The Life You Save May Be Your Own (Caught'ya #16)

The Life You Save May Be Your Own

Today, we had the pleasure of reading The Life You Save May Be Your Own by Flannery O’Connor. While reading Mr. Delacruz asked us to think about what the short story revealed about the nature of human beings.

In the beginning of the story, we meet Shiftlet, who is a hobo that approaches the house of Lucynell Crater and her daughter Lucynell. Shiftlet and Lucynell begin negotiating about Shiftlet living and possibly working at Lucynell’s house. Shiftlet talks about all the things he has done as well as all the things he can do in order to convince Lucynell to allow him to work at her house. By exaggerating his accomplishments, Shiftlet reveals the narcissistic nature of human beings. We all like to think we are the best. Even when we know we aren’t the best at a certain thing, we often make up accomplishments as well as find other things we are good at to compensate for some of our inadequacies. Many people are obsessed with themselves and believe the sun revolve around them. They are the best at everything and have done the most amazing things in the world. The way Shiftlet brags about himself reveals how poisoning cockiness can be to the human brain.

            Another characteristic of human nature uncovered in The Life You Save May Be Your Own is the “every man for himself” kind of attitude. When Shiftlet abandons Lucynell Jr. at the Hot Spot, he was watching out for himself. Heck, he didn’t want to be married to someone who couldn’t even speak, so he bailed! It can also be inferred that all Shiftlet really wanted was to con the car out of Lucynell Sr., which he successfully did, because he ran away with the vehicle. His actions show all he really cared about was himself. Shiftlet didn’t feel an ounce of compassion for either of the Crater’s. All he wanted was the car so he could go on his merry way. In addition, let’s not forget the fact that Lucynell Sr. essentially sold her daughter off to some stranger! What a terrible mother! Lucynell Sr. uses the quotes, “She can sweep the floor, cook, wash, feed the chickens, and hoe,” and “can’t sass you back or use foul language” when advertising her daughter to Shiftlet! How mean! I think this stems from Lucynell’s want to be free of the intensive care her daughter requires. Lucynell Sr. just wants to be free to do as she pleases without the burden of Lucynell Jr. These actions show how humans tend to only look out for what they want and need. Basically, humans are selfish.

Anyone Lived In A Pretty How Town (Caught'ya #15)

Anyone Lived In A Pretty How Town

            Today we derailed from the John Donne track of poems we have been on the past few class periods and looked at the poem Anyone lived in a pretty how town by E.E. Cummings. Before I start I must confess something that is making my grammar OCD go through the roof: why isn’t the whole title of the poem capitalized? Could it possibly be a typing error or is it because Cummings specifically wants it that way? Whatever the reason, it really annoys me.

            Okay back to what I was saying! I really liked this poem in comparison to Donne’s poems because Anyone who lived in a pretty how town is much easier to read, and it is much more fun to read due to its rhyming schemes and the song-like way it rolls off your tongue. Not only is it the easy reading of Anyone who lived in a pretty how town that I like, it is the message it presents.

Cummings paints the picture of a depressed town where everything is fake and everyone just goes through the motions. Throughout the poem, Cummings uses the repetition of the lines, “summer autumn winter spring” and “stars rain sun moon” to show the monotony of the town. Days and seasons pass, people go about their day and the counterfeit smiles adorn the folk’s faces. In a sense, these lines literally represent the robotic-like attitude of the townspeople E.E. Cummings is trying to portray.

Nobody shows any REAL emotion and nobody cares about anyone else in the town. The quote, “Women and men (both little and small) cared for anyone not at all” embodies the lack of compassion Cummings writes about. I also think Cummings implies that any empathy that is shown is not genuine in the slightest. Sounds like a pretty melancholic place to live!

I almost feel like parts of Anyone lived in a pretty how town can be seen in DeWitt, and more specifically, in DHS; especially the monotony. Every year, students file in and file out, each with their heads down. Nobody looks up and expresses emotion. We are like zombies in that respect! Students seem to be emotionless creatures just taking up space and making our limbs move. The lone exception is the wonderfully ecstatic Abby Ruch, who is always spewing her thoughts, emotion, and overall spontaneity. Besides Abby, everyone has their routine. They must there at that time, no exceptions. I will say that I am part of the epidemic, especially during the high tide of the fall months. Now that I ponder this, it is almost depressing. I need to inject some emotion and some laughter into each day, or I might possibly turn into a robot/zombie after all. I need a living and breathing interjection! 

Louis C.K. and The Flea (Caught'ya #13)

Louis C.K. and The Flea

I really enjoyed to “MOMO” today. Louis C.K. was exceptionally funny while delivering some great points. The biggest point he made was everything is amazing and nobody is happy. If you really think about it, he is absolutely right! We experience the best technology known to man and yet we continue to gripe over the little things. Instead of getting frustrated over slow service, you should appreciate the cell phone even exists. Just give it a second! It’s retrieving information from space! I also really enjoyed his airplane story. We really should be ecstatic to travel via an airplane, because it is after all, amazing. It made me think back to my flight to China. I was a bit disappointed with some of the food served on the plane, but now that I think about it, I was being served hot food thousands of feet in the air while traveling over 500 miles per hour! How incredible is that!

Comics do the same thing as poets: they bring to light issues in life but with a lot more swearing and humor. Mr. Delacruz also noted how even comedy needs a thesis statement like an essay does. Imagine if there was no premise in an episode of Modern Family. You wouldn’t understand the jokes as much as you would if there was a lead in to introduce the conflict for that specific episode. This “MOMO” goes to show how crucial a thesis is.

Today we also looked at the poem The Flea by John Donne. We were asked to use the SOAPSTone principle to decipher what Donne was trying to say. SOAPSTone means:

Ø  Speaker: Who is telling the story?

Ø  Occasion: What is the time and place of the piece?

Ø  Audience: The group of people to which the piece is directed at.

Ø  Purpose: What is the reason behind the text?

Ø  Subject: Who/what does the author talk about in the work?

Ø  Tone: What is the attitude of the author?

I had a very hard time understanding The Flea, but alas this is what I came up with:

Ø  Speaker: A man, probably middle aged.

Ø  Occasion: A breakup or trying to date someone. An event that includes two different people.

Ø  Audience: Possibly talking to a friend or family member about the problem.

Ø  Purpose: To get feelings out/to vent.

Ø  Subject: Flea, blood, and two people.

Ø  Tone: Angry and frustrated?

After we completed this, people volunteered and used other classmates to act out what they thought the poem meant. I realized there were so many ways to interpret the meaning of the poem, and there is no right answer. Mr. Delacruz raised the argument The Flea is about a man trying to get a woman to have sex with him, and he uses their blood inside of the flea to make the point their blood is already together in a flea, so they should just combine their bodily fluids in real life. If Mr. Delacruz did not bring this up, I would’ve never looked at The Flea from this perspective. It actually makes a lot of sense. The man is trying to woo the woman and uses the flea to make his point they should just get it on. A weird way to try to get a girl to bang you, but hey, whatever works. He could be considered the first recorded “YOLOer” because he simply tells the woman to just have sex with him and it’s not a big deal. What a guy!

CP's in 1984 & Scarlet Letter