Welcome to my blog that I will be using in my English I class. On this page, you can find my IRJ’s on responses to our in class texts, open prompts, and creative short stories.
IRJ Reflection #22 March 1, 2010
Maturity: The Common Struggle
In almost all hero journeys, a character must grow up in order to go on a quest. In the Odyssey, Telemachus, son of Odysseus, has to find the courage to set out on a journey to find his information on his father’s whereabouts.
Maturity remains something in all cultures, from which one must find his inner motivation and overcome the hurdles of life. Over the fifteen years of my lifetime, I have found myself going through this never ending maturing process. Although I would love to think of myself as mature, I realize that I have to encounter much more serious and life-altering situations before I can ever even think about saying that I am fully mature. Then again, what is fully mature? Scientists will tell you that a human being is fully matured when it can produce the necessary chemicals for reproduction. I believe that a normal human being never reaches a full maturity level. However, this does not mean that I believe my elders are immature, but that life has too many different experiences that one can learn and mature from.
Although the tough, life-changing experiences often inflict a physical or psychological pain or struggle, a previously unknown fact can be discovered and applied to one’s knowledge upon completion.
IRJ Reflection 21 February 4, 2010
Texting While Driving: The New Phenomenon
While reading part of The Los Angeles Times today, I came across an article that sparked my attention. It described how people today use their cell phones while driving on a regular basis. In this past year, California has created a new law forbidding the use of cell phones without a bluetooth device. Although many people know about this newborn law, the true reality has not hit them.
However, the other day in Torrence, California, several drivers were forced to accept the fine for thier actions. Police had setup a check point from which they ticketed forty-one drivers in one hour for using moble devices while driving.
I believe that this law shows a great step in the right direction for California, because technology has taken over such a huge part of our lives. When a person uses a cell phone to text or call another while driving, they lose a sense of awareness on the road. Although I am just beginning my driving life, even the littlest distraction will throw my concentration off, I can not imagine what my phone would do!
Also, it confuses me as to why people think it is so necessary to use their cell phone while driving. Why can’t the person simply pull-over to send that text message or return a call to their friend? Anyways, I am proud to see California’s action towards this issue and I hope to see less people driving crazily while on the phone.
IRJ Reflection 20 February 3, 2010
Common People’s Battles: Trust
In the Bible, God instructs Abraham to sacrifice his only son as praise to the Lord. Abraham, not thinking twice, hikes up the mountain the next day with his son and a knife in his pocket. Upon reaching the alter, Abraham lays down his son and almost takes a stab at him. However, an angel from the heavens interrupted the ceremony, telling the man that the sacrifice was unnecessary. Afterward, God realizes his wrongdoing and apologizes to the father.
I think this incident resembles many that occur in or culture today. A lot of times, one will fail to realize how much power they have over certain individuals. Whether the power had came from friendship, family relations, or respect, it still can be used in the wrong way. Often people will ask “if your friend told you to jump off a cliff, would you do it?” Unfortunately several people reply yes, because they feel that they can trust another.
I believe that, especially in our modern culture today, people have become incredibly trusting within small time periods. Now some will argue that this “quick” trust is a benefit, but I disagree. One reason for the disagreement is that often the person that breaks the trust bond doesn’t realize their mistake until it is too late. In some instances this breach in trust can lead to something as serious as death or a broken relationship, which I think is a greater loss than to not have the possible “quick” trust.
IRJ Reflection 19 January 28, 2010
The Common Question: How Many Kids to Have?
In various chapters of the Genesis in the Bible, long lists of family trees and siblings fill the pages. These ongoing family descendants have developed the basis of the theme of family throughout the first chapters. The idea of family and how large a family should be often changes depending on the origin location of the family and what their culture believes in.
