Wednesday Update

Ugh. I'm exhausted. I haven't been able to sleep lately. It's a vicious circle- accidentally sleep in one day, don't sleep well that night, oversleep the next morning, don't sleep well the next night. But I managed to get up this morning, and I'm going to go to bed at 11:30, so hopefully I'll get myself back on track.

I have to go home tomorrow- my grandma is having aortic aneurysm surgery and she'll be moving in with my parents indefinitely. The only place free in the house is my room, so she'll be living in my room indefinitely. If I ever want to go home, I have to sleep on the couch. My brother is moving home too, and he'll be living in the basement. This pretty much guarantees I'll be staying in Grand Rapids for a while- it'll be quite crowded and likely really tense at home.

My knees hurt really badly for some reason. Sadness.

Finished Wanting for my World Lit class. It was AMAZING! I cried at the end, and was incredibly depressed for a while, but it was still really good. For my paper I'm going to focus on the idea of nature (as opposed to nurture), how it reflects the general ideas of British identity at the time, and the way that it affected Mathinna's fate. Or something like that. We're reading Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man next, but I read it last semester with the same prof, so I don't think I'll have too many problems with it.

Umm, not sure what else to say. I just wanted to make sure that I got something written today. Maybe my goal should be to write something EVERY day, despite how busy I am. That's a good goal, I suppose.

Random Pic: Me, in Queenstown, New Zealand, standing by the lamppost that arguably leads to Narnia.

Procrastination

I'm supposed to be writing a 2-3 page paper on The Two Gentlemen of Verona and I can't make myself do it. I think it's a combination of the fact that I know I don't have to turn it in at all (we only have to write three papers) and the fact that it's not actually due for nine days. However, if you turn the paper in nine days early, she'll give us 10% extra credit. But I'm having the worst freaking mental blocks and can't get this damn paper going. It's driving me insane! Ahhh!

This picture makes me really happy. That's the only real reason it's on here. In reality, rats creep the hell out of me. Have a good day, everyone!

Book Review: "Wanting" by Richard Flanagan

I'm reading this book for my World Lit class, and have actually fallen in love with it. I haven't reached the end yet, but wanted to get this up.

"Wanting" is a mixture of several different perspectives, and is set during the early colonization of Australia and Tasmania. On the forefront is Mathinna, a young Aboriginal girl who is adopted by an influential British couple. Their plan is to 'civilize' her, and to prove that a native can have the same education and decorum as any white British woman. Woven into this narrative is the perspective of Charles Dickens during his time as one of the most famous men in England. He is slowly drifting away from his family, and is slowly becoming obsessed with the performance of a play and a young woman who is decidedly not his wife.

Richard Flanagan definitely has a gift for words- he manages to evoke (at least in me) anger, sympathy, sorrow, and even a few "ew!" moments. His writing style is almost spartan in nature, with very few flowery details and everything the characters say is both to-the-point and heavily laden with symbolism. Having to read this critically has made me enjoy this book a lot more, and making the notes that I have has helped me to understand not only what is going on in the plot, but what the author was trying to communicate through symbolism and motifs.

All in all, "Wanting" was a really good read, even if you're just reading for pleasure. This is definitely a book I'm going to be keeping, and am really happy that my prof decided to put it on the syllabus for this semester!

My Kickoff

Just to start, I thought I'd let you know that the title of my blog is a quote by William Blake, one of my favorite poets.

I'm not entirely sure about what's going to go on in here, but it's nice to have a place to vent, ponder, ask questions, and pretty much get my thoughts into words. I tend to bottle things up a lot, and by writing things down, even if it's just for myself (and whoever wants to read them), it'll keep my mind a bit more organized.

In essence, this is what I intend to be my greatest homework procrastination tool ever. 

A lot of my friends are doing the one picture a day thing, and good for them, but I don't have the patience nor will I remember to do that. So, instead, I'm going to put up one random picture for every blog post that I do. It most likely will have nothing to do with what I'm talking about. Today's picture is of the the Pancake Rocks (Punaikaiki) in New Zealand.

I hope you all are doing well, and I don't absolutely bore you to death in the course of this little venture.