State of The Plamet

Class on Tuesday was very interesting. Fist I would just like to say that I do not really like reading about nature and other stuff like that. I find it real hard to experience some thing without you really being at this special place. I believe that people have their own opinion and preference to the things they enjoy reading Mr Corrigan :)
The scripture that really stuck out to me about the environment is Matthew 6:26-28. It says "Look at the birds of the air.... Observe how the lilies of the field grow. That to me is just telling me to look at all of God's creation around us. There are times I get up just stare at the things around me such as the trees, sky, clouds, plants, grass and all sorts of things that our God has created. The things that he created around me is so breath taking I can hardly speak at those times of silence. If you haven't read the scriptures that Mr. Corrigan gave us, I strongly think that you should give it a glance.

I enjoyed doing that activity in class simply because we got to hear all the different sentences that stuck out to everyone. There were a couple of sentences that really stuck out to me the first time I read State Of The Planet. The sentence that grabbed my attention was "Poety should be able to comprehend the earth". To me that means in order to write poetry about about nature and the earth you must really experience it and know how to translate it in words. I find it very insightful how someone can write a poem about insects eating birds and the sky being so blue just by sitting while observing nature. This story has really inspired me to gave nature poems or novel a chance. Hopefully in class we will be able to go outside and be one with nature.

Little riding hood.

Through out my life I was not much of a reader growing up. I always would find other things that are more important to do. When Mr. Corrigan asked us to name our favorite literature I couldn't think of any. Half way through the semester I began really appreciating literature. Literature is not all about the long and boring stuff, it can be about anything that is a story.
Today I am going to talk about one of my favorite literature stories that my mother would always read to me. That story happen to be "Little Red Riding Hood". For some reason this story stuck with me as a child. The characters in this story are little red riding hood, her grandmother, and the big bad wolf.
For those who hasn't heard this story, I will give you a brief summery of the story. Little red riding hood ask her mother if she can pay a little visit to her grandmother. On her way there the big bad wolf saw walking through the woods. The wolf found out that she was on her way to her grandmother's house. The wolf ended up beating her to her grandmother's to gobble her grandmother. The wolf dressed as the grandmother trying to trick the little girl. Little red riding hood realized it wasn't her grandmother and took off running.  A woodman made the wolf spit up the grandmother and they lived happily ever after. The author who wrote this story had a good sense of humor. When literature is funny people seem to remember it more, well at least I do.  A couple other stories that I enjoyed as a kid were little mermaid, the Tortoise and the hare, Beauty and the Beast and last but not least was Rapunzel. To think that literature was never in my life, but all along i been listening to it my whole life.

Lectio Divina "Sunny Blues"

After reading sunny blues I found it to be a very good story. I don't read too many stories but for some reason I found this one very interesting. It could of been the characters I related to or it could of been music of conversation that they kept on bringing up through the story. In class on Tuesday we did an assignment called Lectio Divina. Some of you might heard of this and some might not. The whole point was to practice of approaching a text in different ways, reading text recursively, meditatively and reflectively. The second part is to make sure your being implicated in what you read, of aiming for it to matter in how you live and who you are after words.
The first part was Lectio (Listening to the words). As I was listening to the story the first time I tried to grasp everything that was important in the story. Even though I read the story before I got to class, I heard something new when he was reading it. "He who has to fill it, this instrument, with the breath of life of his own". "He has to make it do what he wants it to do". These two statement that really stuck out to me when i first read it.
The second part is Meditatio (Reflecting on the word). Those quotes I gave you from the last passage really opened my eyes. I think he means the life within who controls what happens around us. Our single breath gave life to the instrument and it came alive. Simply amazing to me.
The third part in this exercise was Oratio (Responding to the word). As we read the story again my thoughts of the story is that He's relating life to music. Life is like a melody that we bring to this world.
The final step was Contemplatio (Resting in the word). This part we are simply to rest in the spirit. This part was really weird to me. It hard to rest in the spirit of book that is called a literature experience. Someone in class stated that it would be easier if we did it over the book of Joel, simply because when we meditate on the scripture we have an image of God. I totally agree with that statement. When we do it on a book that not about God, what are we suppose to picture? The author who wrote the book? 

