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.

Removing the Barrier

I flipped through the pamphlet, anxious for the show to begin. I skimmed through the bios and glanced at the pages when my eyes were drawn to a statement addressed in bold black letters. 
"Life is a drama without an intermission"
My eyes lingered on the phrase.
The lights started to dim, so I tossed the pamphlet beneath my seat, but the phrase impacted me more than the show.
"Life is a drama without an intermission", for some reason I thought of the nickelodeons popular during the Great Depression. How for fifty cents, you could relieve yourself from a day's worries. It was an escape, an intermission from the Depression. Then I started thinking of my own personal intermissions from life : study breaks, long walks with my iPod, writing, reading, and Facebook. I, like most people, turn to these activities for relief. We dive within these activities to forget about the troubles of life. Unfortunately, sometimes while in this state of relief, we become passive. Our skills of interpretation and observation are numbed as a method for stress relief. This numbed state can lead to a lack of understanding, especially in novels. Reading, a leisure activity, is used by many as a source of escape, but it is also used by writers as a source of communication. During this mental state of passivity, readers on not picking up the message the author is trying to convey.
Why is that though?
Because the reader has a barrier between the work and themselves. For them, it is merely a book. A source of stress relief and why would they strain themselves trying to understand the message of the author. It has nothing to do with the, why should they get involve with more troubles? Create more things to keep on the brain?
How does one defeat this discommunication?
Change the source.
For me, Persepolis was an intermission from college stress. It was homework that I actually enjoyed doing. As I read deeper and deeper into the novel, my reading skills grew more and more passive, and I ended up reading it for pleasure than trying to understand the author's message. I was able to passivly read the book, because I had a barrier between the narrator and myself. She was a child in Iran, and I was a teenager in Illinois. I couldn't relate, therefore I couldn't understand. Why should I? It was merely a book. I wanted to enjoy it anyway.
Watching the film, I saw a completely different story than the one I had read. Everything that happened in the book happened in the movie, but now it was the source of the story. Visually seeing her live her life, made her story seem more like a biography than a work of fiction. Seeing her interact with her parents, play with her friends, and go to school all in the shadow of her nation's chaos: made her story realistic- relate-able even.
We has humans build up barriers between us and troubles : it's a defensive instinct. In order for us to gain understanding, we must tear down this barrier, and allow ourselves to be vulnerable. Vulnerable enough to feel the pain the narrator is experiencing, think the confusion the narrator is thinking, and live the life the narrator is living : because only than can we understand the work.

Bildungsroman

I found myself at my usual post; slumped upon a computer chair, hands resting lifelessly on the keyboard, and a brain resting lifelessly in my head. I had to write my post tonight. Tomorrow was consumed by rehearsal and Spanish review for my exam the upcoming Wednesday. I was determined to write my blog tonight whether my brain was willing to cooperate was out of the question. But, as per usual, I was at a loss as to where I should begin. Being the creative being that I am, I channeled my source of infinite imagination - google.
Typing " Persepolis, themes and symbols", I discovered numerous usuless sites along with a new word.

Bildungsroman.

Wow.

"That sounds like fun" I thought. The description of it proved more interesting than the phonics of the word.
According to Mariam-Websters Dictionary, Bildungsroman is a novel about the moral and psychological growth of the main character. Persepolis is a Bildungsroman. Every story within her book is a moment in which she experienced moral or psychological growth. With this new found knowledge came inspiration, my writer's block defeated.

Persepolis: the Poem

It happened when I was but a child
no older than the age of ten.
That my innocence was defiled,
and never to be repaired again.
My world crumbled faster
than cookie shared by two.
How quickly it became a disaster
seems too impossible to be true. 
Chaos consumed all my life
and turned it upside down,
 most of it was the strife
when the revolution came to town. 
I didn't understand
and I couldn't comprehend;
how people made, demand after demand
only to have a new append. 
I lost my uncle along the way
and I lost my home as well. 
I've lost so much, I cannot say,
my life had been an eternal hell.
 But I've grown from all my trials.
I even overcame the worst.
The lessons learned make them worthwhile
even those I didn't understand at first.  
I apologize for the length of this poem,
it may sound a bit garrulous,
but my story must be known,
this poem is Persepolis.
.

