Coming of Age

Since I just sorta finished high school, I feel like I should write a post about what this means to my coming of age--and how I think of coming of age now. At the beginning of the course I defined coming of age to be knowing what you want to do (with your life etc.) and doing it. While my understanding of coming of age has altered over the course of this course (of course), that original definition is still at the heart of it. I have gained many nuances to this conceptualization, but not in a way that I can express them--that understanding has simply become part of me now. Anyway, that was just to say that I still define coming of age to be knowing what you want to do and doing it.
In light of this, I do not feel all that much more come of age now than I did three hours ago, before I finished my last day of high school. Nothing about my idea of what I want to do has changed--I have had a quite solid idea of that since the beginning of this year. However, I have matured some in the sense that I have gotten closer to that goal of what I want to do--yeah, it wasn't school, crazy (not that I don't like school, I do really enjoy much of it, but I have bigger/more important to me plans). Anyhoo, wanting to graduate was a big part of what was standing in the way of what I want(ed) to do--take a gap year in MS etc.--and now that I have finished school, I feel much closer to this. Well, I guess after I finish this post I will actually be done with school, but even now I don't feel much different. This last day of school has brought me no closer to my goal chronologically, but it has brought me closer in some way--I have crossed some large, and perhaps not completely arbitrary boundary, and now I am that much closer to next year. It seems funny to me that the end of school can feel like so much and so little at the same time, and it still hasn't really hit me yet that I am never going back to high school. This post is super ramble-y, sorry about that. I am a little in shock still.
I suppose I will wrap this up now by saying that this course has helped me come of age by gaining understanding of the world--and therefore of how I want to interact with it--and that there are lots of nuances in coming of age, and some things can be huge and minuscule at the same time. Coming of age is not something that you will necessarily feel, but I think that you will know when you have found what you want to do, and when you are doing it. This may not always happen in everyone's lives, but I think that everyone has the ability to get close to it if they pay attention to themselves, and work to understand everything behind everything--all of the "why"s behind every other "why". Wisdom, yo. hear me now believe me later, I guess. Or not.
Good luck everybody, and I love you all.

Brotherhood in Sag Harbor

I think the relationship that Benji has with Reggie is very cool in Sag Harbor, in that it seems quite accurate to me--not idealized too much, but also not overly dramatized. Ben simply states the directions in which their interactions are going, and while Benji may seem upset, Ben doesn't. I think it is cool that they are beginning to make different friends and do things separately according to their interests rather than their genes. At the same time, I think that Reggie seems like he is ready to grow apart a little sooner than Benji--or at least has found friends to grow apart with sooner than Benji. Of course, we are only getting one side of the story, and maybe Reggie is imagining that Jonni Waffle crew all having fun listening to mixtapes, nudging breasts, and talking about Martine in their own exclusive group.
That being said, I also really enjoy the fact that neither of them are totally willing to give up their tight relationship of before. They still stick up for each other, look out for each other, and try to minimize the arguments between them. I think it's cool that they have this extensive law of even Steven to keep order and fairness, and when something confuses it (like their Mother's dirty pot), they don't blame each other or try to force the other to do it, but rather try to figure out the logical solution to the problem. I was very pleased when Reggie backed up Benji after he got shot in the eye, and tried to help him out a lot. This was mentioned in class, but I sorta feel like it was worth it for Benji to know that Reggie still cares about him a lot--which he obviously does. It made me really happy that Reggie was worrying about Benji, and eager to help him out, in part I think because I feel like me and my brother have a similar relationship to Benji and Reggie in some ways. While we don't have as close-knit a background, we have definitely grown apart a bit the last couple years (with him going to college and all) but also closer in many ways. We see a lot less of each other, but I know that both of us are there to help out the other should he need anything, and that we both care about each other a lot. Even though we aren't going to always be on the same team (and usually only play one-on-one anyway) I still consider him one of my best friends, and I think it is awesome to see a similar relationship reflected in Sag Harbor.
Also shoutout to Ez for being a great brother and--as Jackson and apparently many others will readily point out--a great person.

