Artifact 2: Awakening

They sat around the heavy oak table; anxiously awaiting the feast of a supper I’d concocted in the transitory silence of the late afternoon. Three identical sets of big brown eyes were upon me as I entered the room. The soft, charming pair so near belongs to my husband of seven strong years. The two playful pairs across from my own belong to our twin boys, Marcus and Mathias, who’ve inherited their father’s features as well as his appetite. My heart flooded with pride as I watched my insatiable boys enjoy what I had provided.

“How is your research going?” His low, smooth voice coaxed me back to the present moment, back to my career and lit a spark of enthusiasm behind my eyes.

“Great, Papi, the clients are doing well with painting,” I smiled. Being an art therapist at a drug rehab facility can be emotionally demanding but the work satisfies my desire to help others and feeds my voracious, creative soul. My time commitment allows me to make dinner and take the twins to their training. Our five year old warriors unleash a portion of their energy on their sensei for half of the week and their boxing coach the other half. By the time they begin college, their skills will rival some of the greatest athletes. They will be healthy, disciplined, and perceptive.

“That is, of course, if they continue to eat their vegetables…” I hoped as I watched the boys shovel down salad.

My eyes drifted to my other half and locked on his. A smile spread across the table. A moment of satisfaction was felt as the hungry were fed. Moments like this are more than a simple meal but are bathed in the warm glow of a blessing.

Suddenly, bright artificial light flooded the windows and blinded my sensitive blue eyes. A shockwave rolled across our farm and shattered the windows. Our cover had been compromised and our moment of normalcy now has passed. The twins just laughed, high fived and transformed. All at once they were wearing capes and were levitating over their chairs. They floated to me and kissed my cheeks before soaring up and out of our ceiling port. The prophesy was true after all. The juvenile heroes, my sweet baby boys, have officially celebrated their awakening.

Artifact 1: Article 1 Community

We share this moment; this particular time in space belongs to us. The world is inhabited by us; we simultaneously nourish and poison it. We are conflicting, eccentric, unsatisfied and hungry. There are no comparable beings to our intelligence, our sentience, and our depth for light years or more. We share everything and seemingly nothing and yet our common identity is inescapable. The community cannot be out run.
Words are an interesting medium for communication. We give names to concrete objects but also express concepts, feelings, hunches, and dreams. Language helps us articulate abstractions that we all experience. It is proof of the existence of our community.
The impact of a term is dependent on the listener’s cognitive process. If it’s something familiar and understood, the brain allows it to move on. The context is considered, memories are consulted, emotions are deployed and identification may take place. A word like community may settle in many parts of the listener’s brain, take root and take over. Contrariwise words may sail over the top of the listener’s head and go completely unregistered.
We have a responsibility to end passive listening. Each person is called by our community to be present in the moment, to participate in reality and own their personal position relative to the community.
Eve Ensler discusses the dangers of feigned personal disconnection from the community. To deny your place is to deny yourself. In Ensler’s case, her denial of her community and her numbness to the world was reflected in the denial and numbness towards her own body. She says “Me only existed in the trying. My body was often in the way.” Those of us who share Ensler’s initial position may actually believe that they are separate entities. The view that allows for a personal and a universal existing unattached is a damaging lie.
Ensler discovered this the hard way. It took loss of a loved one, a debilitating disease, heartbreaking stories poured out by strangers and countless subconscious nudges for her to finally acknowledge her place among us. Life has a way of providing undeniable, unshakable, and impossible to ignore circumstances that herd the straying masses back to their home. Ensler says “I suddenly understood that the crisis in my body was the crisis in the world, and it wasn’t happening later, it was happening now.” Each individual has unique circumstances and different stories to tell. Each of these stories is woven together and suddenly they are no longer discernable. Each story is one pixel of a computer screen and when one steps back all that is seen is the big picture, the human condition, the community to which we all belong.
The sooner this truth is realized, the sooner progress can be made. Just as Ensler has pointed out, living in denial of the community brings about carelessness, lack of responsibility, blame and chaos. The schism of wounded community becomes deeper and infected, fighting against the tides of unity and healing. The self is conjoined to the community and is vitally dependent on it for the sake of developing the world around us as well as for self-growth. We all belong within the community, responding to its pain and rejoicing in its achievements. We are made flexible for the perpetual motion of our community’s flux. We are not intended to break off and become rigid and stagnate. The community is not a place down the street, it is not a group of exotic people half way around the globe, it encompasses us all at every moment in time and it demands to be acknowledged.

