| Hey you guys, here's project D. I decided that the text works best in this project, so I'm going to do a major overhauling of project c instead.
Here's the final version:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/32894710@N00/sets/72057594110103887/
Instructions on how to operate Flickr:
1) After clicking on the link, you will be directed to the page which hosts my multimedia essay.
2) Once there, click on the upper left hand photo in the set (you should not click on the large picture above the title (that’s the last photo in the set), nor should you click on “view as a slideshow”, because the text will not appear).
3) When you are ready to view the next picture, click on the small arrow on right that says “more”, with a photo above it. You can read and look at each slide at your own pace. | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment   |
| Hey, this is revised and ready to go!
Cheryl Debelis
4/4/2006
Project C, Draft 2
The Dangers of Traveling
For many, traveling is a source of great excitement, a prospect of adventure and of experiences that simply would not be possible had you not gone somewhere unfamiliar. For others, however, the thought of traveling somewhere foreign can trigger feelings of panic and fear. It is important for even the most adventurous of people to remember that although traveling can be quite rewarding, it is always necessary to be cautious of your surroundings. Different countries have different customs, and different countries also have different dangers to look out for.
Last year I took a trip to Morocco with my study abroad college based in Paris, France. I remember how as the large tour bus pulled into the medina, I could feel myself swelling with excitement. This crowded center of the city, full of possibilities, made for a refreshing break from the red clay countryside we had been traveling through for the past 9 days. In the medina, we were officially left alone for the first time since the beginning of the trip. My friend Pam and I entered into the maze-like part of the medina, called the “souk” in Arabic.
Suddenly men from either side of us began yelling out “Bonjour les gazelles, bonjour!” (Which literally translates into “Hello gazelles, hello!”), and trying to take our hands to lead us into their respective booths to buy their merchandise. Pam and I were overwhelmed – even though we had been told that they bartered in this country, we still were not used to being pressured as we were. In a lot of bartering countries, even stopping to look at an object for more than a second will cause them to try and sell it to you. This can take you off guard, as it did me when my hand touched the first scarf this man’s stall.
After being practically pushed from one vendor to another, I looked in back of me and noticed a man wearing bright yellow shoes staring at us. He, unlike the others, said nothing, yet made no attempt to hide the fact that he was staring. Eventually, with the combination of running out of cash and becoming more and more irritated with the rudeness of the men, Pam and I decided to leave the medina for a little while, go to the ATM, and perhaps have a cup of coffee prior to reentry. As we walked down the long road to go to the ATM, I noticed once again the yellow shoes of a man walking some 15 feet in back of us. I dismissed it, and used the ATM some moments later.
When we had gotten back into public view, I happened to turn my head once more and saw the same man following us. I looked at my watch; the first time that I had seen him was well over an hour ago. Every few minutes we looked behind us, hoping that he would be gone. Every time we did this, he was always at the next booth, waiting for us to be done bartering with the vendor. As we navigated through the labyrinth of passageways, I began to forget which way we had come. We made a variety of sharp turns in hopes to evade him; and numerous times we thought we had only to see him reappear 15 minutes later with that same dark sinister look on his face.
Finally I was fed up, I told him in French to stop following us and we ran off again. By now it was dark, and we had lost him; we had been followed for nearly four hours by this stranger in this foreign country. For the remainder of the night we stayed in close proximity to the others in our groups. This adventure into the medina had shown me that perhaps when visiting such a place it would be best to stay with people who know more about the dangers that exist than go off on your own, assuming that you are tough enough to handle anything that could come your way.
I talked with Caitlin, another student who attended the same study abroad program as I did last year, and inquired about her travels. I wondered if she had perhaps come across some of the same dangers as I had in Morocco. She had taken a trip to Amsterdam, and said that “everyone was offering drugs on the street”, but other than that there did not seem to be any real apparent dangers. However, when she was in Paris she had been followed for hours by a man who actually cornered her into a series of alleyways. She was pretty sure he had a knife, and it was only by chance that she found her way back onto the main roads before anything bad happened.
It’s truly frightening to think of all the horrible things that could happen while traveling, yet it is also important not to let any of those fears hold you back. Instead, the smartest way to go about these things is to be careful and take precautions. If you know that a certain country is going through political turmoil or there have been a lot of religious prosecution, use your judgment and stay away. There are many other places to travel to with safer conditions.
