Alduthood, Not Yet

As a human in general the the toughest thing that you are going to go through would deal with love. Whether it may be loosing someone or a heartbreak. I may not seem that I know so much about the subject, because I am only seventeen. Since I am seventeen, the closest I am to my adulthood is driving and a job. Believe me or not, I have been through a lot these couple of years.
As a freshman in high school I entered carefree with school as a priority and having fun a way of living. Then that girl and guy thong happens when people begin to have crushes and your friends try their best to get the two of you together. Well that is what I went through. I tell my friends one little crush and they take it on me as soon as possible. Within a month they got the guy to ask me to be his girlfriend, and yes of course I said yes. I liked him. We had lots of fun together. We may have fought but we always smiled afterwards no matter old terms or bad.
If you noticed my thoughts of him are past tense, so you will tend to conclude... We aren't together anymore. Now we weren't the usual broken heart in high school. We weren't even your normal couple. I was at least four inches taller, but his height never mattered to me. The relationship we had was basically ALWAYS described as your old married couple, which I am not going to lie, it was exactly like that. Fighting over little things then fighting over bigger things. Then the bigger things became more bigger and everything was a miscommunication between us.
Our relationship ended four days before our two year anniversary. It sucked and it still sucks. The thing is that everything before, during, & after has affected me both negatively and positively. He meant a lot to me, it got to the point that everything and anything I did revolved around him. I didn't do something unless he was there or if he was okay with it. I was as many will say on a "leash". Since we fought so much about other people, I stopped talking to every girl for my sake and every guy for his sake. I was isolated. Even though it sounds bad, I took it as being happy that I still had him. It was worth it.
One day we began fighting more and more. I did what he asked but he was hesitant about what I said. We broke it off and left each other. I was broken down. I was full of anger. Everyday from then on, I always still worried about him. I missed him. He was my everything then one day nothing. It wasn't easy bouncing back. My family saw the change in me. I laughed little, my grades plummeted, and my mood was off. I gave up on everything.
After two months of crazy madness, I had a wake up call. The girl that I wasn't very fond of became very close to him. The things I gave back to him, he gave to he, and she showed it off in one day. I got heated up, anger was boiling inside me. I sped walk around trying to cool down, then I saw him. I ran up to him yelled and we started arguing in front off other people. Two friends separated us, and we walked away. Next thing you know, I see her. I didn't do anything, and she just smiled. Then I heard laughs and I turned right back around. I was ready to fight her, and that moment I lost control. My sister saw me going after her and stopped me half way. She got a hold of me and love led me down. I saw one of my teachers from the corner of my eye and shoved her and turned the other way.
That day was the longest day of my life. Every teacher in the school talked to me that day, a lot of friends talked to me that day, but one person changed my whole view that day. A lady that is the mother of my little sister's best-friend. She saw me when I was picking up my sister, and she stopped me right there. She began preaching to me.
"I am worried about you. Your fighting over a boy that is sitting back grinning about two girls fighting over him. Your beautiful, and you need to know that. He got by once, shame on him. He got by twice,shame on you. He got by three, shame on both of y'all. He got by more than that, shame on YOU. If he isn't going to respect you and if he is going to keep hurting you, he is surely not worth it. You need to go up to her and say, "it's okay you m friend can have my leftovers and him, because I will find someone twice his height". Then I want you to go to him and say, "you put me in pain and you keep smiling, but I will find someone twice your height".
She opened me up that night, and I won't deny that I cried. Everything she said was true. There was no reason for me into holding such anger that was just hurting my health, when he wasn't worth it. I shouldn't have let him control my life, especially affect my grades. I should have been overall concentrated on school because that is what will make up my future. I held in that I wasn't good enough and well I am, and I didn't deserve to be treated like I wasn't.
Overall it was something I learned from, because I know not to let myself fall that low again.

The Night Unseen

In the documentary, The City Dark, Neil deGrasse Tyson makes a statement concerning what humans miss out on. The astrophysicist states: “You could live your life at home never looking up … [but] I … submit to you that you’ll be missing a point of view, … a cosmic perspective, because … you’ll start thinking of your own environment as all there is. And if that’s how you think about where you are, then it rises to an artificial level of importance to you, whereas, when you look at the night sky and you realize how smaill we are within the cosmos, its kind of a resetting of your ego. To deny yourself of that state of mind, either willingly or unwittingly, in my judgement, is to not live to the full extent of what it is to be human” (qtd. in City Dark). Neil deGrasse Tyson wanted to point out to everyone how important it is to actually see and know what the sky looks like at night. He says it helps people understand what it is being human.

