At the beginning of my English 222 class, Dr. Vince presented us with an usual challenge: to Blogg about our class readings and to take ownership of this class. I have never tried blogging before (although it seems relatively fun), nor have I really felt like I ever owned any class I've ever taken, so this was new to me. I like interesting challenges though, so I set out to do just that.
I believe I have succeeded in that mission.
Instead of just retelling what was said, I tried to incorporate my own ideas and/or experiences into my bloggs, like:
I was so happy for this little farmer guy for his triumph over the military and death itself, yet it actually was just him picturing what he wanted to happen before he croaked.
At first, I was able to accept that, and even wonder about that sort of thing myself, debating on whether or not it is possible to be in love with someone and have sex with another and not feel guilty about it. In the end, however, I came to the same conclusion that most of our society has rammed down our throats for years: no.
So is the real thing necessarily better than others? I say no. But at the same time, that doesn't necessarily mean that the real thing is less than others either.
It wasn't just about me adding my own opinions into the stories either, some of my bloggs were myself telling my own story and how it meshed with our readings, usually showing how I grew a little bit from those stories, like these! :
While sweeping the floor, Roosevelt's challenge kept popping into my head. At first I tried to reason it away, surely it only applied to physical things, right? But eventually I realized that Roosevelt's message wasn't just about physical challenges (although without a doubt that's one of the things he was saying), but his challenge was to step out of ALL of our comfort zones to build our character. Keeping with what I know and getting lazy in it would only end up stunting my growth and keeping me from going forward.
To sum it up, I feel like I'm a pretty darn lucky guy, when you look at people who can't even manage to get food, let alone shelter for even a night or a nice bath! And that's not all! Even the poor people in our society are better off than people in other countries who get even less than our poor does!
The point of that story is simply this: at least in my experience, the less words you use, the more bitter and angry you come off. "Cathedral" does a very good job of capturing that style, and it reminded me exactly why I prefer to use a lot more words to get my point across.
I also kinda took advantage of these assignment as a way to vent out some frustrations and face some of my demons... like these:
It all makes me sick. I wish I knew just how to actually gain my own identity, instead of feeling like I'm just another of the Parrish boys...
This wasn't the first time one of our managers has asked me to work on register, and I'm sure it won't be the last. They all seem to think that I am ready for the register, unlike myself, who is perfectly content with sticking to sweeping (which is always what I tend to be doing when they ask me about register). I am comfortable with staying in lobby, I know how to do it.
So basically, what I'm trying to say is this: I tried my best to use this class not only as a requirement for graduation, but actually as a learning experience (something that strangely seems to allude the education field, or so I have felt recently), and I (somewhat) enjoyed this class :)
Thank you for reading all of these bloggs!
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