"The Little Lady" (Personal Essay No. 1)

 One of my classes this term is a Nonfiction English class that requires a great deal of personal essay-writing. Since I have been meaning to write and blog more, I am (hopefully) going to be posting the essays here. This was written in-class, writing nonstop, on graph paper.
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It was summer and we were in the music room at my parent’s house: bay window before us, piano on the right. She was sitting on that rocking recliner she had reupholstered for my dad years earlier. I always felt a kinship with the fishermen on the fabric. She was my grandmother, Lois, grammie, probably wearing some purple polyester getup like always. I don’t remember what I was doing before she called me over, or what I was wearing, but it was just the two of us in the room, it was afternoon, and it was summer.
    She held the book as she explained its significance to me. “I’ve had this book for a long time,” she said, her gnarled hands tenderly holding the worn pages. I recognized it, then, I think, like she had read it to me before. Maybe she hadn’t. But I feel like I felt it was a book I already knew. I remember her handing it to me, gently, warning me to not let it fall open. I no longer remember whether she or dad taped the binding, an ungraceful attempt at slowing the deterioration that had already begun: pages, pictures, and stories missing, numbered pates our of their intended sequence.
    I held the book before she said we should write my name in it. I saw her name, Lois Burnett, next to the name of her sister who died when she was still small: Gladys Burnett. I knew then I was not holding a mere book in my hands, it was her memory itself, and she entrusted it to me. To me, in ink, as she wrote my name and the date next to her own and some other name I did not recognize. The dates were decades apart, spanning nearly a century.
    I read the book, with her and by myself, I read it several times. The title was and still is “The Little Lady: Her Book” and was published in the early 1900’s. Just as the title suggests, the stories are about a little girl growing up in a big house and all that happened to her: big man and puppies and sweets and stores in her fathers office, stores she set up there and then made him pay for.
    I read it again last year, and I cried, because the book  was just as sweet as I remembered, but my grammie was gone so I couldn’t tell her how much I still enjoyed it, still enjoyed the graceful cover, the illustrations that were intended to be black and white but were colored in by some child less precocious than I. I still loved the words of the story, the words on the pages, the words in my hands. Far beyond the fear I felt when it was first handed to me, like I should encase it in plastic, now it sits in a place of honor, in company with other old beautiful books I’ve collected. Maybe I picked up those other books because I never wanted the Little Lady to be lonely.
    I have been many things, but lonely was never really one of them. I always had those books, even when grammie died I was left with a pack of cousins who help keep her memory alive, parents who help fill in the gaps in my memory, and a note in the cover of the Little Lady that proves I was loved.

Angry Letter to the Editor RE: Django Unchained

This letter was written in response to a review of Django Unchained published in Volume 61, Issue 12 of The Broadside, the campus newspaper for COCC and OSU-Cascades. Unfortunately, the review has not been posted on the papers website, http://thebroadsideonline.com. 

Letter to the editors and readers of The Broadside;
    Aaron Fennell’s recent film “review” in The Broadside distressed me for many reasons. However, it should be noted that I placed the word “review” in quotes intentionally, to draw attention to that ill-advised word choice. In order to call a piece of writing a review, the writer is required to have actually experienced what is being reviewed. It is clear from Fennell’s description of Django Unchained that that experience did not occur, which is unfortunate both for him and his readers. Not only does Fennell inaccurately describe main characters and the plot of the film, but he grossly underestimates the shocking quantity and quality of violence in the film.
    I would have been able to tolerate either a positive or negative review, despite my own feelings about it. However, I will not tolerate an uninformed review, especially regarding a film of this caliber. I vehemently disagree with Fennell’s statement: “This is a must see for everyone who loves a good story and very graphic descriptions of gunfights.” This film, while being one of the greatest achievements in cinema I have ever seen, is certainly NOT “for everyone.” The brutality of the violence in this film goes far beyond mere gunfights, and to not mention that is both irresponsible and ignorant on part of the writer. Based on what was printed in The Broadside, readers anticipate a “deep love story” filled with “quick comebacks” and “explosive action.” What they will actually experience is something much more compelling and unsettling than that.
    To Aaron Fennell, I do not mean this to be a personal attack. However, I cannot allow your statements about Django Unchained to go unchallenged. If you decide you want to see the film in all its bloody glory and write another, more informed review, shoot me (pun intended) an email. I’ll buy the ticket.
Sincerely, Jazmin Miller

Chicken soup for the soul of the exhausted college student.