Traveling using a tour is another great way to experience other countries that have different customs than us. They are equipped with a tour guide who will inform you of what behavior is acceptable and what is not, and will most likely make your trip not only better, but you will also have learned a lot more about the culture than you would have otherwise. Regardless of where you travel to, make sure to keep an open mind and, in some cases, a lower profile would be advisable as well.
Whenever you visit a foreign country of any sort, there are a few things to keep in mind:
1) Have a map with you of the city you are in at all times. This way if you are lost or are in trouble, you might be able to navigate yourself out of the bad situation.
2) Always travel with someone else. No matter how brave you are or if you have even been there once before, having a friend with you in imperative to your safety.
3) Periodically check in with someone from home. Always let them know where you are going that day as well as for the next couple of days. This will not only ease the minds of your family and friends, it will also make you much safer.
4) Know the customs of each country you visit. In some countries it is not okay to wear low cut shirts or even knee length skirts. In order to not make yourself a target, it is a very good idea to conform to their ways of life during your stay.
5) Have your trip planned out in advance. You want to make sure that you have a place to stay each night, along with a way of getting from place to place. Without these things you may be stuck outside in a foreign country with no where to go. This can incite danger.
After traveling, you’ll find you have an almost limitless number of stories to tell, regardless of whether or not you did anything that could put you into danger. If anything, those people with stories about how they were not safe while traveling abroad will most likely be greeted with people who are concerned, not with people who are impressed. Overall, have fun, take lots of pictures, and most of all, be safe. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Cheryl Debelis
English 501, Project B
2nd Draft
(I'm sorry this is kinda long - I'm going to have to cut some of it out...)
Going abroad is an experience that is bound to be unforgettable. Here I was, 21 years old, living in a foreign country with a foreign family for four months. There was no escape now, I had already paid the tuition, purchased my plane tickets, and got my visa to live in France. Even though I knew not to go in expecting anything particular for fear of being disappointed, I must say I had higher expectations of my “famille d’acceuil” or “host family”.
When I first met my new host mom, Paulette, I hoped that my initial impression would prove to be inaccurate. She was a single older woman who had four children that were already in their forties. Paulette seemed to be very set in her ways. She just had a way of putting things that blatantly got the point home that things were not subject to change.
Paulette stood at a mere 5’1”, yet her presence commanded your attention. I’m not sure if it was me misinterpreting her looks and behavior, but I always felt that it was as though her dark eyes could see every imperfection, fault, or flaw. I felt vulnerable due to the way she looked at me; her dark eyes were piercing and made me feel as though I was constantly under scrutiny. As I glanced around the small apartment for the first time, I noticed a couple small details that, at first, I didn’t know what to make of. The first was a large framed portrait of her. Even in the portrait, where she was trying to look happy, she still looked cold somehow. There was a roughness that was there that seemed to be unshakable.
At that point I didn’t know why, but eventually I learned that her husband had left her shortly after the birth of her forth child, leaving her to care for all of them alone, without child support. She had raised all of her kids in this one small apartment, and had worked three jobs throughout most of their childhoods in order to pay for everything. Due to the fact that she had to work so much, whenever she wasn’t working, things still needed to be arranged in just the right way.
It really seemed as though it was because she could maintain control of her life since everything had to be meticulously balanced in order to function at all. Apparently, as the years went on, this controlling behavior became embedded into her personality because when I met her, she was quite possibly the most controlling person I had ever met. She ran a tight ship, and since I was now a part of her life, she seemed to feel the need to control me as well. It was as though I was child #5, but I was not a child that she even cared for. Child #5 was not a title I wanted nor did I need. I did not come from a ‘tight ship’, and my lack thereof suited me just fine.
The second thing I noticed was Paulette’s deep frown lines. After the first few weeks I began to put together the half-formed thought that occurred to me when I had first met her. How does one get frown lines instead of the normal smile lines? Well, I would assume that it means that you have to frown consistently over a long period of time; much like how often one normally smiles. If someone is frowning as much as most people generally smile, it should then follow that the person is probably not a happy one. Even someone who has lived a hard life yet didn’t have a defeatist attitude generally has laugh lines – sometimes even more so than people who had things handed to them. Although most of this was pure speculation, I couldn’t help but see how the pieces fit together.
