[the power of suggestion forces you to click on this link]

Monster by Walter Dean Myers is a story of a hopeless teenager. As readers, we don't know much about Steve Harmon. We know that he is on trial for murder, he is presently in jail, he is black and sixteen years old. His story doesn't seem outstanding, he just seems to be a troubled youth. But while reading his movie version[screenplay] version of his reality, you see small scenes from his small life and his desperate thoughts: "I'm innocent." Soon I started to realize that this isn't just a story of guilty/innocent, it is a story of proving an under aged and unlucky boy's humanity.


So, as I do in a lot of my posts, I will find definitions of the word 'humanity' and similar words. Dictionary.Reference.com says humanity is "the quality of being humane; kindness; benevolence." merriam-webster.com says being humane is "marked by compassion, sympathy, or consideration for humans or animals". And if being 'humane' is simply showing compassion and generally being kind, everyone can be 'humane'. Everyone has their own small moments of kindness and small niceties. It seems very easy to prove someone is humane but then again, proving someone is innocent is something completely different...


The reader begins to see the world through Steve Harmon's eyes, and the world becomes an ugly place. It seems like everyone judges him because of the color of his skin. "Half of those jurors, no matter what they said when we questioned them when we picked the jury, believed you were guilty the moment they laid eyes on you. You're young, you're Black, and you're on trial. What else do they need to know?" says O'Brien, Steve's defense attorney. In response, Steve says something very ,very interesting. He says "I thought you're supposed to be innocent until you're proven guilty?" And he brings up a very good point. Everyone is looking at him, and just because he is on trial, he is judged. Just because he is young, he is judged. Just because he is Black, he is judged. As a youth, he must already be slightly insecure and this must be really shaking him up(it would shake me up).
The prosecutor called Steve a "monster", causing him to feel uncomfortable. He is questioning himself. And I think that the power of suggestion is acting up. When people call him things, I think he believes them. I think he is slowly giving up hope on his innocence. But I'm not done with the book yet. So, I'm left thinking... Do you think that he will become a monster if he is called a monster? Do you think that the jurors will be humane, and judge him solely on the evidence?

Extremely Sad and Incredibly Beautiful

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer was a small book about life and death, love and war, and gain and loss. It was very beautiful but granted, very sad. When reflecting upon what I was going to write about, I realize how increasingly beautiful something becomes when it is heartbreaking. But does sadness in literature always make a good story? It's not the large topics in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close that really hit home, rather, it's the small moments of life before the mournful moments of death.

Oskar's, the narrator's, father died in 911. Oskar's grandfather's family died in the bombing of his home town. Both Oskar and the grandfather character, Thomas, are in between life and death. Once Thomas said "life is scarier than death". I always found this concept very interesting. Every since I first heard Mystery Jets' song Dreaming of Another World (Side note: I have written about the Mystery Jets before. I'm very sorry if it is getting stale and if you think I am a broken record for only talking about this one song, from this one band. Please forgive.) There is a lyric that reads "to live or to die, the riddle without a clue". After hearing this, I kept thinking about how death compares to life? Honestly, to me living outweighed death every time. But nearly all of the characters in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close found living a dreaded chore. This is because all the characters believe that life is scarier than death. They have lost many family members to political violence. Even Oskar, no, especially Oskar feels that wavering between life or death is a legitimate choice. “Everything that’s born has to die, which means our lives are like skyscrapers. The smoke rises at different speeds, but they’re all on fire, and we’re all trapped”, says he. He feels just as figuratively trapped as Thomas, the grandfather, and just as physically trapped as Thomas, his father.

In the flashback part of the story, Thomas, the grandfather, remembers the first time he "made love". (Side thoughts: He uses that term, "making love", that always bothered me. What is the difference between having sex, and making love? Nothing, it is two different words with the same definition. Like joy and happiness, cry and sob.) He remembers how much he loved her, and how she asked for them to "make love". And he remembers her wincing. When he asks her if anything is wrong, she says no. He asks her why she winced, and she said because it hurt. The next week or so, she died in the bombing. She was pregnant. To me, this is the definition of love: desire and pain.