This is not something I ever thought I would write, but I am aiming to write a B essay tonight.

I'll explain that statement by explaining why I never thought I would say it. While I don't have a type A personality and I'm not a perfectionist (or maybe I'm just in denial), I am very competitive, especially in academic environments. My goal for this year is to graduate with a 3.9 GPA, because I know I can do it, and it is hard for me to accept anything less than the very best I can do. This is not inherently a character flaw (at least in my mind... or maybe that's the type A personality I don't have talking).

However, I am not great with the art of balancing one's life. When I'm in school, I am a great student. I'm not a great friend, or co-worker, or most other things. I have a hard time being wholly present anywhere because I am always thinking about school. I disappear from the lives of my friends and family, buried beneath textbooks, notebooks, and assorted Apple products. While it may just look like I have a great work ethic, what I am actually doing is fusing my self-esteem with my grades. This is not healthy and not something I'm proud of.

I am trying really hard not to do that this year.

The reason why is as follows:

My grandma died just over a month ago. While we were going through boxes and boxes of her things, we found many pictures and documents that'd we never seen - or paid attention to - before. We found her diploma from George Fox (then) College, where she graduated with honors. We also found boxes of old cards she had sent and received, almost a dozen photo albums, even collections of recipes. We pored over the cards and photos and clippings, and we loved it because we were seeing things that mattered to us as a family. However, no one gave the diploma more than a brief glance. Truthfully, I don't even remember what level of honors she graduated with.

Now, I am one of the last people in the world who would degrade college education, or graduating with honors. I want to go to graduate school, so I know that grades really matter.

However, so does life.

I realized that when I'm dead, my dozens of grandchildren won't really be concerned with my GPA or what's on my diploma. They will be far more interested in pictures, in my stories, in what I did with my degree - with my life.

I think everyone is going to school for different reasons, so this state of mind that I have somehow ended up in may sound straight-up crazy to you. That is okay. My goal with confessing these things is to encourage you, as a student, to take a second to reflect on why you're going to school, how you're living your life right now, and what will matter in years to come. Take breaks, go for walks, spend time with friends, eat grilled cheese sandwiches and watch sports once in a while without kicking yourself for it afterwards. Our college experience are, after all, 4 years of our lives - I for one don't want to hate it.

Just an thought.

Much love, and good luck with midterms. 

"Our well-intentioned destruction of history" and other thoughts from the first week of school.

This is straight out of a class assignment, but it sums up nicely where my head has been for a few days. Feedback and/or questions welcome. 

After one of my classes this morning, I started thinking about how the discovery of some element of history – whether it is a site, an idea, or a people group – is often the first step in its eventual destruction. I began to wonder if it is unavoidable that humankind’s attempts to appreciate and understand history would end up destroying it. I have seen this pattern repeat in multiple ways. Physically, it manifests itself in the destruction of Mesoamerican historical sites that stood for centuries before tourists started visiting. Figuratively, it is shown in white America’s attempts to “remember” and “honor” Native American culture, succeeding only in propagating images of the censored version we are comfortable with.

                In Steinbeck’s piece “The Leader of the People,” he painfully describes Grandfather’s repeated attempts to inspire his family to appreciate and sympathize with his journey Westward. Carl’s angry outburst: “That time’s done. Why can’t he forget it, now it’s done?”(p.890) caused Grandfather to see that his eager retellings were only defiling the overarching story for the people he most wanted to understand it. He sought to use specific incidents (Piutes and the 35 horses) to illustrate what it felt like to surge Westward, he desperately wanted the “movement” (p. 891) to be as emotionally meaningful to them as it was, and is, to him. It was not until he sadly recognized that “Westering isn’t a hunger anymore” (p. 891) that he could see his experiences as the others saw them. I cannot help but wonder what the reaction would have been if he had only told the story once. But who has the self-control or humility to tell a story only once? Who can take only one picture of a beautiful scene, who has been to only one museum? When we see something we like, we want more, whether it is good for us or not. However, it is that overexposure, that rabid appreciation, that does not enhance our enjoyment but rather makes it mundane, untrue, or even damaged.

