This was not my first English class and I do not know that it will be my last. I do know that I have learned a lot from this class, a lot more than I have learned from any other English class that I have taken. It seems as if I have been in school forever and it also seems as if I have taken too many English classes to count. In elementary school, junior high and high school you have to take so many classes and many of them seems to repeat themselves, for example have taken Biology classes three times, once in junior high, once in high school and here at Antelope Valley College. To be honest taking an English class has always felt the same. I never really got something drastically different from each class. I think though that when I got out of high school i really assumed that every college class that I took would be so much more fulfilling and interesting but the truth is that many of them are not. I took an English 101 class and it was also online but I was really let down by it because I did not get very much out of it. It seemed as if the work was somewhat pointless and it did not really change the way I looked at English class or the way I approached writing. When it came time to take this English 102 class I really felt that it would be a risk because after taking that other English class and not really taking anything away from it, I was worried that not only would it be hard but it also would be really boring. I was really surprised however and glad to see how different this class was formatted though. From the first week when we were asked to introduce ourselves and give a brief overview of who we are and what we are about I felt that this really helped me, and im sure it helped everyone else too, it helped to feel that we were actually connected and interacting with real people. When it comes to online classes or projects, I think that it often seems as if you forget or fail to realize that you are interacting with other people. I really enjoyed the fact that although everything was done online, we all seemed to feel connected like in a real class that you physically go to. I enjoyed the fact that the majority of our assignments depended in part on the interactions w had with other class members. For example, I think that the Peer Draft Reviews that we had to do really allowed many of us to look at our own papers as compared to others and not only help those others to improve their own papers but it also helped us to improve on our own. So I would have to say that I am really glad that I took this class, even online, because I do think that it has helped me analyze not only education subjects but also life issues. A lot of our work depended on analysis, including self analysis, and I think many of us forget to do this sometimes because we have so many other things going on.

Pg. 1088 #4

When I think of a love song I always think of the song “When You Say Nothing At All” by Alison Krauss. I suppose it is the first song to come to my mind because it is what I imagine love to be like. The thematic similarity that I take from a contemplation of this song and the poems in this section has the most to do with how when someone is in love, everything else fades away. For example in the song I chose it says “without saying a word, you can light up the dark” and the poem entitled “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love” states that the narrator will “make thee beds of roses”, I say that it shows that love makes everything else fade away because its thematic theme usage of importance and grand nature of love displays real life, no we usually do not literally make the one we love a “bed of roses” and it is not really true that someone’s words can “light up the dark” but I do think that this is what love makes you feel. It is the reason why people go back for more even after they have been hurt. Love is too grandiose and singular to be left alone. I think happy love songs and poems convey the singular nature of love, these poems brim with longing and impossibility because in many ways this is what love is all about, the struggle and mystery. Although as time goes by words and what they mean change, I think the basic emotion behind some things and topics remain. Love is one of those things and topics, in looking over the poems I noticed that they, for the most part, display and also convey not just the longing that love can create but also the exhilaration that it can evoke. This was really interesting to me because a lot of modern songs convey the exact same principle. “When You Say Nothing at All” is one of those songs, it is one of happy love but it also conveys a longing for the subject of the song and an exhilaration over that subject. When I listen to it, it reminds me of something being like new, it reminds me that love makes everything fresh and exciting. Even if you sit on a couch and just watch a movie with someone your in love with, it will feel like the best thing in the world even if you have done it a thousand times. I think these elements are universal and timeless. No matter what country, race, religion or era you come from some things are universal and unchanging. The poem entitled “Song” is not a happy view on love, but the others are more hopeful. “Song” conveys the realistic aspect of love, the aspect that is practical and the one that knows that you cannot live off of love, no matter how much you might want to. This realistic point of view is not really echoed in the other works nor is it reflected in the song I chose for comparison.