Communication in Black Swan Green

So I want to make this post to sorta lay out some ideas that I am planning on expanding further in a critical response paper. Basically my thesis will be something like "A large part of Jason's coming of age is manifest or caused by his realization of the importance of good communication." That is a very tentative thesis mind you--don't hate.
In essence, Jason seems to mature proportionally to how much he is willing to communicate and open up to other people. In the beginning of the novel, before he has hardly come of age at all, we see Jason talking very little, and feigning knowledge instead of trying to alleviate his ignorance when he doesn't understand something.Before talking with other people, Jason thinks that the forest is huge, that gypsies are mooches (or at least that they are incomprehensible and want the land), that Julia prefers her room, and that he wants to be a part of the "hairy barbarian" group, to name a few.
It is only through talking with Eva that he learns a lot more about poetry, and about his values. Through conversations with her he is able to discover more about himself, and learn how to be truthful. Through talking with the gypsies, he learns their side of the story, and better understands the nuances in that whole situation. By talking with the carpenter dude he learns that the forest is really quite small, and not so scary after all (he also learns more about the mysterious woman and the house in the woods). When he opens up to Julia, he connects more with her and learns that she knew about his poetry, which makes him feel much better than before, when he was worried she would find out. He also learns that they should have traded rooms a long time ago--an act that would have been so easy to pull off had they only been aware of each others' feelings. It was through communication with Dean and Holly that Jason got through the Maggot chapter, and when Jason finally seems to be comfortable with himself it is when he communicates far more than socially normal by grassing on Neal Brose.
While some of these examples may not seem like much, I think that they add up to show how important communication is, and I think that Jason comes of age as he recognizes this importance.

Sylvia and Sylvie (a new take on safety versus freedom)

I really like drawing things back to the struggle between safety and freedom--two opposing ideals that must be chosen between. I talked about this dynamic in regards to The Bell Jar, and was also quite struck by it towards the beginning of Housekeeping. Sylvia and Sylvie seem to embody the two ideals of safety and freedom (Sylvia is safety and Sylvie is freedom). I think the beauty of their lives is that they are both very happy, but neither would be at all happy living how the other lived.
Sylvia and Sylvie are both similar in many ways. They are both happy because they know what makes them happy and they do it. They both seem to be obeying the law of inertia. And they both seem to force their lifestyle upon the kids they are in charge of. I wrote the last similarity earlier in the novel, but just now I realized that while they are also teaching their kids to do what they love. Just because Sylvia lives a sedentary lifestyle does not stop Sylvie from being transient, and Sylvie's transience does not stop Lucille from being sedentary. It seems that either finding your niche (coming of age) is inevitable, or having a parent that does what they love is good guidance and helps kids find what they love, even if it is different.
Sylvia embodies safety, and she does this though having a rigid routine, one which hardly alters even at the death of her husband. She is able to fall into this routine and it makes time appear to stop (she can imagine living with her kids forever). This does make it harder for her when her kids leave, but I think that if she had worried about that possibility it would have eroded the safety that she feels. Her life works for her because she always does the same thing, and she knows that one thing (housekeeping) fits what she wants to do. She is able to get over her husband's death because she can continue with the routine of her life, and act like nothing has changed. By following this safe routine, Sylvia does not have to ever think.
Sylvia embodies freedom by having no routine. She ever worries, but merely takes everything she encounters in stride. Her life seems to be difficult, especially given our traditional values, but it always works out for her. She becomes very resourceful, and is able to tackle all tasks that present themselves. Although she has no routine, she has gotten so used to dealing with new situations that overcoming the unexpected almost becomes a routine for her.
Sylvie's lifestyle appeals more to me personally, but for I do not think that neither safety or freedom is better than the other in an absolute sense. I think Sylvie realizes this (shown in her interaction with Lucille). I am not so sure that Ruth does at the end of the book, although she appears to for most of it (I discussed this in my last blog post if you are interested).
Do y'all understand what I am trying to get at with the whole safety versus freedom dynamic, and do you think that Sylvia and Sylvie are good personifications of it?

Is there loss associated with coming of age?

