I know where I am....I am lost

Last blog! So, how do I close out the semester? Why not another narrative?
Yes?
YES!
Hurray for narratives!!!

     On August 16th 2012 when I arrived on campus, I knew I was ready for my  four years at Saint Mary's. Confident and cocky, I marched into McCandless like I was a queen returning home to her castle, absolutely fearless to the crocodiles lurking in the mote below.(BAD JOKE ALERT) What was there to be afraid of? There were no hungry carnivores lurking around Saint Mary's, it was an all girl's school.
      Fear is caused by a lack of understanding, and if there is one thing I understood, it was how my life was going to be. I thought I had everything figured out. I knew exactly what occupation I wanted, what I wanted to major in, what clubs I wanted to do, and who I was going to be by the time I held a diploma in my hands.
Then welcome week arrived, and I slowly began to realize that I knew absolutely nothing.
         At activities night at Notre Dame, I was overwhelmed. I felt like a tiny bee in a swarming hive. Everyone was buzzing with excitement, zooming back and forth from booth to booth. I had no idea there were so many possibilities available, and I'm still getting my zimbra account bombarded with emails from clubs I've signed up for, but never went to. By the end of the first month, I had completely abandoned my original major. By fall break, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. By Thanksgiving break, I had no idea who I was anymore, let alone the person I would be at the end of this roller coaster.
        Now it's the end of my first semester, and I only know one thing - that I'm completely and utterly lost. Everything I thought I knew, is completely irrelevant now. I don't know where I am, and I don't know where I'm going. But it's kind of expected for someone to become lost somewhere they don't know. That's exactly why they are lost, because they don't know where they are. I guess that's why I'm lost, it comes with starting life in a place that you haven't lived all your life, with people you've never met from other places that you haven't grown up in. Being removed from home, I knew I'd eventually get lost around campus, but I never expected to get lost somewhere inside of myself.
         Although there is something nice about being lost, you have to make your own path in order to find your way back. Right now, I'm lost from myself, but these four years are going to be my path, a path that I will call my, chirstened with my own footprints, and this path will lead me to the person I am meant to be.

TO BE CONTINUED...
(the second portion of the blog will be completed once Maria Welser is relocated, she has gone missing).

Blog Reflection

I had mixed feelings when I heard that we would be blogging for the semester. On one hand, I was very excited, even picturing myself in  Amy Adam's shoes when she blogged in the film Julie and Julia. But on the other hand, I wasn't sure if I'd find much to write about. The course required one blog per week, and I figured that writing week after week, I wouldn't have anything left to say. Luckily though, the blog served as an idea generator and creative reflection for the works we discussed in class.

Because of the blogs, I was forced to think about the literature in a new light. I didn't want to write about the same things we discussed in class, so in most cases, I had to dig deeper into the book to see what else was there.This endeavor into the literature caused an even greater endeavor into my learning. It expanded my thoughts, making me think outside the box, and in doing so, made me reflect on the works. Learning how to read literature is much like learning how to speak a different language, you need practice to get good at it. The blogs were an extra practice at analyzing the works. The best part about this practice was that it was individualized. If you got stuck on a blog you couldn't turn to another for an answer, because you had to write your own ideas. The challenge of the blogs made the experience all the more beneficial. If it had not been for my writers block when writing the Persepolis blog, I would not have went on a Google rampage, which lead to my discovery of the term Bildungsroman.Or if it had not been for the blog I had to write on Translations, I would not have understood the depth of Brian Friel's title- Translations. I thought about the numerous types of translations, and realized that the inability to communicate is more complex than a language barrier. That sometimes it is a lack of understanding each other that leads to miscommunication.