Within the first week of me living there, I had noticed that every day when I would come home from school that my things would be arranged differently than when I had left. She would take the things I had put on my desk and place them on top of my bureau instead, as if to tell me that I was not allowed to arrange my things in my room the way I wanted to. Sometimes I would put things back the way I had them, as to make sure that my speculations were correct. Every time I did this I would come back home and they would be back to the way she wanted them. She even instructed me how she wanted me to make my bed; even though I had been making it daily already without having to be asked to do it. Paulette wanted the bed made her way, so that was how things were going to be.
This lack of privacy bothered me, but what came next was even worse. When it was time to do the laundry she would let me know and I would give her my clothes that I wanted her to wash. I had several silk garments that were dry clean only, so I never gave those to her. Instead I would place them in the bottom of my suitcase until I could take them to the dry cleaner. One day, while I was at school, I had already given her my laundry for the week, but while she was going through my room she actually opened up my suitcase, took the dry clean only silk garments, and washed them in the regular cycle.
When I got back home and saw them hanging up to dry, I was shocked. I wasn’t sure if this was something that was an accepted practice in France, but in the United States it sure as hell would have constituted a violation of privacy. I calmed down prior to talking to her about it, and finally just asked how she had come across those articles. She claimed that she had gone into my room to open the windows and saw that I had more dirty clothing that I must have forgotten about (I didn’t push the fact that the suitcase was closed, so it would have been impossible for her to have seen the clothing without going through my things…). When I told her that they were dry clean only and not meant for the wash, she apologized, but behind her apology I sensed bitterness.
During dinner long awkward silences were a regular, almost inevitable occurrence. I constantly racked my brain, desperately trying to think of things to say. Whatever I wanted to say I first tried to analyze and filter out any comments which could potentially be taken offensively prior to actually speaking. When you add in the language barrier, things became even more complicated (as Paulette spoke no English).
It was after a few weeks that I had learned to do this; following the first time that I met her daughter, Christina. During dinner the following night I had mentioned to Paulette “Your daughter seems really nice. It was great meeting her; she really seems like a great person.” I had expected her to take it favorably, because I really had been trying to complement her abilities as a mother indirectly. Instead she managed to somehow take my comment personally saying “Yeah, well Paulette is nice too. Paulette is nice too.” This had been the exact opposite result I’d intended to get. It just seemed like whatever she could take personally she was going to.
This became a major factor in why the dinner conversations slowly came to a halt. She never made much of an effort to start a conversation with me, so when I eliminated all the things I had to say (for fear of them being taken the wrong way), the dinner table became altogether too quiet. The only real things I came up with to say were basic complements on her cooking, saying that school was going well, or asking her what she had done that day. I was especially thankful at that point that we only had to eat dinner together twice a week. All during the days that I knew I was going to have dinner with her I would be nervous. I began to loathe having dinner with Paulette.
All of these conversations were so generic that I really thought it was apparent to both of us that neither of us truly wanted to be there. These were the types of conversations people have when someone doesn’t know you well enough to ask or talk about the things that really matter in your life. With our relationship, I felt such a barrier that I felt that she never wanted to take our relationship beyond this first introductory conversation. As a result, I never felt comfortable in doing so either. Perhaps if I had taken the initiative more often and pretended to be happier than I was she would have eventually warmed up to me, perhaps not.
Eventually I started needing to vent my frustrations. I began recounting the abnormal events to friends, telling them about how she yelled at me for staying up past 11pm, and how she yelled at me for brushing my teeth and washing my face for too long, because I was “wasting water”. As I started letting some of the frustration out, I realized how upset I was at the situation. Above all else, the thing that upset me the most was how she went through my things as if it was her right to do so.
Finally I started giving her a nickname; I referred to her at first as “the Old Bag”. Later I began calling her the direct French translation “le Vieille Sac” (This phrase doesn’t actually make sense in French either, due to the fact that “old bag” is an English idiom and is therefore not directly translatable. However, those people who are familiar with both languages would be able to understand the joke). Eventually I just started calling her “the Sac”, or “the Bag”. Sometimes she was even “My Bag”. By then I felt as though I had to get my kicks where I could.
