Black, White, and Shades of Gray

Sometimes I wish the world was black and white. If this was so, there would be a right way to do something and a wrong way to do something and there would be nothing in-between. The course would be set and there would be no questioning of the way things are done because it is only way to do something and must be the best way. This school of thought is very straightforward and direct and would be very simple and free of conflict.
Over the second course of this semester, I have been learning about the ‘gray areas’ of English and all its practical applications. Before, taking this class, my personal view of English was very black and white. I had been given the Standard English education, read the works required or recommended by the state, and passed reading and comprehension exams. Although I have met state and national regulations on these proficiencies, I feel terribly inadequate in the field of English theory. Now I know that there are several different positions and stances on a number of subjects related to the general field of English such as teaching styles, writing styles, theories of English, and qualifications of what is considered merit-worthy.
Learning about the various English theorists really opened my eyes to everything that I did not know. Before this class, I had never heard the names of modern English critics like Gerald Graff or David Bartholomae. It has made me question what I believe and wonder why the public school system has adopted a very ‘back and white’ view of teaching the art and science of the English language. But being exposed to the gray areas of the subject has not been a completely positive experience for me. Several times, it has been quite difficult to keep everything straight and not get confused in the different opinions and voices. Also the concepts being discussed by the various authors are sometimes in an abstract language that would almost mean the same thing to me if they were written in Greek. I feel what has helped me the most with understanding what the essayists are saying have been the peer discussions, guest lectures, and one-on-one discussions with the professor. I have managed to form some beliefs on my own about some of the issues discussed in class and in the assigned literature. I am anxious to continue to read more critical essays from diverse authors who have even more varied points of view.
A material that has helped me tremendously is something that I acquired my mere chance. I was having a last-minute progress check with my Reading and Writing Advanced Essays professor on how my critical essay was not coming along, while furiously trying to record every precious word that he said that could possibly save me on this assignment, when he reached over to his ceiling gracing book case to refer to something in one of his many books. After he had finished his thought, I asked to borrow his book. He agreed, and I quickly did a skim of the table of contents and saw two specific chapters that he had referred to most of the semester, quoting and summarizing. Immediately, I felt that this book would be a valuable tool in my critical essay writing process.
They Say/I Say by husband and wife duo Gerald Graff and Cathy Birkenstein may not initially strike a person as being anything profound. The simple paperback copy I had borrowed was just under 200 pages, and seemed like an easy enough instruction book for such a daunting task as critical essay writing. So, I began to read through it at the late hour of 10:30 P.M. and actually found myself entertained. I had been secretly dreading the final assignment for this class of mine, because I felt I had nothing to really say on the subject.
When I was reading most of the critical essays, I found myself getting lost in them, like a small child wandering around in the woods alone. The wordiness of Bernstien-“I diagnose the problem as “frame lock” a kind of logorrheic lock jaw, or sandy mouth, or bullet-with-the-baby-not-just-quite-then-almost-out-of-reach, as a mood swinging under a noose of monomaniacal monotones, the converted preaching to the incontrovertible, the guard rail replacing the banisters, stairs, stories, elevation, denotation, reverberation, indecision, concomitant intensification system.” really did a number on me. Other times, I could not grasp the mental picture that Robert Scholes was trying to paint for me-“First we will locate the binary oppositions which organize the flow of value and power in our institution; then we will proceed to criticize or undo the invidious structure of those oppositions. Though there is much in structuralism and even more in deconstruction that I find misleading or unfruitful, this combined strategy of interpretation through the laying bare of basic oppositions followed by the deconstructive critique of those oppositions seems to me immensely rich in critical potential.”
I was beginning to feel that I had gotten in over my head in enrolling in the class, and began to feel like everyone else got the concepts and the message in the texts except me. I really enjoyed writing the personal essay, because I felt I could be myself and write from my own perspective. But when I started to study the critical texts, I began to feel very confined by the need to use the same higher English spoken by the different composers of the essays. The need to conform my writing style met with my desire for a decent grade and I began to attempt to do what was being asked of me. I understood the concepts of why it was important to present a strong argument contrary to the point I was trying to make because it is important to know the enemy, but I was having trouble mastering this and other skills. By using Graff and Birkenstein’s book as an instrument to help formulate my thoughts and feelings about an author, I now have more confidence in my ability to write a critical essay.
In Graff’s essay, “What We Say When We Don’t Talk About Creative Writing”, the author is addressing the current state of how English departments are run at the university level and is calling attention to various aspects of the field that are completely ignored. Graff is for professors being experts in their specific fields and wants to achieve department cooperation and unification instead of the great divide that exists between the kooky creative writers and the dry critical English language theorists and academic writing. He feels that by bridging that gap, students would get a much more richer learning environment and that professors would be helped as well. It certainly would be nice to think that critical essay writing did not have to be dreaded and could be a medium that I could express myself in freely, without having to change my writing style or acquire a whole new vocabulary of long, hard to pronounce words, just so I could write something that I feel would ‘fit in’ and be accepted by the university.
However, I do not know if Graff is being entirely realistic in his essay. While he does propose some solutions, such as discussions between different divisions of the English department where some may walk way with “seriously bruised feelings”, I think some professors will walk away and not be changed at all. To get the two possibly hostile groups of the English department to come together, first there must be some form of common ground between them, maybe a shared love of books or a passion for their specific subject matter. The next step would be to show how the departments already overlap. An example of this could be between the grammarists and the creative writers because what would creative writing mean if it was written in such a way that the reader could not understand in because of ‘artistic license’? Likewise, just because a sentence is worded properly, that doesn’t mean that each student will not interpret it slightly different depending on their frame of reference. I think what will ultimately make Graff’s dream of a united English department a reality is acceptance and open mindedness. This can be achieved by freethinking professors like the ones East Central has and I feel that eventually it may happen if students are taught early on that all aspects of English are equally important and can be enjoyable. With any luck, the love and passion of the professors for their subject would ooze from every word they speak in a classroom and the students would not only understand the lecture but come to love the subject too.

