Thoreau the Transcendentalist

Out of all the readings we've had to read for this unit so far, I've liked the Thoreau ones the best. He was a brilliant man, and revolutionary too, going into realms of thought that hadn't even crossed anyone else's mind. His time at Walden and in jail, like we read in our book, were two prominent experiences in his lifetime that helped him to develop his thoughtful opinions about the world. I especially like Walden. I used to live in Lexington, 20 minutes away from Walden Pond, and we would go swimming there. It's really a beautiful place, isolated but not too isolated, and you could really see how Thoreau would choose there to be alone with his thoughts. I think, in today's day and age [and also back then because that was the middle of another time of great change, the Industrial Revolution], it's important to remove yourself from your fast-paced life once in a while and just be alone and think about things, which is exactly what he did. A lot of his philosophies agree with my personal ones, such that the individual has the power and it's important to recognize this in order to create a functioning society.

Although Civil Disobedience seemed more serious than Walden, his idea that we are all cogs in the machine of the government is one that still holds true today I think, and has since the time he wrote it. One can really see the path his life takes- he went into the woods because he wanted to be self-sufficient, to not be a cog for a brief period of time.

I think we can all learn something from Thoreau, and his view on what it means to be an American is a very unique and though-provoking one.

King Still King?

Although Martin Luther King Junior is still a holiday [as it rightfully should be], is it truly a day off for him? Sadly, I think the answer is no. I mean, I'm not going to complain. I love a day off to do absolutely nothing and to make up all the homework I didn't do because it was a three day weekend. And yes, it is a day dedicated on paper to him. I guess it all depends on what you do that day to actually make it dedicated to him. One could do a National Service Day.

In grade school, we always read these nice picture books that explained what Dr. King did for America and civil rights, but in a way that was appropriate for young children. As we got older, we learned what he truly did and how it impacted the world, but also the events that lead up to it, with no filter. However, now in school, it merely gets mentioned, maybe with a brief praise of King but not usually.

The short answer of what I'm trying to say here is that yes, King is still a King, but less so than he was in the 60s, or after he was assassinated. Most legacies fade over time, and even though Dr. King is not most people, it happened. Also, it depends on the time period. It took awhile for America to become desegregated even after laws were passed and Dr. King died for his cause. Racism is still prevalent today, but I would say that the US is less racist than it has ever been. It is, of course, still really important to remember what MLK did for the US. He literally broke down barriers no one had even dared to approach in the past. He got things done. And he did so without violence and brutality, a peaceful fighter. I wish we still made a bigger deal out of this day being a day specifically for him.

Children of the Sea

Edwidge Danticat has a unique writing style. She tells it just how it is, no BS, but yet even though she is blunt, her words have a certain poetic flow to them. She is great at imagery, and while reading Children of the Sea, I was able to create some extremely powerful and vivid visuals. Children of the Sea was not only an interesting and genuinely good piece of writing, I learned about Haitian life as well.

The characters in the story grew up in Haiti underneath the Duvalier regime, a dictatorship. She describes some of the horrors her neighbors and friends experienced during that time. In the other part of the story, she wrote a character on the boat, escaping away from life in Haiti if it was the last thing he did. I didn't imagine the characters to be that much older than us, so I tried to imagine growing up in a place like that, and not knowing if my friends were in Haiti, dead or had escaped somewhere else. It's a very scary thought.

To both of these characters, America represented a new start, and hope. Anything was better than in Haiti, and if you had to die trying to find a better place to live, so be it. The Haitian attitude toward death is something I found very intriguing, and I like it. Times are different now, and I'm saying this having lived in the US my whole life, but I think people these days have such a negative view on death. I'm not saying it's happy, but maybe we as Americans could try to make it seem less... bad, overall. Anyway, back to what America represents. No one knew exactly what they might run into when they got there, but they flung themselves out into the ocean with only hope carrying them forward. Hope is what kept them on the boat. These people had great faith that something great was out there. I'm not sure what to call that quality, but it certainly is admirable.

I look forward to reading more of Danticat sometime soon. Any suggestions, Mr. McCarthy?