10/6/2017 0 Comments Life Choice: Is This My Tradition?Write a 50-word introduction that provides the focus of the blog post (two-sentence summary of the story and transition to questions) and a link to the reading. In the story The Lottery written by Shirley Jackson, there is a village that had a tradition annually called “the lottery.” During the lottery, the men draw one piece of paper out of the annually used black box. When all of the villagers were done picking, Mr. Hutchinson had the marked paper. There was a black dot in the center of the paper. This indicates that Mr. Hutchinson and his family all need to draw again for the chance to pick the paper with the black dot. Once everyone drew a paper, it was revealed that Mr. Hutchinson’s wife, Tessie, had picked the paper with the black dot. This now indicates that all of the village people stone her until she dies. So the fellow villagers all picked up a stone, even her own family, and stoned Tessie Hutchinson to her death. Write a 200-word argument that responds to this question: Are there any American traditions that share similarities with the lottery tradition in the village? Please provide a link to an article that illustrates the tradition you choose to discuss. One American tradition that shares similarities with a tradition from the lottery is murder and violence. There have been countless acts of violence and murders that have happened in America. One recent event is what has happened in Las Vegas, Nevada. Recently, there was a mass shooting in Las Vegas that resulted in the death of 58 people and over 500 injured. This has been one of the biggest mass shootings and violent acts in the country. Another violent and murderous event that happened in America was the Boston marathon bombing in Boston, Massachusetts. In the middle of the marathon, two bombs went off near the finish line killing 3 people and injuring over 260 other people. There have been plenty of other violent and murderous acts that have happened in America, and the Las Vegas shooting and the Boston bombing are just a few. In The Lottery, the violent and murderous act performed in the village was the stoning of Tessie Hutchinson. This lottery happens annually in the village, meaning someone gets stoned to death every year. One man said that he has been involved in the lottery drawling for over 77 years. If this violent and murderous lottery happened every year for over 77 years, that’s 77 people murdered, which is a big chunk of people. In conclusion, America and the village from The Lottery share a tradition of having violent and murderous act happen in the area. Write a 200-word narrative that illustrates a response to this question: When have you made an important choice to break away or not break away from a strong cultural tradition you shared with a family, friend, or culture?
A tradition I used to share with my family was playing sports. I did not actually play the sport with my family, but we would encourage each other to try out for teams, talk about practices, go to each other’s games, and overall use the sport as a family bond. In high school, I played volleyball for my school. I would start tryouts in the summer time, play throughout the fall, and repeat the process every year. My family would come to almost all of my games and cheer me on; I would talk to them about practice and conditioning, and we would have full out conversations about anything that happened during the sport. However, when I finished the season during my senior year, I decided that was my last year playing and I would not play in college. I chose not to for a couple of reasons. One reason is because I started playing the sport later on compared to when everyone else on the team started playing. I started high-school level volleyball my sophomore year, while most of them started in 8th grade. This caused me to not be as good as most of my other team mates. This also meant that I did not get a lot of playing time, which caused me to not fully enjoy being on the team. The other reason is because I did not really get along with my team mates. I never really talked to them besides being at practices or games, so we were never close friends. I also believe that since I was not as good as them at the sport, then they would look down on me for it. I would catch them looking at me funny if I messed up, saying not-so-nice things about me, and I really did not want to deal with this anywhere else. These two reasons caused me to not want to play the sport anymore, or any sport really. Now, I do not play any sports so I do not have that traditional “sports bond” that I have every year with my family. Although my parents were not thrilled that I decided not to keep going with volleyball, I think they understood and we all moved past it.
