Confessions of a Logophile

Prompt #3  America has always held the honorary title of “the land of opportunity”. And whether it may not always be kind enough to fulfill this promise, it definitely has a place for you. Whether you’re an immigrants or you’ve been here for generations, there is bound to be a community for you somewhere within this melting pot of land. But every story don’t always get told. Sometimes they’re hidden by media chatter of who’s dating who in Hollywood, or who you should vote for, or what to wear and how to live and how to spend your minimum wage salary so that it benefits the economy and not you. But Lynn Nottage has made it her mission to sort through the junk and the TV static and find the stories of  real  people. Not the white collar business men who make 300K a year, the lower class. The people that make up  46%  of America. It may seem like the struggles of Olstead workers in Reading isn’t very widespread, but the truth is, this is how 46% of our country live...

  Having a ‘seat at the table’ insinuates that you’re deserving of respect and trusted to be apart of important discussion. Having a ‘family dinner’ denotes a gathering where you eat good food with people you love, while celebrating nothing in particular except your togetherness. Langston Hughes uses both of these concepts metaphorically in his poem, ‘I, Too’, which centers around the exclusion of Black Americans from American society. The poem starts off by Hughes declaring that he ‘sings America’. I believe that this is a nod to choirs, and how they are sung with the voices of groups of people rather than singularly. Hughes is stating that he, too, is a part of the American nation. Afterwards, stating that he is the ‘darker brother’ asserts that he is still part of the same family as white people in America. The third line is where the metaphors come in— ‘being sent to eat in the kitchen means that black Americans are hidden from the ‘company’ (the world stage, other nations) and...

Sorting various Great Gatsby characters into Hogwarts houses has made me realize that there's another underlying theme about the presence of shallowness that Fitzgerald presents to us through the majority of his character's personalities.  1. Tom - Evidenced from Tom's overall brutish personality, we all know that Tom Buchanan is the most arrogant, conceited, insulting character in The Great Gatsby. He had 0 moral convictions all throughout his affair with Myrtle (I'm not calling it a love affair because breaking another's nose certainly doesn't seem full of love), but when he had a sneaking suspicion that something was going on between Gatsby and Daisy, he started itching for a confrontation. He holds everyone around him to moral standards that he doesn't even bother with. He also hails from an upper class, wealthy family and takes pleasure in being part of social circles that are unattainable to others, like at Yale with Nick, which leads me to believe tha...

The Jazz Age. An era of new, shiny things— flashy nightlife, extravagant parties, and the lively music of tipsy, outrageous youth. But aside from material elements, this era brought sexual liberation, redefinitions of age old gender roles, and the freedom to choose how you wanted to find love. However, to really understand how revolutionary this era was for romance, we have to go all the way back to the Victorian Era.  In the 1800s (back before dating was even a thing), men used to use calling cards during the ‘social season’ (spring and summer) to court young women as their wives. Men looking to court a woman would give their card of information to the butler, and line up in her house. Each would have some time to talk to her parents, have refreshments, and watch her play piano, sing, or display some other talent solely for the man’s entertainment. Marriage wasn’t just a relationship between two people at the time, but a family affair. The general age for a woman to enter the soci...

Based on a passage of ‘Where I lived and What I Lived For’ by Henry David Thoreau Ever feel like you’re bored with your monotonous life? Relax . Follow my footsteps. Go live in the woods. No joke. I’m being completely serious. I wanted to find out what it was like to live a Real Life, with only what we were intended  to use, like a complete nomad. Call me crazy, but I want to experience living that’s absent of material wants, with only what nature has to offer. I want to lead a life as deep as the groundwater beneath us, and as sturdy as the great redwoods. To live a life so full that I feel like I might burst if I speak to another being. To feel the weight of the rain and the wind and the stars and to accept all of what Mother Nature provides to me with open arms. That profoundly intense feeling that you’re full of Real Life , that’s what I want. To squeeze the Real Life in my hands like an orange until it is only the most concentrated, powerful parts of itself, and, if Real Lif...

I remember the afternoon of October 14th, 2022, very clearly. I was sitting at the kitchen table, bundled in fuzzy socks and my winter coat because our heater had broke. I was eating cold pizza in a cold house, ready go out and walk down the block to my art class.  On the news channel I put on absentmindedly, a headline about Van Gogh streamed across the screen. We’d learned about him just last week, so I snapped out of my daze and focused on the display.  CLIMATE PROTESTERS THROW SOUP ON VAN GOGH’S ‘THE SUNFLOWERS’ It went on to show the two culprits being arrested by police officers. They looked younger than I’d thought they’d be. Fresh out of high school. A dramatic close up of the tomato soup covered painting followed.  It didn’t look too bad to me. And I remember thinking that there there were worse people to focus on arresting as I made my way out the door.  The woman who taught our small Saturday class of 7 held her lessons in her basement. The other floors of...

In class this week, we read a piece called 'The Partly Cloudy Patriot'. It followed the casual thoughts of Sarah Vowell, and were a collection of her musings on patriotism, society, and the sense national unity that surrounded the aftermath of 9/11. She wrote of how the meaning of the American flag had changed-- the days following the attack, the flag was a symbol of pure American grief over those lost, but also a mark of the togetherness that connected the nation. Even after we had finished discussing the piece, it sparked a train of thought of what else had the power to connect the masses. The most obvious things came to mind first; the Internet, everyone's immeasurable need for companionship, and sports (not for all of us, because I still don't understand football). But there are also things that are hidden directly in plain sight.  We all own socks.  That's right. Whether they're no-shows or knee highs, dress socks or patterned, all socks serve a particular ...