Saturday Night Jail Cell

It was about ten at night and as much as I didn’t want to go home, I needed to. As I passed the fountain at the entrance of the park, three kids from school (I wasn’t really the most popular kid at school. Well…that’s an understatement, I was basically a punching bag) stopped me and shouted things at me. I still had my headphones on but I caught some words, things like ‘loser’, ‘fag’, ‘gay’, ‘shit’, ‘nerd’, etc. Typically I brush these off, this time I didn’t. After that everything was blurry, but I had a bruised, cut, and bloody fist that I was examining on my walk home. A mumbled line of “fuck”, “shit”, “Jesus fucking Christ”, Before I even made it a block, I heard one of the kids say “That’s him, officer. That’s the one who attacked us.” I looked around trying to see whom they were talking about. Before I could think about doing anything, I was in a police car feeling sick.

That night was spent in a grimy jail cell. I called my only friend but no answer. There wasn’t any point in trying to call anyone else; Mom ignored me after Dad left. I just sat on the worn bed and stared at the blank wall. There was another man in the room; in his late twenties, messy hair, and wore thick glasses, he sat diagonal to me on another bed. I didn’t really see him before. He noticed me though. He was staring directly at me; if I moved his eyes would follow me, like he was expecting me to do something. As he was watching me, I began to feel self-conscious, why was he looking at me like that? After about ten minutes of him staring at me and me staring at the wall in front of me, I decided that I go and talk to him. (I mean might as well get to know whom I’ll be spending the night with. Right?) As I approached him, his eyes were trained on me, but as soon as I reached him, he broke contact and scrambled back on his bed; his back pressed against the cold cell wall. I mumbled out a sorry and a greeting. He just stared at me, not bothering to say anything. After failing at trying to talk to him, I turned on my heels and sulked to my bed. I fell down and contemplated how stupid I was, not only did I punch some dudes, I didn’t have much recollection of it.

I pretty much spent the whole night staring at the crumbling grey ceiling, a flickering light only added to my inability to sleep. I knew the other man in the room was asleep, for I could hear his snores, but I still had this eerie feeling of someone staring at me. I was chewing at my lip, before long there was a slight trickle of blood running down my lip. I sighed in defeat and rolled over to my side. I could just call someone in the morning and get driven home. A night away from home would be good, right? Nothing to worry about. I’m all good.

Classmate I'm Thankful For

I dunno. This is kind of hard for me to say because I'm thankful for a lot of people. I'm thankful for my friends. I don’t really know how I would pick one person who I am most thankful for in this class.

I told her I wouldn’t write about her but I think I’m going to have to. Claire McGrourty is a pretty cool person I guess. Well she edits papers really well. When I wrote my six-page paper she read it and made good edits on it. Plus she wrote little things that didn’t need to be there but it was nice that they were.

She’s also my boyfriend. So I’m pretty thankful for that.

She also drew me and it was pretty freaking awesome so that was pretty cool. Yeah.

Okay. I don’t really know what else to say.

Like I mean I’m thankful for so many things but when I need to write about them I can’t. Like my brain just shuts off.

I have to write 83 more words.

I am thankful that Claire exists. I am thankful that she is in English with me. I am thankful that she tells me stories almost daily. I am thankful that she can edit papers. I am thankful that we can work in a group together. I am thankful that her blog background is a picture of me. I am thankful that she’s pretty cute. I am thankful that only have 3 words left. I am thankful for Claire. 

"Then He Is Dead?"

An overhanging question as we read Macbeth was, 'was everything he did worth it?' 'Did killing all those people really do good for him?'
In my opinion, it didn't. He wasn't king for that long and while he was he was in constant fear of being killed. He had trouble maintaining his mindset of bravery. He lived in fear.
Okay. So for one of our journals, the question was "ARE MACBETHISH ACTS WORTH DOING IF ONE REALIZES THE 'REWARDS' FOR: A MONTH, A YEAR, A SCORE, AND A LIFETIME.'
To start with a month...really? Are you really willing to kill so many people in order to be great and powerful for one month??? Personally, I don't think its worth it. You are doing yourself more bad than good. Do you really expect to live peacefully because you murdered your way to the top? Not a chance.
Now, a year. Same as stated before. Are you expecting to live life in bliss? Do you want that so badly that you are will to kill so many??
A score. Now if you REALLY needed to do something that required you to murder and then have 20 years of perfect living.... how great is that thing really. Twenty years in the long run doesnt seem so long does it? Sure during the moment everything was great and amazing but now? Not so much. YOU WILL LITERALLY KILL YOURSELF MENTALLY.
A lifetime. Same as before. But yes, you may view it to yourself as 'oh its alright I will be amazing and powerful the rest of my life.' And it would be awesome if it were to be like that but its really not.

"From the crown to the toe, top-full Of direst cruelty"

So, we are reading Macbeth by William Shakespeare. Lady Macbeth is amazing. Like wow. So, she gets a note from Macbeth telling her about how he was promoted and there were some weird witches who vanished into thin air. He explained to her that the witches called him three things; Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and King. Then when he became the Thane of Cawdor, he was wowed by the fact that the witches had predicted the future, but us as the readers know that it was indeed the present. He writes to his wife telling her that if they witches did predict the future, he might become king as well. Lady Macbeth knows that with royalty, the only way to become the king is be heir to the throne or kill the king and his heirs and be the highest standing person after the king. Well, Lady Macbeth was aware that her husband is too kind and humble to overthrow the king. So she says "from the crown to the toe, top-full of direst cruelty," which is her basically saying that she needs to throw away all of her old self and create a new one. An evil one. One that has no problem will killing the king. One that will slay everyone so that Macbeth will be come the King of Scotland. She needs to act in place of her husband so that her husband gets the crown. She is filling herself with pure evil, and greed is driving it. Greed and her love for her husband. She wants her husband to move up on the social/royal scale so she is doing everything she can do to make it happen. If this isn't a great wife I don't know what is.

