HALLELUJAH

I am finished with finals! *cue happy dance*  *twirl around the room*  *mimic my Papa's dorky dance moves* *remember my Papa is the only one who reads my blog* OOPS (hehe).

And a bit of entertainment....

O Mama Mia....

I haven't been on here in eons! School does terrible things to my blogging habits I tell ya. In honor of me being nearly finished with my poetry class, here is an imitation poem* I did.

*Imitation poems follow the skeletal structure of their original with the poet placing his/her own specifics and verbs. Think poetry mad lib.

Deep in a Mirror

(after a poem by Robin Becker entitled “When Someone Dies Young”)

When a dancer looks in the mirror

a trickle of rejection lives

in her spine like a growth.

The crook of a knee

is a leg you would sculpt.

When a dancer looks in the mirror

and she arches fiercely

at the chained barre

in a studio tossed by music

and a director's scowl,

she longs for the clock,

preferring the warm-ups past.

Corrections she hears over and over

to suck in her stomach

dulling to hammers, bones

aligned with each twitch

to their anatomical ache.

When a dancer looks in the mirror

she wants to burn fat furiously

and get forgiveness for holidays of fat-scalloped morsels.

When a dancer looks in the mirror

the mystery of her muscles own

memory finds a rhythm

in the sunshine beam at the window.

The rigorous technique

of that spewing

mirror takes a hardening, like a nutshell,

and balks at no

when a dancer looks in the mirror.

Social Disorder

Hello, fellow troublemaker! I hear you wish to cause disorder without doing anything one could task you with. Such difficulty! Through our program's superior search and observation methods we have found the perfect solution for the domesticated pest. Just follow these simple steps and see what chaos unfolds!

1. Find a class in which serious people attend. Academic settings are recommended, but not required.
2. Sit in one place the first day of class.
3. Observe where other people sit and pick out the most annoying ones.
4. Next day pick an entirely different seat where someone you'd enjoy annoying sat.
5. Enjoy the entirely free entertainment of having people scramble for chairs and have to re-arrange their lives due to your genius chair displacement.

Viva la disorder!

Oh, the world is ugly?

Sunlight streaming
Eighty degrees
Mouth opening
Words away

Nothing like a totally spur-of-the-moment poem to introduce another poem! Here is a favorite from my readings in poetry class. Keep in mind that the author is being sarcastic about how people think that the world is ugly.

Gubbinal

That strange flower, the sun,

Is just what you say.

Have it your way.

The world is ugly

And the people are sad.

That tuft of jungle feathers,

That animal eye,

 Is just what you say.

That savage fire,

That seed,

Have it your way.

The world is ugly

And the people are sad.

By Wallace Stevens (1879-1955). Taken from Writing Poems, Eighth Edition by Michelle Boisseau, Hadara Bar-Nadav, and Robert Wallace (pg 13-4).

So Maybe Life Is Sparta

One of my fellow deep-thinkers wrote this blog post on comradeship. What could be more fitting?! A friend writing about friendship! SHOUT OUT. This Is Sparta

At The Witching Hour I Contemplate Hope

Vines have snagged me
Evils have trespassed me
alas! if not for hope the world would perish
Vices have ruled me
Passions have corrupted me
Darke moons turned red by the blood of all they've seen
Scars have marked me
Errors left their stain
Battlewounds obtained in places of peace to remind me
Trust has misused me
Fools have satisficed themselves with me
Blind aspirations lead me as leprechauns toward unexistential treasure
Dawn has surprised me
Silence has inspired me
Enchantment so intertwined with dark struggles free
Hearts have righted
Souls have soared
Antiquated principles imbed to create the narrow anew
Old disfigurements hold fast
History engraved in flesh and bone
Hope ever reigns a dastardly foe and an avenging conquerer

Woe is me! A contrast to all the love nonsense going on

you're welcome world

A Motto For You

I have many hardcore beliefs. Most of them can be found in your handy-dandy Bible, but there is one that I can't find a scriptural reference to, it is: If you don't have anything important to say, SHUT UP! That was my motto as I searched for a topic. Now I have this presentation coming up and along with the challenge of presenting it in my second language (American Sign Language) I have to make it relevant to my audience. Otherwise I put in hours of work only to get an A on my report card and a mass nap by my peanut gallery. Not. Worth. It. So here is the gist, my topic fits under the umbrella of sociolinguistics. We smart people like words with multiple Os and the ever desired "ic." Sociolinguistics is the study of how language is used by people. The nail and hammer side of linguistics. I study language. A lot. One thing that I have learned, especially with training to become an interpreter, is that everything matters. Ya know those little things? Welp that's a myth right there. It could be your tone of voice. Perhaps its the 'kinda' or 'really' you threw in. Was that a spare adjective you used? It all says something. All communication is communication. This is called a duh theory. It's so blaringly obvious that it was a snake it would have bit you. I really started noticing this when I had to interpret for guys. See, there I go using really again! Guys don't tend to do that. They say something is this...not that it really is. Using that sort of adjective makes the message less powerful. How many adjectives you use says something about you. As does anything that is in your general vicinity for that matter. My goal is to show my audience these little things so they can start to analyze how they are perceived and how they perceive others. Some very intelligent person once said Know Thyself. In case you are wondering, there is a whole lot more to you than you could ever imagine. Created in the image of God makes you nowhere near simplistic.