Work Cited
Ensler, Eve Suddenly My Body Ted Talk transcription from www.ted.org

Reflection: Engl104 Writing for a community

Community and the Writing Process

The process of writing multiple drafts was mildly helpful to me because it helped me to recognize grammar mistakes and improve organizational structure of the content. The revisions I made on my final drafts didn’t normally change the content or approach, but were useful for the flow and consistency of the piece. When revising I first focus on the sentence level, looking at spelling, grammar and the continuity of the individual sentences. I then went back and revised holistically, making sure my thesis was clear, the paragraphs lead into the next and the organization of the piece made sense.
For example, in Article 1 I paid close attention to the last sentence of one paragraph making sense with the first sentence in the next paragraph. “Each person is called by our community to be present in the moment, to participate in reality and own their personal position relative to the community.” The following paragraph began “Eve Ensler discusses the dangers of feigned personal disconnection from the community,” I chose this method of revision because I naturally work small to large. By starting with detail I more effectively focus on the direction of my piece. Both types of revisions are necessary but the holistic revision was much more beneficial to the quality of the piece. I will probably continue to work this way in the future because I feel that my work really benefited from being consistent, with every part working in one direction.
I think that having a large audience while remaining somewhat anonymous made my writing more focused and accurate without me being discouraged to say what I mean. In other classes where you hand your work in to one teacher, you don’t really care how good your work is. I feel that peer feedback on gateways was more effective than in class because when we do peer revisions in class people are less likely to be interested in your piece and generally do not have constructive things to say. Usually the case is that they look at grammar and spelling and hand your paper back after simply saying “good job”. On gateways it was more thought out and helpful because those who comment were actually interested in your piece and they were not pressured to candy coat their critiques. Instructor feedback was more helpful on paper however because you could visually connect the areas of your paper with the feedback given.
The majority of the advice I received on gateways was very helpful and insightful so it was not hard to decide what advice to apply to my writing. Giving advice on gateways was better than peer revision in class because being able to choose the piece you comment on allows you to be engaged in a topic you’re interested in. Commenting on other’s work in a public domain also encourages you to apply your advice to your own writing because you don’t want to seem like a hypocrite.
I feel my last blog was very significant on a larger scale because it is introducing people to a life in God. This is personally very important and considering the internet is a way to reach a lot of people, I used the blog created in class to reach a wider audience. I also feel my Pro/Am paper raised awareness of an important social issue.

Strengths and Weaknesses

My strengths as a writer are related to my creativity. I enjoy writing narratives because they give me the opportunity to paint a picture with words. My introductory blog starts “They sat around the heavy oak table, anxiously awaiting the feast of a supper I’d concocted in the transitory silence of the late afternoon.” One of my favorite parts of writing is creating the world I’m imagining for my readers.
I also enjoy exploring concepts and relating them to life. Article 1 gave me this opportunity with the prompt being to define an abstract idea. “The community is not a place down the street, it is not a group of people half way around the globe, it encompasses us all at every moment in time and it demands to be acknowledged,” I used language that didn’t limit the scope of my audience because defining “community” applies to all people since the need to belong is part of human nature.
I struggled with the collaborative writing that was required with Article 2 because it is something I’ve never done before. The concept of melding two papers together into one seemed very difficult to me. Luckily my partner and I already had very similar approaches to writing Article 2 and our thesis’ were virtually the same. This made the process much easier because we agreed about the strengths and weaknesses of Wilson’s argument in Apocalypse Now and the way we went about proving his strengths was similar. I believe that this was a very useful experience to have no matter how uncomfortable it may have been in the beginning.
This class has helped me very much in the organization of my writing as well as clarity. The Toulmin argument model and using approaches that Eve Ensler and other writers used to organize my piece was very helpful. Persuasion was not an important aspect of this class but having clear organization is definitely helpful for building credibility and getting people to understand your view. These are skills I will be using in the future.

