im running out of time

I'm Rachael and I'm in AP Lit "Maybe I'll see you again, in another lifetime or something, where I'm the waves and you're the shoreline."

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Umm I’ve dead been trying to pull myself together and write these lit crits since last week but it’s really hard because all the literary criticisms are boring and they’re all saying the same thing about the book

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I’m irritated. I mean, I knew Giovanni was gonna go to jail and die from the death sentence-David said it on the third page. I just feel so... wide open? There was no closure; David just left Giovanni alone and that was it. And I guess that’s how it’s supposed to feel. Being gay in the 50′s probably left one with a lot of questions and no time to find the answers. But knowing that this was probably intentionally done by the author doesn’t make me feel any better. 

And since the book was written in first person, I got even less of an idea of what was going on. Doesn’t help anything that David is one of those annoying narrators that you highkey hate. He reminds me of Gene because 90% of the time everything he’s saying is some kind of twisted up, internally homophobic garble that I’m not trying to hear. There’s so many questions: Why did Giovanni love him? He has approximately zero redeeming qualities. Why didn’t he let himself be with Giovanni? WHY DID HE JUST WALK OUT? Yeah like the homosexual panic is hard to deal with I get it but he’s still such an irritating character idc idc idc. He was still so arrogant because he still lived in his I’m-a-straight-white-male-and-you-can’t-taint-me-with-your-fairy-hands bubble and I didn’t appreciate it. Like he was looking down on Giovanni for knowing what he wanted and being okay with himself like what kinda...

In conclusion: I’m bitter.

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ummm i finished the book and now I'm gonna make blogs but this book ruined me this is why i dont read books

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“Jacques laughed. “You don’t know what he means by friendship but you have the feeling it may not be safe. You are afraid it may change you. What kind of friendships have you had?”

I said nothing.

“Or for that matter,” he continued, “what kind of love affairs?”

I was silent for so long that he teased me, saying, “Come out, come out, wherever you are!”

And I grinned, feeling chilled.

“Love him,” said Jacques, with vehemence, “love him and let him love you. Do you think anything else under heaven really matters”(57)?

This passage makes me feel weird. I think I’m uncomfortable because it’s really real. The internalized homophobia is so evident here in the main character, David, and it is something that he has been struggling with since his early teen years. Despite the fact that Jacques himself is really annoying 90% of the time, I enjoy this small snippet of a scene with him (he immediately goes back to being kind of irritating after this). I just think the part about love is really nice to think about because most of the time we don’t feel love from others because we don’t let them love us. We shut everyone out for fear of them leaving not knowing that the act of shutting them out is what’s actually making them leave. 

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SPOILER ALERT: HE DOESNT LET HIM LOVE HIM AND I’M HEARTBROKEN 

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“Jacques laughed. “You don’t know what he means by friendship but you have the feeling it may not be safe. You are afraid it may change you. What kind of friendships have you had?”

I said nothing.

“Or for that matter,” he continued, “what kind of love affairs?”

I was silent for so long that he teased me, saying, “Come out, come out, wherever you are!”

And I grinned, feeling chilled.

“Love him,” said Jacques, with vehemence, “love him and let him love you. Do you think anything else under heaven really matters”(57)?

This passage makes me feel weird. I think I’m uncomfortable because it’s really real. The internalized homophobia is so evident here in the main character, David, and it is something that he has been struggling with since his early teen years. Despite the fact that Jacques himself is really annoying 90% of the time, I enjoy this small snippet of a scene with him (he immediately goes back to being kind of irritating after this). I just think the part about love is really nice to think about because most of the time we don’t feel love from others because we don’t let them love us. We shut everyone out for fear of them leaving not knowing that the act of shutting them out is what’s actually making them leave. 

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“My reflection is tall, perhaps rather like an arrow, my blond hair gleams. My face is like a face you have seen many times. My ancestors conquered a continent, pushing across death-laden plains, until they came to an ocean which faced away from Europe into a darker past”(3).

I think this description of a character is so well-written and unique. The main character is obviously white, but it is never explicitly stated. The author, James Baldwin, is African American which makes a description like this all the more interesting. This is also the first glimpse I got into Baldwin’s writing style for this book. He uses a lot of commas and dashes, and everything he says is drawn out a bit longer and more vague than it needs to be.

[2stepsfar-blog]

The Shining

Look, I’m not here to tell you what to do, but if you love horror stories (or hate horror stories, there are no rules), you should DEFINITELY read The Shining by Stephen King. Have you been DYING to read a book with a good plot, but a totally annoying adaption of said plot? Or maybe you love alcoholic fathers who continuously do freaky things to their family in creepy hotels? Or, and this is a real game changer, you love to think deep and try to figure what things like ‘Redrum” mean? If you love all of those things, then this book is really for you. Not only do you get a drug out, mediocrely scary development of what could have been a truly nice novel, you also end up just a tiny bit (majorly) bored for over 50% of the book. But that’s okay, because we all need something to help put us to sleep sometimes. I’m telling you, if you want the melatonin to start flowing, just pick up this horror novel, kiss your kids goodnight, and sweet dreams. 