I have been thinking about a lot of different things as we have read Housekeeping, and have though of many different topics I would like to explore further. This is mainly because I relate very much to Sylvie and Ruth, and have enjoyed the novel immensely, especially the more philosophical aspects. However, a topic that I want to explore here was raised on our last day of discussion, and I think that I would like to explore it further in a reflective response paper, so here goes:
Is there any loss associated with coming of age? I mean this particularly regarding empathy. Do you lose the ability to empathize deeply with those different from you when you come of age? Do you have to think that the path you chose is the absolute best path? Must you feel superior? Must you lose sight of all other options once you have chosen yours?
One thing that I really liked about Ruth and Sylvie were that they were so very accepting of other ways of life. When Lucille chose to leave, they both let her, knowing that what she did was best for her. This only made me like Lucille less when she didn't trust Ruth to be able to find her own way, and tried to convince her to leave Sylvie as well. Being quite relativistic in my outlooks, I think it is awesome that Sylvie let the children under her care discover the people they wanted to be, and accepted that no one future was objectively the best, but that it was a personal choice, and had to match each person's character. Ruth seems to understand this as well.
Unfortunately, after Ruth fully comes of age by crossing the bridge and leaving Fingerbone, she seems to lose sight of this acceptance, and appears to believe that her way of life is objectively greater than any others, instead of just the best way of life for her. Ruth seems to really pity Lucille for her way of life, just as Lucille pities transients. Before Ruth came of age she seemed to accept both as understandable (at least theoretically), although she was much more drawn to Sylvie's transiency. The book ends with Ruth feeling bad for Lucille, and though it is not like Ruth went up to Lucille and say "ha look I am super happy you aren't transience is superior to housekeeping or whatever boom I'm right you're wrong ha ha ha," Ruth's pity does imply a feeling of superiority, because it means she cannot imagine someone enjoying a lifestyle that is not her own.
One line that really drew this out for me was when--in the ridiculously symbolic ending to Housekeeping--Ruth commented that she could no longer see her old house from the train tracks as they rode past. To me, the symbolizes the fact that she has lost sight of what that life could have been, and can no longer understand the appeal of housekeeping.
Due to these developments, I began to like and sympathize with Ruth less after she came of age--though Sylvie still seems pretty bomb. If loss of empathy with other people and failure to accept or understand their life choices is a necessary part of completely choosing the lifestyle best for you and following it (my rough definition of coming of age) I can understand much more why Holden was so against the idea. Although I am not so sure that this is what he had in mind exactly when Holden tried to avoid growing up, it does seem to understandable factor in to his dislike of grownups, even if he does not specifically point to it as a cause. What do y'all think about that? Are there any other things you think I should take into account if I write a paper on this?

Esther's future: safety versus freedom

I write this as a winding response to Mr. Mitchell's blog post, asking what we think of Esther's lack of confident planning for her future. Warning: I ramble a lot.
About the fig tree analogy, I think that it is nice to have picked one fig for yourself, and to know (or at least have confidence, false or not) in what your future will hold. It can bring a lot of peace and mind, and allow you more focus in your life if you are set on what you will do. However, I think that you would lose out on a lot of opportunities if you trapped yourself in this way. As in many things, our future holds the choice between safety and freedom--we can choose the safety of a well-planned future, or the freedom to change your future if you find one you would prefer--it is extremely difficult to have both. In my mind, the ideal would perhaps be having chosen a couple futures that are reasonably possible and would make you happy, but at the same time being open to new possibilities. Personally, I tend to choose freedom over safety, and so I am more eager to not know what I will do past college, and excited to investigate new opportunities or possible futures. Nonetheless, the appeal of sure knowledge of the future is also evident to me.
To get back to (or perhaps just to) a question Mr. Mitchell asks in his post, I do not see Esther's refusal to pick a "fig" as weakness, because I can strongly relate to her hesitation, and I applaud it. She picks freedom over safety quite explicitly. “That’s one of the reasons I never wanted to get married. The last thing I wanted was infinite security and to be the place an arrow shoots off from. I wanted change and excitement and to shoot off in all directions myself, like the colored arrows from a Fourth of July rocket” (83). I feel that I am almost congratulated when I say I don't know what I want to do after high school, or after college. Even when I confidently tell my parents that I have decided on my major, they respond with something along the lines of "Yeah, that's what you plan for it to be now Tim, but that's probably not what it will be when you graduate." Rather than seeing this as doubting my assertion or ability, I understand it to be pushing me to be open to enjoying new things, and learning new things about myself. My interest in exploration of possibilities and opportunities is what convinced me that I wanted to take a gap year back when I was a mere underclassman, and long before I had any idea what I would possibly do during such a year.
To conclude, I tend to choose the freedom of opportunity in my future rather than the safety of a plan, and I maintain confidence in my future happiness and success (of all kinds) without having confidence in any one set future for myself. I guess that confidence comes easier to me than some, but because I can have that confidence, I much prefer having the opportunity to explore and discover new possibilities than choose one now (or in elementary school) and stick to it. I lied, I'm not concluding. I just noticed the irony in this, given that since about 4th grade I have been convinced I want to be a teacher, and am still pretty convinced of this (though less so in the last year, after being exposed to more schools than just Uni). Although being a teacher does appeal to me, I see it as just one possibility for me. Tutoring is also high on my list. Why I say I am open to new things, when I have stuck with the same thing until now, is because it is true. Although I do want to be a teacher (or a tutor) I am also very interested in finding something else I would rather do, or perhaps just finding more evidence that teaching is right for me. So despite the fact that teaching appeals, so to does exploring. While I feel disposed to teaching now, I am also very open to not feeling disposed to it later, I guess. And that is why I feel that I choose freedom over safety, despite being able to see myself teaching. I see it as only one of many possible opportunities, rather than a final goal.
Cool? Cool. Peace.