When a person lives in the city, they don’t see the stars because of all the light. Living in a box is the same thing as not seeing or noticing the night sky’s beauty. The night sky is filled with many things. There are shooting stars, the moon, flying objects, and just the many stars that are there. The people that live in the city are so sucked up in their own environment filled with building and lighted signs. Since they’re so sucked up in that kind of environment the sky is forgotten in the mist of it all the city ruckus. The city life is so concentrated on what is the city that they forget about what is outside of the city itself. On top of that a main point on why that is concerns the sight unseen. In the documentary he looks up and sees a sort of foggy shield blocking most of the stars. In a way this foggy coat creates a bubble tomb over everything. The people living in the city get so used to it that they don’t even look up anymore to see the sky.

People that don’t see the starry night sky loose a point of view that also affects their ego. City people lose the sense of how many important things there are and how small we are compared to everything else in the universe. The view of the night sky relaxes us emotionally and physically. Emotionally the sky helps everyone see something so beautiful and calm that it relaxes us. Physically the night sky helps us as humans or any species know when it’s time to sleep. Also because the sky relaxes people it relives our stress and soothes our mind. The point of view on the night sky can also relate to a person’s ego. When the sky is seen, the realization that there are a lot of things out there and not just us helps us take things into consideration. If we don’t realize that we are caught up in our own view in mind.

The night sky is a big importance to us, but we need to see it to get the full experience.

Two Points of a Sky

    The one thing that I loved to see is the night sky. I can write on Tumblr of the moon and stars a million times and always with something new. As growing up I have always been a nature child. Well my entire family as a whole really likes getting away from the towns and cities. My favorite times and places to see the sky are Mexico at my dad’s ranch and far into Galveston or any beach. At each of these places you see the sky in a different point of view from each spot. One thing in common is that it’s clear and the sky is seen as real.  

    The last time I went to my dad’s ranch in Mexico was this past summer of 2012. The reason I went to Mexico was to celebrate my parent’s 25^th anniversary wedding. We stayed in a city called Guadalajara for a while. Once the wedding was over we went to the ranch in a very small place named Ojo de Agua de Picacho. This small place was on a mountain seven miles away from the other small town with actual stores. My other sisters complained about it much because they got bored a lot. Another reason would be because it was a ranch with lots of smells. Every night my grandpa, brother, and I would hike up to the cabin at the top of the mountain.  The stars were so big and bright. The sky was clear with no clouds in sight. It was cold but calm and nice to spend time with my grandpa, because I never really get to see him. We would lay back and try making drawings from the stars we saw.

    Even though I saw many stars that night, I never saw a shooting star. One Memorial weekend my sisters, brothers, cousins, and some friends came together and camped for the weekend. We all drove out to far Galveston pass many beach areas and passed Jamaica beach too. While out there we didn’t have no electronics just our vehicles and one cell phone, that was the deal. It was a good time for everyone. It was a true get away from any stress or problems. One night while sitting next to the water, I was looking up and I saw a full moon with stars surrounding it. Then something flashed by fast. It was bright and it wasn’t a spaceship. It was a shooting star. I quickly made a wish. That was my first and only time so far seeing a shooting star.

   Both of these places have been places that I have visited more than once. Mexico and the far alone water beach in Galveston have views of the sky that is far better than Houston or any city. Personally the sky is one thing I would always want to have a good view of, no matter how far I would have to be from a store. Seeing the stars and the biggest star of all, the moon, make me feel relaxed and give me a chance to think.

Reflecting Poems & Authors with a Mirror

             The two poems I chose both dealing with memories, disappearance, and a reflective instrument. The first choice, “Please Come Late”, by Hugo Williams concerns the narrator not wanting someone to arrive with the other on time. The second choice is “In the Rear-View Mirror”, by Robert Shaw is about thinking about someone who has gone. The poems describe about memories that come up as they are both moving around. The reflective object in both stories is a mirror which is used to see things and yourself. The mirror I believe is a major part even though in “Please Come Late” it is not as mentioned as much as the other poem. These two poems aren’t ones you can look at once and tie in together as similar. Once the poems are read not once, not twice, but more it is understood how they are similar in their own way.

