Blogs (Throughtout The Semeter)

Blog Post about Colin Dickey’s chapter

Ghostland, Blog Post

After reading this chapter, my thoughts were all over the place. The book started off with well known ghost stories in virginia. These stories seemed to be well “documented” because a lot of people knew about them. Then the author transitioned to a more in depth look at these stories. He documents the changes the city has gone through, the origins, but also a point of view of people that went to visit this location in Virginia. He describes certain locations with so much detail that one can imagine and see the place and what went on during these times. Although this chapter mainly focused on ghosts, there was a section of this book that made my eyes open up. “While touring Richmond in the 1850’s, he happened upon a commission agents office, empty save for three negro children, who, as i entered, were playing at auctioneering each other… The little auctioneer continued his mimic play, and appreade to enjoy the joke of selling the girl, who stood demurely by his side”. This is the full section but parts of it caught me by surprise. This description that Fredrick Law Olmsted states shows us how these kids were recreating the actions of what white people did to African American slaves. It’s almost as if they saw it as something good or were not old enough to truly understand what was happening at the time. To tie it all back together, there is a purpose and a reason for these ghost stories. That is to keep a reminder of death but also its history of what might have or truly happened at that time. Dickey even states, “Ghost stories and haunted tales connect us to the past, to family and to our ancestors.” We need to take into account what happened in the past and inform people about it. 

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Blog Post for Community Essay

Community Essay Reflection

The “On Community” essay was a very short assignment to complete. I personally believe the reason as to why this essay was assigned to us was so that we can open our minds a bit and see how we portray ourselves. What I’m trying to say is that we get to write about ourselves and not have to face any conundrums. We are free to write about how we feel about the stuff we care about. 

Just like any other essay, it needs to be in a formal format. My essay consisted of an introduction and conclusion as well as two body paragraphs. In the first body paragraph I just tried to define and explain the basics of my community. The second body paragraph I tried to go a little more in depth on the communities. I included some of my experiences to show that I am indeed a part of these groups but to show that I’m credible. For me It was hard to choose a certain community to write about. I am really passionate about a lot of stuff so it was very hard to choose a specific one. I ended up writing about being a New Yorker but also being a cyclist because these two correlate with each other. 

Personally, I always tend to struggle during the writing process. I often tend to write a small outline of topics to hit or stuff to include but for this essay I didn’t do it. This took me around 6 to 8 hours to complete. I honestly think I could have done it in 3 hours but I am easily distracted and wander away. Although it took me a very long time to write 500+ words, I did a long sprint for the first draft and edited it when I was done. For the revisions, I did something different that I usually don’t do. 

We weren’t able to have a peer workshop nor gain any feedback on our writings. So instead, I questioned my writing and went back and did major changes. Instead of rereading the entire paper, I took each paragraph and either changed it completely or just did minor changes. I very often just re-read it and change things around but for this I took each paragraph by itself and did surgery on them. From me doing this, I was able to see how bad my first draft was. I’m not saying my final draft is perfect, but I definitely saw the drastic changes that needed to be done. 

To be very honest with you, my writing skills are very bad. If I had to choose one thing about my writing, it would be the topic I chose. I say this because I can talk about them for so many hours. For example, i can talk about different types of bikes, materials, clothing, gear, routes, my experiences, etc. same goes with NY, once you step out your door, you never know what to expect. Once again, when you mix both of these topics together I have the opportunity to write about so many things. 

If I had more time to work on this, I would most certainly try to find better vocabulary as well as transitions within the essay. I hope to improve on my vocabulary but also to sound like a normal person when i’m writing and not a robot. All in all,  the “On Community” essay was an easy assignment to complete with small brick walls along the way. I hope to improve on these qualities throughout the semester and become a better writer.

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Blog Post: “Husband Stitch”

Husband Stitch Blog post

What is the true meaning of the ribbon?

The structure of the short story was in a way helpful but also confusing to me. I felt lost at times reading the narrator’s point of view and then suddenly getting long in a random story. But I totally understand why she did this. For every part she was explaining, her youth, her love story, her kid, and her family, she always had another story to tell with it. In a way, this shows that whatever has happened to her there are other stories that relate to her experiences. But one of the biggest questions I think anyone would have is knowing the true meaning and significance the ribbon plays. We know that it can’t be touched and we can’t know about it, it just exists. There is a part where the narrator sees another woman with another colored ribbon. But what does this mean? Do the colors signify anything or is the ribbon hiding something? What is the purpose? 

When the wife finally decided to show her husband what was underneath the ribbon, I hoped we were going to get more information on it and NOT LEAVE IT ON A CLIFFHANGER. After all those years of growing up with each other, the husband has had questions about the ribbon, he has respected the wife’s decision until the end of the story. The wife describes his reaction very briefly and from this we can tell that the husband was shocked, almost as if he’s seen a ghost or something. Why would she reassure her love towards him? The writer ends this short story with very powerful words. “I feel as lonely as I have ever been.” Was this ribbon something she had for comfort, something as protection? I wonder why she felt lonely without it even with her husband being in the same room as her. There is probably some deeper significance the ribbon plays and I’m not getting it. 