The blogs served as an outlet for my ideas. In most classroom settings, there are certain expectations on what the writing assignment should consist of. Usually, it has to rehash everything discussed earlier in class, and in most cases, the ideas that I'd like to discuss I usual don't include because they aren't what the teachers wanted to hear. For instance in Servants of the Map, I wrote on an idea that as really a huge tangent off an idea discussed in class. It wasn't exactly the main purpose of the story, but it was the lesson that I pulled out from the literature. It was the lesson or message that I thought most significant, and because of the blog, I was able to write on it.  Through the blog, I could write about any idea that popped into my head, and I felt like this helped me grow in my perspective and in my writing. In my blog Life of Layers, I was able to incorporate my ideas and my writing style into a homework assignment, two things I never do out of fear that it will deduct me in my grade. Some blogs were purely things I wanted to write, for instance The Old Wood Wall and Just Salmon. I'm a poetry junky, and the fact that that I could submit my own work as an assignment, kind of made my life.

The blog assignments were an excellent supplement to the Lives and Times course, because it provoked curiosity over the literature and helped my literary analysis, but ironically enough, the very things I loved about the blogging, were the very things I disliked as well. If I could change anything about about my blog, or if I had the chance to go back and rewrite some, I would have liked to redirect. When writing my blog, I got carried away with the fact that it was MY blog. I became too focused on MY thoughts and My ideas, and I felt like I could have spent more time focusing on the material rather than using the blogs to serve as an outlet for my endless tangent of rants.In the future though, I could imagine myself using a blog as a type of social discussion network. Two of my favorite pastimes include writing and deep conversations with friends. If I could use blogging as tool to ignite internal reflection within myself or others, I would like to start a mini revolution of some sorts. Not one that would overthrow governments or cause people to convert religions, nothing so drastic, but have people reconsider the way they treat others, their morals, values, and their own personal signifigance. If I could use blogging as a revolution of the soul, that would be pretty cool, highly unlikely, seeing as I'm not a perfect role model for the ideal good Samaritan, but hey...it'd be pretty cool.

Judgment

In Linda Hogan's novel Power, Omishto's life is turned upside down when she is accused of aiding Ama in the killing of a panther, an endangered species. Everyone from her classmates to her fellow church members to her parents are quick to blame her, but none of them knew why she and Ama killed the panther. Everyone found it so easy to blame her, yet none of them took the time to understand the reason behind her actions. This made me think of our society, and how we are so pron to judge people that we know so little about. We make opinions based on their actions, lifestyle, looks, intelligence, social standing, wealth, ect., but none of us take the time to understand people. Power shows it's readers that there is a distinct difference between appearance vs. reality, by having its protagonists judged by their community. The way to avoid judgment is to withhold opinions until you understand the entire situation, and both sides of the story.

Servants of the Map: Search for Purpose

In Barrett's story, Servants of the Map, Max is on an expedition in the mountains to help detail a map, or so would it seem. The real idea of this story is man's eternal search for purpose. If the map represents life, than Max, representing the common man, doesn't have a big impact on life, he is one of many who adds the details. This is similar to most people in life, who although make a contribution to this world, it isn't always the most noticeable. Max starts to question whether or not he has a purpose, or if his purpose is of any significance to this world  -a universal thought.

Everyone questions whether or not their lives make a difference. We as humans are always evaluating ourselves, especially through comparison of other humans, their accomplishments, and their impacts on the world. Max reminds me in a way of George Bailey from It's a Wonderful Life, the impact of his actions are limited just as George Bailey's were limited to Bedford Falls. Although the impact of their lives doesn't extend very far, it does in fact make a difference on the people who matter most: their family and friends.

The cliche "to the world you are just one person, but to one person you could mean the world" is about as true as it gets. Both Max and George share disappointment in this cliche, but what they don't understand is that every action is limited. Even people who have an impact on thousands of lives have no bigger purpose than Max and George. It's the not the quantity of lives or people that you impact that matters, but the fact that an impact was made at all. To have a significant purpose in this world, you don't have to change everyone's lives, if you changed just one, that's better than good enough.

You don't have to search for purpose, you already are the purpose, go out and be it.

"What's in a name?"