My Confession Part 1

“Forgive me father for I have sinned” I begin to say after I have firmly planted my knees on the stiff, unpadded bench in front of the thin screen that barely conceals my identity from the holy man.
“Yes my child” he immediately answers, and I can almost make out his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down, as he swallows two Advil before I begin. He should have taken them about twenty minutes ago, so that they would already be kicking in, as it would ease the time that is slowly slipping by him. I am about to embark on my weekly hour and a half long confession. If I had been especially wicked in the past week, I almost gush for two full hours, and by the end of it, I can make out that he is fidgety, like he has to go to the restroom, or that he has been sitting too long and needs to stretch.
When I start to confess my sins to Father Rusty, immediately I feel fire and heat rush to my face as I try my best to recount the events that happened since my last confession. The hardness of the bench, the soft murmurings of other parishioners praying outside the confessional booth, or the organ playing softly in the background fade away, as I intensely focus on the task of freeing my soul. At times, the shame and guilt of what I have done and how I have screwed up my life once again take control over my voice and it cracks and breaks, temporarily choked back with the sound of tears. Once I get past the initial feelings of disgrace, I am able to remove some the emotion out of the retelling. After I am beyond the first couple of wrongs committed, the words start to tumble out of my mouth faster than can be understood and I begin to feel lightheaded by the time I am halfway done.
This week has had its moments that I know I need forgiveness for. From cursing at the stupid driver that cut me off on Tuesday to loosing my temper on Friday, my sins run the gamut of varying degrees of evil. I do take a small amount of pride in the fact that I am not nor never have I ever been an axe-murder, but I know that I have jokingly said that I wish I could kill so and so for what they have done to me. If just thinking something bad about someone is like committing the sin, then I am really in trouble because I am always thinking or am trying to think of a comeback to a verbal assault that I have just survived. While I am not a vengeful person, I may entertain the idea of getting back at someone for a few minutes, slightly savoring the sweet taste it leaves in my mouth, before abandoning my idea of payback.
Certain things are particularly difficult to confess about. I like to skip over any and all sexual transgressions, as those are sins committed against one’s own body, and carry more weight than others. I like to omit these sins because I do not want the priest to think I am a whore for having sex outside the confines of marriage and do not want to describe any details to him. While he has never openly condemned me for anything I have told him, I still am a little afraid of it happening. So I generally try to avoid the whole topic, so that it does not come up.
There is something about admitting that you did something wrong to someone else that takes a small amount of the guilt away. It is comforting to me to know that I am facing the same demons and temptations that my fellow man is also undergoing and can be forgiven of the sin and can begin to try again to do right. Someday, I would like to be able to withstand the assaults to my character, and not give in to the persuasive power of sin. I just wish that the priest that I confess to-Father Rusty-could also give me penance to do, as I feel that it would be the perfect way to express to God how sorry I am for going astray once more. I also think forgiveness would mean more to me if I had to do something to earn it, instead of effortlessly receiving it. Doing penance may also help me from committing reoccurring sins, as I would not like the punishment that would follow confession.
While I enjoy the feeling of forgiveness that sweeps over me most, I also anticipate and look forward to my confession day. The reliefs I get after attending confession lasts roughly twenty-four hours and I feel slightly empty after the lingerings of euphoria have abandoned me. I enjoy going to confession. I can count the times I have attended Mass or an event at the Catholic Church on one hand. Still, I am fascinated by it as a small child would be by a complicated machine, with awe, and mystery and thinking it works by some cosmic magic that cannot be seen or touched, only felt. Since I am not Catholic, Father Rusty simply listens to me very patiently, analyzes what I have said and suggests a change in behavior, prays over me and blesses me and sends me on my way. Occasionally, he will throw in a story from he is boyhood about how he did something similar to what I am describing, and this never fails to strike me as funny, because I am reminded that he too is also human, and has not always been pure of heart, like he has dedicated himself to now.
I think the reason why I enjoy confession is because it is free therapy, and has a cleansing effect on my soul. Each time I complete my Saturday afternoon ritual, I feel like I have been given another chance at life and get a small rush off of the newfound liberty that is mine to enjoy. I know I have a problem forgiving myself for things I have done in the past, because there is no way to go back in time and correct them. But if Father Rusty can give me forgiveness, then maybe I can start to forgive myself.

