| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| September 11, 2001 | ||||
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The Phantom Tollbooth.
"Does everyone here grow the way you do?" puffed Milo when he had caught up.
"Almost everyone," replied Alec, and then he stopped a moment and thought. "Now and then, though, someone does begin to grow differently. Instead of down, his feet grow up toward the sky. But we do our best to discourage awkward things like that."
"What happens to them?" insisted Milo.
"Oddly enough, the often grow ten times the size of everyone else," said Alec thoughtfully, "and I've heard that they walk among the stars."
It's funny because it's TRUE.
A grasshopper walks into a bar and the bartender says "Hey! We have a drink named after you!" and the grasshopper says "You have a drink named Steve?"
Miss Whoever-you-are?
"You know what's wrong with you, Miss Whoever-you-are? You're chicken, you've got no guts. You're afraid to stick out your chin and say, "Okay, life's a fact, people do fall in love, people do belong to each other, because that's the only chance anybody's got for real happiness." You call yourself a free spirit, a "wild thing," and you're terrified somebody's gonna stick you in a cage. Well baby, you're already in that cage. You built it yourself. And it's not bounded in the west by Tulip, Texas, or in the east by Somali-land. It's wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself."
- Breakfast at Tiffany's
Abandon.
"You were just afraid that they'd abandon you, so you abandoned them."
I leave people before they can leave me.
It's easier that way, then I don't get hurt.
I don't know what that says about me.
I push people away so I don't have to deal with feelings.
Everyone is an enemy no matter how close they are to me.
I guess it's a defense mechanism.
But...I'm used to it, and I don't know if I could/should/would change it.
But then there is the fact that I am very protective of those I let in.
Because they mean so much to me, since they are so few in number and I treasure them greatly.
Jekyll/Hyde, to a lesser degree.
I think about why I'm like this sometimes.
Or all of the time.
I guess there are many reasons that I just don't want to talk about.
Whenever I let my guard down and become the girl I sometime want to be, bubbly, perky, always happy...
something ruins it and hurts me.
When I let someone in, and start to trust them, they hurt me.
So I have to go back to the barbed wire.
It's the easiest way.
Who I'd Like To Meet.
The Little Prince
"Men have forgotten this truth," said the fox. "But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed."
- Antoine de Saint Exupéry
Fourteen.
14. I always feel that I'm bothering people when I talk to them, even my family and friends.
Why do people even want to hang out with me? I think about that a lot. Most of the time I regret what I say the moment it comes out of my mouth. I feel like I'm an embarrassment that my friends want to keep hidden away except for the three days out of the month they want someone to make them laugh. It's very rare that someone calls me just to talk, or invites me to hang out if I don't initiate it. Most of the time I'm just ignored. I've been wondering about that a lot lately. Why is it so easy to brush me off? To ignore me for a week, or weeks, at a time? A text every once in a blue moon doesn't count.
I try to listen to every one...but only a few of them return the favor. When I have a problem I can't even talk about it because it seems like no one wants to hear it. I don't get offered advice, just an acknowledgment and then we go right back to talking about the other person.
Maybe I'm just having a bad week? One where it's clear that I am always pushed to the back, until other plans are canceled? I don't want to take it any more, but I don't want to cause any problems. Stalemate.
I've decided to stop. No more initiating hangouts, texts, comments or phone calls. Let's see what happens. I hate being treated like this, yet I always am. By the same people, over and over again. Is the problem me?
Wanderlust.
For as long as I can remember I have wanted to live in Paris. It seems so exotic to me, someone who has been on Staten Island for her whole entire life with the occasional trips to Disney World. I long for an apartment with a view of the Eiffel Tower, a symbol of my independence and freedom from my not so extraordinary life. I can smell the butter on the croissants and taste their flakiness as I imagine walking next to the Seine. In my head the city is less crowded then Manhattan and no one is pushing you out of their way in a rush to go someplace unimportant. I can be an anonymous person in a street café just reading until dusk without all of the honking taxis. This is the Paris of my imagination.
One of the first things most people get to know about me is this desire I have to be in Paris and away from New York. A lot of them think I am crazy considering that the French have a reputation for not being so fond of Americans and that New York is a wonderful place to live. I feel like Paris is the place that I belong, a place that is not quite so loud and obnoxious as New York, a place where I can be content in. It seems beautiful, with cobblestone streets and old world architecture combined with so much history that America doesn’t have. I know that we are a relatively young country with history of our own but France seems like a place where I can truly be myself.