                I suppose it is an innate human urge, to cling to or draw near the stories and experiences that move us, though that often means that we will defile or corrupt them. It is almost as if we are small children with candy bars, holding onto them so tightly and eagerly that  we melt them with our hot little hands, ruining it for ourselves or anyone else who may have enjoyed it.

Is there a metaphor for trying to create a metaphor for a metaphor?

Perspective is a funny thing.

I become so used to my own, 5'4" from the ground (give or take 1/4" depending on how worn my TOMS are), looking through young blue grey green eyes that have seen sunlight nearly every day of their 20 years.

My outlook on life and my worldview are shaped by my perspective, by the things I've experienced and seen. My perspective is unique because no one else has lived my life.

Explaining how one's perspective, thinking patterns, ideas, and understanding are/have been/will be changing is like trying to explain swimming to someone who has lived in a desert their entire life.

The reason I started thinking about this is as follows: today I found myself in the theoretical but very real trap of creating a metaphor for a metaphor.

I tried to think of a way to relate the bizarre impression of vertigo I felt when the rearview mirror in my car fell off while I was driving to something else - but how can the feeling of suddenly not being able to see in two directions at once while moving be explained? I can't think of another way to explain it. It just is what it is. Like in math class with those pesky algebra problems, this answer cannot be simplified.

What is a metaphor for the way water soaks into dry land? How do you describe a description?

How do I explain what it looks like to have a room filled with sunlight coming through a window that has been blocked for years?

I can't.

Maybe we can all imagine a sort of picture of what those things may look like, but that's because we've seen them before. If you haven't seen something before, you can't really understand what it looks like.

Your perspective can't account for things that you haven't experienced or learned, and when your perspective changes it can be as foreign to someone else as the concept of mp3's would be to someone who had only ever listened to records.

Perspective is a funny thing. And when it changes, slowly or dramatically, it can be as hard to rationalize or explain as the sudden loss of the assurance of a rearview mirror. And if no one else has ever driven the type of car that tends to have things like the rearview mirror fall off, it's possible that no one will know what I'm talking about.

So I suppose, by my own explanation, no one will understand this post. It won't resonate in your bones or change your lifestyle. But still, my wish is that we'd all have our perspective widened a little bit. If you need to stop revisiting the past, I hope your rearview mirror falls off. If you feel thirsty and dry, I hope you get the refreshment you need. If you're in the dark, I hope you find a window.

And when you do, and your perspective changes, I hope you remember what it was like to look back, be thirsty, or be in the dark. Because our perspectives are best used to understand other people.

A tribute to the Thunder to the tune of "Oklahoma"

Oklahoma!
Where Durant comes driving down the court,
And Chris Bosh will weep
When the Thunder sweeps
While Lebron and Wade fin'ly retire!

Oklahoma!
Better than the Lakers or the Spurs,
So they won the West,
Soon they’ll be the best
When they win the finals and the rings!

We know that the Thunder is king,
And so this is the song that we sing,
And when we say: ah yip ah oh ee ayy,
We’re only saying “You’re gonna win, Oklahoma,"
Oklahoma,
O-K-L-A-H-O-M-A:
NNNN BBBB AAAA finals!

(Song begins at :52) 

Summer to-do list: working draft

1. Memorize the list of logical fallacies and mention every one I see/hear (AKA: be obnoxious all the time)
2. Purge my vocabulary of unnecessary abbreviations. Yeah guys, I know it's hilarious and charming when I say "totes perf" but no more.
3. Movie marathon list:
     A. Scorsese
     B. Wes Anderson
     C. Ellen Page
     D. Brad Pitt
     E. Emma Stone
     F. Christian Bale (censored, most likely)
4. Get really good at bocce ball
5. Improve frisbee skills from level 'arm amputee' to '12 year old boy'
6. Climb a mountain