Ignorance

Today, I came across a sight which is not that unusual in today's society, a teenage girl smoking in the parking lot of her work. Being a smoker since a very young age myself, I usually do not say anything at all. I do try to convince teenagers that the longer you smoke the harder it is to break the habit and that you should never start if you haven't already. However as I sat there watching her, I couldn't help but notice that not only is this a very young girl, but she also looked to be about seven months pregnant. I immediately wanted to go up to her and scream at her for being so ignorant. All I could think was how dare her. Like I said, I am a smoker and I know that I am slowly endangering my health and eventually if I do not stop it could lead to my demise. I can live with this fact, but what I could not live with is endangering an innocent unborn child that you are choosing to have. I see this more and more in today's world and especially with teenagers, the lack of respect for the wonderful thing that they are carrying. All I want to know is who is their mother? How can people be so ignorant of the dangers that cigarettes cause unborn fetuses? If you want to hurt yourself go ahead, but don't possibly ruin someone's life that hasn't even begun it.

Word count: 250

Flannery O'Connor

In general, the controversial author is not afraid to show the reader their identity through the stories that they write. One such writer is Flannery O’Connor whose Southern roots and Catholic beliefs are easily identified in her short stories. Being born and raised in the South, I can easily identify this Southern association within her stories. The South is traditionally depicted as slow talking racist people who are at the same time very gentile and demand respect. O’Connor uses this idea and her experience as a Southerner to portray characters that fit into that criteria or ideal. She associates class distinction, which has always been big in the South, between not only blacks and whites, but also white trash and respectable Southern ladies. When O’Connor talks about the grandmother wanting to be seen as a lady and then her mentioning of the plantation, it automatically makes me see the South. I think that O’ Connor uses her Southern heritage and knowledge to almost make fun of Southerners. I mean who better to make fun of then someone you know in and out. I think that she uses her Catholic background to even further the Southern portrayal in her stories. Most people think that Southerners are all devout church goers who pray every day. I’m sure that the fact that you cannot go a block without seeing a church anywhere in the South has a lot to do with this. However, Flannery O’Conner uses the depiction of these deeply religious people to not necessarily preach, but to warn those of the reality that is not always taught in churches. In her stories, all her characters have to go through some act or revelation to redeem them and become a better person. I think this gives insight to how she truly felt about the world and the people in it, in regards to religion and salvation.
Word Count: 314

Poetry

I think that poetry is one of the most creative forms of expression. I love the fact that some poems are so straight forward; while others you can spend weeks trying to figure out just what the poet meant by the coded lines. One of my favorite poets is Emily Dickinson. I think that the more raw emotion a poem provokes in a reader the better and that is exactly what her poems do for me. I started writing poetry myself and have written over 200 poems. I am very proud of my poems yet I am very shy about them also. I find it hard for me to let other people read them because they contain so much of my inner self in them that I rarely share with anyone.

Word Count: 132

Halloween

I absolutely love Halloween! Whether it is just because of the beautiful fall colors and the crisp fall air or the idea of getting to dress up and go out, it is so fun. Like many things, I do not think I will ever outgrow Halloween no matter how old I get! I know it is kind of childish to want to wear a costume and go to haunted houses, but it incorporates the magic of Halloween. As children we all got so excited to go to a store and pick out a costume or make one. Then you get to stay up late filling a bag full of candy! How can there be anything better than that as a child, ha. I guess that I still like to dress up because there are not many things you get to do as an adult that you can do as a child in this life and that is one of them. Assuming you have somewhere to wear it other than your house. Halloween is about fear and magic that you can still experience as an adult and when you're scared like that you get to feel like a child again which you rarely get to experience as an adult.

Word count: 221

I might be crazy, but I think you are.

So when I left school last Tuesday, I was driving in the pouring down rain on a divided highway when I see something move in the turn lane next to me. It was a tiny kitten sopping wet and scared out of its mind trying to figure out how to get past the traffic that was whirling around it. I immediately bust a u-turn and get as close to it as I can, throw the car in park, and leap into the road without even thinking! I grab the kitten, run back to the car, and then immediately go back out into the rain for about twenty minutes making sure there isn’t any more out there that need saving. Thankfully I could not see that there were anymore kittens, but I also could not figure out where this kitten, who besides having a busted lip is fine and sitting right next to me now, warm and happy, came from. The reason why I am telling this story is because it amazed me that when I told some people, they thought I was crazy for going through all that trouble to save a kitten! Actually it infuriated me because I can’t imagine having just seen that and kept driving, but people do it every single day. So to those people I only replied by telling them that I could not live with myself knowing I could have prevented an animal of any kind from being hit and I don’t see how they could. And to all the twilight fans in our class, I named him Cullen!