To expand, can you live your life without fear of losing everything? Thomas and Oskar cannot, they are scarred by the horrible events that unfold and take everything from them. They are paralized by this fear and it prevents them from fully living their lives. Thomas used to have a family, a loving girl, an upcoming child, and a lovely home. But all of these things were ripped out of his hands, leaving him unable to love and resettle.

I honestly don't know what to believe about life and death, love and war, and gain and loss. After reading this book, it seems that one has to overcome fear in order to move forward. I feel I have only become more puzzled about my beliefs after reading Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. I have even been questioning my writing style. To make a story beautiful, does it need to be so unnecessarily sad?

A Shakespeare Related Post....

It's a bad sign (I think) when your favorite part of a book is the end. It has only happened to me twice; while reading Youth in Revolt and It's Kind of a Funny Story. The last page or so of It's Kind of a Funny Story (by Ned Vizzini) was one of the most beautiful things I have read (and it really inspired me to run free and really live life), but the beginning is just so sad and depressing and it was rubbing off on me. It makes me think a lot about the title of Shakespeare's play All's Well That Ends Well. I honestly have never READ it, but I find the title a piece of art in itself that we can deconstruct and think about if it is relative. Does a bad beginning paired with a great ending, make the bad beginning so much better?

I would say it is a true statement for books and movies because they are not as serious or real as current world events. Reading a book or watching a movie cannot affect the masses negatively in the same way that a war or a natural disaster can. When people are severely hurt from an experience, a happy ending isn't going to erase the unhappy event in its entirety. It can only give hope for repairing the world. In real life happy endings don't always follow disastrous events.

"When the time comes to leave, just walk away quietly and don't make a fuss" -Banksy

By BANKSY
found in Southbank, London

Untittled

White and clean
The dress beckons
Do I want to try you on?
Yes, I reckon

You look so pretty
Ironed flat
You fit me like a glove
How about that?

Red and shiny
You glisten from afar
I wish to be a part of you
Your contrast on the tar

When I spare the dime
You laugh and say
"We have have no time,
I must go away"

I smiled
And curtsied
We said our good byes
I reached a hand out to say
"I wish I could fly"

I know what your thinking,
And don't you fret
I think of the balloon everyday, but yet
I still don't miss it
For I know
Everything has its time to go

When Should We Stop Watching, And Start Living?

I know this is sinful, but I haven't read at all this week! The largeness of Youth In Revolt by C.D.Payne intimidates me, and causes me to run away from the book instead of reading it. But this weekend I was thinking about it while my family and I were driving to see my cousins. I have come up with a question; When Should We Stop Watching, And Start Living? My question breaks down into these other questions: How does one view and interact with the world? What is considered 'living'?

I come from a family of watchers. My mom is a photographer and has a certain view of the world and shes not afraid to express how much she likes or dislikes something. She often shows me what a great photograph would look like, and describes why. I have odd memories of my mom and I moving slowing into the shadow covered park, taking in each and every small blade of grass and making it a pretend photograph and framing it in between our fingers. I still do that now, except I do it in my head. I look at the world through a specific lens; one that automatically creates a story, composition, contrast, and beauty in the world around me. This does not nessicarily make me a "good" artist, instead an avid viewer of this world. This also causes me to think too much, and psychoanalyze things. If I am brought up with an opportunity, I am likely to think too much, and then the moment passes when I have reached a decision.

Nick Twisp, the narrator of the story, is also a watcher. He never really speaks back, or does anything daring, or hangs out with new people. But when he meets Sheeni, he suddenly changes. She dares Nick to be "bad", and start living. But what is considered living? I would say doing what you love. So if he doesn't enjoy being bad, why should he? Why should we change for someone else? Should we stop being ourselves, and become the person our significant other wants us to be? I believe not. We are who we are, and I'm not sure if Nick Twisp is doing the right thing. If someone doesn't like you for who you are, you shouldn't change.

What if watching is your form of living, like me and Nick?

Then I would say keep watching.