In the last few months I have begun to realize that my yearning to live in Paris is just a means to escape any problems that occur in my life. It could have been any other city that I attached myself to, but Paris is a fashion capital of the world which is probably what made it the subject of my fixation. This realization really hit home once I found myself reading this passage from Sarah Vowell’s novel The Partly Cloudy Patriot; "An astrologer once told me, 'You suffer from what's called a geographic.' A geographic is when a person walks around thinking that where he lives will make his life better. The astrologer said, 'Let me tell you, life is about an emotional connection to people and things and it doesn't matter where you are on the globe.'" That paragraph really struck a chord with me. I realized that I kept thinking that I would be happier if I lived somewhere else and that what I really needed to do was change the things that were bothering me here where I actually live. I would most likely be the same in Paris as I am everywhere else.
My bedroom is a dedication to my dream. There are Moulin Rouge posters along with at least three sculptures of the Eiffel Tower and numerous other French artifacts cluttering up space that could be put to a better use. I am not going to take them down because I still dream of going to France and wondering if my instincts were right, but now when I look at all of the Parisian memorabilia they are more of a bittersweet reminder that nothing will change by relocation. I have to take charge and change things on my own before I can truly be happy anywhere.
Thank you J.K. Rowling.
When I was eleven years old my parents gave me Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone for Christmas. I was an avid reader but the book just didn’t interest me much. A month later we were taking a long car ride and Harry Potter was the only thing in our house, including cereal boxes that I had not yet read. I started the book in the car and finished the entire novel twice before we got to our destination. It was the best book I had ever read in my entire eleven years of life. It involved magic, which always interested me, but also good vs. evil, amazing characters who were my age, and just an amazing world that I still love to this day. I have cultivated my closet group of friends based on Harry Potter and my entire childhood was spent being in love with those novels. This has been the case for many others all over the world. J.K.Rowling’s napkin scribblings have become more than a fiscal wonderland; they have become an inspiration to people all over the world to pick up a novel in the age of electronics.
Through her Harry Potter novels author J.K. Rowling has inspired many reluctant readers around the globe to pick up a book. From children who never before have been interested in reading during an age of electronic entertainment to people who have never before had access to books in third world countries. Even adults have become obsessed with the stories after reluctantly picking them up.
Harry Potter books have had a positive impact, not only on a child’s attitude toward reading, but also on the quality of schoolwork. This shows that once children get interested in reading, they will keep being interested and accept other literature as well. This is an amazing accomplishment for a novel, or author to pull of. More than half of Harry Potter readers said that they hadn’t read books for fun before the series. Finding a book that can encourage a reluctant reader is not easy. Children can feel defeated by age 9 or 10 if they have not found a book they can connect with. The Harry Potter series has truly been a monumental force in encouraging children to read.
J.K. Rowling inspired many people to do something that is sadly unusual in this day and age, pick up a novel. How did she accomplish this when others could not? I for one would say sheer brilliance but that is because she is my one of my greatest idols. Others would say her literary skills are the cause of this phenomenon. Such as her use of literary tools: good and evil, humor, magic, fantasy, relationships and thrills-the stuff juvenile readers love. The books hit on major themes that children commonly like in fiction books. These include being special, going from poor to rich, and knowing more than adults. Children can also connect with these books because they are not written in an advanced language or “dumbed down”, which makes children feel as if the author is taking them seriously. J.K. Rowling accomplishes that while also writing the novels in a way that children can understand them. I started reading these novels when I was eleven and I never had any problem understanding them or the themes that Rowling was trying to bring forth. Adults also like these novels because the can see the meaning on a deeper level. They watch the three main characters deal with puberty, friendships, and the importance of loyalty. The series ended when I was 18 and many of the friendships and morals in the series have influenced my own. I liked watching the characters grow up as I did and deal with the same issues as I had. Many people can identify with Harry, a new kid in school dealing with all the insecurities, the bullies and the normal problems of life. Even the humor is a selling point for all of the readers.