What Myths can teach us about ourselves

By studying and comparing different cultures creation myths I feel that we can learn a lot about how we as a society act, now individuals act and how our ancestors felt and thought. Cultures create creation myths to explain a world that seems so random and violent. From the beginning of time Man has been faced with many problems, the biggest of which probably being death and the universal question of what our purpose here on Earth is. Creation myths in a way answer these questions because many cultures such as the Greek feel that Man was created by Gods. I think beliefs such as this show that man has an instinctual need to feel that there is an order to our world and a reason for every act. I think because our ancestors faced such unique trials in terms of survival, they created Deities that they felt could control the life around them. I have heard of many that think that religions such as Christianity tie into and evolved in some way from stories such as the one of Zeus, being a son of a Titan and taking control. Many see a strong link between Zeus and his human like image as being very similar to the Christian portrayal of Jesus as human like. Whether or not you agree is really a moot point because I do not really take this to mean that God and Jesus are a fairy tale but I do feel that in ancient times people needed to feel that there was something they could look to for protection and meaning. In terms of how individuals acts I think that in the majority they feel a sense of security in their creation myths because they do imply that there is an order to the world and by extension an order and meaning to the world of Man. Regarding what creation myths can each us about ourselves today I think that they can really teach us a lot. I think the fact that so many of us are so interested in creation myths and myths in general show that as a culturally diverse world, we all still search for meaning and purpose in our lives. So many books have been written concerning such myths and much analysis has been done in regards to them and this shows a clear interest in them in not only what they can teach us about the world and its order but also what basic human need is. Which is to know everything, as a species we always want to know everything about every aspect of our lives, and I think this is directly influenced by the existence of the myths but I also think that this need to know is also why creation myths were created in the first place. I believe that creation myths taken alone are very interesting and creative. When you consider and take into account the people who create these myths, you can then achieve some small semblance of the connection we share with them, which is one made up of the desire to find meaning for our own fragile existence.

Bees

In the beginning of the novel Lily does not seem to be overtly racist or prejudiced. She seems to be an inherently kind and observant young girl who does not seem to me to believe that her race is superior just different from that of the Black community. I did get the sense though that being brought up in the South in this time period and with such a Father gave her a skewed outlook on the Black community. For example, when Lily first meets Zach she was really taken aback by the fact that she found him good looking and attractive to her. She was taken aback because she was so used to other people, both young and old, looking down upon Black features as bad or unattractive that she never really questioned it until now. Prior to this, when Lily breaks Rosaleen out of the Hospital she takes control from the get go and eventually Rosaleen takes offense to this because Lily is treating her like the other white members of the community do, as someone who is too slow or simple to take care of her let alone the both of them. These examples and other similar ones did not make me see Lily in a bad light because you cannot help but be a product of your environment, to an extent we are all products of our individual environments. The difference with Lily is that Lily did not blindly follow along the path she was set down upon. She loved Rosaleen as a mother figure and she risked her own life and safety to rescue her. Her concept of race did indeed change, but she was never a hard core “racist” or bigot to begin with. I think deep down inside she always knew that color is the most insignificant factor of a human being. When Lily first meets August, May and June I did not get the sense that she was amazed that Black women were the source of the Black Virgin Mary card rather it seemed as if she was most amazed at their way of life and its dream like quality. To Lily it was a haven and even after May has died and the police man tells her she should not “lower” herself to living in a Negro house she pays no heed because through her time spent with them she has realized more so than ever how inconsequential color is. Rather than saying Lily’s concept of race has evolved I would say it rather expanded. By living in such a strong minority household, one made up entirely of strong Black women, showed her how wrong judgment based on race is. As Lily said, after spending a good deal of time with the women, she wished God has erased any concept of skin color. I think August especially expanded Lily’s mind and what she thought, she became a substitute mother for her, the hearth fire that Lily saw in Augusts’ eyes called to her and told her that she would find unconditional love and acceptance in her. These “calendar girls” and Rosaleen called them showed Lily how race should be and how it is. In society race is a ball and chain when it should be as unimportant and meaningful as shoe size.

Wriitng Topic #1 pg. 1326

My sophomore year of High School my Mother got really sick and she had to stay in the hospital for about two weeks and the only time I got to see her was on the weekends during visiting hours in a hospital that I still get nervous to even drive by. I was only fifteen years old and it seemed that at that age I needed her most, for comfort, advice and simple understanding. My Dad worked long hours so my paternal grandmother, someone I was never able to get that close to, came out from Los Angeles to “watch” out for us and although I do love her and it was nice to have someone there as a distraction, it just was not the same as having your own mother there. In those two weeks it seemed that I became like an Ostrich, I say ostrich because similar to that animal I tried to bury my head in the sand and shut out all the bad things around them and the world. Obviously I did not literally go out into my backyard and bury my head in the dirt. However, during those two weeks I tried to stay out of my house and I stuck to my friends as if they were my life lines and in many ways they were. I looked on them in this way because I did not want to feel the fear that my Mother was not coming back or that I would never see her again. Every chance I got, I would go over to a friends house, go to the mall or even do the homework that I so hated just to keep myself busy and preoccupied so I would not have to feel that fear. Like the Ostrich who shuts itself off from the world, I tried to shut myself off from feelings that I did not want to deal with. I did not feel comfortable confiding in either my father, grandmother or my friends about what I was feeling, yet I looked to those friends to provide a distraction. I never really told them where my mother was because I did not want to talk about it, I looked on them as a distraction so I hid anything and everything about the situation that I could because the whole point of a distraction is to forget about something. At the time it seemed like my only option because I felt like it was essential that every other aspect of my life stay the same because I felt that if I could control part of it, the whole situation would follow along and nothing bad would happen. But I think that being like an Ostrich all through that experience hurt me more than it helped me because I never really dealt with how I felt. Like they say, unfortunately it is the hard times we experience that make us grow and later in life such times actually help us to deal with tough situations that arise, and all I can remember about that time has to do with how my entire attention was focused on just getting through it and not dealing with it. But I do wish that I had let myself experience the whole thing because those times do really make you who you are and I think times like that can make you stronger and im sorry that I did not give myself the time to work through that and confide in someone.

