History Repeats

  This weekend I was able to participate in field training for a class of mine.  It was cold and wet and people were not always happy with each other.  Mistakes were made and individuals chewed out but overall it went well.  On the ride back, I was talking to a guy that was in Prof. Sextons Shakespeare class and then another girl, who was with me when Prof Sexton was talking to me in the sub and told me that mythologies are everywhere, asked about what Prof Sexton was talking about.  I quickly gave her the idea of mythology but I could tell she wasnt super interested.  But by bringing up the topic of mythology, it got me thinking about relating my weekend to mythology.  I started to think more broadscale though.   Mistakes is what my mind went to.  When I was younger, my parents told me that my generation had more problems than theirs and that their parents had told them the same thing and so on and so forth. But when I started reading Ovid, I noticed that the things he was takking about were things that were the same as what we deal with now.  We as people still look at things we shouldnt and tell secrets we shouldnt and hurt each other.  I think that this is because everyone has a beginning and middlr and end and that we have to learn from our own mistakes and dont take advise as people very well.  Whether ornot this is the reason for repeating history, or myth, or not I dont know though

End songs

I found a song this weekend that reminded me of ends.  Partly because of the movie it came from, though.  It is "The Call" by Regina Spektor.  I was listening to musicwhile driving back to Bozeman and it randomly, or maybe on purpose.  It is thesong at the end of the movie Prince Caspien and is when the children are passing through thedoorway on their way back to their own world and to me the doorway is the end.  And thestart of a new adventure for the children back in England.  Here is a link to the song:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNsQewlFtEs

Simplicity

       For some reason, Wednesday felt ordinary and normal, more so than usually.  I cant explain why it just does.  In reality, though, it was different than most days.  I got up earlier that morning and had my final APFT test of the year, this is my army physical fitness test.  I suppose you can call me a goal person, but I have been striving to achieve a perfect score this entire year.  This is a certain time for a two mile run, a certain number of push-ups in two minutes, and a certain number of sit-ups in two minutes.  This was one of those victories, or milestones, that I was able to reach.   After PT I was sitting in the Sub with another girl from the program when I saw Professor Sexton.  I was working on my anatomy and physiology reading for the day and he asked me about mythologies and reminded me that everything is mythological.  This is really true.  A day that should have been considered abnormal felt more normal than usual.  I started to have my mind wander toward mythologies and different men and women who accomplished great things.  Recently, Margaret Thatcher has passed away.  A women who I would  consider a historical hero to me, she was able to accomplish what she set out to do in England and win her battles as well.  while many would argue st her political decisions, I saw her as a strong woman who defied the normals and thought she could do it better.  In a way it reminded me of Arachne but without the end that Arachne saw.  I was reminded, though, that everything is mythological and has been done before

Woman's Punishment

In class on Friday, I was very interested in the ending topic.  I think I had always thought that men got the worse punishment in our creation story, now we all have to die, can it get much worse?  But know looking at our discussion, I am starting to question that.  I am still a little confused at the analogy of death and knowledge.  But what definitely spoke me was about the scientific look at the size of a human's skull.  I had just the day before been in my anatomy and physiology class talking about the size of the brain and the cost - need analysis of the size of a human brain, or how large a baby's skull could be.  What my teacher said mimicked what Dr. Turner said.  The size of a woman's pelvis determines the size of a baby's brain.  So when I started to look at it this way, I started to wonder if pain wasn't really the main curse that Eve was given, but instead it was the limit to our knowledge.  I know that my A & P teacher would hate this, because immediately after telling us that woman's pelvises determine brain size, he said that statistically there is no proof that brain size determines how smart a person is.  But I do wonder if it was easier to have children and we didn't have this restraint, how much our knowledge of things would have differed.  I know that Dr. Turner also talked about Knowledge and death go hand in hand and also that science proves our stories.  I just was a little blown away at this new look at an old story that I have known since I was very little.  

Apple Blossoms

  Spring Storm and Pear Trees was the free verse Poem that Doctor Turner read on Thursday of last week.  While I immensely enjoyed all of his works, this one gave me the most vivid mental picture, not because I knew what pear trees in bloom looked like, but because of an apple tree that while growing up had sat in front of one of my bedroom windows.  I had claimed the tree as my own, and was very quick to yell at my brothers if they started to climb it or break it's branches.  Thinking back now, I believe in a way I considered it a dear friend, who grew older with me as the years passed on.  On windy nights, it's branches would scrape against the window of my room, scaring me at first then becoming a lulling sound in the storm.  In the winter, it stood solemn and bare, but in the spring it was the most romantic tree.  Although it never produced fruit, every year thousands and thousands of blooms would fill the tree producing the most wonderful smell and I would leave my windows open just to bring the apple blossom smell into my room.  Along with the pale pink flowers, bees would swarm around the tree, creating a relaxing sound.  Bees were always something that scared me when I was younger, and although I loved the tree, I would avoid it outside because of the hundreds of bees that traveled to collect pollen and nectar next to my house.   But when I got older, I actually worked with bees for a summer job and my fear of them has decreased tremendously.  As we are talking about "the end," or Apocalypse portion of this class, I have to think of bees a little bit.  All summer long, these little insects work much like ants.  Every morning after the temperature raises to around 50 degrees, the workers leave the hive and start their daily journey to find nectar and pollen.  They will travel up to a five mile radius in order to find both food and water.  One hive can produce up to 100 pounds of honey in one summer.  This is all to prepare for winter.  This made me think of the end period.  I don't know why I associate winter with end, maybe because it is the end of the year or maybe because of the cold harsh weather.  I was surprised at how Spring Storm and Pear Trees made me reminisce of childhood memories though.  

Be Careful What You Wish For!

I had to laugh in class the other day when Professor Sexton was talking in class the other day about being careful what you wish for.  I had an experience when I was eight that mirrors this point of view perfectly.  My Aunt and Uncle had come over for dinner on a Sunday night in the late spring (I still remember the fact that it was a Sunday) and my cousin, brother and I were outside playing.  My cousin had on a blue cast that ran from his wrist to the middle of his shoulder.  I thought it was the coolest thing I had ever seen and was slightly jealous of all the signatures he had on it.  I couldn't help but think how much I wanted a cast just like it.  Sure enough, the next day while playing on the swing set my Dad had built for my siblings and I, I fell off the trapeze bar, backwards, and dislocated and fractured my left elbow and arm.  Ironically, it was the left arm, which was the same side that my cousin broke.  So to say the least, the entire ride to the hospital, riding on a gravel road, I was telling myself that I would never again wish for something that I really had no business wishing for in the first place. 

Perspective

I loved reading all the different displacement stories from the class this weekend.  I think I got though all of them, but I'm really good at missing some on the side of my blog, so I will have to continue to keep looking to make sure that I did read them all.  With some of the stories, the "theme" story stuck out very quickly, others you had to read quite a ways until you saw it, and then others I still am puzzling over.  What really struck me, though, was perspective.  Seeing how differently everyone weaved Ovid into their stories was what I enjoyed.  Some people to small clues while others used the plots of the story from Ovid.  I kept thinking how the story was either like the "Signs and Symbols" or like the displacement story that Professor Sexson read to us from his former student.  Two completely different ways to displace, but both still masterfully done.