           The poem by Hugo Williams, “Please Come Late”, goes on about this person not wanting the other to be there or even be in their lives. At first it was come late and it will be fine, then later on it says don’t come at all. The feelings change. In the poem “In the Rear-View Mirror” by Robert Shaw the poem starts off talking about the memories before realization comes into play. Throughout this poem and the first poem, the point of view of the mood and sight changes for the author.  The ending of the two poems end with satisfactory. In the first poem it says,

“I know it is all over between us,

but I go on sitting here,

reading a newspaper, not understanding a word.

if you came in now, I wouldn’t recongnise you.

Don’t come anywhere near me

until I have gone slightly madly in love with you” (24-30).

Then in the second poem it says,

“… no matter how far down the road you’ve gone

to bring them back in view as large as life,

putting yourself in the picture, too, which makes

thinking about them as you saw lasting” (20-23).

The two poems start off different and end differently even by comparing the two poems together. The first poem by Hugo Williams mood goes from I don’t want you there, to I don’t like you, to I don’t want you at all, then to I do want you there but to give the author some time to fall in love. Hugo Williams starts off with the poem with a vibe that there is no chance, and then it changes to her concluding that there is a chance. Even though the chance may not be easy, it still is a chance. The second poem by Robert Shaw began the mood off sad by explaining how goodbyes may be with someone close to you. Then the poem changes and just talks about any other person that may come on by, loosing care for what would go on. At the end the poem changes again to only focusing on those important. It says that no matter how far one of them may get they will never lose the feeling they have for each other.  

                The two authors of the poems have much in common too, considering their poems are revolving around some of the same ideas. Hugo Williams appears to be young because of how much his feelings change and the same goes for Robert Shaw. From reading the poems I can also conclude that they have both lost someone before because they know the feeling.

                These two poems can connect in little ways, in a general form, or even by the author’s experiences that we can conclude.

I Love, I Hate, & I Obsess

The two poems I chose were “A Monoryhme for the Shower” and “Hate Poem”. The reason that I decided to pick these poems is because they stood out to me to be detailed. They also completely contrast each other. The similarity I found between the two is obsession. The detail in both poems was either intense or awkward which gave the idea of being obsessed of a particular feeling or subject.

The first poem, “A Monoryhme for the Shower”, by Dick Davis is an awkward obsession to me. It talks about a women taking a shower and describes the movement of her showering. It starts from the beginning saying,

“Lifting her arms to soap her hair

Her pretty breasts respond-and there

The movement of that buoyant pair

Is like a spell to make me swear” (Line 1-4).

The start of the poem gives you a sense of the subject and who is who. We have the narrator who the one watching the woman taking a shower. The subject is the woman taking a shower and a man in love with her especially with her body. The continuing lines prove to me to be obsession because he tells how he doesn’t even know the woman. He says that he wouldn’t dare to approach her. This seemed to be a characteristic of a stalker which led me to obsession. Then the next stanza goes into more of his feelings towards her, and the feelings of her toward him. He says,

“That constitute the life we share-

Slip from her beautiful and bare

Bright body as, made half aware” (Line 11-13).

These lines describe his actual emotional feelings toward her. He describes them as having things in common aside from how beautiful she may be, and that he isn’t aware half the time with her. Then the poem brings the woman in the picture. As he has this blank stare looking straight at her, she looks back and smiles at him as if she has been knowing him for a while. I guess some questions to be asked is to know how their relationship really is besides through him watching her shower. What does he mean by the twenty-odd years he mentions? Answers to these questions can help a better description connection of their relationship and of the poem.

The second poem, “Hate Poem”, by Julie Sheehan appeared to be more in an intense and in deep obsession. The obsession you can guess from the title it relates with hatred. The poem uses random objects to describe the deep emotion of hatred towards this person. This gave a sense of obsession considering how she used so many different examples. She kept nonstop talking of the matter. She talks of things she does as holding a pencil or the way she moves her wrist hating this person. At the end of the poem we conclude that she is talking of a man because she describes her head under his arm. When she says,

“The little blue-green speck of sock lint I’m trying to dig from

                under my third toenail, left foot hates you” (line 8).

The detail and specifications that she talks about in this line alone show her deep feelings for the hatred for him. The way she wrote a poem about her hatred towards him and in such detail shows signs of obsession.

Both the poems had obsession but one with more love than the other. One showed obsession through the good things of the woman in the shower, her beauty. The other showed obsession through great details to show the amount of hatred that she can’t get over, so obsesses over.  

Wedding, Ring, & a Poem

In the poem by Lynne McMahon titled, “Wedding Ring”, brought more attention to me because of the different things it includes. This poem has italicized words, parenthesis, comparisons, questions, dashes, and words I haven’t seen before. Lynne McMahon kept her poem interesting from the first line to the last. She talks about what is exactly mentioned in the title. She talks about a wedding ring, the meaning of the ring in her perspective and what happened when she encountered the ring herself.