Reflection to James Carroll's Christian Culture Lecture

Slowly but surely, I pushed myself down the sidewalk towards the O'Laughlin Auditorium. Forcing back a yawn and the lids of my eyes from fusing shut, I pulled my limp legs up the steps and into the auditiorium.
I sat down in a plush chair with velvet seats that felt like a cloud against my skin. I could have sworn these chairs didn't feel as good a month ago when I sat in them for orientation. I could feel myself slipping into sleep. I pinched my leg to keep myself awake.

This was going to be a long lecture.

After a few speakers made their introductions, James Carroll himself took to the stage. He was different than what I imagined, and his lecture was nothing at all like what I had in mind.
I first came upon this realization when he started talking about the middle east. How western christian culture was to blame, also how western christian culture was to blame for the Holocaust. That's when I snapped out of my sleepy funk, because, and correct me if I'm wrong, I could have sworn every history class I've taken since fifth grade claimed that disaster was caused by Hitler.

Of course, he had a connection that justified his claim. Unfortunatley, I personally wasn't educated enough and the Vatican 2 to gain a full understanding, but for the gist of what he said I really valued.
James Carroll, in an essence, stressed the importance of between piety and philosphy. In my Intro to Religion class, piety is described as the act of striclty following a religion, where as philosphy is the following of a belief. To paraphrase James Carroll, it is not our piety (practice of religion) that is important, but rather our philosphy (practice of beliefs). The way we practice our religion is not as important as how we live our lives. Jews, Catholics, Christians, Protestants, Muslums, and all religions out there, although differ in practice, their core beliefs are the same: God and his will.

God is God, no matter what name you call him. And his will, is the same no matter how it's phrased. If people of different religions and different political backgrounds put aside their differences, or better yet accepted them, the world could live in harmony. It is the goal of every religion to live their life in the imitation of God. If we focused on just that goal, living our lives in the light God shines for us, we wouldn't have the problems associated with the darkness that consumes us when we venture off "the path rigtheousness".

I walked out of that auditorium with a sense of being awakened, figuritivly speaking, because I was still tired.
But James Carroll's lecture did speak to me in a way I didn't expect it to. His speech, although about christian culture, was truly inspirational. Although I didn't take out of the lecture exactly what he wanted, I took out of the lecture a lesson that I will try to live by. To live my life, in the imatation of someone who was selfless, generous, kind, and ever forgiving- God.

A Not So Heavey Memoir

"The story is what saves us. And that is why, this soul can rejoice"~ James Carroll, An American Requim.

I have been able to make two connections between the memoirs of Maya Angelou and James Carroll: their power to heal and their deep material. Touching controversial topics like rape and war, both memoirs also  take place in the shadow of some of the greatest events in the 20th century. Mentioning WW2, the depression, and the socioeconomic status of various ethnicities: gives these memoirs a greater signifigance, because they offer insight to a personal account of that time. Although both reads have been intriguing to say the least, they've been very heavey in material. Thinking ahead about the memoir our class must write, I began to ask myself  "Do I have a story of memoir merit?" My life was not lived within an interesting moment in our nations history. I did not face any hardships nor encounter any prejudices nor anything of any importance. I tried to think of moments in my life I could use , but in order for one to know how to heal, they themselves must first be hurt. I've never experienced anything so traumatic that would need me to learn to heal.
So in defeat, I ventured off to the land of procrastination- Facebook.
Upon my venturing, I happend across a link. It was the story of a man, and a simple random act. Although light in material, it did have the power to heal. This man, by no means experienced anything as extreme as Angelou or Carroll, but his story had the power to heal and inspire people, including myself.

