Peter and the Storms of Life

When the apostles first saw the savior walking on the water toward them, they were frightened. But, once the Lord told them who he was and not to fear, Peter’s immediate response was “Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water.” As I think about that response, I try to put it into modern terms. In my life, storms sometimes rage. Whether it is drama natural to the life of a young single adult or major and all encompassing difficulties, storms rage. In my little boat of sanity, that can be thrashed in the waves, I sometimes don’t understand how to escape the encompassing storm, until I realize that the one who can and wants to save me, is waiting for me to hear Him, to recognize that he is just outside of my boat.

I wondered if Peter’s response, “if”, was asking for a sign rather than exercising faith, but I feel that that is actually just his desire to run to the Lord, the part of Peter that had just great faith that he knew the impossible was possible for something so important. Being human, however, Peter began to sink when fear rose back up and pushed away that child like faith. The Lord “immediately” grabs him and asks why he would doubt. Peter had the faith it took to step out of the boat, but the moment he took his focus off of the Lord and onto the distractions of the world happening around him, it was not strong enough to withstand the currents pushing against him.

Doctrine and Covenants section 88 verse 67 says, “And if your eye be single to my glory, your whole bodies shall be filled with light, and there shall be no darkness in you; and that body which is filled with light comprehendeth all things.” The point of this life is to get better at it. Peter’s first reaction was the reaction I would hope to have and to keep in all of my distressing times. However, it is not always how I react. Sometimes I take a while to recognize that I am not alone (that’s usually when I get the most dramatic about things…), but only when I hear Him calling, “Be of good cheer, it is I! Be not afraid!” do I finally figure it out. 

A Timeless Literature

My posts of late have been sparse. As I have made the excuse before, school takes up a lot of my time. And the depressing amount of spare time I do have is used for doing laundry, grocery shopping, cooking something other than Top Ramen, working in church callings, or sometimes (okay, maybe more than sometimes) taking a nap… Learning is hard work! But, I still love to read. I still love to study words and still find so much meaning in telling the stories of our lives and experiencing the events of others.

With this post, I am taking a slight turn in the topics of discussion. I am currently living in Las Vegas, Nevada. Quite a change from the small town Rexburg, Idaho where I completed my university education. I am student teaching in an honors English class and taking an online religion class with it. In the class, I am participating in guided study of The New Testament in the King James version of The Holy Bible. I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I know The Bible to be the word of God as I know The Book of Mormon to be another testament of Christ and truth as well. I am excited to be taking this class because in all of the time I have studied the scriptures, I have never read The New Testament cover to cover. That is my goal here.

Each week, part of my assignment will be to make a blog post on the week’s topic. The Bible is a slightly different genre than my blog is used to being filled with, but it is one of the greatest works of literature of all time.

(My favorite picture of Christ. "Prince of Peace" by Liz Lemon Swindle)

Today’s topic: Parables

1.       During Christ’s ministry, his teaching strategy of choice was often parables. Parables were an effective tool in His situation because they teach deep and important messages while requiring an honest desire and learned ability to understand. A parable is a story used to teach a specific principle. Christ explained to his apostles that he only taught in parables because those who didn’t understand, were not ready to understand. The bible dictionary aptly explains, “Thus it is that the parable exhibits the condition of all true knowledge. Only he who seeks finds.” True knowledge and understanding requires work, and through that work the meaning and personal application is deepened and implanted in one’s memory.

2.       The parable of the tares can explain one reason why the Church sends out so many missionaries. The parable of the tares involves a sower of good seeds (representing the Son of God sending His children and angels to the earth) and an “enemy” who secretly sowed seeds that are destructive to the original wheat seeds, tares. The man’s servants ask if they should pull the tares out to save the wheat and he replies that they should wait until they are grown, harvest the wheat and separate it from the tares, then burn the tares and bring the wheat to his barn. Missionaries are sent out to all corners of the world to bring the gospel and knowledge of Christ to those who do not have it. Followers of Christ continue his work here on earth and join his army in the fight against the evil influences trying to thwart his work. Being “brought into His barn” is representative of being with Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father in eternal happiness. 