After a month of her going through my things, I began taking things out a tad passive-aggressively. Everyday when I returned to my room, I would replace my umbrella on the closet door handle, which she had moved. Everyday when I left for school, the Old Bag would come back in and take it off of my door handle and place it on the floor. I am aware that this type of child-like interaction seems utterly pointless and stubborn, but at that point I felt as though I was standing up for my privacy. I was trying to show Paulette that it should be my prerogative, not hers, where I decide to put things in my room – especially since I was paying to live there. This pattern continued for the next month. I could tell that each of us was just waiting to see who would be the one to back down.
Finally, when I was out shopping with some friends at H&M, I knew what I had to do. I purchased a second umbrella. That night I hung it along with my first umbrella on the same door handle. The instigator in me had taken over, and honestly I would have paid a large sum of money to see the look on her face when she walked into my room that day only to see that there were now two umbrellas on the door handle, not just one (oh that silly Sac). When I returned, both umbrellas were on the floor. After that we barely spoke anymore.
I was never quite sure why I didn’t seem to meet her expectations. My passive aggressive reactions had been the result of poor treatment from her – I could not think of a good reason why she seemed to almost have a bias against me. I didn’t generally stay out late (except for once and a while on the weekends), I was a good student, I was always on time for meals, and I initially showed her a great deal of respect.
Little did I know that there had been other extraordinary circumstances while all of this was going on. It was not possible for me to have known the extent of the family problems that existed because she never opened up to me. Apparently she had a granddaughter who had been eight months pregnant- this was supposed to be her first great grandchild – but the baby died during the premature delivery. This created a great sadness in the family, one that she never shared with me. I had no idea what was going on at the time, so when Paulette would get upset over little things I always took it personally.
In addition to this, Christina, her daughter who also had a host student staying with her, was sent to a mental institution for a “rest period” after having a mental breakdown. This was, of course, tough on their family as well. Paulette never told me anything about this either. It was only when I requested to move that I was finally informed by the school that the family was falling apart.
I realize now that she had never signed up to be a host mother because she wanted to get to know someone from another country. She never did this because she wanted a different perspective on life, or to even teach her perspective to another person. She signed up to be a host mother because it would supplement her income. For Paulette, she was too old to really work anywhere, so to help out she took in students studying abroad. I wasn’t someone she wanted to get to know, I was a paycheck. I was someone to control. I think that if I had been a meek person who was easy to control we would have gotten along just fine. I think that Paulette would have then even treated me well. It just came down to the vast differences in personalities and the family difficulties which intensified her already controlling behaviors and pushed me to my breaking point.
Eventually both students in either family’s households were moved, myself included. I met my new host mother, and she was a breath of fresh air. She would let me have friends over, go out when I wanted, she never went through my things, and she never got upset over the little things. Honestly, when I think about Paulette, I think that even if these other factors had not been present we would not have gotten along very well. I consider myself to be a free spirit, and an adult. Although I am completely fine with following along someone else’s guidelines when I am staying with them, I am not okay with being treated poorly, controlled, or stifled. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Project B
1st Draft
“The Old Bag”
Going abroad is an experience that is bound to be unforgettable. Here I was, 21 years old, living in a foreign country with a foreign family for four months. There was no escape now, I had already paid the tuition, purchased my plane tickets, and got my visa to live in France. Even though I knew not to go in expecting anything particular for fear of being disappointed, I must say I had higher expectations of my “famille d’acceuil” or “host family”.
When I first met my new host mom, or Paulette as she preferred to be called, I hoped that my initial impression would prove to be inaccurate. She was a single older woman who had four children that were already themselves in their forties. Paulette seemed to be very set in her ways. She just had a way of putting things that blatantly got the point home that things were not subject to change.
Paulette stood at a mere 5’1”, yet her presence commanded your attention. Her dark eyes were piercing and made me feel as though I was constantly under scrutiny. As I glanced around the small apartment for the first time, I noticed a couple small details that, at first, I didn’t know what to make of. The first was a large framed portrait of her. Even in the portrait, where she was trying to look happy, she still looked cold somehow. There was a roughness that was there that seemed to be unshakable.