How to live a fulfilled life

There are so many people searching for answers. It is not uncommon to watch an individual jump around from hobbies, relationships, and jobs hoping to find what will fulfill them. Some spend their entire lives searching for themselves, for their purpose or for the truth. Why is it that the majority of people are left unsatisfied? I believe these people are looking in the wrong place.

Our society values things that will never satiate us. We are living in a culture of excess. In an attempt to justify our dissatisfaction with what we have, we have made it the norm to always want more. When we make things like money, our reputation or our style the center of our lives we are only setting ourselves up for disappointment. Instant gratification loses its appeal, new cars and technology become obsolete, our careers and appearances reach their peak and there comes a time when the things that held all the attention seem empty and routine.

Do you ever wonder if there is more?

There is. Life in Christ is the most fulfilling, most satisfying, most fascinating and peaceful way to spend your life. A lot of readers just turned off, lost interest, gave up. They decided they are content with hustling for money, trying to find activities and things to fill their lives and with maintaining flawed and chaotic human relationships. They believe that science and human knowledge is the only thing to hang their hats on. This is certainly an option that many have chosen, but it won’t satisfy that hunger in your heart no matter how much junk food you feed it.

The truth is that God is our loving creator and every situation you will ever be in is a tool to bring you closer to Him. All you need to do is to seek Him. If you’re analytical, just do some research. God instilled every personality trait you have in you because it will help you realize and reach your purpose. You have absolutely nothing to lose by simply trying a relationship with God, and literally everything to gain.

Groundwire.net is a great place to start. On this website there are resources available to people who want to find out more about God. This includes an option to live chat with a groundwire coach, someone who can answer your specific questions and direct you to other help. Commercials for groundwire like the one below, according to their website, is a way to combat the overwhelming messages of the media by being aired on “MTV, VH1, Cartoon Network (Adult Swim), BET, TruTV, ESPN, Comedy and Nick at Night”.

God has done powerful things even in our generation. By taking a step to learn more about God you are broadening your intelligence, learning more about yourself and giving yourself a chance to be truly happy.

Article 2: Apocalypse Now

Cassieandra18 in collaboration with LonnieKing

          In Apocalypse Now Wilson writes a letter to a hypothetical pastor pleading for a union of religion and science for the sake of the environment. Wilson, as a scientist, acknowledges the separation of the two disciplines and argues that their differences do not need to be reconciled in order to unite under a common cause. Wilson addresses the pastor because the pastor has the ability to influence a lot of people to join him in a quest to become one with science. Throughout the piece, Wilson continues addressing this pastor, but as a whole is really addressing all people in the religious and scientific communities because he wants them to know that solving these problems with the environment is serious.  At one point Wilson stated that if the destruction of the environment does not stop, then most of the animals and plants on Earth will be extinct by the end of the century.

          After reading the piece it becomes clear that the message applies to all people. He does not limit the scope of his essay by using qualifiers that exclude any of his readers; this is one of the many strong points of his work. As human beings, Wilson suggests, we all have a responsibility to care for and protect the environment in which we all and depend on. The political influence of the religious portion of America is also necessary for the science community to make progress in getting legislation passed. Wilson also mentions the issues of poverty and hunger that may be improved by protecting and encouraging the health of our environment. His major grounds are very convincing, his argument is clear and logical and by the end of the piece Wilson has left his readers wondering how they could ignore a message as strong as this.

            Wilson identifies his thesis “Surely we can agree that each species, however inconspicuous and humble it may seem to us at this moment, is a masterpiece of biology and well worth saving.” His premises include the facts on the damage humans have caused the environment and the losses we will surely suffer if action is not taken. Wilson also introduces the tangible benefits of saving our world.

            Wilson’s first ground mentions our human responsibility to take care of the environment. The warrant he provides is “[The environment] serves without discrimination the interests of all humanity. Pastor, we need your help. The creation- living nature- is in deep trouble,” which suggests that we take responsibility for the destructive path the environment is on. Wilson calls each reader out, holding us personally responsible for the deteriorating environment.