0 Comments
Write a 50-word introduction that provides the focus of the blog post (two-sentence summary of reading and transition to questions) and a link to the reading. In Hills Like White Elephants written by Ernest Hemingway, a man and a woman are sitting in a train station waiting for the train to come. The man and the woman are a couple, and they both have a big decision to make. The woman is unexpectedly pregnant and they both have different perspectives about the situation. The woman wants to keep the baby, and the man does not want to keep it. The man keeps pushing the woman to convince for her to want to have an abortion; however, the woman wants to keep the baby and wants the man to accept life with their child. I will now be answering questions as to whether I believe that the woman kept the baby or not, and when I have been in a situation where I stayed or left a relationship. Write a 200-word argument that responds to these questions: Does the girl in the story keep the baby? Does she stay in her relationship with the man? I believe that the woman does keep the baby. One reason why I believe this is because the author mentions a beaded curtain multiple times to show its significance. The woman at one point takes 2 beads from the curtain and holds them in her hands. I think these 2 beads, which are held together by a thread, symbolize the relationship that a mother has with her child. I believe that the woman held these beads because she wants the relationship between a mother and a child, therefore wanting to keep the baby. Another reason why I think she kept the baby is because in one point of the story, the woman says “And once they take it away, you never get it back.” I believe she said this as in talking about the baby. If she gets an abortion, she can never get the baby back that is currently developing. Sure she could get pregnant again, but it would never be that exact child that she aborted. The last reason is because the woman says to the man, “That’s all we do, isn’t it – look at things and try new drinks?” The tone that I am receiving from this statement is boredom, and I believe that she is bored of her and the man’s relationship. Therefore, if she is bored and tired of their relationship and she hints numerous times that she does not want to abort the baby, I believe that in the end she decides to keep the child, no matter if it means that her husband is unhappy with her decision. Write a 200-word narrative that illustrates a response to this question: When have you made an important choice to stay in a relationship or leave a relationship -- OR -- stay or leave a difficult situation? I encourage you to write a scene that shows the moment. Consider using dialogue.
A few years ago, I made an important choice to leave a relationship with this guy named Joe. We had only known each other for about 3 or 4 weeks before we started dating. Since we did not know each other for long, I wasn’t head over heels for this guy, but of course I liked him. However, I knew that he and his friends hung out with people that I did not get along with. One day, my friend Sam came up to me and said “I need to tell you something.” I froze and thought that it had something to do with Joe, beings that Sam and I did not really hang out unless we were hanging out with Joe and his friends. She told me that one of Joe’s friends had told her that Joe had cheated on me with 2 other girls that I knew. I was furious. How could I not have known this? I should have seen this coming when I knew that he was hanging out with a crowd that I did not belong with. I immediately texted him and told him to meet me at this coffee shop. As I was sitting there with a warm cup of coffee in my hands, I look up and see him walking toward me. When I saw him, my skin started boiling and my breaths started becoming heavier. The closer he walked toward me, the more my skin boiled and the heavier I had to take each breath. He sits down with this shameful look on his face. The look of guilt and sinfulness was directly in his eyes. I said “so, do you want to tell me about Teresa and Katie?” His eyes start to move downwards as his cheeks start to turn to a pinkish red color. As I sit there with the cup still in my hands waiting for his answer, he does not move a single muscle. After a long, cold minute, he says “I’m sorry.” I say “I am too,” picked up my coffee and my jacket, and left. Ever since this day, I have not talked to Joe or any of his friends, and they were the best group of people that I decided to get rid of in my life. 9/19/2017 1 Comment Life Choice: To Tell the Truth?
