Giving Thanks

For Thanksgiving, I think I would like to thank a group of people other than just one individual.  I’m really thankful to be a part of such a unique brotherhood such as the Whitney Young basketball program.  During the school year, you see these select few of people more than you see your immediate family so these young men become family to you.  I’ve acquired the majority of my closest friend through basketball in some kind of way and I am really thankful for that.  From me being a part of a community such as this, you learn to gain trust for other and learn how to work with people through adversity and these are essential tools you need in order to succeed in life.  It’s kind of funny because it seems like when someone from the outside is messing with one teammate, you’re messing with the whole team so everybody feels affected.  So besides of having one problem you have 15.  It’s kind of nice to know that a group of people have you back like that.  I’m thankful for this group of people for giving me the competitive drive to do better in life and strive for greatness in whatever I do either its on or off the court.  I felt the need to address such thanks for this group of people because sometimes this brotherhood is overlooked so I wanted to pay homage to my brothers.  Thank You.

Letter to Cormac

If I were to write an open letter to the author Cormac McCarthy, I would ask him what were his motive and or vision.  The overall plot took a more pessimistic outlook and I was wondering why he chose such directions.  Don’t get me wrong, The Road was a great novel, but at times it was difficult to detect the theme of the story.  One theme that I could come upon with the story was the concept of trust.  The son trusted his father that he would never leave his side no matter what.  That’s a hard promise to keep in an apocalyptic world, but it was a promise that the son expected his father to keep.  In beginning of the story, the son asked the father, “What would you do if I died?”  The father simply said, “If you died, I just would want to die too.”  The son took this statement by his father as a commitment from him (the father) that he would never leave his side, or die before him.  Another thing I would like to commend McCarthy on is how well is implemented the concept of protection in this novel.  Throughout the whole story, whenever the father found something, weather is was food, a hygiene utensil, or something for warmth, he always made sure that his son ate, or reaped from the benefits first before him.  I think that said a lot about the father’s character under such gruesome circumstances. 

defend the poet

I kind of can agree with what Charles Bukowski is talking about in his poem, "Dinosauria, We" simply because he talks about how we are born into what we are going to become later on in life.  It almost goes with the pre-destination theory that says God already set in line what we're going to do in life before we are even born.  Charles Bukowski doesn't go in depth with the pre-destination theory, but he explains how if your family is well known and wealthy, most likely when you are born you will become successful as well.  If you are born impoverished and your parents live in a bad neighborhood, the child will most likely be influenced by such negativity and do what the people in the neighborhood do.  In the poem, Bukowski says, "Born like this, Into this, Into these carefully mad wars, Into the sight of broken factory windows of emptiness, Into bars where people no longer speak to each other, Into fist fights that end as shooting and knifings."  This direct quote from Bukowski's work tells me that this world has gradually and gradually become more violent as the years went on, and this violence is like a gas that our countries youth has been inhaling.  So overall, I think Charles Bukowski is trying to tell the reader that we should try and change the world from what is has become and make an attempt to enshrine quality into all individuals, and not just life with what is given to you. 

classroom direction

I would say that the class is going into a good direction so I don't really believe that there should be some drastic change to our style of learning.  I do believe that at times we tend to get off topic on the task at hand but that doesn't really determine whether or not we understand the material.  I think since I've taken this class that I've grasped a better understanding on how people think and how i should think out problems and conflicts rationally.  I do believe that you can grasp a concept on a topic without taking an assessment and in this class we have proven this opinion because for the most part, everybody in the class knows what's going on at all times.  We do enough projects and type enough papers to understand what we're supposed to be learning about.  I'm also happy that we read the books before the movies simply because usually the book is drastically better than the movie (hence The Road).  One direction that comes to mind now that we might need to implement in the classroom is the understanding that every individual in the classroom is different and we tend to not give students a chance when they suggest or have an opposite opinion than what you have on a topic.  We should learn to be more open to other peoples beliefs....That is all :)