What's the deal with cats?

So today I was sitting on my bed,
and my cat comes up to me and sits on my head.
Can you believe that, right on my head.
And then he starts purring my ears to shreds.
I'm just sitting there, minding my own business,
and he decides to become my hairnet.
What really gets me is that it seemed so phony.
Cats seem intelligent, and usually so stony.
They know better than to be near us,
they want their food but then they bus.
Blake though--that's my cat's name, Blake--
he tries to chat for Chrissake.
You would think he would know better,
usually his only action is chewing my sweater,
but today he decides to interact.
I know he didn't want to--that's a fact.
I mean, why would a cat want to talk.
Usually he doesn't even want to walk.
I guess people are influencing him,
which really stinks of them.
You get it right, cats don't just chat.
There must be more than that.
I think he felt like he had to, you know.
Because otherwise he wouldn't show
affection at all, and that gets me down.
It's like just because I frown,
Blake thinks he has to be friendly.
Like if he didn't it would offend me.
I just don't know man, he's like
that kid I knew as a kid, Mike.
Mike'd always do whatever he thought
he was supposed to do, what he ought.
That always depresses me.
Why couldn't he just climb a tree.
I hate it when cat's try to act good.
Why should they act like they should.
That depresses the hell out of me.
Why couldn't Blake just act free?
I can't believe the phonies got to him too.
It seems like they got through
to everyone but me and you.
Anyway, what can you do?




So that was my interpretation of what Holden would write if he had to write a poem about a cat or something. I don't know. I just thought I would challenge myself a little bit, and I enjoy trying to capture Holden's voice. It was a ton harder to do that through poetry than an essay though, so I'm not sure how accurate it is, or how good a poem it is for that matter. I think I compromised a little in both directions. Yeah.... Bye.

Holden's Perspective

I made a comment a couple of days ago in class about how Holden would see Esther and the other girls she works with, and how he would probably have a very wrong idea of what kind of people they are (or at least Esther is).
The basic point I made was that it is hard to know people from just a quick glance at them. This is a fact that Holden blatantly ignores through Catcher as he continuously judges everyone he meets, and often makes huge assumptions about their lives. I do not say this in an attack on Holden, because he does sometimes think positive things (particularly about the kids he meets). I just think that Holden feels quite depressed in a large part because he feels so alone, and that no one understands or thinks like him. I think that how he was likely viewing Esther only proves that Holden's loneliness was at least partially invented. If he had seen Esther, he would have assumed she did not feel at all similarly to him. In reality, Esther does feel at least in part much like Holden. I think that if Holden had approached more people with his thoughts, he would have found some people who agreed. Admittedly, many people would have reacted like Sally Hayes, but I think that if he had persevered and talked to more people instead of just getting discouraged, Holden would in the end be much happier and feel much less lonely.
I am trying to write a paper from Holden's perspective about how Stephen's issue is that he never connects with people (unlike Holden who has Phoebe) but I think that this also applies to Holden. Also I realize that both that paper and this post assume a lot of things based on previous assumptions about Holden and Stephen, but despite this, I think that most of my assumptions are valid and based off of legitimate aspects of their characters.

