doctoral candidate in rhetoric and scientific and technical communication
Archive for June, 2004
Tuesday June 8, 2004
0This is a different review than I had planned on only because it touched me so deeply.
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I went to a movie today. I used to go to the movies a lot…when they weren’t so crowded. I don’t enjoy it as much anymore.
This movie, though, was worth it. There were only 6 people in the entire theatre but the movie was intense.
I went to see What the #$*! Do We Know!? It’s part documentary, part drama and it deals with quantum physics, the effects of ourselves on our own state of being, and how we can affect change in our lives.
It’s a powerful movie.
One part talked about the Message of Water. A scientist exposed water to certain messages…like The Chi of Love, Thank you, and I hate you and I want you to die. What came from this experiment is amazing. The water samples that had positive messages were astoundingly beautiful. The ones that had negative messages were odd and different and there was apparently something wrong with them.
One person in the film says (paraphrasing), “Our bodies are mostly made of water. If we can project positive thoughts into that part of ourselves, imagine what we can do.”
The links between quantum physics and spirituality are intense.
The thing that touched me the most, though, was in our emotions. One scientist (most of the interviewees were physicists or medical doctors or psychologists) said that we become addicted to a specific type of emotion and cling to that because we know how it will manifest itself. If we’re used to being the victim, if we engage in bad relationships, if we are angry, our synopses begin to ignore any other messages they receive and only work on those types of emotions, the most predominant ones.
They said that the only way to overcome this, to change the ways our synopses behave, is to change our reactions, change our behaviors, to have willpower against those things we know are destructive for us. They said this is the hardest thing we can ever do…but it is worth it.
I liked, most, though, that we can affect change by finding the positive…by loving ourselves…by finding beauty in every day things.
I like those kinds of messages. They make my heart smile.
I also liked the link between the scientific and the spiritual just because I’m such a science geek. Heh.
When I went back to school, I knew science was where my heart was…but I also knew that I needed something that spoke to me. I ended up with a major in linguistics (I graduate with my bachelor’s next spring and will go straight into grad school after that). My minor is in geology. I covered science on both sides of the spectrum: social and hard.
Anyway…this film spoke to me because of that on some level.
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Next Review: Shrek2
Monday June 7, 2004
0While I Was Gone
by Sue Miller
ISBN: 0-345-91151-4
Ballantine Books, 1999
This book left me with an overwhelming sadness. There is loss on so many levels.
This is a story about one woman who has spent a lifetime figuring out who she is, dealing with deep losses, and finding some sort of peace. However, that peace is at risk when she meets someone from her past who intrigues her and brings memories flooding back.
Jo risks her entire life to pursue a past that was not as it seemed. Her integrity is challenged. Her marriage is challenged.
This book reminds me that life is not as easy or as uncomplicated as fairy tales and movies may have us believe. We have pasts that can tempt us. We have people we are attracted to even long after we’ve entered marriage or long-term commitments.
What defines us is how we deal with temptations and the baggage we bring.
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Next Review: Shrek2
while I was gone
0While I Was Gone
by Sue Miller
ISBN: 0-345-91151-4
Ballantine Books, 1999
This book left me with an overwhelming sadness. There is loss on so many levels.
This is a story about one woman who has spent a lifetime figuring out who she is, dealing with deep losses, and finding some sort of peace. However, that peace is at risk when she meets someone from her past who intrigues her and brings memories flooding back.
Jo risks her entire life to pursue a past that was not as it seemed. Her integrity is challenged. Her marriage is challenged.
This book reminds me that life is not as easy or as uncomplicated as fairy tales and movies may have us believe. We have pasts that can tempt us. We have people we are attracted to even long after we’ve entered marriage or long-term commitments.
What defines us is how we deal with temptations and the baggage we bring.
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Next Review: Shrek2
remember?
0Do you remember, a few months ago, when we were knee-deep in sharing Sarah McLachlan and you got to see her on TRL Live? You told me that she sang “Stupid” and that it touched you…that it was a great song but so sad.
I agreed. I heard you but I don’t think either of us really *heard* you. I think you were sharing things even then that we both didn’t realize…things about your past and your present.
I thought about that today. I heard the song on the radio and something struck me so I went to read the lyrics.
Stupid
Sarah McLachlanNight lift up the shades let in the brilliant light of morning
But steady me now for I am weak and starving for mercy
Sleep has left me alone to carry the weight of unraveling where we went wrong
And all I can do to hang on, to keep me from falling into old familiar shoesHow stupid could I be
a simpleton could see
that you’re no good for me
but you’re the only one I seeLove has made me a fool set me on fire and watched as I floundered
unable to speak except to cry out and wait for your answer
and you come around in your time speaking of fabulous places create
an oasis that dries up as soon as youre gone
you leave me here burning in this desert without youChorus
Everything changes everything falls apart
I cant stand to feel myself losing control
In the deep of my weakness I knowChorus
I realize, now, that you were thinking about Randi. I understand that. I realize that you know you’re stuck in that place and you don’t know how to get out.
I think I wanted to be the person to help you find happiness. I wanted to be the person to help you with your demons, to help you with your pain, to help you find a way out.
I realize, now, that it’s not possible for me to rescue or heal you. You have to want to do that. You have to be the one to take the first step.
You were right in saying that I deserve more. You were right in saying that you need to let me go. I was letting my heart get in the way of understanding that. I wasn’t thinking about what you were saying, I was feeling it.
I will always be a friend to you, Curtis. I will always be here to talk to you, to share things with you, to be your biggest fan and supporter.
You are right, though, in saying we should go our separate ways.
Thank you for being strong when I could not.
Thank you for caring about me enough to do that.
50 words (for curtis)
0I watch, while you are away. She plays you. She feeds your jealousy, your co-dependency. Flaunted in public. You will be required to notice. It’s push and pull. No one wins. I sit, loving you, aching for you to want something healthier. Wanting you to want a better life soon.
Wednesday June 2, 2004
0The Secret History
by Donna Tartt
ISBN: 0-449-91151-9
Ballantine Books, 1992
I would classify this book as “good kids gone bad.” It is set at the fictional Hampden College in New England (which is supposedly based on Bennington in Vermont). The narrator is a working class kid from central California who has a penchant for dead languages (ancient Greek, in this case) and wants to attend a college that will allow him to build on that.
He eventually gets into a very exclusive field of study that is based around the classics and is in a non-traditional setting of studying with one instructor and 5 other students.
These students are not your typical party-going frat/sorority kids. They come from wealthy old-money familiies, have gone to boarding schools, and are outcasts because of their style, their intellect, and their disdain for anything remotely “normal.”
The original five students decided to try to take their studies to the extreme and recreate what Plato termed telestic madness, the Dionysiac frenzy. It does not go well and, subsequently, the story just begins. The narrator, Richard, learns of the event and sets out to help his friends even though he is confused about what is right and just.
It is an interesting tale of deceit. It is haunting. It is steeped in intellectual superior thought.
My copy of the book actually had an interview with the author. I almost wish I had not read it because she has a haughty air that turned me off. I loved the book. I did not like her attitude that projects a “better than you” feeling.
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Next review: While I Was Gone by Sue Miller