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Blog Post Reflecting on “Inventory,” “Mothers,” or “Real Women Have Bodies”

Real Women Have Bodies

Do you think the media had an effect on the outcome of these affected women?

Out of the 3 short stories, I read “Real Women Have Bodies”. The first time I read it, there were moments where I felt completely lost, moments where I knew what I was reading and then it completely did a 180 on me. For example, at first this story took place in a dress shop, then transitioned to a love story, and ends in a very horror movie style. I read this story around 4 different times, each time at a different pace in order to comprehend what was going on. But in the end I find it hard to find the true meaning of these stories. 

There were a myriad of questions that rose up each time I read this. These questions varied between the book, questions about the author, and the narrator. But there was something very specifically one might have missed when reading this. This is the impact the media has on people. For example, the main character mentions online videos, news on the tv, or conversations of the opposite gender. Does the media affect the outcome of these affected women? Do they portray women in a certain way which causes them to want to change? I believe the author put this in on purpose. With everything constantly changing around us, I believe she put this to make us realize that people are changing because of stuff being said about them. Each example she includes, there is a woman being rudely talked about not being talked to. The opposite gender seems to not care about this and is completely ignoring itt and letting it happen. Could the author relate this to something in the real world? I would like to include that the author is not as descriptive but you can still imagine things happening with a lot of detail. To finish off, I would like to say, why is Petra the only one fading and not the main character?

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Blog Post Reflecting on “Eight Bites” or Difficult at Parties”

8 Bites

Why doesn’t the mother and the daughter have.a strong connection?

The short story, “8 Bites” in my opinion, was very straightforward. Of course there were points where it was confusing but once i reread them, it was clear what was happening. This was one of the few where it was engaging. If I remember correctly, this story did not contain any sex whatsoever. which was shocking since almost every short story had something sexual. This story mainly focused on a woman’s body and how the narrator sees herself. 

There were a few questions that rose up as I was reading this. One of them involved the relationship between the daughter and the narrator. Why doesn’t the mother and the daughter have.a strong relationship? There are parts where we clearly see that there is no trust, constantly fighting, and simply no love for each other. From my understanding, the main concept of the story is the struggles women face with their bodies. But we see that there is another problem between the daughter and the daughter. Where did this “hate” towards each other first start, this is what we don’t know. As the story progresses, we get a sense of betrayal. The daughter could have felt “ugly” now that her mom got a surgery and she looks the same, since she compared herself to the mom. This most likely increased their “hate” towards each other. I think the way the daughter reacted to this is understandable. These are all guesses but maybe the daughter looked up to her mom and have always seen her as perfect the way she is. And since they both looked the same, the daughter feels even more different. The mother now looks like all her sisters and the daughter now stays the same. This is in a way pressuring her to maybe change and be like her mom. 

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Blog Post about Op-Ed

Op-Ed Reflection

This op-ed essay was a rollercoaster. My first draft consisted of the majority of the essay completed but the editing for it took me a while to complete. It wasn’t laziness, but more of a fear of reading it and not like it and having to start all over. One of the things about writing an op-ed is the fact that you can express how you feel. There’s no stopping in your writing and I honestly didn’t struggle while writing. Ideas were constantly flowing and if it wasn’t for the word count the essay could go on and on. At that point it would no longer be an op-ed and more of a ranting essay. One of the things that I liked about my op-ed is the urgency for change. I’m constantly saying it because we do need it. On the other hand, one of the few things that I dislike about my writing is the usage of information. I personally feel like I used way too much evidence and it could have been less. I understand that one of the requirements was to use 3 different sources, but I think it could have been less on my behalf when including it in my writing. My writing process varied at different stages. At first I was struggling trying to find a hook and how I wanted to outline my essay. But as soon as I managed to finish my introductory paragraph I knew the next steps I had to take. Overall the introduction honestly took me around an hour to complete because of all the different changes I made. But after that it was a constant flow, with a couple stops in order to find decent evidence to back me up. This was my first draft of course but then I had to edit and submit the final draft. As I mentioned before, the editing process took me a while to complete. It wasn’t really hard to do, but just add new things and get rid of a couple things I didn’t like. The peer workshops are one of my favorite things. You get feedback but you also get to see their point of view on the topic. It made me add a few new ideas in order to make the op-ed sound a bit better. If I had more time to improve on this essay, I would definitely do a few things, not just to this writing but to other pieces of mine. I would most certainly try to find new words in order to have better transitions or just sound smoother and “smarter”. I would try to switch up different ideas in some paragraphs. For example, in one of the paragraphs I didn’t like how it sounded or flowed in the essay, so I would most definitely find something better to replace it with. I would also try to incorporate people’s opinions who are being affected. I have a couple of friends at other universities who are being impacted by these government changes. But overall, writing this op-ed had to be one of my favorite writing assignments . 