In China, the government requires that a Chinese family have no more than two offspring. The reason for the law seems to be that the Chinese government does not want to encounter overpopulation. In Mexico however, the government does not have a specific law enforcing the production of offspring. Thus most families tend to have more than four children, whom they can utilize in order to tend crops and raise animals. And in the United States, the number of children per family ranges from one to six.
I believe that it is a good idea to have a larger number of children because the payout in the end can be much better. Although one must be financially equipped to have multiple offspring, the United States government offers tax deductions for each child that you have. And even though raising a baby can create difficulties, I think that if one can raise just one child, they can have that child take care of its brother, and later both of the children can provide assistance in the supporting of the family.
IRJ reflection #18 January 27, 2010
The Most Common Mistake: When Curiosity Kills the Cat
In chapter three of “The Genesis” in The Bible, the serpent convinces Eve to eat the fruit from the tree of knowledge, even though they both were told by God strictly not to eat the fruit from the tree. After eating the fruit, they realize that they aren’t wearing any clothes, and immediately create leaf garments. Not long after, God arrives to inform them that, in fact, he knows of their violation and states the consequences of their actions.
This curiosity often occurs in both the lives of children as well as in adults. One will be told of something they must not do which immediately triggers them to go against what they are told in order to find a reason why a specific action can not be done. However, many of these people neglect to realize that there actually lays a reason that forbids the certain action and later suffer the consequences of their wrong-doing.
I believe that this curiosity that human’s have is a blessing and a curse. It is a good thing because of the fact that when we act curiously, we often learn much more and discover right from wrong. After all, without curiosity, there would be not scientists, historians, or teachers. The burden of following curiosity can range in severity, most often the consequence is of little importance, however sometimes the consequences can become much worse. Thus the quote has evolved, “Curiosity killed the cat.” This quote not only applies to cats but also to humans. Whether the consequences actually include killing can be debated, however depending severity of the incident, serious consequences can evolve.
IRJ-QR#17; When The Good Turns Bad: Positive Outlooks In Society November 20, 2009
For any object, feeling, or event, an ending always occurs. Sometimes the end is a reward, and sometimes it come as a burden. In The Golden Compass, Lord Asriel visits Jordan College and is offered a very rare wine, Tokay. As the server explains how it has become so rare, the Lord replies, “All good things pass away.” (Pullman 12)
Even though Asriel was referring to the wine, this statement remains true for numerous other things as well. Popular rock bands, intense movies, intriguing stories, and even death are all common examples of unfortunate endings. However, some ending can have a positive effect on the situation. Many difficult tasks end with relief.
So one might ask, why do good things pass away? It is believed that in society today those good things must pass away. In fact, if they don’t, everything would appeal as good. However if everything were created good, the society would not have anything bad. Without anything bad nothing would exist to juxtapose the good things. If a society only has good and happy things, soon their effectiveness would disappear.
Proposition: If society only contained positive views and outcomes, their positivity would soon run out and the positive views and outcomes would be considered normal.
IRJ-CP#16 November 12, 2009
The Kidnapping of the Boy with the Gift: Mark Davidson
Mark Davidson lay alone on the couch, once again stuck babysitting his boring little sister on a Friday night. He hated staying home on the first night of the weekend, and tonight Mark was missing the Boys Like Girls concert, and they were releasing their brand-new album. So he lay on the couch watching TV, waiting for his eyelids to drop. He thought about earlier that night when he went around locking the doors of the house, and he noticed the back door open. Although this was not considered normal, Mark figured the dog pushed it open to chase a squirrel. Except there remained one problem, the dog was spending the night at the vet for a check-up.
Suddenly, a man in black appeared in the doorway. The man resembled a strong and tall person, certainly able to take on any person, large or small. As he walked into the room, he hung up his cell phone. At first, Mark thought he was seeing things. After all he thought, he would have noticed if a person had entered his home. The burly man only stated one thing, “We have been waiting for you Mr. Davidson.”