On December 6th, 2008 J.K. Rowling published another book, the Tales of Beedle the Bard. It coincides with a fictional book in the Harry Potter series and she has decided to publish it and make it a reality. I bring this up because when the book was only in pre-orders it was already set to be published in 63 languages. Rowling has reached an international audience like no other ever before. There are even countries that are so desperate to publish the book they translate the novels themselves, unauthorized. I think it is amazing that Rowling has been able to essentially bring the world together, over a novel. Even people in countries as remote as Nepal are reading these novels! To me, Rowling is an amazing person, to have accomplished this much with a series of novels. Especially when novels are so easily disregarded in this day and age.
Harry Potter has changed my life. Those novels have connected me with so many people I cannot even count it. When I was a freshman in high school I felt it was uncool to have been such an avid reader as I was, and especially to be so in love and obsessed with a novel such as Harry Potter. That was before I discovered, in the beginning of the year that I was not alone. Lindsay Hansen and Alyssa Henry, two of my closest and best friends to this day were just like me. We spent hours discussing theories on the books and even reading them together. We went to every single midnight release party and based our friendships with people and even relationships on how the other person felt about these novels. Alyssa and I were just talking the other day when I said “I think the reason we became friends in the first place Lys, is because of Harry Potter.” She agreed and we just went on, but that revelation hit me like a ton of bricks. I have J.K. Rowling to thank for a large amount of people in my life whom I treasure like no others. There is even a Facebook group called “I only know you because of J.K. Rowling.” Her novels have inspired music, called “Wizard Rock Bands” which are brilliant, and websites galore. All of us Harry Potter fans feel connected to one another because of our love for these novels. Whenever I am talking to someone new and they mention that they like Harry Potter I feel relieved because I know that on some level we are already connected and understand one another.
I could never go into all the details about my life and Harry Potter because it would probably be as long as the Harry Potter novels themselves. Many people laugh at the idea of changing the world, especially with a novel, which unfortunately is an idea that is becoming more and more associated with the word antiquated. I think Rowling has accomplished that. I believe that inspiring children to read, is an amazing accomplishment all in its own. These children will now go out and read other novels because of Rowling, hoping that they will also love them as much as they did Harry Potter. The whole world has been influenced by these novels that I will treasure forever.
My DeviantArt.
Hrhlolablack
Wake Me Up When September Ends.
The start of a new school year is always exciting. I was thirteen years old and only just a few days into my 8th grade year at I.S. 34. As I was sitting in my science class, other kids kept being called out and not returning to class. Pretty soon all the grades were brought to the auditorium and all of the teachers went to an emergency staff meeting, none of us children really had any idea what was going on. Kids kept being called out and not returning, this went on for two hours until it was my lunch period and I went with my friends down to the cafeteria. We were sitting around joking as usual, mostly about how we wish we could leave also, and then my name was called. I stood on a line with other kids as we were ushered out the front door of the school and into a huge mass of screaming and crying parents. It was September 11th 2001.
I was immediately upset and I wasn’t even sure what was going on. My name was called and my mother raced up to get me, with my younger brother in tow. I remember seeing some of my friends parents and neighbors who all patted me on the back while giving my mother sympathetic looks. As I sat in the car I asked my mother what happened and she was shocked that I hadn’t found out yet, seeing as how my brother’s fourth grade teacher had told them and let them listen to the radio. As she tried to explain to me about what exactly a “terrorist” was and what they had done to Manhattan all I could hear was the loud roar of the Army bombers overhead.
I sat on the couch in my living room, with a pillow on my lap for hours without moving a muscle. I just watched the news and my mother. My father is a Police Sergeant based in Brooklyn. Every time the phone rang my mother pounced on it (this was of course before caller ID) hoping it was my father, but it was just family members from all over the country calling to make sure we were okay. It wasn’t until I was a few years older that I realized I might have lost my father that day. It just never occurred to me that he wouldn’t come home. When my mother finally received a phone call from him after many long hours due to there being no cell reception, a lot of the tension in the house was lifted, but the sadness just stayed in place like a fog.
To this day I still get upset on September 11th, the memories now hitting me harder then the actual event did. My father refuses to talk about what happened in those few weeks. We can guess but he has never told any of us, and now I don’t think I would really like to know. People all around me had lost friends and relatives, and I was lucky enough to have made it through with just a scratch. Yet, the thick black smoke rising from the city that I saw driving home is always in my mind and it will never disappear.
I'm not usually a fan of poetry.
To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.
- William Blake
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