            After discussing the estimated extinction rate, Wilson states another warrant. He says “If this rise continues unabated, the cost to humanity- in wealth, environmental security and quality of life- will be catastrophic,” This warrant links the extinction rate to the impending doom the human race faces if measures to protect the environment are not taken. Not only will the plants and animals of our world die out, we will too.

            Wilson states explicitly that “we depend upon [the biospheres] razor- thin health for every moment of our lives,” and immediately follows with his warrant “we must be careful with the environment upon which our lives ultimately depend,” before moving on to his next point.

            Wilson then mentions the wealth of scientific and medical information we will never obtain if our environment continues to be destroyed. After stating these grounds, Wilson does not connect this section of the letter with his next argument. He instead speaks directly to the reader, acknowledging a possible rebuttal forming in the readers mind. He answers this with a warrant, introducing his next point dealing with the political push the religious community would provide. “If religion and science could be united on the common ground of biological conservation, the problem might soon be solved,” and later continues, saying “an alliance between science and religion, forged in an atmosphere of mutual respect, may be the only way to protect life on earth, including, in the end, our own,” A statement which acts as a warrant linking the previous point with his next, concerning the amount of evangelical interest in protection of the environment. This also connects with Wilson’s point that an alliance between science and religion does not require identical worldviews but simply a concern for creation.

Wilson soon points out that “every great religion offers mercy and charity to the poor,” which acts as a warrant for his argument that improving the health of our environment will simultaneously improve living conditions for impoverished and hungry people of the world. This implies that if this pastor is claiming to be part of a great religion focused on improving the lives of fellow humans, he will surely be willing to get involved with Wilson’s cause. This is a very persuasive argument. Wilson challenges the religious community to do their part, not only for our world, but for fellow human beings in great need.

He then concludes that “there remains the earthborn yet transcendental obligation we are both morally bound to share,” This implies that as moral human beings living on earth, we are responsible to each other, to nature and to ourselves to take steps to improve the environment.

Wilson is very strong in his argument because he has a serious lack of qualifiers that limit the reach of his claim. He may repeatedly and explicitly call upon religious leaders but the rationale can be applied to everyone and holds us all equally responsible. Wilson connected his ideas well and supported them with data or examples and evidence that cannot be refuted. He builds his argument in a logical way, from an honest perspective and does not leave any reader out.

Wilson’s argument is similar to Ensler’s theme of community in her Ted Talk piece. The idea that we are all in this together and that we need to take responsibility for each other as well as the world around us is a powerful statement. In a way, they both call out every member of the human race to actively participate in a collective change for the better. Wilson mentions the way petty differences divide a population that is deeply connected. Ensler also discusses this idea in her Ted Talk. Both imply the inherent connection between the environment, nature, the world, and humans. We are responsible for the care of the Earth and dependent on its good health for our own. Conversely, division within the human family only leads to destruction. When united, people are capable of amazing things.

 

Work Cited

Wilson, Edward O. Apocalypse Now. The New Republic. 22 August 2006. Web.            

 15 October 2011. <http://alaninvermont.org/Environment/Apocalypse_Now.html>

Numb to the world

“What are you wearing to the concert, Tia?” I asked with enthusiasm radiating from my smile. My best friend and I got tickets to see our favorite band, like, six months ago. We stood outside all night to be one of the first in line. That night, just as many
others, was an amazing time simply because we were together. Everything seemed like such great fun when it was just her and I. Those memories seemed so far away now as I looked over at my friend.

“I don’t know, jeans, or something?” She answered in monotone as she stared out my car window. I shot her a concerned glance, remembering my once bubbly friend. I’d always admired her passion and drive and most of all, her amusement with the
littlest things. These days she seems less of a cheerleader and more of a zombie, except I doubt she would even perk up for a platter of brains.

We pulled into her long snaking driveway. As I slowly guided my car up near the house I tried to stay positive. “Ok, well maybe we will go shopping tomorrow and get something cute! Does that sound good?”

“Mmm… sure, Nat. I’ll see you then,” She mumbled as she gently shut the door and shuffled to her garage.