Epiphanies

A motif that appears throughout Portrait is that of Stephan's many epiphanies. At the end of every chapter, Stephen makes some earth-shattering realization or decision that he imagines will change his life forever. Mr. Mitchell has asked us to listen to the music of the words, and at these climactic moments, the music crescendos beautifully and exultantly into what sounds like a resolution of all problems faced in the chapter. First Stephen accepts being alone, and is happy with it. Then he finally has sex, ending his rampant imagination's reign over his thoughts. Next he repents, and rejoices in that he is forgiven, and he sees beauty everywhere and feels serene in his piety. After that, he hallucinates (?) and discovers his vocation for the arts.
After all of these epiphanies, Stephen's perception of his life gets flipped-turned upside down, and our perception of him and his life cannot help but change as well. It is unclear if his life actually changes that much though, and with Joyce laying on the irony pretty thick in some cases, it is easy to doubt the validity of some of Stephen's epiphanies. The question that remains is whether his apparently ground-breaking realizations are actually meaningful. I have to say yes, these epiphanies are significant. Firstly, I really relate to Stephen is this, because I am wont to have "epiphanies" or at least overly dramatize my realizations--at one point I had two epiphanies within an hour, and the second epiphany was just "hey remember that epiphany you had an hour ago, yeah that was wrong"--so I sympathize with Stephen's perceptions changing dramatically and rapidly. I also think that, while some of his may not appear to change Stephen's life (as seen by Joyce's undermining them at the start of the following chapter), they do change how he perceives his life. These altered perceptions also change Stephen's actions, which is probably just as important.
At the beginning of the semester, I defined coming-of-age to loosely be when you know what you want to do with your life, and you do do it. That is to say, you know yourself, and you act on that knowledge. Stephen's epiphanies are how he knows himself:  each one gives him deeper insight into who he is, at least at that point in time. The chapters end on such a high note because Stephen is halfway to coming of age. Joyce starts each chapter by showing that Stephen doesn't act on his epiphanies much, proving that he has not yet fully come of age. While each epiphany helps Stephen develop, it is not until he knows himself well enough to change his life accordingly that he actually comes of age. At the end of chapter three, I would say that Stephen comes of age, because he has the epiphany (that he is going to go to hell) and he acts on it (confesses). I do not think that the factuality of his epiphanies matters so much as his believing in them, and his acting on them. However, I think that, since Stephen only returns what he is supposed to be doing at the end of chapter three, he does not completely come of age, because he does not choose his own path. At the end of chapter four, Stephen has another epiphany, and he again acts on it, this time discovering his vocation for the arts and choosing to attend University. So Stephen comes of age again, but this time more so, because he left the beaten path and actually thoughtfully chose his own fate. I have not yet read the last few pages of the book, so I cannot speak on whether or not Stephen is fully of age at the end or not (probably not) but I do think that he is no longer a child once he goes to University. Pretentious adult, maybe. But not a child.

Also I am thinking of writing about this topic for a Reflective Response Paper, so any feedback/critiquing of what I am saying would be much appreciated.

Coming of Age?

So I was about to comment this on Mr. Mitchell's blog, and then I realized it was basically the length of one of my blog posts, so I am just going to put it here:

I think the reason that it is so hard to pin down when we come of age is because we always grow more. I remember being in Kindergarten and just being totally in awe of the huge 2nd graders. By the time I entered 2nd grade, I could not even imagine ever being as big, mature, or smart as a 5th grader. By the time I entered 5th grade, I think that I realized 5th graders were not very intimidating after all, and that I would always be looking up to someone or some group of people. I have become very used to this, and accepting of it, and I can now fathom reaching stages in my life that seem unfathomable (if that makes any sense). I think at this point, I can totally picture myself going to college, and I can even picture myself getting a job teaching or whatever after college and grad school--but those images are all very blurry and I am sure very mistaken. The one thing that I can not imagine at all is paying my inevitable college debt. For whatever reason, that seems like the one thing that is unfathomable for me to be adult enough to manage. At this point, I have realized that I will eventually be able to do this, but I think that it illustrates our perpetual development. I think that we all realize that we will be forever growing and learning more and developing more, and this understanding makes it hard to imagine ever fully "coming of age", because we are always coming of age. When I was in 2nd grade, I thought that there was me (a kid), there were 5th graders (big kids) and then there was everyone else (adults). Everyone older than a 5th grader was in my mind fully developed as a person.
Part of what is making Portrait so interesting for me is that I see different stages of my own life being played out by Stephen, and I see myself right now reflected sometimes as well (which makes me feel a little silly about myself to be honest). I also expect to see stages of Stephen's development that I have not yet gone through, which should be interesting. But I am coming to understand that coming of age is a continuous process, and, while often painful, the many stages of our development are necessary in forming who we are now, just as who we are now (which at least in my case will probably be embarrassing to think about in 5 years) is a crucial stage in getting to where we will be in 5 years, and in 10 years, and in 40 years.