At that point I didn’t know why, but eventually I learned that her husband had left her shortly after the birth of her forth child, leaving her to care for all of them alone, without child support. She had raised all of her kids in this one small apartment, and had worked three jobs throughout most of their childhoods in order to pay for everything. Because she had to work so much, whenever she wasn’t working, things still needed to be arranged in just the right way so she could maintain control of her life. As the years went on, this controlling behavior became embedded into her personality. She ran a tight ship, and apparently I was going to become child number 5. This was not a title I wanted nor did I need. I did not come from a ‘tight ship’, and my lack thereof suited me just fine.
The second thing I noticed was Paulette’s deep frown lines. After the first few weeks I began to put together the half-formed thought that occurred to me when I had first met her. How does one get frown lines instead of the normal smile lines? Well, I would assume that it means that you have to frown consistently over a long period of time; similar to how often one normally smiles. If someone is frowning as much as most people generally smile, I doubt that the person is a happy one. Even someone who has lived a hard life, but who saw the good in things and didn’t have a defeatist attitude generally has laugh lines – sometimes even more so than people who had things handed to them. Eventually it became clear that this thought process coincided with the way Paulette acted, and I believed it to be accurate.
Within the first week of me living there, I had noticed that every day when I would come home from school that my things would be arranged differently than when I had left. She would take the things I had put on my desk and place them on top of my bureau instead, as if to tell me that I was not allowed to arrange my things in my room the way I wanted to. Sometimes I would put things back the way I had them, as to make sure that my speculations were correct. Every time I did this I would come back home and they would be back to the way she wanted them.
This lack of privacy bothered me, but what came next was even worse. When it was time to do the laundry she would let me know and I would give her my clothes that I wanted her to wash. I had several silk garments that were dry clean only, so I never gave those to her. Instead I would place them in the bottom of my suitcase until I could take them to the dry cleaner. One day, while I was at school, I had already given her my laundry for the week, but apparently while she was going through my room she actually opened up my suitcase, took the dry clean only silk garments, and washed them in the regular cycle.
When I got back home and saw them hanging up to dry, I was shocked. I wasn’t sure if this was something that was an accepted practice in France, but in the United States it sure as hell would have constituted a violation of privacy. I calmed down prior to talking to her about it, and finally just asked how she got those articles. She claimed that she had gone into my room to open the windows and saw that I had more dirty clothing that I must have forgotten about (I didn’t push the fact that the suitcase was closed, so it would have been impossible for her to have seen the clothing without going through my things…). When I told her that they were dry clean only and not meant for the wash, she apologized, but behind her apology I sensed bitterness.
During dinner there would always be long awkward silences. I would always be thinking constantly of things to say, analyzing them, and filtering through my thought process prior to actually speaking. After a few weeks I had learned to do this, since after the first time that I met her daughter, Christina. During dinner the following night I had said to Paulette “Your daughter seems really nice. It was great meeting her; she really seems like a great person.” I was expecting some sort of comment like “well, that’s because I raised her”, but I should have known better by that point. Instead she managed to somehow take my comment personally saying “Yeah, well Paulette is nice too. Paulette is nice too.” It just seemed like whatever she could take personally she was going to.
This became a major factor in why the dinner conversations slowly came to a halt. She never made much of an effort to start a conversation with me, so when I eliminated all the things I had to say (for fear of them being taken the wrong way), the dinner table became altogether too quiet. I began to loathe having dinner with Paulette. I would tell myself constantly that it was a good thing that we only had to eat dinner together twice a week. All during the days that I knew I was going to have dinner with the old bag I would be nervous. In the back of my mind I would always try to come up with foolproof things to say, and by the end of the day I would usually come up with next to nothing, besides complementing her cooking or saying that school was going well or asking her what she had done that day.
All of these conversations were so generic that I really thought it was apparent to both of us that neither of us truly wanted to be there. These were the types of conversations you had with someone you just met, when you didn’t know them well enough to talk about anything in depth. You had these types of conversations when someone didn’t know you well enough to ask or talk about the things that really mattered in your life. With our relationship, I felt such a barrier that I felt that she never wanted to take our relationship beyond this first introductory conversation, and I never felt comfortable in doing so either.