As I pulled out onto the street I wondered if our days of excitement ended when she was prescribed her antidepressants. Even going through rough times, at least she was responsive.  Now it seems like she’s numb to the world, the good and the bad. I cherished the days we would have heart-to-heart talks but lately her familiar knowing glances have transformed into blank stares. Tia acts like she is detached from herself and the rest of the world. Where did her emotions go?

The drugs her doctor prescribed her are completely legal and accepted. There are commercials advertising how great life gets after “treating” depression but in our case things have become worse. I do not see my best friend smiling or laughing like the actors in the commercial.

Longest War in American History: Lost

The War on Drugs has been a highly controversial topic since its emergence forty years ago. It encompasses a variety of social issues, legal aspects and financial implications that fuel the debate and intensify opinions of both sides.

Even if you happen to be sick of hearing about it, the fact remains that the way the “war” is being fought now is unacceptable and the issue will not simply resolve itself.

The stakes of this “war” are high. Following the tradition of actual wars, the war on drugs leaves behind it a wake of destroyed lives and lost money. The justification for this initiative is to deter drug usage and prevent addiction, which, admittedly, seems noble enough.

However, while fighting the longest war in American history, many people have begun to question if the goal is realistic. The overall usage and distribution rates have remained stable despite multi-billion dollar investment in the cause.

The supporters are quick to proclaim progress after large scale raids but the speed at which the drug market rebounds renders this absolutely meaningless. In this way the drug market is comparable to the Lernaean Hydra of Greek mythology, after cutting off one head, two grow back in its place.

A common justification of the war on drugs is the well being of America’s impressionable youth. In their eyes, the War on Drugs is necessary to save children from homes broken by addicted parents, from unsafe drug infested neighborhoods, and the temptation of drug usage. Without serious penalties, what is to stop youth from continued usage of dangerous substances after experimentation?

This mindset is dangerous because it hides the government’s greed under a mask of concern for children, not just any children, OUR children. If the well being of citizens is truly at heart, why are treatment methods and harm reduction not at the forefront of the legislation? The impulse is to lock up offenders, charge them legal fees and hope they learn from their mistakes by the time their sentence is up.

This is not how drug addiction works; treatment is needed to change a users habits.

Dealers are likely to pick up where they left off when released from prison, a problem directly caused by the War on Drugs. Since drugs are illegal, their street value increases, making trafficking, producing and selling drugs very lucrative businesses that do not require a resume and degree to obtain.

The points mentioned are only scraping the surface of the entire issue. An entire spectrum of opinions has been offered on these and many other topics dealing with the War on Drugs, but action has yet to be taken to improve the legislation.

For your own well-being, reader, and that of your friends and family, it is important to educate yourself and fight for a policy that will truly improve our communities, our budget and our lives.

Your True Identity

We share this moment; this particular time in space belongs to us. The world is inhabited by us; we simultaneously nourish and poison it. We are conflicting, eccentric, unsatisfied and hungry. There are no comparable beings to our intelligence, our sentience, and our depth for light years or more. We share everything and seemingly nothing and yet our common identity is inescapable.

The community cannot be out run.

Words are an interesting medium for communication. We give names to concrete objects but also express concepts, feelings, hunches, and dreams. Language helps us articulate abstractions that we all experience.

It is proof of the existence of our community.

The impact of a term is dependent on the listener’s cognitive process. If it’s something familiar and understood, the brain allows it to move on. The context is considered, memories are consulted, emotions are deployed and identification may take place. A word like community may settle in many parts of the listener’s brain, take root and take over. Contrariwise it may sail over the top of it completely unregistered.

We have a responsibility to end passive listening. Each person is called by our community to be present in the moment, to participate in reality and own their personal position relative to the community.

Eve Ensler discusses the dangers of feigned personal disconnection from the community. To deny your place is to deny yourself. In Ensler’s case, her denial of her community and her numbness to the world was reflected in the denial and numbness towards her own body. She says “Me only existed in the trying. My body was often in the way.”

Those of us who share Ensler’s initial position may actually believe that they are separate entities. The view that allows for a personal and a universal existing unattached is a damaging lie.

Ensler discovered this the hard way. It took loss of a loved one, a debilitating disease, heartbreaking stories poured out by strangers and countless subconscious nudges for her to finally acknowledge her place among us. Life has a way of providing undeniable, unshakable, and impossible to ignore circumstances that herd the straying masses back to their home.

