Before I came into this class, I was an above average reader.  Reading was my hobby; I loved to read.  But academic studies halted my pleasure reading because I had to do homework and study.  After the class, I think I have improved slightly on my reading.  When I read now, I now take in details I usually just forget and I analyze things I usually just let slip by.  This is so because of the in-class discussions with questions that are really detailed-oriented.

I think I was a fairly good writer before I came into the class, but I think I have improved a great deal.  But I am not one to decide that and I am not certain as I haven’t received any feedback on my writing this whole year.  I think I have the ability to write with more descriptions because of the “loaded word essay” we did a while back.  That was really fun to try to make everything come alive with sense, touch, and sight, to try to lift the words off the page and surround the reader with new sensations.

My least favorite was probably reading Native Son, but other than that, I rather enjoyed everything we did.  I didn’t not like anything.  My favorite assignment would probably be blogging because it’s nice to receive feedback from my classmates.

I perceive myself to be a hard-working and determined student.  I will do whatever it takes to finish my homework or assignment, even if it takes me until 1 in the morning to complete it.  As a person though, I am loud, friendly, weird, crazy, and some people say I am always happy.  In general, I have learned a lot about who I am and what I stand for this year.  This class might be a part of it, but everything has contributed to how I grew in maturity and in my beliefs.

This was my first experience in blogging and it has been very positive and fun.  I remember when I received my first comment from someone who wasn’t in my class.  It was very sweet and it was very exciting.  I like how I got to express my ideas to the unknown world and receiving feedback on it.

My advice for incoming students is to just try your best and work hard.  Hard work really will get you far.  Oh, and be nice.

That’s it.  Thanks for a wonderful year.

The Color Purple by Alice Walker is the book for you.  Yes, it is also a musical and a movie, but the book is something else.  It talks of women empowerment and it tells a heartfelt and human journey of a black girl abused by her stepfather and her husband.  It tells of how she later found her voice and her individuality and stood up for herself.  It tells of how she gained respect, not only from herself, but from other people.  She has to work through many hardships.  She gives birth at a very young age; the father of her children is her own father.  Her babies then gets ripped away from her arms and sold to another family.  She was later married to a cruel husband and whose children despise her.

“Dear God,

I spent my wedding day running from the oldest boy.  He twelve.  His mama died in his arms and he don’t want to hear nothing bout no new one.  He pick up a rock and laid my head open.  The blood run all down tween my breasts.  His daddy say Don’t do that! But that all he say.”  (12)

Told in broken English, Celie describes her life, and her courage and strength speak out to God.  But it seems as if God isn’t listening.  Celie learns how to find her voice and how to speak up for herself throughout the book, with the help of the beautiful and exotic Shug Avery.  Shug Avery is like Celie’s God, and she teaches Celie a bit about religion in the end too, how something as simple as the color purple is worth one’s admiration.

This quote tells of Celie’s impression of Shug: “Shug Avery is standing upside a piano, elbow crook, hand on her hip… Her mouth open showing all her teef and don’t nothing seem to be troubling her mind… The Queen Honeybee is back in town.

Lord, I wants to go so bad.  Not to dance. Not to drink…Not even to hear Shug Avery sing. I just be thankful to lay eyes on her.” (25)

This book is fast paced and full of empowerment.  It is a very good book to read.  It opens your eyes to the cruelty that does go on in the world, but it teaches how one can survive through anything.  It mainly teaches about standing up for oneself, because Celie finally did and she became successful.

The first person Eddie met in Heaven was “The Blue Man”.  Even though they were strangers when they were both alive, their lives were connected.  It turns out that the Blue Man died because little Eddie ran out into the street and caused The Blue Man to swerve out of the way to avoid hitting him.  He crashed into a fruit cart and had a heart attack.  Little Eddie made it to the other side of the street unscathed.  The lesson the Blue Man gave Eddie was, “there are no random acts.” ” Every life is connected.” and “strangers are just family you have yet to meet.” “No life is ever a waste.”  I agree that every life was put on this earth to do something; everyone has a purpose in life, no matter how small.  When I watched this scene in the movie, it was scary that you could responsible for some people’s death without even realizing it.

The second person he meets is his old captain from the war.  His captain taught him that sacrifices are something to be proud of, not ashamed.  All his life, Eddie was ashamed of his sacrifice.  When talking with his captain, it was revealed that he was the one who shot Eddie in the leg.   The captain sacrificed Eddie’s leg to save his life.  The captain said that sacrifice is noble, and its the thing that makes humans humans.  From this scene, I learned that everyone has a different heaven.  The Blue Man’s heaven was the Pier and the captain’s heaven was the world before the wars and the killings.

The third person that Eddie met in heaven was a total stranger.  It was in fact the girl that Ruby Pier was named after and built for.  She taught him how to forgive.  All of Eddie’s life, he never forgave his father for being abusive.  But you can’t go through life hating someone forever.  Sometimes, you just have to forgive them.