Eventually I started needing to vent my frustrations; luckily I had some friends who were all ears. I would tell them about how she yelled at me for staying up past 11, and how she yelled at me for brushing my teeth and washing my face for too long, because I was “wasting water”. I told them about how she went through my things as if it was her right to do so.
Finally I started giving her a nickname; I would refer to her first as “the Old Bag”, then I started calling her the direct French translation “le Vieille Sac”. This would not make sense to anyone besides those who knew both French and English, because this idiom was not directly translatable into French. In this way, no one else besides my friends knew who I was referring to.
Eventually I just started calling her “the sac”, or “the bag”. Sometimes she was even “my bag”. Hell, I had to get my kicks where I could at that point.
After a month of her going through my things, I began taking things out a tad passive-aggressively. Everyday I would come back into my room and I would place my umbrella on the closet door handle. Everyday when I would leave for school, she would come back in and take it off of my door handle and place it on the floor. Such an interaction seems so utterly pointless and stubborn, I know, but at that point I just really felt as though I was standing up for my privacy. I was trying to drive the point home without having to actually confront her that if I wanted to put my umbrella on the door knob that was my prerogative. This pattern continued for the next month. I could tell that each of us was just waiting to see who would be the one to back down.
Finally, when I was out shopping with some friends at H&M, I knew what I had to do. I purchased a second umbrella, and that night I hung it along with my first umbrella on the same door handle. I would have paid a large sum of money just to see the look on her face when she walked into my room that day only to see that there were two umbrellas on the door handle, not just one (oh that silly sac). After that we barely spoke anymore.
I was never quite sure why I didn’t seem to meet her expectations. I didn’t generally stay out late (except for once and a while on the weekends), I was a good student, I was always on time for meals, and I tried my best to always show her respect. I was not possible for me to have known the extent of what was going on in her life at that moment. Apparently she had a granddaughter who was eight months pregnant- this was to be her first great grandchild – and the baby had died during the premature delivery. This created a great sadness in the family, one that she never shared with me. I had no idea what was going on at the time, so when Paulette would get upset over little things I always took it personally.
In addition to this, Christina, her daughter who also had a host student staying with her, was sent to a mental institution for a “rest period” after having a mental breakdown. This was, of course, tough on their family as well, but this was never communicated to me. I had no idea what was going on while it was happening. It was only when I requested to move that I was finally informed that the family was falling apart.
I realize now that she had never signed up to be a host mother because she wanted to get to know someone from another country. She never did this because she wanted a different perspective on life, or to even teach her perspective to another person. She signed up to be a host mother because it would supplement her income. For Paulette, she was too old to really work anywhere, so to help out she took in students studying abroad. I wasn’t someone she wanted to get to know, I was a paycheck. I was someone to control.
Eventually both students in either family’s households were moved, myself included. I met my new host mother, and she was a breath of fresh air. She would let me have friends over, go out when I wanted, she never went through my things, and she never got upset over the little things. Honestly, when I think about Paulette, I think that even if these other factors had not been present we would not have gotten along very well. I consider myself to be a free spirit, and an adult. Although I am completely fine with following along someone else’s guidelines when I am staying with them, I am not okay with being treated poorly, controlled, or stifled. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| I Ain’t Got No Nothing.
“No, I never want to visit any other of them countries.” As my father spoke, his incorrect grammar made me wince a little. This was not nearly a rare occurrence. Even though I had been able to get used to it a bit over the course of my then 21 years, I still felt a bit ashamed whenever I would hear it.
As I had just returned from my study abroad program to Paris, France, I felt as though the love of traveling had consumed me. All I could think about was the last four months. That section of time had an ethereal feel to it, as though it were a dream; an eye-opening life-changing dream. Even through this fog I was in, I still can’t say that I was shocked to hear those words come out of his mouth.
“Why not, Dad? It’s such an amazing experience to see other cultures.”
“Well, life is going to be just as bad there as it is here.”
There. He had said it. The comment hit me like a swift punch to the gut. I thought to myself immediately that it was one of the most depressing comments I’ve ever heard him say. I shouldn’t have been surprised, I told myself, that he had responded as he did.
