Reflective Writing

Reflective writing about volunteering and a life lesson I learned:
I will never forget those eyes. No matter where life may take me, no matter how my path unfolds, that moment, that look, that face, those eyes will remain etched in my mind. In every lifetime, there are a few moments that can be deemed life-changing and are capable of defining one's time on this earth. The summer of 2008 was one of those moments, when a small and innocent child deeply impacted me through those ineffable, poignant, unforgettable eyes.
We as a society, or a least the society I grew up in, is governed by materialism as many of us go through life looking solely for self-improvement and self-happiness. As much as I loath to admit, this was exactly how I was, and even when I did volunteer to help others, it was for the volunteer credit, not for the people themselves. In the summer of 2008, this all changed when my family took a trip to India. I had of course been there before to visit my grandparents and other extended family members, but never had I ventured into the rural depths of the country as I would do that summer. When we landed in India in June of that year, my parents first broke to me the news that we would be visiting a school in a small town near the place my dad had grown up as a young child. At the time, I was not sure whether I should be excited to see how far my dad had come from his poverty-stricken town or disappointed that I wouldn't be able to spend my time in the luxury of my grandparents house in the middle of the Chennai, a major city in South India. As we left the city to head into the rural areas, I noticed that the further away from the city we got, the worse the living conditions were; the streets got dirtier, the buildings looked more archaic, and evidence of malnourishment was shown in the people on the sides of the street. It was during this time, that I felt a small doubt creep into my mind on how I had been living up to that point in my young life. I began to notice how fortunate I was to live the way I did, and that there were people in the world who truly needed help.
When we finally reached the rural school, I was dumbfounded. I couldn't move from where I was, not because I was in awe, but because I was in shock at the conditions of the school. It literally looked like a shack, and once inside, I saw that there were no desks and no blackboards, and the extremely meager school supplies, consisting of a few books and posters, that were there were out of date. How could any school function on so little? While I was walking, pondering this appalling thought and how I could help out, I saw one young boy sitting outside of the school staring at me. Seeing the school itself had left me with an unforgettable image, but those eyes that seemed to look into the very depths of my soul were on another level. The child looked to be raised in poverty and had a sort of malnourished look to him, but his eyes told a story their own. They told a story of the hardship he had likely faced trying to make ends meet in the poverty-stricken town; they told of a life where having two meals a day was a luxury; they told a tale of deep sadness, a tale he had remained strong through, but that he was ready to give up. But, there was one other thing I saw in his eyes that struck me; it was a small glimmer of hope, a hope that maybe he could live on and persevere, and that maybe I could help him leave the poverty cycle that had trapped him. If a child who had endured so much in such harsh conditions could have hope for a better future, shouldn't I, someone who has lived in relative wealth, do all I can to help him. Wasn't it Thomas Jefferson that stated, "All men are created equal." If this is true, then isn't it our duty to do everything in our power help those with less than us and raise them to a level of equal opportunity.
When I got back home from the trip to India that summer, I sat down and thought for the first time in my life that maybe I could do something to help someone outside of myself. I realized that even helping that one child realize his hopes would be enough for a lifetime of contentment and accomplishment. Since then, I have founded a club in school to help raise money to send to underprivileged children in India, and have also participated in other charity activities geared towards helping those less fortunate than ourselves. After seeing those eyes, I can truly say that I will never forget that boy and that my very soul has been changed. I have become enlightened to the fact that if you light a lamp for somebody, it will also brighten your path.

This recently came up in a college essay I had to write and it brought back old memories that I thought I would share.

Winesburg, Ohio- new season

This past week in class, we had our fish bowl discussions about the short-story cycle written by Sherwood Anderson called Winesburg, Ohio. To say the least, the discussions were extremely insightful and gave me ideas regarding the topics that I would have never thought about. Among the short stories discussed were "Paper Pills", "Adventure", "Tandy", "Death", and "Loneliness"; for each of the discussions several comments caught my interest. The particular story that I chose was "Adventure" and in reading deeply into the plot and the characters, I discovered deeper meanings that I would have previously not found possible.
The story "Adventure" seems to be about a typical girl, a rather bland maid named Alice Hindman, whose lover, Ned Currie, left her. During their younger years, the two had "hooked up", but then Ned felt his greater calling in Cleveland and left Alice saying that he would be back when he got some money. After failing in Cleveland, he moved to Chicago where he met some women who attracted his attention and eventually forgot all about Alice...except when he looked at the moonlight. Throughout the whole chapter, this one line bugged me and made me wonder why would he, if he had completely forgotten about Alice, remember her when he glanced at the moon. There is a scene depicted in the chapter where the two met in a field under the moonlight, but it seems too ironic to have a definite importance. Usually, the moonlight combined with a summer night symbolizes a lasting love, but in the story, the love doesn't last for more than a few months, at least in Ned's case. Alice is stuck to her love for years after he has gone constantly obsessing over him in an almost fanatical way. This moonlight scene is very similar to the scene in All the King's Men when Jack and Anne both sit in a roadster in the moonlight professing love for each other only to eventually part ways. The irony is repeated as both loves don't last, but the question of why Ned remembers Alice when looking at the moon persists. Despite the irony presented through the love falling apart, Anderson seems to leave remnants of the previous relationship in the moon, thus supporting the symbolic nature of the moonlight present. This ambiguous nature of the moon as shown in the story can go back to the ambiguous qualities of many of the characters. There is no definite clear cut personality in the whole book. Even Alice, who seems to be the prototypical maid, is different due to her nude adventure in the rain. This ambiguous nature, an ambiguity that can once again be tied in with All the King's Men and Willie Stark, may also contribute to the grotesqueness of the characters in the novel.
Anderson seems to have an uncanny ability to tie together seemingly unrelated stories by giving them certain key similarities that are hidden within the depths of his writing. Ms. Clinch stated her fear that the class may not like one of her favorite novels, but I can assure that the fears are unfounded.