Beliving What We Are Told

There comes a time in every child's life when they are willful. They think that they are invincible and that nothing and no one can stop them. They are fearless and free, yet are also slaves to their emotions and whims. A child in this stage will not listen. They believe with their vast knowledge gathered at the unpreceded age of 4 that they know everything that there is to know and that the adult knows absolutely nothing. Therefore, they dare to touch the stove burner while it is still hot, and feel the searing metal upon their flesh and cry out in pain and say: "why didn't you tell me" and wail.
There are many examples of how the United States is much like the willful child. We are smart, perhaps too smart for our own good, and we know it. We live in the richest and most freest nation in the world, yet instead of exercising those rights by voting or getting involved in our communities, we are a slave to our T.V.'s that show us sexy reality stars or actors or whatever rubbish happens to be on the the glass screen. The stove that we are about to touch or in the process of grasping is our economy, and it is hurting to try and exercise so much control over something that is falling hard and way to fast for us to grasp. I am positive that there are financial analysts who predicted a downturn, a recession, an increase of unemployment, and a crumbling social security system. Yet, just as the parent is ignored by the child, so has the U.S. ignored sound financial judgment and advice.
The U.S. has been working on this childlike ego for decades. We have chosen to get in debt time and time again to help fund government programs that were supposed to help the economy. I believe that this technique was first used by the great FDR to help with the Great Depression. And the solution worked-for a little while. However, it does not make sense to me how one can fix a problem by spending money, and our great nation continued to borrow more and more money from foreign countries that were more that happy to give it to us for all sorts of 'improvements' both in our own country and abroad. In a sense, we have always had an inflated market, full of money that is not ours that we did not earn and that we do not deserve. So, I am not as shocked as most are or seem to be at the present state of our economy.
The whole nation knows that banks, auto manufacturers, retail chains, and a slew of other businesses have burned their hand on the stove and is now crying out to the U.S. government to 'bail them out' of their insolvency. But how many companies can the federal government support? Which ones are the most important and who needs the assistance the most? How many people would loose their jobs if the CEO's and CFO's are not given that aid and where will we get the money to give to the company? Which companies will only fail six months later? And what do you do if a whole state (California) is going under fast?
I am glad that I am not the parent of the willful child, because I would not even know where to begin to solve the problems. There are just so many affecting our nation that the decisions will be tough to make and the answer will definitely not benefit everyone. I strongly believe that the U.S. will pull out of this eventually, but the process will be long, painful, and hard.

*This essay was inspired by an article on Google News-Dems push for GOP senator to back state budget http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article

My Five First Paragraphs

I am a square peg desperately trying to fit into a round hole. There are times when I am going to my next class on campus and I am watching the other college students around me and I just feel so out of place and out of touch compared to them. They are listening to their Ipods, wearing clothes from the Buckle or Aeopostale or some other trendy store that I never shop at. They are popular and go to parties and have a nicer car than me. Some of them have both of their parents support and go home on the weekends and have roots and ties to their hometown. And I look at myself and how I am none of these things, and the fact that I never will be makes my desperation worse.