3.       The parable of the treasure and the pearl of great price in Matthew 13 describes a man who gave up his worldly possessions in search of something of greater value, the pearl of great price. The pearl that holds great value can represent the gospel. It is the thing that means the most in life and is the most important to understand and to hold on to. Those who are willing to sacrifice worldly wealth and recognition in order to maintain their relationship with God understand that this life is not the life that matters. What we choose to do here matters because that is what creates our character, what we take with us. But the events and glories of this life are not as important as becoming who God would have us be and keeping a real relationship with our Father in Heaven. 

The Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge

I have watched Gilmore Girls off and on through the years, but have always just loved it! I guess I can't say that I am a die-hard fan, considering that there are many others out there who have faithfully watched each and every episode... I need to Netflix them. However, I do share a passion for words and literature with miss Rory which makes me feel a little connected. I'm basically never without book, although I did not bring one in my purse to prom like Rory... I saw this list of 250 books that she mentions throughout all of the seasons. Thought it would be a fun goal for someday!

1984 by George Orwell
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
Archidamian War by Donald Kagan
The Art of Fiction by Henry James
The Art of War by Sun Tzu
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
Atonement by Ian McEwan
Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy
The Awakening by Kate Chopin
Babe by Dick King-Smith
Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women by Susan Faludi
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie
Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Beowulf: A New Verse Translation by Seamus Heaney
The Bhagava Gita
The Bielski Brothers: The True Story of Three Men Who Defied the Nazis, Built a Village in the Forest, and Saved 1,200 Jews by Peter Duffy
Bitch in Praise of Difficult Women by Elizabeth Wurtzel
A Bolt from the Blue and Other Essays by Mary McCarthy
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Brick Lane by Monica Ali
Bridgadoon by Alan Jay Lerner
Candide by Voltaire
The Canterbury Tales by Chaucer
Carrie by Stephen King
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White
The Children’s Hour by Lillian Hellman
Christine by Stephen King
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
The Code of the Woosters by P.G. Wodehouse
The Collected Short Stories by Eudora Welty
The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty by Eudora Welty
A Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare
Complete Novels by Dawn Powell
The Complete Poems by Anne Sexton
Complete Stories by Dorothy Parker
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas père
Cousin Bette by Honor’e de Balzac
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber – started and not finished
The Crucible by Arthur Miller
Cujo by Stephen King
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon – read – 2009
Daisy Miller by Henry James
Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
David and Lisa by Dr Theodore Issac Rubin M.D
David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
The Da Vinci -Code by Dan Brown – read
Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol
Demons by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
Deenie by Judy Blume
The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America by Erik Larson
The Dirt: Confessions of the World’s Most Notorious Rock Band by Tommy Lee, Vince Neil, Mick Mars and Nikki Sixx
The Divine Comedy by Dante
The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells
Don Quijote by Cervantes
Driving Miss Daisy by Alfred Uhrv
Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson - read – 2009
Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Tales & Poems by Edgar Allan Poe
Eleanor Roosevelt by Blanche Wiesen Cook
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters by Mark Dunn
Eloise by Kay Thompson
Emily the Strange by Roger Reger
Emma by Jane Austen
Empire Falls by Richard Russo
Encyclopedia Brown: Boy Detective by Donald J. Sobol
Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
Ethics by Spinoza
Europe through the Back Door, 2003 by Rick Steves
Eva Luna by Isabel Allende
Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
Extravagance by Gary Krist
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Fahrenheit 9/11 by Michael Moore
The Fall of the Athenian Empire by Donald Kagan
Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World by Greg Critser
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson
The Fellowship of the Ring: Book 1 of The Lord of the Ring by J. R. R. Tolkie
Fiddler on the Roof by Joseph Stein
The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albo
Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce
Fletch by Gregory McDonald
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem
The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Franny and Zooey by J. D. Salinger
Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers
Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut
Gender Trouble by Judith Butler
George W. Bushism: The Slate Book of the Accidental Wit and Wisdom of our 43rd President by Jacob Weisberg
Gidget by Fredrick Kohner
Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen
The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels
The Godfather: Book 1 by Mario Puzo
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Alvin Granowsky
Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchel
The Good Soldier by Ford Maddox Ford
The Gospel According to Judy Bloom
The Graduate by Charles Webb
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
The Group by Mary McCarthy
Hamlet by William Shakespeare
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J. K. Rowling
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad (TBR)
Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders by Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry (TBR)
Henry IV, part I by William Shakespeare
Henry IV, part II by William Shakespeare
Henry V by William Shakespeare
High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
Holidays on Ice: Stories by David Sedaris
The Holy Barbarians by Lawrence Lipton
House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus III (Lpr)
The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende
How to Breathe Underwater by Julie Orringer
How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss
How the Light Gets in by M. J. Hyland
Howl by Allen Gingsburg
The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo
The Iliad by Homer
I’m with the Band by Pamela des Barres
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
Inherit the Wind by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee
Iron Weed by William J. Kennedy
It Takes a Village by Hillary Clinton
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare
The Jumping Frog by Mark Twain
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
Just a Couple of Days by Tony Vigorito
The Kitchen Boy: A Novel of the Last Tsar by Robert Alexander
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Lady Chatterleys’ Lover by D. H. Lawrence
The Last Empire: Essays 1992-2000 by Gore Vidal
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
The Legend of Bagger Vance by Steven Pressfield
Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis
Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them by Al Franken
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens
The Little Locksmith by Katharine Butler Hathaway