In this blog post, I will be reflecting on the reading What You Don’t Know written by Lulu Wang. In this story, Lulu’s grandmother was given 3 months to live; however, her family did not want her to know. Therefore, the grandmother’s sister, children, grandchildren, and everyone kept that secret from her so she could continue living happily. I will be answering questions as to whether I agree with that decision or not and if I had done something that can relate to what Lulu’s family did to her grandmother. Write a 200-word argument that responds to this question: Did you agree with the family's choice to deceive Wang's grandmother? I actually do agree with the family’s choice to deceive their grandmother. At first, I did not. I wondered how they could keep something so big from her, especially if it was their grandmother’s own life. I then thought that if it were my life, I would want to know if I was going to die soon. This way I could get to do everything in life that I was not able to do yet, maybe take a trip to somewhere I always wanted to go and never got the chance to. However, by the end of the story, I completely changed my mind. Someone in Lulu’s story had told her that if they tell their grandmother that she is going to die, then she will focus on it and make herself unhappy, and they did not want her to do that. They wanted her to continue being happy instead of knowing that she only has a little longer to live. After hearing that opinion, I started to agree with the decision. They did not want their grandmother to suffer and become depressed knowing that she was going to die, so it made sense that they wanted her to live out the rest of her days as happy as she could. After realizing that, I realized that I probably would have wanted to live the rest of my days as happy as I could too, I don’t want to look forward to the time I die. In the end, I agree with the family’s decision to not tell their grandmother she was going to die and let her be as happy as she could be for as long as she could. Write a 200-word narrative that illustrates a response to this question: When have you made an important choice to tell someone a difficult truth or you made an important choice to tell a lie that had a major impact on you and/or someone else?
Just recently, I had made an important choice to tell a difficult truth to my boyfriend. We were working at an event in Radnor, PA and our job was to watch moon bounces. As I was working mine, a volunteer came up to help me with watching the kids. He was about my age and we were talking for a while, and when he had to leave he said that we should hangout and gave me his phone to put in my number. First of all, I’m horrible in those situations. Do I tell him I have a boyfriend? Would he get mad? Will my boyfriend get mad? I froze and basically had no time to think of an excuse, so (stupidly) I put my phone number in his phone. I knew I wasn’t going to text him (mean, I know), but then I needed to decide to tell my boyfriend what happened or not. I know that if he did what I did then I would want to know so I can know I can trust him and that he isn’t hiding anything from me. Therefore, I knew I needed to tell him, but I knew that he was not going to be happy with me. After I told him, he was mad at me but I told him that I wasn’t going to talk to the kid at all, and I just didn’t know what to do. He understood, but he was still angry. Everything was fine at the end of the day and we were okay. Now, I hope that he knows that he can trust me and that I make some dumb decisions when I am put on the spot. 9/14/2017 5 Comments Life Choice: The Powers That Be?
This post is a reflection on the short story I read called “My Name is Margaret” written by Maya Angelou. This story is about how this young girl, Margaret, works for a lady named Mrs. C. One day, Mrs. C’s friends were over, and one of her friends told Mrs. C that Margaret’s name is too long to say and in her opinion, she would call Margaret Mary. The next day, Mrs. C called Margaret Mary, and long story short, Margaret decided to get revenge on Mrs. C by breaking Mrs. C’s favorite casserole dish and two green class cups. I will be writing my opinions and argument to questions that relate to this reading. In my opinion, I do agree with Margaret’s choice to break the casserole dish and the two glass cups. I agree because Mrs. C took away Margaret’s identity by calling her by the wrong name on purpose. Also, Mrs. C was showing Margaret that she is socially ranked above her and she can call Margaret whatever she wanted to, and there was nothing Margaret could do about it. I do not think that anyone should be treated this way, and anyone who does treat other people this way should get revenge or some type of bad karma. When Margaret broke Mrs. C’s casserole dish and the two green glass cups, she also broke free of Mrs. C’s abuse of acting as her slave. One reason why Mrs. C loved those dishes so much is because they were handed down to her through generations, just like her wealth and high class. Margaret breaking those items took something that Mrs. C owned and loved, just as Mrs. C took away Margaret’s name that she owned and loved. Therefore, I think that Margaret had every right to break Mrs. C’s casserole dish and her two green glass cups. |
Julia ThorntonI am using this blog for my English course and beyond Archives
December 2017
CategoriesAll Life Choice Making Connections Memoir Proust Questionnaire Reflection Research Paper Student Choice Summary Where To Invade Next Writing Process |