Response to "September"

While this was a very short piece, I really found it to be quite emotional. First of all, I am a lover of cats, so I found the fact that it was a dead cat to be very sad. However, I found the descriptions of the cat and what it may have been doing when it died gives the reader a great visual scene. I also really like how Purpura describes the earth as "home" for the cat, as well as describing the cat by its "simplest components", which I also found to be an interesting addition to this short essay. 

1-28-14 Writing Assignment

I'm somewhere in between. Where do I belong? I certainly don't belong in Blanchester anymore, that's for sure. When I left home for college last year, it's like the whole world had opened up. No, literally, the whole world as I knew it has opened up. As soon as I set foot on campus, I had experienced a whirlwind of things that were new to me. People of all backgrounds, some from different states, others from different countries. I had encountered people of many different races, religions, sexualities, and political views within the first hour at OU. These were very interesting things for me, since where I grew up nearly everyone was white, Christian, conservative, and straight. If you didn't meet this criteria for social survival in farm town America, you didn't dare talk about it in Blan. And hearing different languages spoken there? Forget it. Here, I hear people speaking Chinese, Spanish, and even Arabic on a regular basis. I have no idea what they are saying, but it is interesting to hear nonetheless.
It was experiences like this that made me realize that the next time I went home that my mind had grown beyond the confines of that Blanchester birdcage where I was never able to fly. I hear my old friends from high school who stayed in town talk about hings that just aren't relevant to my life anymore, and every time I was bored by the end of the conversation. I have people ask me "Aren't you glad to be home?" and I must answer them truthfully, "no, not really." I had outgrown my hometown. I had been surrounded by closed-minded people my entire life, and while I thought that I didn't have much in common with them back then, I certainly knew that for sure now. Do I love my hometown? Of course I do. It's where I was raised, and I have fond memories of everything from jumping on top of hay bales at my grandparents' farm to marching halftime shows at the football games. However, it is not where I belong. It never really was, and it is not now. But where in the world do I belong? Is it Athens? Is it New York, Los Angeles? Cincinnati, Chicago, Kansas City? I don't know. Maybe it's not even in this country, and I belong some place like London, Paris, or Rome. I don't know where I may belong in the future, but for now, I know one thing is for sure. I belong right here.
             

Response to "Those Who Stay and Those Who Go"

In “Those Who Stay and Those Who Go”, Ann Daum talks about her life in a small country town, and does so using some interesting techniques. First, I would like to say that this piece was great, because I really felt like I could relate to it. While I am not from South Dakota, I know what it is like to feel like you have outgrown my hometown as well as the concept of “those who stay and those who go”, which is prevalent in my small hometown in Ohio as well.  With the exception of the special details of her life, it almost sounds like I could have written this, I kid you not. The specific writing choice that Daum uses that I would like to talk about is her use of short, staccato sentences. This short separatedness has an impact of the way the story is told because it enhances the difference that time and distance has on a person’s mind as well as their relationships. For example, “Clouds moving across the sun. The grass that holds the prairie dirt. Thirsty roots sunk deep.”