Ensler says “I suddenly understood that the crisis in my body was the crisis in the world, and it wasn’t happening later, it was happening now.”

Each individual has unique circumstances and different stories to tell. Each of these stories is woven together and suddenly they are no longer discernable. Each story is one pixel of a computer screen and when one steps back all that is seen is the big
picture, the human condition, the community to which we all belong.

The sooner this truth is realized, the sooner progress can be made. Living in denial of the community brings about carelessness, lack of responsibility, blame and chaos. The schism of wounded community becomes deeper and infected, fighting against the tides of unity and healing.

The self is conjoined to the community and is vitally dependent on it for the sake of developing the world around us as well as for self-growth. We belong within the community, responding to its pain and rejoicing in its achievements. We are made flexible for the perpetual motion of our community’s flux. We are not intended to break off and become rigid and stagnate.

The community is not a place down the street, it is not a group of exotic people half way around the globe, it encompasses us all at every moment in time and it
demands to be acknowledged.

 

 

 

 

Work Cited

Ensler, Eve      Suddenly My Body  Ted Talk
transcription from www.ted.org

Pizazz is NOT an option

Our lives today are saturated with overstimulation. The development of technology has undoubtedly shaped our generation’s interests, education and attention spans.  Television and the internet have made information sharing and entertainment exceedingly simple. Not only does the media come to you, but it presents itself in an easily understood, flashy and enticing way.

Books are becoming obsolete with the rise of ebooks and websites and perhaps the love of reading is becoming extinct with them.
Experiencing plain words on a page is dull and exhausting compared to the ease of multimedia. Therefore visual and audio elements have outgrown their uses as creative additions and became a necessity for holding the audience’s attention.

The internet provides an opportunity to employ a unique combination of multimedia and writing together. A modern author who uses blogging as a medium can reach a much wider audience on a much deeper level than in the past. Using images can engage the readers more quickly than words alone. If used correctly, images and audio can be an effective tool to manipulate the reader’s emotions.

Using visual and auditory elements definitely underscores the audience’s expectations. Without these elements, a writer must step up their game to achieve the same impact on their viewers. Changes in font color or size can help grab attention but auditory and video enhancements are much more powerful. Our culture is hungry for constant commotion. Being interesting
is not enough; in exchange for our attention we expect to be consumed, enthralled, fascinated and absorbed in what we are coming into contact with.

Exploring internet humor

I began my blog exploration mission with an attitude of dissatisfaction with the world and nearly everyone in it. Cynically I signed into wordpress hoping to discover a voice mirroring my own or, at the very least, one that was preaching something interesting. I started with hyperbole and a half and found a particular post called “sneaky hate spiral”. Relating very much to the title and image I followed the link and much needed hilarity ensued. It comforts me to know that others experience neurotic episodes from seemingly insignificant things from time to time.

I stumbled on to 27bslash6 and had another hearty giggle. The author, David, had posted an email discussion between himself and authorities of his apartment building about pets which proved to be utterly ridiculous and ultimately sucessful for David. Who knew blog surfing would be such a mood lifter?

I came across somethingson.com which offered an interesting post from yahoo answers about constructing things out of duct tape. The reply came from a sarcastic man in England who suggested “the slightly less popular, but immensely useful ‘shush mask’.”

Next I found an article (also on somethingson.com) about saving money. It included suggestions on how to save on food “Instead of eating, why not try reading a book?”, water “put a brick in your bathtub, to reduce the amount of water wasted filling it,” and work “Why not try burying paleolithic organisms for hundreds of millennia then excavating and refining the resultant black gloop?”. All valid suggestions posed by the author, some more do-able than others, and highly entertaining.

I was surprised at the amount of amusement I got from going through these websites and blogs. I realize there are infinite amounts of categories the pages may fit, but my focus seemed to remain on humor and sarcasm. What drew my attention was highly dependent on my mood and the means by which the blogger went about offering their thoughts. Some used images, others used audio and many let their shared experiences with their reader speak through loaded words. The impact a viewer receives
from the internet can be limitless.