Writing Topic #2 pg. 1211

Contemplating the subject of suicide reminds me of the saying that suicide is “a permanent solution to a temporary problem”, in other words there is really no situation that justifies suicide and any problem that someone is experiencing will eventually go away, even though it does not feel that way. However, I do feel that suicide is something that is different from Mercy Killings, in which terminally ill people are aided by doctors to humanly end their lives. I think that suicide is not only religiously and morally wrong but also wrong for any and every person. Anyone who has ever been at a point in their lives where they contemplated the idea and action of suicide and its seemingly ease can attest to the fact that later when you look back on that time such thoughts will be proven to have been wrong and wasteful. I say wasteful because when you take such permanent action you will never get out of that tunnel, you will never have the chance to find out that those thoughts can and do go away with enough time, understanding and much needed help and will. By will I mean the will power that someone can have to overcome hard times in their lives. Yet I do not think that every person has such a strong will power and anyone who has such thoughts or even contemplations should seek help because it is not something anyone should be ashamed of or something that anyone should be afraid to speak up about. When some is in such a mindset, where they cannot see anything but their own pain I think that this is then the last moment in which they should contemplate such a permanent act. This permanency in itself is so important and monumental and regardless of its subject , be it suicide or abortion or any similar controversial act, it is not something that I feel anyone should really think about, least of all someone who is in such a dark hopeless space. I say that suicide is also religiously wrong because it seems that many forget that the commandment of “thou shalt not kill” includes the killing of the individual self, if you are the type of person who believes in like after death and Heaven then you know as a general rule that someone who takes their own life ends up somewhere that is definitely not as pleasant as Heaven. Therefore, I feel confident saying that suicide in most cases is the wrong answer, one that will destroy not only the individual’s life but also the lives if all that love that individual. Mercy Killings, once again, through helping someone else end their, seems somewhat acceptable in situations in which that persons is terminally ill and in tremendous pain. I feel that this is one of the saddest ways that anyone’s life can end but there are definitely cases in which prolonging life only serves to make that person suffer worse when they are already terminally ill. So in such cases I do believe that Mercy Killings can indeed be justified, unlike suicide which cannot, in extreme cases. However, I personally think that I could not be a part of Mercy Killing or Suicide and even just writing about it makes me uncomfortable because of the stigma and the sad association with the early ending of a life that each has.

Writing Topic #1 p. 937

Becoming infatuated with someone you do not really know is like waiting on the results of a final that will decide whether or not you pass or fail a really important test. When you do not know someone very well and you are barely getting to know them it seems so nerve wracking because like an important test you are so hopeful that the result will be fantastic and that you will pass but on the other hand you are also terrified that you failed miserably and the doubt and fear of both success and failure eats away at you. Sometimes it seems that the things that are most important or the things that will have the biggest effect on you take the longest time to relate their result. An hour can seem like a year and a day a century, but when it comes to something that you feel you really need, like a great score, the time never goes fast enough. The result of this “test” can seem like the end of the world, or the beginning, depending on your result and how dramatic you are. Many times, after walking out of the situation, once the test is finished it can seem like such a sure thing that you aced it, but I have come to the conclusion that it is usually in these situations that you fail, its like the universe plays this huge joke and lets you think you have won, only to later reveal that you have actually lost. In contrast this, I have learned that in many cases you can walk out after a test and be sure that you just failed miserably and often times when you get your results, you will be shocked to find that you actually passed, either by a decent margin or completely. So often times it is no use what so ever to speculate about the test and whether you passed or failed. Most of the time the only thing to do is wait and see what happens. It can be the hardest thing to do because it is not like you can say “ok mind, stop thinking what your thinking”, but there are a lot of times where you have to forget about some things or lose it. I do not want to sound overly dramatic but im sure there are plenty of people that can attest to the truth behind this. Especially when you are young, when you find someone that completely catches your attention and holds onto it; it can seem that, like that much needed good grade, your happiness hinges on the result. Any form of “love” even infatuation brings numerous problems and worries, no matter your age because everyone always has the highest hopes that they will come out the winner. Even though like that test, you can do all the preparation possible, yet that final grade rests with someone else and their interpretation or opinion. It is the same in relationships, you can only try so hard and out so much effort, the rest is up to the other person.