“I got ‘em,” Jack Driscoll entered into a text message and sent it off. Driscoll made sure the chemicals had sent the boy to sleep, and made his way to the fridge. He had been waiting for the call for hours, hiding in the kid’s small little house. Now, he went to search to solve his hunger. He opened the fridge to the unpleasing sight of healthy food. Obviously, this explained the boy’s slender body, but only created more anger in his stomach. After ransacking the healthy food cabinet, Jack finally encountered a box of Oreo cookies. He threw the cookies in his truck with the boy, and turned back into the house to check one more time if there lay any other good snacks he did not find earlier.
After thoroughly rummaging through the other food cabinet and finding nothing, he realized; why am I looking for food here? He remembered the change he had from his morning’s coffee run and figured there would be somewhere on the way back to the warehouse he could stop for a snack. Jack turned around to head out to his truck only to find a quivering man with a bat in his hands.
“Who are you and what the hell are you doing with my son?” The man in the coat and tie waited anxiously for an answer.
IRJ-OP#15 November 11, 2009
Risk: The Greatest Learning Experience
Last Saturday while working at a one of my client’s residences, a woman asked the guys and I to clean up a couple of trees in the her front yard. Normally, we consider this an average job and went about it in that manner, however when we arrived the woman had left. Since she had specifically told us to start without her, we began working. Not soon after, Jorge, one of my coworkers, asked me if we should remove a major branch because of its path into the house. As I sat and thought about it, he said, “Es mejor ser seguro que ser arrepentido.” The translation to English represents a famous old quote, “Better safe than sorry.”
Now most people would eagerly agree with the statement, but I however, strongly disagree, especially in this situation. The real question is actually why do we even have risks in society today? Researchers and I agree on the fact that risk intrigues the pursuer. When a person realizes and thinks about all of the dangers and possible outcomes of the event, their curiosity level increases.
Common Risks- A reporter’s views on a human’s risks
Risk- A psychologist’s views on the average human risks
Risk can also create a learning experience for a person. After all, don’t we learn from mistakes? Scientists and researchers alike have proven that all humans learn from their mistakes, which supports the idea that after taking a risk, a human being develops more knowledge whether or not the outcome satisfied the person.
Although some of these risks have deplorable outcomes, all most every risk can benefit a learning experience. So, after debating the removal of the branch with my coworker, I portrayed risk’s greater goods and we ended up removing the branch and satisfying the client.
Proposition: Not only does risk please our thriving curiosity, it creates an unbeatable way of learning and provides a person with a perspective on the event that a teacher’s, professor’s, or knowledgeable being’s definition could not compare to.
IRJ-CP#14 November 4, 2009
The Greatest Fear: Singing, And Not in the Shower (continued)
After class ended that day, Danny sauntered home, thinking about his situation. He arrived home to an empty house, like normal. Since both his parents worked late nights, he often had to prepare his own dinner. Although he felt lonely on these nights, he enjoyed the trust his parents had in him. Danny sat at the counter for a while, and then came to the conclusion that he had no energy to make dinner, and would go somewhere to get something. On a desultory lark, he randomly decided to go on an adventure to Jamba Juice. He figured he could get some good energy from there. When he arrived at Jamba Juice, he walked in to find that he realized that only one customer remained. That customer however, appeared to be the one and only Patrick Driscoll, Coldplay’s choreographer and voice coach. After ordering, Danny disdainfully approached the celebrity, and took a seat next to him. Driscoll turned to face the newcomer and replied, “You better make sure they put extra energy boost in your smoothie, you are looking quite murky.”
Danny sat puzzled, replaying in his head what just happened. He managed to let out, “ Hi, my name is Danny.”
Pat then replied, “well hey there Danny, what’s bringing you down today? Anything I can do to help?”
Danny explained his copious story to Patrick, making sure not to leave out one detail. Pat looked at Danny deplorably as he wrapped up his story.
After a few minutes of thinking, Patrick precipitated the statement, “Well why don’t I teach you a couple rudiments?”