My father has always had a certain way of putting things. He always let you know that his opinion, although completely unsubstantiated by any information, previous experience, or even at times logic, was unshakable. My father’s definitive ways of putting things did not make others understand his point of view, although he never cared whether or not other people understood him or not. The way he put things showed plainly that he didn’t care whether or not his opinion was wrong or right; it was his opinion and he was not going to change it for anyone.
“Oh Dad, c’mon, you don’t mean that. Don’t be silly!”
But I knew before I had even said it that he had meant it, so when he gave me a brief yet all-telling look just for a flash of a second, it was confirmed. For just that one second it was as if we both knew the truth: my father was depressed.
My father has never been the King of Ambition. He has never seemed to want to even get out of his own way. He is working a position frighteningly similar to the one he was working 25 years ago, a machinist in a modest factory, and not making much more than he had then either. It seemed as if the thought had genuinely never crossed his mind to try harder. Dad was content to be a drone.
I had known these things about him since I was a child. My mother, a chemistry teacher with her Master’s degree, has always been quick to warn her children “not to turn out like your father”. She would point out the factors and consequences of living a life of not wanting more for yourself and your family. It was because of this that I began realizing what I, in turn, wanted out of life. I wanted to be everything that he never was.
He had always been the cheapest person I had known. I remember when I was 12 asking him for fifty cents to ride the city bus to the mall, since he didn’t want to give me a ride. His response was “Where’s your fifty cents? I ain’t got no nothing.” It was typical, and I learned after a while never to ask my father for anything unless I wanted a guilt trip. Even then I usually would be denied, so I chose never to rely on him. Things were easier that way, and I didn’t end up feeling so bad about myself.
When I was a freshman in college, I was staying with my Dad over winter break. I came home from work one day and walked into the living room to see my father using a broom to sweep the carpet. Apparently the vacuum cleaner broke, and this was his solution. Seeing this short man wearing a stained t-shirt, ripped jeans, and slippers with holes in them trying to sweep the carpet almost made me laugh; I had always known that my father was ridiculous, but this was more severe than what I had ever imagined him to be.
“Dad, why don’t you just buy a new vacuum cleaner?”
“I don’t have the money to just replace the vacuum cleaner! Besides, this broom works surprisingly well.”
It’s almost four years later, and he still has not replaced his broken vacuum. I had always hated our small house, now I was embarrassed by it and happy that I no longer resided there.
It had always been like this with everything for him: shirts would be worn until they had holes in them, and usually even thereafter as well. His jeans would be worn until they had giant gaping holes, then they would be converted into jean shorts. After my parents’ divorce, however, my father’s appearance faltered even worse than it had been when they had been together. I think my father has always been depressed, but now it was much worse. He almost never smiled anymore.
It was always embarrassing when I would be out in public with my father dressed this way, so when I became old enough to do something about it, I began buying my dad what I called ‘necessity items’ for all his birthdays, father’s days, and Christmases. My older sister Jessica did the same, and he hated it.
Whenever he’d open the presents and see what we’d gotten him, he of course was never satisfied. He wanted CD’s and DVD’s; although he would never tell us which ones he wanted. Not knowing what to get him, we would always get him something that at least he needed. Even when he got new articles of clothing from us, he still wouldn’t throw away the old ones.
The pillows at my dad’s house are falling apart, some only kept together by the pillow cases which prevent the stuffing from falling onto the floor. Most of them he had around the time I was born, making them about 20 years old. Whenever I go over to his house I am disgusted by them, so I try to remember to bring my own. I have tried to hint to him that he needed new ones, by spouting off disgusting facts like “Dad, did you know that 10% of the weight of a TWO year old pillow is made up of dead dust mites and their droppings? That means these pillows are probably 90% dust mite crap by now.”
He always blew me off saying “Oh yeah? Wow” in a completely condescending tone. Last Christmas I finally went to the store and bought two new pillows and pillowcases. I went to my dad’s house and told him that he could only have these new ones if he surrendered two old ones. Although he looked a little insulted, he finally agreed.
“Go find your two worst, Dad, I want the worst ones you got.”
He came back with two sacks of feathers (well, it was probably mostly dead dust mites), and actually tried to take off the pillow case so he could salvage it.