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Blog Post: Reflection on In-Class Essay and Associated Assignments

In-Class Essay Reflection

We have done a lot in the past couple of weeks. We read various stories by the same author, written blog posts, essays, and group work in and outside of class. I would say each of these have positives and negatives. 

One class before our in class essay, we were given a heads up on what we were writing about. So some of us had the advantage and knew what was going to happen on the day of the in class essay. But as someone who loves to waste time and focus on less important things, I prepared for the exam very late. The night before I wrote ideas that came to mind for each prompt that was given to us, same with writing the stories that best connect to the question. I didn’t go into depth, which I regret because I could have saved a couple of minutes during class. Personally the in class essay was somewhat of a breeze for me with the small amount of preparation I did. Since I read the stories and discussed them during class I had a good understanding of what was going on. But I do have to say, there were times where I lost my train of thought and started wandering in space or finding things to distract me. At one point, I started to look at the weather in Spain for some reason. Also, the fact that we knew this was timed made us feel a bit more pressured, which also caused distractions by looking at the time. I pray there isn’t another in class essay, but if there is, I would like to improve on a couple of things. One of the things will most definitely be to prepare myself with quotes and more keywords to use in the essay. The other thing would be time management. I feel like I spent a bit way too much time on my outline, and that time could have gone to me writing more. 

As I mentioned before, before this essay, the entire class discussed each story with questions, and overall everyones thoughts and opinions about it. These discussions were very useful because it made me realize things that I didn’t think of when I was reading them. Going upfront and having to ask the class questions had to be one of the scariest things ever. Having a quiet class and eyes just stare at you is something I don’t wish on anyone. But overall there was a decent amount of participation with even more questions arising as the discussion progressed. My participation was definitely very low, but at least I contributed something to some questions that were asked. 

Before I end this, I want to mention something I really hated. And that was the group work we had to do. We had a couple of days to come together and discuss our questions with each other but my group did not do this. Our schedules don’t match up, since some of us had work or were just not available, we had to leave it to the last day to finally talk about it. This caused confusion and repetition of questions. Hopefully, if we do some sort of group work outside of class, we get more time to do it. And honestly I don’t think we handed the paper correctly or in its proper format. 

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Blog Post about a Film, Video Game, Album, Tv Show, or Book

Blog Post on a Video Game

After reading the prompt for this blog post, there were a few topics that came to mind. But for one of these topics I could 100% talk about for hours and that is Grand Theft Auto 5 (GTA 5). 

GTA 5 is a video game which was released 10 years ago. Within these 10 years, more and more people buy it and play it, even after knowing that another game is being released real soon. But what makes this game extremely popular? Why do people come back to it, even if it’s old. Well for one, there is always something to do. For example, i won’t go into depth but ill go for some of the basics of a few things. There are two game modes, story mode and online. Story Mode consists of different missions, in which you play as 3 possible characters. And even after you finish this you can do more as those three characters or try to challenge yourself to 100% complete it. Online is the part that I enjoy. You make your own character and start off with nothing. Your main goal is ofc to survive against other players playing the game but also try and become rich. During the early years of this game, it was impossible to get money. So no one was able to buy cars, properties, or  weapons. As the years passed by the developers added missions, events, and more cars, properties, and weapons. This is giving us, the players, more stuff to do and serves us as a distraction. But one of the main reasons as to why I come back to this is because I enjoy playing it with my friends. There is non stop fun when we all come together. We are able to drive around the map and race each other, crashing into each other, or even chase different players trying to scare them. There is endless fun in this game. If you name something, it is probably in the game. For example, we can play golf, tennis, customize our cars, or even go shopping. Going shopping with friends in this game takes hours. We either take it seriously and make something goofy. I got my first console 5 years after the game was released, and my middle school friends convinced me to buy GTA 5 as my first game because it won’t disappoint. Although no one is in contact with each other anymore, I sometimes see some of them play both gamemodes. And honestly this game holds so many memories. There are times where my friends and I just play and don’t do anything. We instead roam around the map and talk for hours about us. 

But there are people that hate these types of games. Some believe that virtual violence could cause the player to be dangerous in real life. But I completely disagree with this statement. Personally, the violence in the game is one of the few things that make it fun. You can purchase tanks, helicopters, planes, guns, explosives, but they are really hard to get and one has to try really hard in order to purchase these. I have made many online friends from this game and I’m still a good person. But yes GTA 5 has its ups and downs, but for most of the part, people come to this game to enjoy it.