Sonny's Blues

When I got done reading, I was amazed on how long the story was. This story was definitely worth reading because it had some pretty interesting things that I thought was really cool. I am a huge fan when it comes to different sounds and music. The first day I sat a drum set and hit the base and the snare I fell in love with drumming. Music was my first love. In this story, the things that confused me a little was he talks about the instrument but also his uncle's death. This story was very graphic when it came to explaining the fathers brother's death. I can not even imagine how that family felt. It seems like the mom held this little secret for a long time. I can tell when mama told him about his uncle that died it took everything out of her not to cry. "I know you never saw you Daddy cry, but I did many a time, though all these years. When she finished explaining tears were gleaming on her face. At the end of the story it stated something about music being played as if it was instruments having conversations. This can be the highlight point of the story. I really cant put a finger on it but hopefully in class Professor Corrigan can explain this better.
 I said this in an older blog, But my cousin died in a shooting almost 2 years ago. He has a kid that is 3 years old right now. When that kid gets older it's going to be so hard to explain to him how his dad died in a shooting. He's going to grow up without a father figure by his side. That just makes my heart burn for that little boy. I will keep praying one day his mom will have some courage to tell him when the time is good.  Stories like this I love reading because I can relate to it. I like how it's very productive and really makes you think.

Notes on Character

Since class on thursday, We haven't really discussed anything new.  As I was looking through my notes I found the page on Notes on Character by Paul T. Corrigan. I found that it was really interesting and that is why I am going to share my thoughts with you guys today.
Having to create a story was very difficult for me. I told myself how can I create a story from scratch when I hate reading and writing?
Mr. Corrigan stated "Characters often determine plot, and character are developed through the things that happen". This statement stuck out to me due to the fact I did not want my story to be boring. I wanted multiple Characters so that it would be entertain to read. In my story my normal life, there were five characters. My mother, sister, father, best friend and lastly me.
Starting off the story was difficult for me. What I had to do is what down every character and write down their roles in the story. I decided to write about my life, simply because my imagination is not too amazing.

The thing about literature is that you cant really define a character's type from the get go. I think that is why literature is so interesting, because as the story continue you can see the characters personality being developed. Characters are developed by
1. their physical description, including the way that they move, the clothing they wear, the way they sound and so on;
2. The things they say
3. The things they do
4. The way other characters respond to them, including the things others say to or about them:and...
5. Their Thoughts, if these are shown
The five points that I've read are really good points that Mr. Corrigan gave so that we can write our short story. Knowing characters in a story tells a lot about the person who wrote it. That is why it is good to really engage and know the true meaning of the story.
Overall this really helped me a lot to develop my characters and story. If you haven't read it, I strongly courage you to read it.

My normal life

My normal life

What exactly is a normal life? Is life all about love, money or possibly family? As a kid growing I didn’t realize the atmosphere around me could affect me in the future. …It all started at the age of 5…

“Mom!” I yelled. “Where are you going?”
“I am going to work” she said.
My mother, Asmene is a hard working lady. She works three jobs practically around the clock, while supporting my sister and me at the same time.
As my mom grabbed her purse and car keys to head out the door, she said, “I’ll be home later so I can cook you guys some dinner, okay?”
To me, this had become a routine for my mom every day except Sunday. 
As she walked out, my sister and I would yell “bye mom, love you!”

As soon as my mom got out of the door, my sister Jenny asked, “can we play dress up today? I have this really cool outfit I want you to wear.”
Jenny was my older sister by three years. 
I replied with a loud voice “No I don’t, I want to do something else besides playing dress up every day!”
My sister really didn’t have any friends that lived in our neighborhood so I always ended up having to play with her.  Who am I kidding, though, I only had one friend myself, and his name was Jean-Pierre.

Jean-Pierre and I had been friend for many years. When I first met him, he was very shy and didn’t talk much. He and his family recently moved down from France to start a business on the Island of St Maarten, where we lived. He had a very strong accent and it was very difficult for him to speak English, let alone for me to understand him. Over time Jean-Pierre and I became best friends. We did everything together; we played soccer, played basketball, went snorkeling, and for some odd reason, always got in trouble by our parents. Other than us being troublemakers, we sure knew how to have fun together.

Often, as we kicked the soccer ball back and forth to each other, we would always be on the look out for my dad’s truck coming down the street. I will never forget Jean Pierre’s accent when he would yell, “your father is coming!”
We would commence our good-bye handshakes and waved goodbye as we went home.