Lynne McMahon starts a comparison in the first stanza so it automatically grabs your attention. She talks of,

 “silver hands clasping a rounded heart,

an apple,

 I mistakenly thought,

topped by a crown” (Line 4-6).

When she talks about silver hands clasping she is referring to the color of the rings. Then she says the silver hands are clasping a rounded heart that describes how the rings are something that represent soothing so strong to hold a heart or love feeling. The next lines bring up an apple and crown. She says that she misread the heart and ring to an apple with a crown. This starts to bring up questions about if she knows what the representation of a wedding ring is and what it really means involving love. Since she mistakenly thought the heart and ring to be an apple with a crown it gives the reader a sense of that she is new to love.

The second stanza has to be the most difficult for me while reading the poem. It includes the words pomme, regnant, etymologies, and also the word wring. Even after I looked up what each word meant the stanza still had me curious and confused. She mentions of the word pomme being French which gave the poem interest and curiosity which made the reader want to look deeper into the poem.

The third stanza is longer than the rest and it is also the last so there is one full meaning going on. She mentions songs that make her think of memories that she describes as “sent bowling down the street”. When she says this phrase it means that she thinks of everything that has happened in the past. The memories pop back in her head. The memories aren’t only good memories though because she continues on of sudden wind and smoky trees with rain. The wind and trees making all the racket displays how there were problems, issues, and the kind of speed bumps you get in relationships. Then she says that they remind her of home. This is when the readers begin to question … Is it good to have fights and arguments? So are problems a good thing?

Lynne McMahon writes that yes maybe the sight of marriage or being with someone can be misread. That once with someone you will have your issues or problems or both but it makes up what a marriage is. When you put that wedding ring on that’s your marriage that you don’t let go and you commit to it just as she ends with.

“I never take it off” (line 31).

“Wedding Ring”

By: Lynne McMohan

Life to Dreams

In the book Stiches: A Memoir everything awkward and freaky grabs your attention. Throughout the whole book you are just stuck to it because of how weird but amazingly written it is. The one thing that always will get my mind spinning around is the dreams. The main character, David, has dreams in every tough moment he may just feel like running away. You can tell that he begins to distance himself more from everyone because his dreams start occurring more often than usual. In the beginning reading of the book there was only one dream. Then as the sections went on, it became to three dreams in one section. The character had more things happening in his everyday life that it gave his brain a trigger to dream away to its own place.

In the book the first official dream David has is when his mother sends him to bed with nothing. On page 45 he says, “sent to bed with no supper, I dreamed that night of the little man in the jar” (Small). The illustration shows him screaming going into some sort of dark black hole with the little man reaching for his hand. There are also some strange objects floating down with him. A safety pin, beads, a key, and a small toy cowboy are all included in the black hole. Some of these objects were mentioned earlier in the book which brings me back to how he dreams of things that were mentioned recently or that may mean something to him. One thing that I still haven’t connected yet is the key, so I think it might show up later. I think it’s one of those objects that give off a foreshadowing sense.

One of his other dreams that popped out to me is the one on page 196-200. This dream happens after David has his surgery and just had removed the bandage. A few moments before walking to his room he slams the door on his mom. It showed the first revolt on his mother. He fought back and slammed it as she always would to other doors. Once he gets to bed he lays then you see him grip the sheets and eyes scrunched in like he was scared. The dream was of a bat out in the cold shivering out alone. Then it starts raining and lightning comes striking. The bat starts to cry and yells, “MAMA!” (Small). If you thought the bat was as weird as it could get just wait. An umbrella appears in the picture and he calls that mama. He was happy and full of energy but then once he opens it the umbrella is destroyed. When I first saw this I noticed what it may have been comparing to. I think the bat represents David and the umbrella represents his mother. The whole dream represents their relationship with each other. It describes how he cries out for his mom and desperately needs her especially with him seeing his scar for the first time. The turning point is that his mom never really is there for him and seems as she doesn’t care. She becomes a kind of disappointment to him like the umbrella does for the bat.

These were two of the dreams that appeared more interesting of them all because of the curiosity and odd elements. When an author has a reader curious then he has the reader hooked in the book. David Small does that with these dream sequences. I think he does an awesome job at it. It has me hooked and I don’t really like books or get hooked easily. I am now just anxious to find out about what the key might mean and how the mother son relationship turns out.

… off to read …