I thought that I didn't have a story worth telling, but I was wrong. Although I have not undergone anything as traumatic as Carroll and Angelou, I still have a story that has the power to heal. Because of this man's story, I am inspired to share my own. Funny thing is, he doesn't even remember it.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVCBrkrFrBE&fb_source=message

Silent Battles and Solitary Victories

Silent Battles and Solitary Victories

Inspired by I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

       The next chapter, the cross roads, the beginning to our story, or the golden years: pick any cliche you please, but college is more than just a time of carefree partying. It is a time of endless possiblities where even the most outrageous of aspirations does not seem as untangible as previously thought. It is a time where you can become the person you've always wanted to be, but for some reason never truly became. But obtaining these desires is easier said than done, this time, although full of possiblity, is filled with confusion. In a quest for our desires, we become lost along the way, and the path to our destiny is not as clear as a straight line. Possiblity and confusion isn't a great combo, and it's equation, one plus the other, equals something not so positive-doubt. How are we supposed to overcome the obstacles that life lays at our feet?

I found my answer through the story of a Maya Angelou.

Angelou's memoir is as unpredictable and intruging as any best selling novel, so much so that it's difficult to believe it's a true story. Throughout the book, the reader is aware of Maya's ending, success and acheivement, but after reading her story it's baffilng to believe that the Maya at the end of the memoir and the modern Maya are one of the same. Sure, everyone has the possiblity for success, but her obstacles were large in severity and quantity. Abandonment, racism, rape, homelessness, The Great Depression, stabbing, divorce, World War Two, and eventually her teen pregnancey: are all obstacles that alone would ruin someone's life.  Here I was, a college student just trying to get my legs in this world and seventeen year old Maya Angelou was bringing someone into the world.  How did she overcome her obstacles? Climb her mountains?

 And so began my quest for the truth.

 Skimming through the chapters turned into re-reading the pages which then turned into analyzing paragraphs which morphed into disecting sentences, I was ravinous for the truh. By the time my book was torn to shreds, I had found nothing. There was no secret, no cure all method to solving life's problems. Infact, it seemed as if she sometimes didn't overcome her obstacles at all. She just kept moving forward. Orginally, the discovery left me rather disappointed, but disappointment quickly faded into an epiphany. She did overcome her obstacles, but she did not destroy them, and none were the grand declerations of accomplishment I envisioned. Sparkling confetti did not fall from the sky, trumpets ceased to sound in fan fair, and no one congradulated her on climbing mountain after mountain. The only one who knew of Maya's accomplishments, was Maya.

Each time she overcame the barriers thrown into her path, she kept walking right up to the next obstacle, then would climb over it and proceed to march. Nothing laid on the otherside of the barrier to congradulate her, except a long endless road of possiblity, and unfortuantley, more barriers.  Discouragement after discouragement did she face, yet she kept trodding on in her unwavering march. The way she lived her life was the answer I was searching for. Overcoming your obstacles does not mean recieving anything in return for overcoming them. It means the chance for more possiblity. If we stop and refuse to climb, we are only hurting ourselves. We are not allowing ourselves the possiblity of a chance. We are freezing life and accepting it as is, instead of moving on to the possiblities life has in store for us. To overcome an obstacle does not mean to destroy it, but climb over it and keep marching.

College is a time of endless possiblities and barriers lying every where we turn. We don't know what is beyond those barriers, but we do know that if we stay stationary, we are denying ourselves the opprotunity of life, more barriers, and chance. Our aspirations are ours for the taking, if we dare pursue them, and the person we aspire to be already exists inside. It is our duty to let them lead the way, down the path, over barrier after barrier. Life is a journey filled with silent battles in which are victories are solitary celebrations, but what happens along the way, and the possiblity of someting more, are the reasons why we keep marching into battle.

Close Analysis of Girl Interrupted

According to Charles Darwin and his theroy of evoluiton, everything is a factor of its habitat. Giraffes have longer necks to reach food, the cheetah has retractable claws to increase speed, and polar bears have an extra layer of blubber for warmth. Along with these physical adaptions, animals can also develop behavioral adaptions. To put it simply, they form to fit the needs of their enviorment. My question is, does this law also apply to humans?
Do we adapt to acclimate to the enviorment we inhabitat?