As soon as I got home I would always scream, “Jen! Jen! Dad is coming, hurry up and clean up the house!”
We would pick up as much as we can to get the house looking tidy; my dad did not like to see the house messy when he came from work. After cleaning, my sister and I would sit on the couch waiting to hear his keys jingle as he opened the door.
He says with a tiring voice, “Hi Adam and Jen!”
We would reply, “Hi Dad.”
I would always get up to and gave my dad a handshake upon his arrival.

I was closer to my dad than my sister. Out of respect and tradition my sister would give him a kiss on both cheeks. Unfortunately, my dad, Paul is not a huggable or lovable person, so what see is what you get.

“How was work today dad?” I asked.
“Work was good today son, my boss got on me for not getting enough work done, but other then that work is just fantastic,” he responded.
My dad would always emphasized the word fantastic, I never really knew if he loved his job or just saying that word sarcastically.
He asked, “How was school today Jen?”
My sister replied “school was good, I got an ‘A’ on my test!”
“Show off!” I mumbled under my breath.
My sister has always been such was smarty-pants when it comes to schoolwork. On the other hand, I never brought a single book home in my backpack. I simply didn’t care about school.
“Why don’t you be more like your sister Adam, you can learn a lot from her,” my dad said out loud.
I replied rudely “I’m not as smart as her and never will be!  I just don’t care about school.”
My dad shook his head and gave me the whole “education lecture” that I’d already heard way too many times.

So far, my life had been pretty normal when it came to having a family and friends. Most kids have a parent who is strict when it comes to school work and other stuff, just like my family. Most kids have a sibling that seems to always get more attention than the other.  However, when my mom got home from work, what I thought was normal turned out to be not so normal at all.

My mom would always get home from work around seven in the evening. For some reason, my sister and I always got excited when my mom got home; as she pulled into the drive way we would be waiting by the front door for her.
“Hi mom!” As we rushed to embrace her with hugs and kisses, we yelled.
No matter what, my mom would always bring home a special surprise for us. It could be a toy, McDonalds or some kind of candy.

As we walked into the house my mom would say, “Hey Paul,” with no emotion on her face.
Without even looking at her my dad replied, “Hey Asmene.”
This was normally the most they ever talked to each other without arguing. However, by the end of every night, my mom and dad would start arguing. As time went on the arguing would progress into yelling at each other. As I looked at both them I would just see anger and frustration with one another.

After they had been arguing, my mom turned to us and yelled, “GO TO YOUR ROOM!” She said it with such a loud voice; I thought that my sister and I had done something wrong.
“What’s wrong mom?” as tears rolled down my cheeks.
Mom said in the same loud voice “I SAID GO TO YOUR ROOM!”
My sister then grabbed me by the arm and took me in to the other room.

We would sit right behind the door holding each others’ hand, listing to the yelling which eventually turned into screaming. After 15 to 20 minutes of screaming, we hear the front door being slammed and my dad’s car engine starting up. With a quick rev to the engine my dad would be gone until the next morning. My mom would then walk into our bedroom crying and holding us next to her side.
I vividly remember her always saying, “I don’t want to live like this anymore, kids.”

People watching

When Mr. Corrigan gave us the assignment to people watch I thought of the perfect place to do it. The thing I was really looking for is to see if I can read there body language. The first girl I saw she was walking down Elprado and had a rolling back back. She weren't really walking with anybody or looked like she didn't have many friends. The way she was walking I can only assume that she's a timid and a shy girl. She also looked like a very studious girl.
Next to me there was a guy talking real loud and obnoxious. This guy seems like he had about the same personality as me. His actions were very expressive and out going. That can only tell me he's a people-pleaser. My last observation, I saw a girl sitting across from me on a bench talking on the phone. As she was talking on the phone I can see she's really frustrated. The reason I noticed that she was frustrated is because she was talking with her hands and her voice kept on progressing louder and louder. Looking at the body language of someone, you can normally find out what kind of mood their in.
In between classes, It was really busy because everybody had a place to be. It kind of reminded me of time square during the afternoon. People really didn't care what anybody else were doing, the only thing on their mind was that they need to get where they were going.
People watching was very exciting to me. What we did was an exercise of learning the outer self. You can tell a lot just by observing the outer self.  I am looking forward to observing the inner self and the self in God. Overall this assignment was extremely fun and exciting.