 "What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."
Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 1-2)

What connection does a name have to an identity? Does it alter it? But that couldn't be true, for if you describe a rose as "rojo" instead of "red" it does not change its color. So what's the significance behind a title? In Translations, Yoland and Owen are renaming the Irish landscape, and Yoland Believes that by renaming the landmarks/roads/towns they are stripping away its Irish identity. Throughout the play, the connection between identity and name go hand in hand, and it is arguable that changing the name will intern change identity. I didn't understand this concept at first. What's the big deal anyway? All they are doing is translating the words for the English, but then I came across a weird thought, how would I feel if someone wanted to change my name? 

What if someone wanted to change your name? 
How would you feel about it?
Would you like it depending on what they changed it to?
We've associated ourselves with our name for so long, we would feel as if we lost a part of ourselves along with our original name. 

Think about how often we associate titles to identity. An example of this would be labels, for instance, we are more likely to be fond of someone who was described as sweet rather than sarcastic. We are more likely to tolerate someone if they are funny rather than obnoxious.  
Or go a step further, and think about who you associate with their names.

When we hear a name, we associate that name with the person we knew. For example, when I hear the name John, I think of my brother, which leads me to think of his slapstick humor and love for sports. Everyone has a name that they associate with a person that is less than appealing to them, and we subconsciously give anyone with that name a bad connotation. 

Changing a name does not change the identity, but the original name of that identity will always be a factor in defining it.
 
 

Types of Translations

The first time is saw the title of Brian Friel's work I didn't fully understand the depth behind it. I was busy on Amazon.com trying to hunt down book after book, and to me it was simply just another title on a long list of works that I was excited to read for the upcoming school year. It wasn't til today in class that I realized that versatility of the title. What exactly is a translation? When people hear the word, they tend to groan thinking about confusing language classes they were forced into during high school. But translations in communication have more to do than just language, and this is evident through the play. The translations aren't only from language to language (english to irish), but also through the different characters' motions, intentions, tone, personality, and intelligence. The play's purpose is to show that when people communicate more is being translated than just words. Sometimes the misunderstandings aren't through a lack of understanding the language, but a lack of understanding the person. A person's identity can be a language itself, and for there are many ideas/actions/likes/thoughts/ that we posses that others do not comprehend. In order to fully communicate with another individual, we as humans must take the time to understand that individual, because when we understand them, then we are speaking the same language. 

Life of Layers

Picture this.
You are sitting on the couch. It's a Thursday night, and you are watching your favorite television show, when the commercials start. You get up decide to grab a snack. From your kitchen, you hear the clip for the evening news report as you put some popcorn in the microwave. The clip says that someone has just lost their life in a car accident, but you pay no attention to it or the rest of the commercials, only returning to your couch once the commercials have ended.
Now, Picture this.
Someone is sitting on the couch. It's a Thursday night, and they are watching their favorite television show, when the commercials start. They get up decide to grab a snack. From their kitchen, they hear the clip for the evening news report as they put some popcorn in the microwave. The clip says that someone has just lost their life in a car accident, but they pay no attention to it or the rest of the commercials, only returning to their couch once the commercials have ended.
You were in the car.

In life, humans like to distance themselves from the bad: illness, heartbreak, poverty, depression, death, ect.It's a defense mechanism, a way to ensure our own safety and optimum happiness, by avoiding the qualities of life that trigger unhappiness. So, if something or someone doesn't concern us, we simply don't worry about it/them. So if when we hear the negative, for example, someone died, we brush them off our shoulder and worry not. But in this process, we De-humanize other human beings. How else would we make it through our days? Bad things happen all the time, and they happen to everyone. If we worried about everything, we would make ourselves sick. We assume that if we don't care or take action, that someone else will, but the thing is, how many other people share this thought? If everyone isn't caring, because they know someone else will care for them, who is that someone?

Our lives our layered upon each others, and, like it or not, we will always be linked to everyone, including the people we never encounter. The world is a neighborhood and we are all members of it's community. Everyone on earth is your neighbor, and my moral is that you should treat them the way you wish to be treated. Do the best you can to help out, lend a listening ear, or offer a second's worth of sympathy, because you never know when you could be the person on the couch, or the person in the car.