leah'sMusings

Lawson, James. “Student Nonviolent Coordination Committee Statement of Pupose.” Composing a Civic Life. Berndt, Michael and Muse, Amy. Pearson Education Inc., 2007. 518-519.

regarding love– “It matches the capacity of evil to inflict suffering with an even more enduring capacity to absorb evil, all the while persisting in love.”

I chose this quote because I really like how it shows both sides of love.  It can hurt and it can also heal.  Love is very powerful.  However, I don’t belive what it says about love absorbing evil.  I think that is very much a rose-colored glasses point of view.  Of course, it was written in the 1960’s when love was thought to fix everything.

I can’t believe we are half-way done with this class.  I really have to get my ass in gear.  I am not happy with what I have done so far.  It all goes back to my procrastinating.  I knew when we started this class that it would be important to stay on top of the work, but I still didn’t keep up.  During the next four weeks my goal is to do all of the blogs on time.  That is what I have been the worst at.  I know that if we had to turn the blogs in on paper I would get them all in.  I just have trouble thinking of the internet tasks as real homework.  That is why I could never take an online class.  I think that the blogs and mycomplab are great tools, its just a mental thing for me that I have to learn to deal with.

One quote from chapter 5 that popped out at me was:

“Whenever you do research, remember that things will go wrong–books you need will be checked out, people will not return your surveys, weather will prevent you from observing people’s behaviors.  This is why you need to plan and start researching early, so you can adjust your methods or select alternative ones when the unanticipated happens.”

I am a terrible procrastinator.  I put things off to the last minute and then get really stressed out.  I don’t know why I do this.  I know that I will regret not starting my work, and still I spend that time playing peggle on my computer.  I have had this problem my whole life and I always say that I will change.  I would go so far as to say that this is my biggest fault.

My second quote is:

“As a form of social action, writing is particularly effective.  Writers have time to craft  their messages carefully, and they can reach a wide audience.”

I consider my self to be actively working for a better society.  Or at least I used to be.  Lately other things in my life, including some major health problems, have gotten in my way.  I believe that writing is an important way to get information out.  I always read the editorials in the paper though I’ve never sent any.  Pamphlets and posters are also great because people are more likely to read them. Especially if they have eye-catching pictures and fonts.  Just writing this is making me miss being involved.  Maybe I will get hooked up with the women’s rights group I was in last year.

I think that Alex was telling the truth because he provided more details and without hesitation.  His story about going with his father to a naval base made more sense also.  Maggie was 16 or 17 when she says she went to Hawaii by herself.  I can’t imagine my parents allowing me to do that.  She was also moving around a lot and twisting her chair like she was nervous.  It could have just been that she was nervous being in front of the class though.  Alex sat still and made eye contact.

I had several ideas for a mock research paper.  Most of my ideas were based on my experiences and interactions with people with mental illness.  I thought about saying that the government is spying on us through our wrist watches or that our pets were reporting our behavior to the government.  I also thought about doing something with zombies but decided against that one pretty quickly because zombies are too popular for my taste.  I ended up writing about curing mental illness with total brain transplants.  I am going for an over-the-top comedic approach.  I hope that it turns out as good as I am picturing it.

I think that doing peer reviews is beneficial.  I appologize to those in my group whose reviews I didn’t get to.  In doing the peer reviews I learned both about the school and about my classmates.  I think I gave good comments.  I struggled with knowing how much to correct.  I didn’t know if I should point out all the grammar mistakes I found or not.  When things didn’t make sense I thought of ways they might be better, but I didn’t know if that would be going too far.  The reviews I got were helpful even though the draft I submitted wasn’t complete.

When looking for a virtue that I possess I was ashamed to say that none of them stick out.  The one that I am closest to is #7 Sincerity.  I follow half of it.  It says to “Use no hurtful Deceit.  Think innocently and justly; and, if you speak, speak accordingly.”  I don’t use hurtful deceit but I don’t always think innocently and justly.  The virtue I need to work on most is resoucefulness.  I waste a lot of time and procrastinate.  I think that keeping track of your virtues is a good thing as long as you understand that everyone has faults.  I tend to be really hard on myself so seeing what I did wrong everyday would be more likely to make be depressed than make me want to change my ways.

I chose the picture on page 22 about fat taxes.  The message they are giving is that the government wants to interfere with people’s decisions on what to eat because they think people are too stupid to make healthy decsisions.  I think this is a very effective sign that would probably be seen as an advertisement in a magazine or newspaper.  I think that some people would be easily swayed by this ad.  It gives enough information to make people angry at the government but it doesn’t give enough details to actually understand the issue.  Some important information that it doesn’t include are,what foods will be taxed, how much will the tax be, and what will the money collected be used for.  Without this other information I cannot say whether or not I agree with the message.

The question about whether  or not a person has ever been a habitual drunkard surprised me.   I know there are a lot of stereotypes about immigrants, especially Mexican immigrants, being drunks and I wonder if this question is in response to that stereotype.  I also wonder if anyone has ever said yes to that question and how it has affected their application.

When I signed up to be an exchange student in Spain I imagined warm beaches and friendly out-going Spaniards.  I did not expect to end up in the Basque region of Spain.  While I don’t like to make generalizations, they tend to be more reserved and wary of strangers.  Of course I met some great, friendly people.  I was very lucky to live with a loving host mother and two host sisters in the final three months of my ten month stay.  My first host family was also great, but some misunderstandings caused them to ask me to leave after only six weeks.  It was the second family that I had problems with.  After several months with them I decided that I had to get out of an unhealthy situation, so I left.  While I was there I made friends with other exchange students but I had difficulty making friends with the locals.  The other students had similar experiences.  I learned a lot during my year abroad, but I wouldn’t call it a happy experience.  There is a lot that I would do differently if I could.