The fourth person Eddie met was his beautiful wife, Marguerite.  Her heaven is young couples’ weddings because she loved her wedding with Eddie.  She teaches him that love never dies, it is just shown differently.  Eddie regretted all his life that Marguerite died before he did, but he learned that she could feel his love all the way from heaven.  It connects with how someone never truly dies, because they’ll always live on in your memory.  Eddie never stopped loving his wife.

The last person Eddie meets in heaven is Tala, the young girl in the hut that Eddie burned.  She teaches him that everyone has a purpose on earth.  Eddie feels as if his life was a waste, but his purpose was to prevent all the deaths that could have resulted from poor maintenance in Ruby Pier.  By doing his job, he saved many lived.  His last person also tells him that he did in fact, save the girl from the falling cart.

And the movie ends.  This movie can bring many tears and make anyone appreciate life.  Life is short, make the best of it.

“In nineteen minutes, you can mow the front lawn, color you hair, watch a third of a hockey game… In nineteen minutes, you can stop the world, or you can just jump off it. In nineteen minutes, you can get revenge.” (1)

You open this book and there you read those thought provoking lines.  Now let me ask you this: Is it all just fun and games when you tease someone? How about when you push them, call them names, or bully them?  Do you make fun of someone just because they are different from you?  In Nineteen Minutes, Jodi Picoult explores what can, could, and does happen when the person being bullied has had enough.  Peter Houghton has been ostracized from society all his life because he was not the typical athlete, and he was “different” from everyone else.  Instead, he was sensitive and creative and for that, he was bullied, called names, been shoved into lockers, beaten up, and being tortured.  No one took the time to talk to him or listen to him.  They always told him to “get used to it” or “man up” whenever he had problems. His own family didn’t accept him for who he was.  It was the last straw when his one and only friend started turning on him too, because she wanted so badly to be part of the popular crowd.

“Ask a random kid today if she wants to be popular and she’ll tell you no, even if the truth is that if she was in a desert dying of thirst and had the choice between a glass of water and instant popularity, she’d probably choose latter.” (241)

Everybody wants the feeling of being accepted into a crowd.  It is the essential ingredient to surviving in this cruel world, and being popular means the high life, or the dirt track.  But why? Why do we mark the people who are different from us?  Why do we put so much importance on being “popular” and “fitting in”?  Why do we not encourage individuality or independence?  This book delves into these questions and explores the emotions that go behind every action, every thought.  It makes the readers forget all they ever thought or knew about bullying and stress, how 16 years of hate can make a person bring a gun to school and go on a killing spree.  This book brings readers to every person’s lives and explores their emotions and how one act affects them all.  The thing that struck me close to home the most was how I see bullying being committed every day at school, and how I would feel responsible if I wasn’t there to listen or lend a hand to someone who needs it the most because I was too absorbed in my own problems.  After reading this book, I felt the need to listen to people more and to stop bullying whenever I see it, because it just might make a difference.  Try it.

book cover: http://www.jodipicoult.com/images/covers/19-400.jpg

http://lahaiseslair.com/crystalk/2010/01/26/133/

“He takes my head down, down, smash my skull goes into the piercing corner of the coffee table.  Pain splinters my face… I cannot cry.  I am going to die.” (156)

In this mesmerizing and horrific story about one of the most covert forms of child abuse, Julie Gregory retells her life story in Sickened.  Her childhood was a plethora of doctor’s appointments, medical exams and test, pills, medicine, starvation, verbal and physical abuse, and pain.  Julie was a sickly child, and her mother always thought something was wrong with her.  She would take Julie to countless doctors across the state to unearth the mysterious disease.  In actuality, Julie was just a normal little girl.  This tells the story of a form of child abuse called Munchausen by proxy (MBP).  MBP is when a caretaker of a child falsifies medical illness to gain attention and sympathy from others.  Julie would have numerous, and often invasive, tests performed, but the results would always show up normal.  The very people who were supposed to help and care for her were the exact people who broke down her soul.  They didn’t have enough compassion or understanding to even hear her story.  In a letter she received from her friends, it harshly portrays the view many had of her situation, “… made the whole thing up, trying to get us to feel sorry for you… Nobody’s mom does those things…You are scumbucket trash…” (131)  Through all of the adversaries, Julie somehow managed to pry herself away from the abuse and start a new life.  She got a job and went back to school.  When she learned of what her mother did to her, that she was never actually sick, that she missed having a life because of her mother’s selfish ways, she grew angry and bitter.  She learned how to heal her broken soul.  This is her story, her recovery, her life.  No one should ever have to go through a life of child abuse, but not only did Julie Gregory survive, but she found the courage to write and to inform others of this atrocious act.

So pick up this book and start learning!

book cover:http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/413SDZFCEAL._SX500_.jpg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfq_A8nXMsQ