The Monster of His Childhood

The reading I picked this week is an excerpt from Rick Bragg's book "All Over But the Shoutin'."  I've been trying to avoid reading or watching depressing stuff for a while now, really ever since my mom died, but the title seemed to jump out at me, so I went with it.  It was sad.  There's something awful about true stories that center on a terrible parent.  Bragg's father is dying, and he's just the same to his son as he ever was.  Bragg wants to resolve all the hurts from his childhood, but, as he's trying to come up with a way to do that, he gradually realizes that it's not going to happen.  
When my mom was dying, she was in hospice care at home.  We were all taking care of her, which was beautiful (I know that sounds strange, but it was beautiful in a lot of ways, mainly because she was a very good parent, definitely NOT the monster of our childhoods, and we felt as though we were doing something almost . . . holy with her--I can't think of a better way to put it) and horrible at the same time.  After three or four days, she stopped talking because of the pain meds, but she was still pretty alert and reacted to what we said to her.  I think we all managed to say everything we needed to say before she reached the point where she couldn't take it in.  But, like Rick Bragg, I have issues that I know I will never get rid of unless I let it go, and again like him, I'm reluctant to let go, but in my case, it's because what I'd be letting go is valuable to me but so complicated and messed up that it would kind of be like trying to cut it out of myself.  If that makes any sense. 
Maybe you can see why I've been avoiding these stories. 

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I Wrote This!

Sorry, Groot.  Your scene was too short.

Yeah, I'm almost finished revising my film analysis, and I didn't post on any of the prompts that would explain what I did in prewriting and drafting and why I did it and what problems I had.  Now it seems pointless to go back and respond to the prompts, so I'm going to summarize it all.
As I mentioned before, I was interested in father-son relationships in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.  That meant that my critical approach was men's studies, but the page on that in the packet we were given didn't really get into this kind of a relationship.  I talked to the prof, and she said to look at the first thing on the sheet, which was "What does this film say a man can or should be?"  Armed with that, I watched the scene I had chosen to ask that question.  
I immediately realized that I needed a new scene.
to be continued 

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note:  All the father and son articles Zemanta listed were about death!  Not what I was looking for.

What Happened to Me?

I remember this.
(Photo credit Wikipedia)

I have a good memory; I remember birthdays, phone numbers, addresses, passwords, even the Bill of Rights.  But now it seems like I can't remember to blog.  I have no excuse.  I just forgot and kept forgetting. 
I've had a bad cold the last couple of days (no excuse--the last time I posted was in September!), and I finished all of my homework except for the final revision of my film analysis, which is almost done.  I checked the course schedule to make sure I had the right due date, and I did, but there it was in the "Writing Due" column:  blog.  In fact, every week's entry ends with "blog."  It's as if my eyes just refused to read it.  What this means is that now, when I should have at least 20 posts, I have only 7.
I don't know why I'm feeling so compelled to post this, probably nobody cares.  I just don't want people thinking I decided not to post.
I'll be back in a few minutes.
I mean it.

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Am I Ready for College?

Robert College Students in the Forum (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My first class starts in less than 2 hours, and after talking with Rebbie, my older sister, over the last couple of weeks, I'm not sure that I really know what to expect.  She told me to check and see if my classes had Blackboard pages yet (two of them did), and that's how I learned that this blog is a major assignment for my English comp class.  So, having set it up, I'm ahead at this point-- but that's not the way I usually am, and I guess that was what Rebbie was trying to get across to me.  It looks like I'll have to make some big changes.

I'm supposed to be introducing myself in this first post, but I think I just gave away a big chunk of info that I normally don't tell anybody.  When it comes to school, I can always find a reason to put homework off until the last minute.  Rebbie asked me how that was working for me (she's kinda sarcastic, in case you couldn't tell), and I have to admit that it doesn't work too well.  I always feel like I'm behind.  Now you know something about me aside from my profile.

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Aliens, or Angels? Who Knows?

English: "The Snake in the Grass or
Satan Transform'd to an Angel
 of Light." At the sides are a
 Puritan and a Covenanter above an
author writing. Courtesy of the
 British Museum.
 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Yeah, I'm playing catch up again.  I really intended to post every day while I was off school, but after working so hard on my critical analysis draft, I was feeling pretty self-indulgent.  Anyway, this morning I realized it was Thursday, and now I'm kicking myself (also again).
I think my draft was okay, although my thesis was not.  I went with:  The information revealed about Quill's father in Guardians of the Galaxy adds up to him being an angel rather than just another nonhuman.  I don't think I really made that point.

I had to make a list of everything that is said about him in the film, and in the draft I basically used the list, except for the material that was in my scene.  The point of this was to include the info without saying too much about all of the other scenes, because I didn't want to give the impression that I was analyzing those scenes (something forbidden in the instructions).  I'll find out if this is a problem at my conference with the prof next Monday, when I also hope to get some help with my thesis.

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Getting a jump on English 101--and alligators!

My class doesn't start until tomorrow, but I looked at the course page on Blackboard and got the first two assignments.  Project 1 is to set up a blog and post 30 100-word entries by the end of the term, so I'm (obviously!) tackling it first.  One of the prompts for this week asks about Project 2, which is a narrative essay about something that happened to me before I was twelve years old.

I think I've already made my decision about what experience to write about, but I can't be sure it'll work until after we talk about the assignment in class.  When I was about 6 years old my parents took us (my sister, brother, and 16-year-old aunt) on a road trip to Miami.  One of the places we went to was a sort of reptile zoo, and my aunt fainted when she saw that a foot-long chunk of an alligator's tail was lying inside the exhibit.  Ever since then, we've been giving her a hard time about it every time we see her.  I think this will work because I've never forgotten it.  All I have to do now is figure out what it means to me.

Related material
Video- Alligator fight.  It's not very exciting, but you can see that the end of the tail is a favorite target when alligators attack each other.