Angels in the Outfield: The Abcarian Story of Wing

In class of Friday, we had an intellectually stimulating discussion regarding the brilliant symbols that Sherwood Anderson uses throughout the novel Winesburg, Ohio. Although the stories seem unrelated, the appearance of similar messages and pictures throughout every short story dispel the thought. Among the symbols discussed were rain, passion, windows, artistry, restlessness, and the presence of darkness and shadows. Also in class, a researcher who had done extensive studies on the writings of Anderson was discussed. This literary researcher was called Richard Abcarian. In his studies, Abcarian found a pattern in most of Anderson's stories in Winesburg, Ohio once again showing that the stories are interconnected in portraying some meaning. The four part of this pattern were 1)The central character in the story is already grotesque in his present state, 2) In the story, there will be a flashback to a time when the character was not grotesque to show how the character gained his grotesqueness, 3) The betrayals that cause the grotesqueness occur the moment the character is filled with youthful hope for the future as well as purity, love, and dignity for the self, and 4) The character in his present state has an afterglow or some residue of this previous self before grotesqueness struck. Although not all of the stories have all of the elements listed in the pattern, I found it quite interesting that the pattern did apply to many stories, especially the story called "Hands."
"Hands" is a story about an old man named Wing Biddlebaum who has large, uncontrollable hands. He very rarely talks, but opens up greatly to one man, a man named George Willard who appears throughout the novel. Wing is characterized by his hands, hence the name of the chapter being "Hands", and when he talks or gets excited, his hands take on a life of their own and sometimes he is forced to punch a wall in order to stop them from doing things he doesn't want them to do. Here, as Abcarian indicates, Anderson establishes the character as being grotesque. Next, the flashback occurs, as Wing thinks back to the days he was called Adolph Meyer and was a school teacher in Pennsylvania. He exuded a natural calming presence for children and seemed to be a natural teacher. Even then, he gestured greatly with his hands and even placed his hands on the shoulders of children in order to help them feel comfort. Then disaster struck at the moment Adolph was feeling at home and at peace with himself as a teacher of children as he was filled with hope for the future. One of the children in the school, who like Meyer, told his dad about how Meyer touched him and eventually word spread like wildfire and he was kicked out of Pennsylvania after being accused of being a pedophile. After being kicked out of the town at a point when he was filled with a youthful hope for the future, as Abcarian states, Wing eventually settled in Winesburg, Ohio. At the time of the narration of the story, Wing has told the story to George Willard and his telling of the story indicates that Wing still has an afterglow of he days he called himself Adolph Meyer, the final step in the pattern Abcarian states is present in Anderson's novels.

New Players: Tess and Candide

Success is defined as the favorable, prosperous termination of endeavors or the attainment of wealth, position, honors, or the like. Looking at the above definition, I am not sure whether or not finishing my books on file project can be considered a success. True, I did terminate an endeavor, but was it prosperous. In terms of the grade I am likely to receive, probably not, but in terms of the fact that I just finished reading and doing a project on two famous literary works, maybe. Candide and Tess of the d'Urbervilles are two novels that have been dissected and widely read by scholars for years. There must some reason behind this.
Candide, by Voltaire, was an extremely awkward book to read and understand due to the randomness of it all. The action in the novel seemed to be taking place in a different area every few pages and people kept dying and coming back to life. It was almost absurd to try and read it. If a person got his head chopped off, some magical surgeon or physician could sew it back on and fix it. It seemed that Voltaire was almost satirizing death. After finishing the novel and reading up on the background of the novel, it began to make a little more sense. Before reading the book, I had no idea that the novel was a satire. This was likely a mistake on my part because it caused me to extremely confused and caused my initial lasting impression of the novel to be rather bad. As I previously mentioned, I better understood the novel after learning that Voltaire wrote the novel as a satire of Leibnitz philosophy. Leibnitz, a rival philosopher to Voltaire, claimed that all was for the best at all times. Through a character in the novel named Pangloss, Voltaire showed the absurdity of the claim through a series of random events. The mission of achieving a full satire was the reason for actually randomizing the events. Despite my initial dislike due to my ignorance, I can see why it is considered one of the greatest philosophical, satirical novels of all time.
Tess of the d'Urbervilles, by Thomas Hardy, was an extremely Victorian and romantic novel with love taking a major place in the novel's action and plot. This romantic nature caused me to dislike the novel. Also the language is romantic and dare I say mushy at times and did not contain the slightest appeal to me. Although the genre really didn't suit me, I can appreciate good writing when I see it. Hardy does an amazing job of setting the scene. Each time there was a scene change, Hardy followed with a deep description of the environment, so deep that I could easily visualize the location in my mind. Also, to augment the completeness of the description of the scene, Hardy seemed to seamlessly integrate the characters into the setting. The character's personalities and descriptions matched that of the setting. Overall, the novel was amazingly written, but the genre did not suit me.