Word count : 269

A helpful editing process

Most of the time as college students when you write a paper, you are just trying to get it turned in on time and rarely take the time to make it the best paper you could have written. I know I am guilty of it. This is why I think that peer reviews are very helpful and allow you to not only see your mistakes, but give you insight to what others think about your paper. It not only lets you see the grammatical errors in your paper, but also let you know if you thesis was appropriate for the subject and that your paper accomplished the idea or theme you were trying to get across. I wish more people took critiquing or reviewing papers more seriously because it can be helpful to the author. I for one think it is great to be able to have someone else review my paper before the teacher does because it gives you another chance to fix it.

Word count: 165

"The Glass Menagerie" Rough Draft

In the play “The Glass Menagerie” by Tennessee Williams, all of the characters seem hindered by some element. Some have obvious handicaps, while others are more subtle. Williams develops each character and portrays their own unique handicap within them, showing that not all handicaps are physical.


The most obvious handicap is that of Laura who is referred to in the play as crippled. Laura, as a result of a childhood illness, has one leg that is shorter than the other requiring her to wear a brace on one leg. While in the play, it does not seem that the actual crippled leg holds her down, the label of “cripple” has made her think of herself as inferior to others and has made her choose not to accomplish much in life. Laura dropped out of high school because she was embarrassed of being different and thought that everyone looked down on her because she was crippled. She sees herself as different than everyone else and identifies with a little glass unicorn for being unique among all other animals just like she is. Laura’s mother, Amanda, also adds to Laura’s feeling of not fitting in by always comparing her own life to Laura’s.

Amanda is constantly referring to her past and recounting memories to her children of how wonderful her past was. She refers to the past as it she is still there captured in her own memories. As the play progresses, Amanda seems more involved in the memories in her mind than the reality which surrounds her. Amanda doesn’t feel like she belongs in this reality where the lives of her children are so very different than hers was when she was young. She is constantly comparing her past and their present as if she can’t comprehend that times have changed and life is not lived as routinely as when she was younger. Another handicap is that Amanda is raising her family alone because her husband left her. She does not have the support



of a stable relationship guiding her through the hardships that have been placed on her families lives.

Jim, the gentleman caller who comes to dinner at the Wingfield’s house, is a boy who Laura liked in school. When Laura knew him, Jim had many high expectations placed on him to be successful in his life. But after six years Jim is only working in a warehouse alongside Laura’s brother Tom and has not achieved much at all. Jim’s handicap is that he was not able to meet everyone’s expectations of him and it made him feel discouraged. At the end of the play however, Jim does not allow for his handicap to hinder him any longer and tries to better his chances of succeeding.

The most handicapped character in the play is Tom. Tom not only is handicapped, but he further handicaps himself by trying to escape it. Tom is handicapped by his feeling of entrapment and that his family is holding him back. Tom has such a longing for escape and almost idolizes his father, who left the family, for being able to get away. Tom works in a warehouse in order to help support his family even though he spends most of his time writing poetry and looking for ways in which he could escape. As much as Tom wants to get away he does not leave because he feels responsible for his family. So in order to cope with the guilt of staying and the entrapment feeling, he turns to alcohol as his escape and in turn handicaps himself further.

The handicaps that Williams portrays in each character are ways of letting the reader see the character for all of his or her flaws. The reader is able to identify with each character and identify with the overall depressing nature of this family. Each handicap is one in which the reader may have encountered in their own life and that is what makes the play more realistic. As Williams shows in the various characters in the play, handicaps not only are capable of holding us down physically like with Laura, but also the psychological effects of a handicap that can hinder one’s own fulfillment of life.

Wod Count: 702

Reading

As children, we have the pleasure of being read to by our parents, but as we get older some do not take the time or even like to read. I find this so difficult to understand because I love to read. A story, whether it is the fantasy stories that we all thrived on as children or the literary classics that we learn to appreciate, all have a magical quality to them. Stories take a general concept or idea and let each person interpret it into their own feelings and get something completely different from another person who reads it. And like we are learning in class you don't even have to like the story because that in itself is a feeling that you are taking away. I do think that everyone should have an open mind to others ideas and that is what reading a book or story is all about. The reader should recognize the feelings that the story evoked in him or her, whether it is hate, sorrow, understanding, love, etc, and appreciate that the author was able to achieve that.