No New Tale To Tell

Modern day literature can, for the most part, relate back to The Canterbury tales. This set of stories written by Geoffrey Chaucer, can relate to many things in modern literature and current day living. Two of the stories from The Canterbury Tales that we read so far are The Wife of Bath and The Pardoner.

In The Wife of Bath, it can be indicated that Chaucer felt that woman should have more voice in the community. This is shown especially when the queen decides on what the knights punishment should be. And it was none, because he was able to fake that he understood woman and what a woman should  and does want in life. It's obvious though that the knight really does not know what a woman would like and need in life because he already ruined one woman's life with his greed and lust. Chaucer could have easily killed off this horrid character by having King Arthur have the final ruling in the punishment. But like we discussed in class, that would have made for a much less interesting tale.

Women are constantly being oppressed in modern day literature and even in current day. Even in America, 'the free country.' To have Chaucer write about woman's oppression and put it in a not so glorious light is good. He shows it as something that should not be taken lightly and by the way he puts it he talks about that sexual harassment is punishable by death. But the queen was lenient and gave the knight a second chance by giving him a difficult task in which he would have thirty days to answer and if not, off goes his head. I feel like that wasn't good because the victim then lived in constant fear, much like today's victims because rape is taken almost too lightly it seems.

In the Pardoner's tale, three men are too greedy and that costs them their lives. It seems that everyone is just backstabbing jerks. I mean of course not everyone but the three FRIENDS in this story definitely are. They ask an old man where to find death and he points them to an old tree. The start of this story isn't going too well. First off, they ask a man cheating death where to find Death. This man wants death so don't you think he would also have been at the tree desperately awaiting Death to come and take him? Well, onto the next part. At this point, they are already at the tree. And there at the base, is a pot of gold. How lovely. Then one of them proceeds to go buy wine and rat poison and the other two decide to kill the one who left. What a shame it would be if they were all to die. Well, that happened. And yes they found Death. Well, Death found them. Dead.

This relates to so many things in modern day everything. Books are constantly expressing backstabbing, greed, and distrust. These never result in anything good. Even in our culture today we are constantly seeing distrust happening too often.

Truth

In Grendel, when the Shaper comes to Hrothgar's kingdom, Grendel sees the Shaper as almost an overseeing being. One who knows everything. From the start Grendel knows that the Shaper is blind but he still believes everything the Shaper is saying. He believes what the Shaper says about him and his origin. He believes that he is a decedent from Cain. He believes all of these stories and even though he has seen most of them take place he seems to forget that and just becomes enchanted and mesmerized by the Shaper.

                  What he hears the Shaper saying, is almost perfect it seems to him. And he wants it to be true. He wants that to be what is actually happening. But at the same time he knows the real world. He knows what is happening. And he is torn between the two worlds. The Shaper’s and his.

                  That is where the Dragon comes in. He goes to the Dragon to seek help. But it seems that he is almost too intimidated by the huge, immense, overwhelming Dragon to really ask the Dragon much. But as we read more we see that the Dragon does have answers. Some are not what Grendel was looking for because he so dearly wanted the perfect life and tale the Shaper was speaking of. 

MODERN DAY GRENDEL

An example of modern day Grendel could be President Bashar al-Assad of Syria. He called enemy forces 'half men,' which is how the humans see Grendel and maybe is how Grendel sees the humans because they are so violent when Beowulf comes to their aid. 

President Bashar al-Assad has become increasingly aggressive recently, like Grendel did when he was fighting Beowulf. The more Beowulf fought back the more Grendel used his force. The same goes for al-Assad, when he was attacked, he used force. 

The president Declared his determination to wipe out the entirety of the opposition. He claimed he is standing against an imperialist army. In Beowulf, Grendel vowed it upon himself to kill. That was how he took out his misery and he fueled himself. He found himself standing against an army of angry men, like the president is now facing. 

When Grendel kills, he feels no remorse, he does it because he needs to. President Bashar al-Assad continues to refuse to express any responsibility or remorse for the blood washing over Syria. Sound familiar to Grendel?

President Bashar al-Assad cannot compromise,like Grendel, he cannot rebuild, Grendel only goes off of what he knows like the President, he cannot reconcile, cant hide like Grendel. He is stuck, like Grendel was when he encountered Beowulf. He wanted to run but he couldnt because Beowulf over powered him and he was left to his own devices which are strength and brutality and when Beowulf is better in both fields, Grendel wants to hide and run away but he can't. 

The president "can rule over a pile of rubble - thats the best he can do." He has nothing left since hes destroyed it all. This relates to Grendel because Grendel ruined the lives of so many in the mead hall that he has nothing left to torture. 

The president let off a poisonous gas attack that killed more than one thousand four hundred people. Grendel killed so many people without a second thought that this almost relates to him perfectly.