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Honestly, its two in the morning and i had a God awful day. I am trying to read this poem and i just cant focus. I feel stressed beyond belief and i am very frustrated with life. I understand this is not a blog about my life, but i decided to be real and honest and i would rather be honest and say i am not going to read this tonight, because i know i will not give it 100 percent. I will read it tomorrow, when i am calm and peaceful. I understand this might affect my grade, but i can not lie and i wont. If i want to get the best out of life and out of this class, i need to try my hardest. Thank you

Imago Dei -- Steve Fetke

Boys next door. Act II

The second act of Boys next door was very interesting. It was not as funny as the first act, however i kept telling myself that this would make a great movie. At the end of this play, i did not really see a moral, or theme or some 'insight into the world'. It was kind of a real life situation. I was a little shocked as Jack decided to leave and get a new job at the traveling agency. The author just randomly put that scene in there without a warning and i had to reread it to make sure it was saying what i thought it was saying. This part was very sad, because i felt compassion for the boys. They were loosing Jack, and Jack seemed to hold them together. Now they had to start all over with someone knew. Also, the scene with Barry's father was very sad. I felt so bad for Barry. He was so excited to see his father and he talked about it in almost every conversation that he had with someone. He went out and bought new shoes and got all dressed up to see his father who left him. Then his father walks in and physically beats him and curses him out. This was very disturbing and I felt compassion for him. It is sad, because this kind of thing actually happens in real life. His father got him some old chocolate and Barry doesnt even like chocolate. I wondered to myself," How lonely Barry must feel". then the saddest part is when Barry says to a closed door, "Dad, I am a pro golfer now". He just wanted to make his father happy. This also reminds me that they are human just like us and they have emotions just like us, (who are not mentally handicapped, because, after all, who is normal?) But i think that sometimes we tend to think that the mentally handicapped are some different species who we are intimidated by and tend to ignore. But they are humans just like us, who care. One thing that i saw was how Lucien tried so much to help Jack when he had a small cut on his finger. He was willing to do anything for him. But this just proves my point that they are just like us, they just have abnormal abnormalities than we have. One question that i did not get answered was why did Norman want to show Sheila the bathroom so bad?

The Boys next Door

This was a very interesting play in Act 1. As i started reading the story, i was very confused at to why arnold would by 9 boxes of weaties. As each character was introduced, i became more confused. It seemed that they were very slow, or honestly, weird. But then, Jack explains to the audience what is going on. It turns out that they are in fact mentally challenged. After i found this out, i thoroughly enjoyed reading this, because i learned more about each character as the story progressed. My favorite character is either Norbert or Barry. Barry was hillarious as he was trying to teach Mr. Hedges his golf lesson. I struggled with this some, because i kept asking myself if it was ok to laugh, because they were honestly hillarious. Is it okay to laugh at mentally challenged people? Most would say no, but for the story's sake, i laughed. Some parts i could not help it, especially because of the way that they think. It seems like it was almost impossible to have a conversation with one another, because each individual focused so much on what they were thinking instead of listening to the other one. For example, Barry kept talking about how his dad was comming home and Norbert kept talking about doughnuts and keys. Another interesting observation that i saw was that Norbert always wears his doughnut uniform. This tells me that he loves his job and it might be a major part of his identity. IT must make him proud. I still have not figured out what Arnolds infatuation with Weaties is. I thought that it was sad how the market took advantage of his disorder. Arnold seems to be the most complex character, as one can tell that he gets depressed easily. He seems to be almost normal sometimes, then he completely looses it by buying 9 boxes of weaties. We also get a good description of Jack, as we see that he is obviously a good man for doing what he does, as he seems to have the father role here in the story. All in all, this is a very well writen play, i just struggled with the moral part of should i laugh or not?

Sonny's Blues

First of all, i need to admit that this post is late, because i was sick last night and today. Unfortunately i was not able to complete this on time. When i read this story, i decided to read it backwards, by reading the story first, then the bio about the author, James Baldwin. Surprisingly, they were not much different. Maybe i should have read the bio first, because it would have provided better insight into the story as i was reading it. But either way, they were shockingly similar. Baldwin's story 'Sonny's Blues' was a very good image of how life can be. Just like the bio says, Baldwin paints a very vivid and intricate picture of how the pain of life can give us the blues. This story ties into everything that we have read so far into this course because it was real. This happens in real life. One of the most amazing things for me was the part that the bio states that James used to read to escape or to get away from the pain of life. In the story, sonny played the piano in a jazz band to get away from the pain of life. It seems also that one part of the story, when sonny was supposed to be going to school, but instead was playing music with his buddies at a white girls apartment, was an escape from life, or avoiding the drugs and pain of life. This story was very intricate and it can be very confusing as it takes you for a ride of sharp turns and hidden turns, but it was very cool to read. One thing that also came out in the story was the part about racism. The bio states that James dealt with this and his story deals with it as well. For example, sonny's dad's brother was killed by drunk white men in a car. This part of the story was very disturbing. One thing that i want to give credit to the author for, was his descriptions of the characters. In this story, you find out a little bit about each character as you are reading. The plot, problems, and the character, event the settings progress as you read the story. The more you read, the more you begin to understand what is going on and what is happening. The more you read, the more you get to know the characters and the plot. I found, like the book 'A Grief Observed', that there is a lot that can be taken away from this story. For example, the scene when sonny is playing piano at the club. The music that is being played is not just notes, but a life story that is floating through the air. There is pain and passion behind that music that is coming from that piano in this story. It was his way of expressing himself in life. I loved that theme in this book, as we all have different ways of expressing or venting our pain and problems in life.