Word count: 185

College

Life is hectic. It is certainly not fair and the older you get the more you have to bust your butt to survive! Everyone wants a good job that pays a decent amount of money in order to support oneself and have a stable life. And that's where college comes in. As kids we are brainwashed by every teacher we have with the idea that you must go to college to succeed and this for the most part is a relative truth. But my favorite part of this statement that we have all heard is what the heck they decided to leave out. Sure they tell us, "it won't be easy" and "you have to try really hard", but they would never want to paint us the realistic picture of what college is really like because it is scary! College is a wonderful and enlightening experience, but when they said hard what they should have said is exhaustive, brain-hurting homework, papers, and notes that only end for approximately 3 weeks between semesters hard! They leave out that if you're not one of those lucky little boys or girls that get the free ride to college either because you didn't slack off in high school or your parents are rich enough to pay for your college experience, that you will have to get loans and be able to balance school with a full time job in order to survive and pay back the loans that are now up to your ears. You know who my favorite people are though, not the teachers who completely under exaggerate the rigorousness of college, but those that say "OMG that was the best four years of my life". They are liars. College is a fun experience, but you soon realize that if you are there only to party and slack off then you're going to fail and be there for a lot more than four years or drop out. And trust me going back to college is a lot harder when you are older even by only a few years.

Word count: 358

Streetcar Named Desire

Streetcar named Desire by Tennessee Williams is a play that everyone should definitely see in person in order to capture the raw emotion of the play itself. In the play, there are four main characters Stella, her husband Stanley, her sister Blanche and Stanley's best friend Mitch. Stella and her husband Stanley live in a small rundown apartment in Louisiana which is a great deal different than where her and her sister Blanche came from in Laurel, Mississippi where they lived on a plantation. One day, Blanche shows up at her house and claims to have lost the plantation and has to stay with them for several months. Blanche is a very eccentric lady who is obsessed with men and does not get along with Stanley who she sees as being in a lower class than she and does not understand why her sister is with him. The play has quite a few sad aspects to it like the violent nature of Stanley who has a tendency to hit his pregnant wife and Blanche who turns to alcohol to ease her mental problems. Blanche gets involved with one of Stanley's friends, Mitch, so he decides to take it upon himself to find out more about this woman who showed up at his house and finds out a lot of disturbing things and that she is known around Laurel as a crazy person and later has her committed. The play is all about the struggle between family and life and how nothing is ever as it seems. It is a very dramatic and enlightening play and the Hatiloo Theatre of Memphis did a great job in its production!
Word Count:293

The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams

The Glass Menagerie is a memory play that centralizes around the idea of escape. The play is about a family's tension during the 1940's and their dreams for one another and dreams for themselves. Tom who has become the breadwinner for the entire household, due to his father leaving, who lives with his mother Amanda and handicapped sister Laura. Tom looks up to his father because his father actually had the courage to leave which he wants to do, but instead Tom just goes out every night after work and drowns his sorrows in alcohol. Amanda is a strange character who comes across very child like in the way that she thinks and she is obsessed with the past and spends most of her time withdrawn into her own memories of a young lady. Amanda is obsessed with her daughter Laura finding a man who will come and take care of her and so they will not have to worry about their future. Laura is the most pitiful character in the play because not only has she been labeled as a cripple, but she has let that label define her character. She is constantly playing with her little glass menagerie of animals, whom she relates with because they are also so breakable. Laura's character does however rise above this inferiority complex when an old crush, Jim, gets invited to dinner by Tom as her gentleman caller and tells her that she need feel that way. Just when you think though that the play just might have a happy ending, you find out that Jim is engaged to be married and leaves. Even though this play is kind of a downer because of all the pity of the characters, it does give a slight hope for change at the end and gives readers an insight to how life must have been like then.

Word Count:318

Mike McCarthy

The controversial writer and independent filmmaker Mike McCarthy came to the University of Memphis last Tuesday as a guest speaker. Even though students were anticipating a lecture revealing insight to his latest film Cigarette Girl and how taking a written piece of literature and turning it into a film works, Mike McCarthy presumably had other intentions. He touched very little on his film only giving students information on what it was about and the characters in it. He was mostly concerned with promoting himself, his other works, and his controversial views on pop culture and education. Students did learn about the writers dysfunctional past and how his obsession with comic books led to his career of drawing comics as an adult. He uses his past for inspiration and tells students aspiring to be artists and writers that you have to take that messed up part of your life and rip it wide open and work with it and that's were creativity and inspiration comes from. He even goes as far to criticize schools and colleges and encourages students to drop out because all they need to know, they will learn from experience in the real world. Even though it was a very interesting lecture, I believe that it was not necessarily the lecture most attending students were expecting.

Word count:220