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Poetry Mentor

I really want Rupi Kaur to be my poetry mentor for so many reasons. The main reason, though, is because her poetry and style reminds me a lot of my own. She writes about things I actually care about and want to read. Her poetry book is called 'Milk and Honey' which is really cute and soft. Her poetry is really comforting and she's only 23 herself, so I am going to get a perspective that I can relate to but is also more experienced and knowing than my own. I live and breathe poetry at all times I take absolutely no days off this is going to be the best unit of this entire year

[mythologyofblue]

I realized that for the time being I could not trust myself to present a coherent face to the world.

Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking (via mythologyofblue)

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Stereotypes

At first I thought that stereotypes were things that bothered everyone and made their blood boil the way it makes mine. But after talking to Jordan about how her stereotype of being a white girl doesn’t really bother her all that much, I changed my mind.

Now I think that stereotypes are something certain types of people get to choose whether or not they are personally offended by. For instance, my stereotype of “you’re the whitest black person I know” bothers me to no end because of what it implies. Because I’m smart and well-spoken, because I drink Starbucks and listen to One Direction, because I’m not “ratchet” and “ghetto”, I am not black. Because no black person can be that civilized, apparently. So naturally my stereotype, this insult hidden by some twisted up compliment, would piss me off. But that’s because it paints me and my people as these dangerous hooligans and that only a few are lucky enough to be able to be honored by white people as “good enough”. I neglected to realize that this is not everyone’s stereotype. Everyone’s stereotype isn’t negative. Okay, it may be a bit annoying for everyone to assume you’re an airhead just because you’re blonde, white, and pretty, but it doesn’t have to deeply offend you. Some people are given the choice, or privilege, to decide if they want what others think to hurt them. But some of us don’t get a choice. Some of us are clumped together as some kind of vicious predator and the only way to get rid of this marking is to conform to someone else’s ideal lifestyle. And even then, no one knows who you really are until they meet you and talk to you and get to know you. So despite how “white” the kids in my math class think I am, I’ll never be white because the stereotype of my skin color comes before the stereotype of the way I act.

[love-personal]

[briannaaiello]

Hey everyone, I finally finished painting my research project! If anyone has any type of feedback then please like, reblog, or comment on this post! Thank you!!

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Not only is it very good artwork, I like that what your message is saying isn't hidden in some deeper meaning that the audience has to dig for. It's very straightforward. This is actually really creative

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So what does this all mean?

In my study, I interviewed three different people based on religion or lack thereof. Let’s break this down. My first interview features a Hindi girl. She explains that she fears death because of pain but when losing loved ones is taken out of the equation, her answer changes to “Probably not”. In my second interview, I spoke with an atheist. When asked if she fears death, she gave a flat out, “Yes” as an answer. When losing loved ones was removed from the equation, she responded with, “Yes, because what if I’m the only one that dies?” In my third and final interview, I spoke with a Christian woman. She did not fear death, but she did fear not being able to accomplish all of the things she wanted to do with her life. When asked if she would fear death if she did not have to worry about losing loved ones, she replied, “…Probably not.”

If you look back at each answer to these specific questions, all three had a similar thought process. The trend being that all three were either afraid or apprehensive of death because they were worried about some sort of worldly tie. Whether it was pain (something you cannot feel once you are dead), regret from not doing certain things (something you cannot feel once you are dead), or the feeling of being alone in death (again, something that you cannot feel once you are dead). But when losing the most important worldly tie (loved ones) was removed from the situation, two decided that death wouldn’t really be an issue, and one was still afraid due to leaving those people behind.

In short, no one is really afraid of death. “Death” is not just dying to us, it is this big and broad topic that spans over many horizons. You can’t just cage up death and say to it, “This is what you are!” It is a contradiction within itself, abstract yet very much real. No one is afraid of dying, per se, just the daunting feeling of ‘This is the end of something and I don’t know if I am ready for it.’ We are afraid of losing the ones we love.

Any feedback or comments would be greatly appreciated.

[hillergoodspeed]

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Start Marking Men

It’s not impossible to give women the option to be unmarked some time in the distant future. But it would take years and years of a specific type of teaching from not only parents, but other adult mentors in the world as well. Despite this, I am pretty sure it would just be easier to start marking men constantly. It sounds kind of rude, but if this is going to be an argument about what is and isn’t fair, than it seems that marking men is what we’ll have to do. 

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“Once I found the strength to be myself, I had no need to act myself.”

This simply means that once someone learns to not only accept themselves, but let go of their inhibitions, they no longer need to put up a front they’ve labeled as “Myself”. It takes strength and courage to not worry about what others may think, so there is a lot of soul searching and time involved in being yourself. 

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“Why can’t a woman be more like a man?”

The only thing that holds a woman down from being like a man is the idea that there is some distinct difference between the two. All genders are made up and are a part of a social construct so that we have the illusion that we have some kind of control over what is going on in the world. There is literally no difference between women and men other than the way we are built (which isn’t technically correct, either because not everyone with female anatomy is a female and vice versa because all genders are made up).