Tornado Scene: Add on and Edits

It was a warm summer night in July, generally perfect for a camping trip. However, this time the midnight sky began to grow even darker than night over the murky water of Cowan Lake. The trees blew around in a swirling sort of motion, and loud cracks of thunder rolled in the distance.  An ugly storm was brewing, and every troop of girls was in their respective cabins for the night unable to sleep for two reasons:  One, we were a large group of nine year old girls having a campout, it’s pretty self-explanatory. Two, the storm was so loud it rattled the bunks of every cabin in the campground, making it nearly impossible to get any sort of shut eye. We were all talking about the cartoons we watched, how yucky and smelly every boy at school was, and of course, played the game MASH to figure out our future destiny. As we were finishing up determining my friend Hannah’s future, it got very quiet all of a sudden. It was so quiet, that not one rustle of a tree branch or creak of a cabin wall was heard. The roaring wind had altogether stopped, and all of the girls in my cabin sat up from their beds in fear, including myself. My mother, who was the leader of our Girl Scout troop, was in a separate cabin than us, along with the leaders of the other troops. I was only nine years old at the time, but I knew what was about to happen: a tornado. A few moments later, my mom burst through the door of our cabin and told us to hurry to the main lodge.  We all huddled under a couple of dirty, cold, hard camping mattresses, and made our way up the hill screaming in fear of what may happen next. The rain was pouring down so hard and the lightning so bright, that we could barely tell where we were going. When we got to the lodge, The mattresses were soaked through, and so were we. There were puddles all over the lodge floor just from our dripping bodies alone. I was wringing out my jacket when I realized someone was missing. It was my mom. I looked around for her. I saw most of the other leaders, but not her. Why wasn’t she there yet?  I looked out the windows of the lodge and saw pieces of what appeared to be a barn roof, as well as fragments of a fence flying through the sky. I began to grow more and more worried as the minutes passed and my mom was not there. I remembered all of the times when I was in trouble throughout my young life, and how she was always there for me. Ever since the moment I was born, she was there for me. Why was she not there now? I remembered all of the seemingly simple things that she had done in my life; she had given me advice, cleaned up my messes, made sure I was fed, and had scolded me when I had done wrong. Suddenly, the door to the lodge swung open, and three people covered in mud and various types of debris from broken trees came in. They were the last of the leaders, which included my mom.  In my nine years of life, I had never felt as relieved as I did in that moment. 

Response to "Signs and Wonders"

In the essay “Signs and Wonders”, Rebecca McClanahan describes city life and the pros and cons that it entails. She talks about the prices of flowers vs. the prices of food in New York, the people, and how she gets these “New York highs” that come and go at unexpected times. She emphasizes that she is in “the peak of her life” often, and even relates this to things like a homeless man pleasuring himself in a public gazebo. After all of her complaining, in the end she decides that there is no better place to live out their leases than New York and that the “peak of their lives” will be gone soon enough, so they should enjoy the moment.

Scene Related to "Moving Water"

The midnight sky began to grow even darker over the murky water of Cowan Lake. The trees blew around in a swirling sort of motion, and loud cracks of thunder rolled in the distance.  An ugly storm was brewing, and every troop of girls was in their respective cabins for the night unable to sleep for two reasons:  One, we were a large group of nine year old girls having a campout, it’s pretty self-explanatory. Two, the storm was so loud it rattled the bunks of every cabin in the campground, making it nearly impossible to get any sort of shut eye. But suddenly, it got quiet. So quiet, that not one rustle of a tree branch or creak of a cabin wall was heard. The roaring wind had altogether stopped, and all of the girls in my cabin sat up from their beds in fear, including myself. My mother, who was the leader of our Girl Scout troop, was in a separate cabin than us, along with the leaders of the other troops. I was only nine years old at the time, but I knew what was about to happen: a tornado. A few moments later, my mom burst through the door of our cabin and told us to hurry to the main lodge.  We all huddled under a couple of mattresses, and made our way up the hill. The rain was pouring down so hard and the lightning so bright, that we could barely tell where we were going. When I got to the lodge, I looked around for my mom. I saw most of the other leaders, but not her. Why wasn’t she there yet?  I looked out the windows of the lodge and saw pieces of what appeared to be a barn roof, as well as fragments of a fence flying through the sky. I began to grow more and more worried as the minutes passed and my mom was not there.  Suddenly, the door to the lodge swung open, and there were the last of the leaders, including my mom.  In my nine years of life, I had never felt so relieved as I did in that moment. 

Response to “Brief History of My Thumb"

                When I read this short piece, the thing that kept popping into my mind was, “wow that sounds dangerous”. In this piece Perillo addresses the dangers of hitchhiking as well as other things that she has learned from her own experience of it. However, she shrugs them off as if it were no big deal. For example, Lucy, one of  Perillo’s roommates in Vermont,  made a living making vests and used hitchhiking to get them to people. Lucy had been recently raped while hitchhiking, yet she still did it. She says that the good feeling she gets from hitchhiking is why she still does it, but my question is, why? It may be one thing to enjoy doing something, but once it has put you in danger, would you really still enjoy it?