Community Presentation Proposal

“The Accessories of Language: How the Little Things Add Essential Flavor”

Language is not only composed of phrases and big picture ideas. In between the words are significant 'little things' that change our perceptions of the person as well as their meaning. These hedges, fillers, transitions, tones, and adjectives have a real impact that the audience absorbs, usually unconsciously. How ideas are accessorized is nearly as important as the idea itself. Which leaves us with the conclusion that in communication there are no 'little things'; everything is significant.

Learning Outcomes

• Understand that how information is cushioned can be just as important as the information itself
• Know that people form ideas of others from those flavorings
• Pay heed to the little things, as nothing is insignificant
• Notice the differences between groups such as male and female and how the flavorings of choice effect the level of respect and recognition given
• Have information and basic tools to be able to analyze their own language choice and how judgments are made either on them or towards others

P.S. I love throwing idioms at you.

Every once and a while...

....I find amazing things while browsing the web at 2am. This is one of them. Hip Hop Violin

Fathers are So Empathetic...said the liar!!!!!

Situation: a huge scheduling conflict

Me: The world hates me!
Papa: It hates you because it hates the one you serve (or something like that)
Me: Well, its a scheduling conflict...
Papa: Oh then the world doesn't hate you, it's ignoring you. Don't you feel so much better?

hmmmmmmmmm. Not really.

Passions Apparently Go with Goals

For a recent college application I had to write on my passion and the goals that will go with it. Now there's a way to make a passion real, communicate to iffy-little-college students that one needs goals! Anywho, this is much more accurate than an about me, although very much lacking in small town details such as my favorite color and how many siblings I have (think "many").

     

       The first passion I have is ballet. I have always been fascinated by how much beauty it can portray without using words. It displays communication in a non-verbal and solely human way. My goal is to further my own technique and hone my body to be able to incorporate the expressive and artistic aspects of ballet into my performances. I wish to get to the point that I can put my story into an audience's mind. From observing a multitude of dancers I have discovered that what makes a dancer truly exceptional is that he/she is not only technically excellent, but artistically compelling. Basically, their personality and style snares ones' eye.

     Communication in language form as well as dance has been a life-long interest of mine, which lead me to my present career. I am currently completing my degree in Interpreting between American Sign Language and English at Johnson County Community College and am on track to graduate in the Summer of 2011. After entering this field I realized that all learning is beneficial. In order to be able to comprehend another person's language it is useful to now every piece of information that may appear. As an interpreter I will encounter many people with many differing vocabularies who are discoursing on a plethora of topics. In order to equip myself to be the best interpreter I can I have decided to further my education. Later I wish to become a nationally certified interpreter which requires a Baccalaureate degree. So along with a prospective dance major I will be pursuing another major to increase my world knowledge.

     I also have a passion for literature and all it communicates to readers. It is my goal to write a story worthy of publishing. In truth, I write only for myself and my focus is on honing the sills in writing I have shown thus far to the furthest of my ability; wither this prepares me to become a renowned author or simply to be able to communicate my objectives in the workplace. Communication in all its forms, wither it be dance, language, or literature, fascinates me. It is my desire to expand my knowledge and skills in each to my maximum potential.

Once Upon A Vocab Assignment

We are occasionally assigned these things known as "vocab assignments" in school. Sixteen words are given and we have to come up with a cohesive piece that correctly uses them all. Its like a crossword puzzle, except with more headbanging and groans of frustration. Our words? Ladies and gentlemen I givvvvvve you.....

Superfluous ~ unnecessary, unwarranted
Deleterious ~ harmful in an often subtle or unexpected way
Emulate ~ strive to exceed or equal
Contempt ~ to hate
Aberrant ~ to not follow the normal or right way or behavior
Inundate ~ to flood or overwhelm
Presupposition ~ to assume before knowing the facts
Ultimately ~ at the end, eventually
Plethora ~ abundance, many
Tetchy ~ irritable, full of pet peeves
Enervate ~ be so dull or mundane that the soul/life is sucked from its victims
Convoluted ~ intricate often to an impossible to understand level
Chagrin ~ to be embarrassed about, feel shameful of
Prosaic ~ boring, dull, unimaginative, everyday
Nostalgic ~ look back on old days or long for irretrievable moments
Embody ~ become solid, leave spirit form

My Spin

     There was once an old lady who lived in a shoe and much to her chagrin became known for smiting her naughty children. As horrid as her punishments may have been, her husband's enervating sermons caused the children to walk around like zombies for hours and so were considered far worse. The house was inundated with brats, but one aberrant child knew the benefits of behaving properly. This child had a plethora of charms including the capability to ultimately winning anyone over. Her mother thought back nostalgically on her prosaic existence before the children and uttered a groan that embodied her contempt. She was not the only soul to house contempt. Her next-door-enemy was a tetchy old man who glared contemptuously at any children who neared his domain. He had views the rapscallions from a convenient window and presupposed that nay of them visiting would be deleterious to his remaining sanity. The aberrant child went searchingly off the normal path. She was searching for something deeper than the contempt of her mother, the squabbles of her siblings, and the tetchy old man. All of them saw nothing but faults and hurricanes. As she had no one to emulate, she set off to carve her own way. The old man had found the same piece of soil as she and began to snarl a protest against her presence. The argument was as convoluted as the myriad wrinkles on his face and nothing could be made of it. So the child gave the only response she had: a smile. Truly, anything beyond an innocent's smile is superfluous. There in that prosaic patch of weeds the irresistible force met the immovable object and they settled into a peaceful tolerance. While she never found out the reason behind his argument, she did discover the story behind his wrinkles. They were the scars of a smile.