The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Andersen
Little Women by Louisa May Alcot
Living History by Hillary Rodham Clinton
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Lottery: And Other Stories by Shirley Jackson
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebol
The Love Story by Erich Segal
Macbeth by William Shakespeare
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
The Manticore by Robertson Davies
Marathon Man by William Goldman
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter by Simone de Beauvoir
Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman by William Tecumseh Sherman
Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
The Meaning of Consuelo by Judith Ortiz Cofer
Mencken’s Chrestomathy by H. R. Mencken
The Merry Wives of Windsro by William Shakespeare
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
The Miracle Worker by William Gibson
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
The Mojo Collection: The Ultimate Music Companion by Jim Irvin
Moliere: A Biography by Hobart Chatfield Taylor
A Monetary History of the United States by Milton Friedman
Monsieur Proust by Celeste Albaret
A Month Of Sundays: Searching For The Spirit And My Sister by Julie Mars
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Mutiny on the Bounty by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall
My Lai 4: A Report on the Massacre and It’s Aftermath by Seymour M. Hersh
My Life as Author and Editor by H. R. Mencken
My Life in Orange: Growing Up with the Guru by Tim Guest
My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult
The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer
The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
The Nanny Diaries by Emma McLaughlin
Nervous System: Or, Losing My Mind in Literature by Jan Lars Jensen
New Poems of Emily Dickinson by Emily Dickinson
The New Way Things Work by David Macaulay
Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich
Night by Elie Wiesel
Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism by William E. Cain, Laurie A. Finke, Barbara E. Johnson, John P. McGowan
Novels 1930-1942: Dance Night/Come Back to Sorrento, Turn, Magic Wheel/Angels on Toast/A Time to be Born by Dawn Powell
Notes of a Dirty Old Man by Charles Bukowski
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Old School by Tobias Wolff
Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Opposite of Fate: Memories of a Writing Life by Amy Tan
Oracle Night by Paul Auster
Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
Othello by Shakespeare
Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
The Outbreak of the Peloponnesian War by Donald Kagan
Out of Africa by Isac Dineson
The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster
The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition by Donald Kagan
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Peyton Place by Grace Metalious
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Pigs at the Trough by Arianna Huffington
Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi
Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain
The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby
The Portable Dorothy Parker by Dorothy Parker
The Portable Nietzche by Fredrich Nietzche
The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O’Neill by Ron Suskind
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Property by Valerie Martin
Pushkin: A Biography by T. J. Binyon
Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw
Quattrocento by James Mckean
A Quiet Storm by Rachel Howzell Hall
Rapunzel by Grimm Brothers
The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe
The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham
Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm by Kate Douglas Wiggin
The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
Rescuing Patty Hearst: Memories From a Decade Gone Mad by Virginia Holman
The Return of the King: The Lord of the Rings Book 3 by J. R. R. Tolkien
R Is for Ricochet by Sue Grafton
Rita Hayworth by Stephen King
Robert’s Rules of Order by Henry Robert
Roman Fever by Edith Wharton
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare
A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf
A Room with a View by E. M. Forster
Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin
Sacred Time by Ursula Hegi
Sanctuary by William Faulkner
Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay by Nancy Milford
The Scarecrow of Oz by Frank L. Baum
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand
The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd – started and not finished
Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette by Judith Thurman
Selected Letters of Dawn Powell: 1913-1965 by Dawn Powell
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
A Separate Peace by John Knowles
Several Biographies of Winston Churchill
Sexus by Henry Miller
The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Shane by Jack Shaefer
The Shining by Stephen King
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
S Is for Silence by Sue Grafton
Slaughter-house Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Small Island by Andrea Levy
Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernest Hemingway
Snow White and Rose Red by Grimm Brothers
Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World by Barrington Moore
The Song of Names by Norman Lebrecht
Song of the Simple Truth: The Complete Poems of Julia de Burgos by Julia de Burgos
The Song Reader by Lisa Tucker
Songbook by Nick Hornby
The Sonnets by William Shakespeare
Sonnets from the Portuegese by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Sophie’s Choice by William Styron
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach
The Story of My Life by Helen Keller
A Streetcar Named Desiree by Tennessee Williams
Stuart Little by E. B. White
Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust
Swimming with Giants: My Encounters with Whales, Dolphins and Seals by Anne Collett
Sybil by Flora Rheta Schreiber
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
Tender Is The Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Term of Endearment by Larry McMurtry
Time and Again by Jack Finney
The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger – read
To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
The Tragedy of Richard III by William Shakespeare
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
The Trial by Franz Kafka
The True and Outstanding Adventures of the Hunt Sisters by Elisabeth Robinson
Truth & Beauty: A Friendship by Ann Patchett
Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
Ulysses by James Joyce
The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath 1950-1962 by Sylvia Plath
Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
Unless by Carol Shields
Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann
The Vanishing Newspaper by Philip Meyers
Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
Velvet Underground’s The Velvet Underground and Nico (Thirty Three and a Third series) by Joe Harvard
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
Walden by Henry David Thoreau
Walt Disney’s Bambi by Felix Salten
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
We Owe You Nothing – Punk Planet: The Collected Interviews edited by Daniel Sinker
What Colour is Your Parachute? 2005 by Richard Nelson Bolles
What Happened to Baby Jane by Henry Farrell
When the Emperor Was Divine by Julie Otsuka
Who Moved My Cheese? Spencer Johnson
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee – read
Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire
The Wizard of Oz by Frank L. Baum
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë - currently reading
The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole

I Live at the Library...

My school's library opens at 7 am, Monday through Saturday, and closes at 11:30 (really they start playing Lion King or something equally ridiculous and kind of awesome at 11:15 or so, successfully stopping all productivity because who can help but dance and sing along?? Last night it was Newsies and my friend, Stephen, knew all the words and moves. Yes. He is great). Since it is finals week and I volunteered to do the grunt work of a group project (I thought I was supposed to get smarter in college...), I have spent almost three days straight in the library. In the same spot. On the same Mac desk top. Okay, so actually I spent a day being sick, then that night at the library trying to figure out how to get the files for this project (while my roommate managed to spill water water on my laptop), then 7:25am to 11:30pm the next day, THEN 7am to well, now, here. Here in this spot. On this blasted computer. 

That first night something crazy happened with the files and the largeness of them and the smallness of my jump drive and there was a couple of tussles with the library staff 20 minutes after they were supposed to be closed (thank goodness Stephen stayed with me!). And the next day after it was encoded and rendered and probably some other techy word, I opened the final product only to find it had cut off the last three minutes. Luckily, last night, I didn't shut my computer off right and it was still there this morning so I could fix it. Anyway. Basically, I want a nap. 

The project that took me so long is finally done though (I think only through divine providence...) and besides all my complaining, it was actually fun and turned out pretty cool. 

I am in a Shakespeare class, as I think I have shared before. Our project was to recreate one of Shakespeare's plays with my group. So, if anyone is familiar with Shakespeare, please don't be offended... He is probably rolling over in his grave. But, gosh, we sure had fun with it. 

It is based off the play The Merchant of Venice (which we turned into The Merchant at BYU-Idaho.. get ready for some Mormon jokes). It's kind of embarrassing and probably won't make a ton of sense if you have never read the play.. but here it is.

I was going to put the actual video here but it won't let me for some reason, so here is the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xQUBMW8_u4&%20feature=youtu.be

Jane Austen: Soul-sister.