“Dad, stop it, I’m taking the pillow cases too.”
As I said it, part of the pillow fell to the floor, no longer contained by the ratty stained casing. “Oh yeah? You’re taking the cases too?”
“Yes, I am, I bought you new ones and everything, you don’t need the old ones anymore.”
Finally I took them and stuffed them into the bag I’d brought the new ones in. The sad part of this is that I actually put the bag into my trunk so that he wouldn’t take them back out of the trash when I left.
When I look at my dad, I see someone who never did well in high school, someone who was content with scraping by. I see someone who never worked overtime when asked, even when his family desperately needed the money. He never worked the overtime because he was lazy. Due to his laziness he was always the first one to get laid off, going months and sometimes even years without getting a job. He is a person who refuses to change, a person who doesn’t want to learn any other specialized skills so they can become more versatile. I see someone who would rather let his family wear the same ripped clothing as he wore because he couldn’t get out of his own way; because their happiness didn’t matter enough to him.
As I looked up at my father, his tired eyes looked the other way. His callused hand brushed against the partially ripped pocket of his oil stained Hanes t-shirt as he reached into the cabinet. His skin seemed to still be nicotine stained, even though he had quit smoking six years earlier. After thirty years, I guess some things remain with you even after you’ve tried to reverse it. My dad looked older than his 51 years; he looked tired, drained. He looked like he had given up. And I think he had. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| #50
Kali's blog
Kali's post really nailed what message this advertisement was supposed to send out to the readers. All too often advertisements are made that depict women as objects or things which can be "won over" or "easily obtained" if you use/have/drink/smoke the right products. This is a classic example.
Laura's blog
This is a post about the Mona Lisa. It's funny because the Mona Lisa is not nearly as large as you'd think it might be. I was in Paris last year and saw it for the first time in person - it was definitely odd because when you look at it you tend to wonder "why is this SO famous?"
But I suppose anyway you look at it, it's pretty cool that I saw it. :)
Kyle's blog
I liked the links Kyle provided, showing the different parts and sections of this online community's website. They were good examples of what you can do if you become a member of this online snowboarding community. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| (#41)
This past August, my friend Christine asked me to go to Hong Kong with her. On a whim, only two weeks prior to the scheduled date of departure, I decided to go for it.
Christine:
Me:
After a flight that lasted more than 24 hours, we were finally halfway around the world. Hong Kong was a very different yet amazing place. At night the city was literally glowing.
At Victoria's Peak, the highest point in Hong Kong, the sunsets were some of the most beautiful that I have ever seen.
I went all over Hong Kong during my 10 day stay. One of my favorite places was the temple I visited. The entire experience was so surreal because there really aren't places like this in the United States.
I wish there were. | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
| | Security: | | | Subject: | Erika | | Time: | 08:01 pm |
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| (#26 revisited as #49)
Erika is my youngest sister. She is 11 years old, and she definitely looks up to me in a lot of ways. Her eyes light up when I come home, and if I say I'm taking her somewhere (especially shopping), she drops anything else she is currently occupied with so she can spend time with me. She is a wonderful caring little girl, but she definitely looks for my approval a lot. If she wears something new for the first time and I tell her I like it, it is guarenteed that she will wear it over and over again.
She's so thoughtful, and generally doesn't ask for anything in return. If I comment that I'm chilly in my mom's house (a regular occurance), she'll get me a blanket without me even having to ask. When my family watches movies together she always competes with her older sister Michelle for the spot next to me. I feel like sometimes she tries to prove to me that she's good enough. With schoolwork, for example, she tells me how hard she tries and that she's doing well, but the way she does it shows me once again that she's looking for my approval. So I give it to her.
Upon first meeting Erika, one might think she's really shy and doesn't have a lot to say. Well, with people she knows she's not shy, but sometimes she is slow to get the thoughts out into words.
This past year, Erika was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. One could easily see how frighted and sad she was from the look on her face. She put up such a brave front, but I could see right through it. Inside, she was scared to death. Luckily they did the operation where they removed her whole thyroid, so now she'll just be on medication for the rest of her life, but a two inch reminder remains in the form of a scar on her neck.
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