Too much Maker’s and coke is a BAD thing. The first one is always nice-not mixed too strong, the ice solidly frozen, just right to take the edge off of the day or week. The second is almost equally as refreshing and perhaps a tad stronger on the amber colored liquid. If I make it to the fourth one, I have lost or am close to loosing my ability to stop pouring, and the glass is have full of Kentucky straight Bourbon Whiskey, half full of Coca-Cola, with a few melted ice cubes faintly swimming around in it, waiting to dissolve into the intoxicating mixture.

Corporate America in a rural town is like a bad joke that is retold over and over again. It never goes away and is not right for the setting in which it is placed. The drive to headquarters is quite imposing-the dark towering building loom ahead almost ominously. Maybe the architect was trying to bring some legitimacy to the place with all the black and somber gray tones used. Everyone is greeted with a too pleasant smile that is clearly fake, and one cannot help but wonder what is really going on at this place of business.

It seems like I spend entirely too much of my time waiting on or for something. This irritates me to no end as I only have 24 hours in a day and like to sleep for at least eight of them. So it is important I use the waking hours I do have wisely, but it never happens the way I have it planned in my mind. The very process of waiting makes time stretch on and I start to time how long I have been doing nothing. I calculate how late they are picking me up or meeting me somewhere or how long it takes to get started on something. This further aggravates me, once I realize exactly how many of those precious minutes have slipped through my fingertips, as I did nothing.

I hate T.V. I also despise movies. The clever producers and directors who have devoted their lives to the God of Film, the too beautiful actors and actresses who play roles and people that I wish were real, the writers who come up with witty dialogue and intriguing plots with the stereotypical twists and turns that keep me on the edge of my seat. Best of all, I love how everything is solved in thirty minutes or an hour or two. Hollywood wraps it all up and decorates it with advertisements of things that I must have and trailers of other movies to come.

On Running After One's Hat By: G.K. Chesterton

I read this essay over breakfast this morning, and while I would not go so far as to say that it made my quasi-gourmet spinach and artichoke omlet with bacon, paramasean cheese and a side of toast taste better, it was rather pleasant to read and enjoyable.
Although the essay is written in what I might call high English language (not like Shakespeare, but the author is obviously a proper British genteelman of the late 1800's or early to mid 1900's) it is easy enough to understand the author by his humorous descriptions and characterizations of people and their behaviors.
In one paragraph, the author makes three very contrasting, opposing comparisons-chasing after one's hat, eating, and making love. This genuinely made me smile and pay closer attention the the author and the message he was trying to convey. I saw the overall tone of the essay as whimsical, light hearted, and fun.
The moral is this:Don't take yourself or anything you do too seriously, go back to enjoying life and the simple pleasures in it. When little setbacks occur, take them in stride, and do not overreact.
This is an essay that I should definitely reread after the day that I have had.

Lines

I am a square peg desperately trying to fit in a round hole.

Too much Maker's and coke is a BAD thing.

"I hate that this is one of his best known songs..." Referring to Dean Martin and That's Amore

I enjoy going to confession, even though I am not Catholic. I even own a rosary, but am working on that whole prayer thing.

It seems like I spend entirely too much time waiting on or for something.

My Best Opening lines from The Art of the Personal Essay

From: Twenty-four Hours in London
By: Addison & Steele
It is an inexpressible pleasure to know a little of the World and be of no Character or Significancy in it.

From: He and I
By:Natalia Ginzburg
He always feels hot, I always feel cold.

From: Once A Tramp, Always...
By: M.F.K. Fisher
There is a mistaken idea, ancient but still with us, that an overdose of anything from fornication to hot chocolate will teach restraint by the very results of its abuse.

From: Against Joie de Vivre
By: Phillip Lopate
Over the years I have developed a distaste for the spectacle of joie de vivre, the knack of knowing how to live.

From: The Crack-Up
By: F. Scott Fitzgerald
Of course all life is a process of breaking down, but the blows that do the dramatic side of the work-the big sudden blows that come, or seem to come from outside-the ones you remember and blame things on and, in moments of weakness, tell your friends about, don't show their effect all at once.