Sometimes, I think that I was born in the wrong century... Then I remember that I really like the laptop I am typing on and the phone that I just sent a text on and the lights above my head, and I feel a little better. However, I do wish with all my heart that so many elements of Ms. Austen's time would come back to our society today. I do know that her tales are slightly romanticized; I'm not hoping to wear a full dress, say pretty words, and then fall desperately in love with a dramatically rich man... although, that would be nice... But, I think that we have lost a lot of good things having to do with general respect to our fellow beings that the 18th century had quite a handle on.

Jane Austen had a particular grasp on human nature that still teaches us to this day. Jane fell in love once, but her own story did not work out like that of Elizabeth's or Elinor, or Emma. She never married, but instead became the voice of true love, strong character, and communal propriety. She was an observer of human interaction, she had a ring side seat but never quite got in the ring herself. Sometimes it is those outside observers, the ones that can be truly objective, that give us the best insight. This was Jane. She was ironic and sarcastic, loved to poke fun when she could. She was confident and wise, was very set in her standards and ideas. She died young and lived a relatively uneventful life, but proved the statement that we make our own. Her characters never die and in my mind, neither will she.
I love her and her timeless, vivacious, passionate tales.
So far I have read Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Emma, and am on Northanger Abbey. My favorite is still Pride and Prejudice. I love Elizabeth's spunk, strength, and the fact that she is not perfect. (I secretly want to name a child after her someday...). I think that one thing we see throughout all of Austen's stories is the idea of self-reflection and change. There is something admirable about a person who can gather humility enough to make a needed personal change. Someone like that doesn't have to be perfect. Someone with that ability will always be working and striving to be the best they can be. And that is really all we can ask of ourselves and others. It is an important part of humanity. We see this in Mr. Darcy as well. His whole outlook on life and people changes when he meets Elizabeth and we love him all the more for that. And okay, besides that fact and that he is a good man, he is also fabulously rich, handsome, and he says things like this: "You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you..." Gosh. And then there is this scene from the movie that I will never, ever get over.

Of course, the movie does take certain liberties, but it captures the right sentiment.
I love what I gain from Pride and Prejudice, movie or book, and I hope to be more like Elizabeth as I live and learn!
For my class, I just wrote a paper on five relationships in Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. Just for fun, here is a link to it. Just click the picture of the girl hugging the book...

Poetry finds...

In all the homework-doing, I've found some cool readings of some of the classics... I've found that listening to a dramatic reading of some of the literature, helps me understand it. I thought I would share.

First, a beautiful rendering of one of my favorite poems from one of my favorite poets, "The Lady of Shalott" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Second, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot, read by Anthony Hopkins

And finally, Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven", read by James Earl Jones.

Each of these poems are beautifully crafted. Delicious music to my ears. 

Work, Life's Zingers, and Loving the Land

I just, this very minute, finished O Pioneers! by Willa Cather. I was unprepared for how affecting that book would be. And, I never in my life have wanted to own land like I do right now!
O Pioneers! is a tale of a pioneering family in the country of Nebraska in the early nineteen hundreds. Alexandra Bergson is the oldest sibling in the Bergson family, and from an early age, catches the dream, the hope that her father has for this unbroken, wild land. While surrounded by failing farms and despondent immigrant farmers, Alexandra, with her younger brothers, is left to hope for and work this land they called the Divide. Alexandra is an inspiringly strong character, leading and raising her brothers, basically foregoing her own girlhood. She has great faith in her father's memory, always looking to the painting of him hung in her and her brother's home as she makes decisions that she hopes are correct, even years and years after his death. She is devoted to the land and her family and bravely continues to give her all, risking mistakes and critisim from friends, neighbors, and even some of her own brothers. "We come and go, but the land is always here. And the people who love it and understand it are the people who own it--for a little while."
It is a beautiful statement on the difficulty and imperfection of life, the work gets us through, and the role that the natural things of our world take part in our lives.
Interestingly, Willa Cather actually moved to the Nebraska country with her family as a young girl with much the same goal in taming the Divide. The descriptions of the open land in the story are testaments to how well Cather knew her land. Whether she loved or hated it, the feelings run deep.
This was a great story, that I was glad to be exposed to. I hope to live my life of some of the dignified strength that Alexandra continued on in hers!

Now I just need some fields to frolic through...