve read novels with main characters as young as this and it seemed to me that they were targets just as much the rest of us are. Figuring out target audiences isn’t quite as easy as it seems it would appear...

2) This is a good book, don’t get me wrong, but I found it frustrating how the characters interact while the group is in France. For example:

(quote here)

I found it very frustrating that Peter decided to lie to Kate, that she figured it out, that she began to doubt herself, and then suddenly, there is almost no interaction between the characters on that level, on that particular subject.

Another fairly irritating point was that they didn’t revisit older Peter much at the end of the book. I think it would have been a fascinating subplot on the already twisty roller coaster of the main plot to have older Peter show up again. However, I have yet to read the third and final book in the series, so perhaps this particular plot twist will have to wait for book three.

That is one of the difficulties in writing reviews for books within a series, because you can’t necessarily claim issues with the plot unless you review the ENTIRE series, otherwise, the plot isn’t complete and you can’t really know if something you feel is missing will show up later on in the series.

Pain and Fear and Fear and Pain

I find it fascinating that as I read through so many vignette projects, so very many of them focused on fear. It might be because we’re all a group of angsty teenagers, or it might be indicative of how scary the world actually is, something we as a race seem to have forgotten. I am to blame in this trend as well, many of my own vignettes focused on some of the scariest and/or worst times of my life. Which brings me to another possibility, that so many of these stories are about fear because we remember fear the clearest. Heading back to my intended topic, I found three projects that really show this trend. Vic's Post was my first find, actually titled “Avoiding Fears”. Aakash’s project came next, the vignette Nepal in Crisis standing out the most. And both were followed by Eric’s post, again with tiles such as “Fear” and “Confusion”.

Vic’s fist vignette, titled “Tall Wood”, talks about waiting for his mom in a parking lot surrounded by trees when he was younger. Any littler kid will tell you that waiting, by themselves, outside while a parent runs an errand is extremely unnerving and a bit scary.

“Whenever I felt like panicking, I stared at the trees and took deep breaths...The thought of mom coming back was carved onto the bark of the tree.”

Here he talks about coming close to full blown panic, but in the end being saved by a tree, something he never considered to be anything special before. In the end, he learns from the tree, he learns to be less afraid in a situation most younger children would freak out in, he also learns that some things aren’t what you first make of them, they can surprise you.

Aakash’s blog talks about his time in Nepal, before coming to America. Or, more specifically, the time when Nepal was in the thralls of civil war. Of course, Aakash is scared, but not so much for himself as for his Aunt, whom was like a mother to him.

“There was tension in the air, we could just feel it. We later found out that a person was shot... I was just happy that my aunt was not hurt”

Aakash seems to focus less on the fact that someone unknown to him was just killed, and more on the fact that his Aunt was unhurt. I’m not saying that he should have been less happy to see his Aunt unharmed, but it is an interesting response to a high-stress situation.

Esperanza

In The House on Mango Street there seems to be a recurring theme of windows. At first glance, it doesn’t seem like much. Until you realize that the windows in this book seem to represent being trapped (especially by loved ones), something to gaze out of as you think about your woes. This metaphor for being trapped, and the accompanying sadness first shows up in “My Name”.
“She looked out the window her whole life, the way so many women sit their sadness on an elbow” (p. 10) Shortly before this is mentioned, Esperanza talks about how this woman had been kidnapped and forced into marriage, and that from the day she was taken, she sat in the window of her home and dreamed of being free to do as she likes once more. It amazes me how this woman is trapped by her family’s ideas and expectations of her, so trapped that she literally is a prisoner in her own home for many years.

The metaphor once again shows up, this time in the vignette “No Speak English”:
“She sits all day by the window and...sings all the homesick songs about her country...” (p. 77) This particular woman, Mamacita, is brought up from her home country by “her man”, and is then confined to their small home with no idea how to speak English, and no idea how to learn. So she is stuck sitting in her window, singing about her real home, and crying over her son, who had begun to talk, not in her native tongue, but in English. She is trapped in her small home, and has no way to escape.

And it shows up once more in the chapter titled “Rafaela Who Drinks Coconut & Papaya Juice on Tuesdays”:
“Rafaela leans out the window and leans on her elbow and dreams her hair is like Rapunzel’s.” (p.79) This poor woman, Rafaela, is trapped in her home because of a husband that fears she will run away because of her beauty. So to combat her overwhelming loneliness and sadness, she asks local children to buy her Coconut or Papaya Juice, to remind her of the days when she could be herself, and help her relive them. It is her small rebellion, asking these children to buy her these drinks. Her one, temporary escape from her prison.

These women, every single one of them, are trapped in a world that seems to want to keep them miserable and unhappy, and none of them, it would seem, can escape.

Is it fate?

In all honesty, I rarely ever actually read my classmate’s blogs. I find them to be places of argument, generalizations, and over all just unappealing. I understand that that may be mean, or even considered cruel, but it’s the truth. But last night I gave in to my boredom and poked around on google reader for something interesting to read. After reading some pretty good posts by some of our classmates, I came across an older post by Andy Tsang, which made some interesting points about pre-determined destiny, or perhaps, the lack thereof. After he discussed a recent conversation with his friend about relationships, he dove into the idea of destiny... somewhere along the way he said this: “If our fate is determined at birth, then we never actually make any of our decisions.”

In my usual fashion, I didn’t think much of it at first. Instead I went about my day as usual, catering to the needs of the cat (who was out of food AGAIN), helping my sister with her homework, etc. But it kept coming back. So I began to wonder that if there is such a thing as pre-determined destiny, if there is a way to deviate from that path, be it through sheer force of will, or just another deviant affecting your own path. Somehow this thought led me to another, what if when we are born, there are multiple possible destinies laid out for us? It’s something similar to the whole multi-verse theory, but confined to our own universe. What if, like in a game of chutes and ladders, there are major points in one’s “destiny” that we reach and actually have a choice? And our destinies will change depending on the path we pick. Like when you land on a chute space in the aforementioned board game, you can change your path altogether, but the end point is still the same (our endpoint being eventual death). Or of course, there’s always the possibility that destiny doesn’t exist.