Girl interrupted is the memoir of  Susanna Kaysen's 18-month stay within a mental institution. Susanna serves as both the narrator and main character of the story, and it is through her experiences that the term "crazy" is defined. Upon her admition, she denies accusations of suicide. Accusations that question her sanity. Although as the story progresses, she begins to see lunacey as a possiblity. The confidence she held about her sanity wavers as her stay within the mental hospital increases. Infact, at one point she even admits that she was suicidal and insane, quoting "I am a crazy girl". But after an encounter with her head nurse, Valarie, she believes in her own sanity again. The setting did not change, but what did change was what she was being told. Which leads one to believe, humans are not only a factor of their enviorment, but of others dwelling within their enviorment. This is shown through the film's presentation.

 The chronological order of the story and the narration give the film its personality. The film contains a series of flashbacks, infact, the film itself is an entire flashback being told by Susanna. This gives the viewer a sense that Susanna is personaly telling them her memory. Through her narration and perspective, we can percieve her decline into insantiy and rise out of it. Her sanity is also displayed through the color scheme used on set. When things are dark and grey, we know that she is mentally unstable. When colors are vibrant and alive, we know that she is coherent. More than anythinng else, Susanna's mental stuggles are displayed through the film's allusion to The Yellow Wall Paper. The parellels of Susanna and the narrator writing journals, being constantly diagnosed with different mental states, being held recluse against their will, and the struggle for control all too much display the effects an enviorment and the people in the enviorment have on other inhabitants. 

Both narrators were removed fromt their former enviorment and placed within a new one. They both molded to fit the part their new habitat had carved out for them - a mentally insane female. This image was reinforced by the other people within their habitat. Unlike the Giraffe's neck growing over time, their change was faster because they needed to adapt sooner. How else would they cope with the conditions they had to face, the way they were treated and the lunatic they were accused to be? In order for them to keep their sanity, they had to become insane.

We are the creation of factors beyond our control. And if we can't control anything, can we even control who we become?

Just Salmon

In her essay A Room of One's own, renown writer Virgina Woolf states that “A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.” She argued that it was the poverty of women that kept them from making strides in the feild of writing. I disagree. Unlike Ms. Woolf, I do not believe that poverty is the obstacle, but expectations. Society expects women to act in a certain way, be seen in a certain light, and live a certain type of life. It is the weight of these expectations that keep women from accomplishing literary work as well as anything. In order to become society's image of a women, one must sacrafice their individual talents to conform. The following poem focuses on this sacrafice and answers the questions : "Who am I?" and "How does that relate to my community?".

just salmon

In a sea of The Same,

is where I dwell.

Caught in the current

of its unifying spell.

Where we are all just salmon,

swimming up stream,

and life is nothing,

but a dream.

No Trout nor Tuna
nor Carp nor Bass,
we are all just salmon
clumped in a mass.

And the Fishermen standing,
looking down from the shore,
to them we are just salmon,
and nothing more.

And when they fish us out
from the pool,
in us they see no difference
from the rest of our school.

Fishermen are lucky.
They aren't the same.
They are individuals
with seperate names.

But we are just salmon.

And it doesn't matter,
what Fishermen we get.
For we are still captured
with the very same net.

Or dare we try
swim against the tide,
because to defy the norm
is practically suicide.

For The Current is survival,
and The Current is strong.
We are just salmon
swimming along.

How can we invent, accomplish,
or discover? We simply don't.
We are just salmon
trying to keep afloat.

The First Entry

The Old Wood Wall
By: Maria Welser

Everyone has a place
they hold in their heart.
A place where everything
seems to make sense.

My place is a space
sitting in the dark
listening for something
to end my suspense.

One simple word
to change my world,
and bring me over
to the other side.

My heart soars like a bird
when I am hurled
from darkness over
to the light a wall did divide.

This wall is old
older than I
and stories are etched in it
by and by.
Names, phrases
carved in wood
representing phases
where it once stood.
This wall is a set
used time and time again.
This wall I would bet
was there when,
I first started acting
and singing on stage
and through the dancing
and looking at a script's page.

Ten years from now,
I'll have the same place,
but I will be on the other side of the wall
with light on my face
and a quiet fame
one gets from creating it all.
I will watch my space
my place on earth
become a place
my imagination can give birth.
It will be amazing
if I could do
the dreams they claimed
couldn't come true.

And it would make it all the better
to watch it take place
in front of the same wood wall
and my own little space.