Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy

            How do you identify yourself? Are you tall or short? Skinny or fat? Beautiful or ugly? Kind or mean? Happy or depressed? Most of the time we identify ourselves by what other people label us. From such a young age, who we are is decided for us and we are told of our own personalities. In the novel Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy, Jude and Sue have both been told their entire lives that they are unfit for marriage simply because both of their parents had been. This leads them to rush into their first marriage and then, getting cold feet and becoming claustrophobic with the fear of commitment, they leave. This is what causes the pair to never marry and eventually leads to the tragic end of their love affair. If the couple had not been convinced of this primal characteristic flaw that they both shared, they would not have been convinced of their inevitable doom. For some reason, we see nothing wrong with letting other people decide who we are- which is truly alarming. Society tries to shape us into these clay figures that cannot act or think for themselves. We are merely being used as puppets by people who are in higher power than us. Without us they are useless, so they need to make us feel as if we need them.

            Throughout most of the book, Jude and Sue debate on whether or not to get married. Sue was unable to see the value in the ceremony and; therefore, refused on several occasions. This poses the question: Is there value in marriage, or is it just something we do to make ourselves feel as if we are not alone? Recently I went to a few Catholic wedding ceremonies. After the first two weddings, I could not understand why every little girl (myself included) has dreamed of their wedding their entire life. I was thoroughly disappointed by the meaninglessness of the ceremony and how anti-climactic it was. But the third wedding that I went to was amazing. The bride was nice, the family requested the chapel to pray in before the wedding, and most of all when the bride and groom were standing on the alter reading their vows you could feel the love they had for each other oozing from their pores. A day or two later once the events had sunken in, I realized that maybe it was not the ceremony that was meaningless, but the people present and participating in it. The bride and groom decide if there is any value in marriage and it is conveyed to everyone at the wedding. There was value in marriage in the world Thomas Hardy created, just not in the matrimony of Jude and Sue.

            Loss and devastation can do one of two things: (1) cause you to give up on your dream, or (2) make you want that dream even more. In the novel, Jude tries to achieve his dream of going to a prestigious university. No matter how much he studies and how smart he is, something always seems to get in the way- a girl, pride, not having money, another girl. There will always be obstacles in your way that distract you from what you want to do in life, but it is up to you to decide to let those obstacles become a permanent pit stop or if you will graciously move around them. Jude cannot get past any of his obstacles to achieve his dream and later in the novel it is clear how much he regrets this.

             As people get older they say that they wish they could do certain parts over again. They made mistakes or wish they had done things differently. This is incredibly sad. You only have one shot at each day of your life. It is okay to make mistakes and wish you had done things differently, but you should not waste more of your time and life by holding on to those feelings. People disregard some of the more important principles of life- happiness, family, and comfort- for money. Thoreau said “The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.” If having a lot of money and an important corporate job is imperative to your life then it is worth it, but if you are doing it to make someone else happy or you think it is what you are supposed to do then ask yourself if it is truly worth it. Is sitting at a desk doing paper work for the majority of your life, getting up early, coming home later, being stuck inside a concrete box worth everything that you could be missing?

            Thomas Hardy did a wonderful job of conveying the message that no one can give your life meaning except for you. So many people are living a life that they do not want and are miserable because of this. The only person that is responsible for that and can fix it for yourself is you. People find meaning in their lives in different ways, some find purpose through religion, love, family, learning, etc. Everyone needs something that will make them excited to wake up in the morning; life is about discovering what you truly want out of life.

The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

                Every child dreams of the day they are granted with the same freedom and respect as adults. They yearn to be taken seriously, resulting in them making idiotic choices like getting drunk or smoking, that no respected adult would do. Holden Caulfield from The Catcher in the Rye is no exception. Everyone has a difficult time transitioning from these two stages in life, but Holden has an exceptionally hard time due to his painful past and the guilt he feels for moving on from it. Holden refers to his childhood as “David Copperfield crap” (pg. 1). While there are many characteristics that classify Holden as an adult- being tall, smoking, having grey hair-, there are just as many that would classify him as a child- smoking so much he cannot run, not being served alcohol at respectable bars, frequently using curse words, hiring a prostitute because he wants someone to talk to, and insulting girls whom he like.

            Though Holden is trying to act older than he is, Holden is also simultaneously trying to keep a tight hold on his childhood. This is the result of a few things; for one, change is scary, especially when that change means to start to fend for yourself. “The best thing about the museum was that everything always stayed right where it was. The only thing that would change is you.” (pg. 135). In a museum, if you think of a section of it a person’s life then the museum would still never change. You can only truly document an event when it is over or extinct. Holden doesn’t want to freeze time, he wants to go through the museum of his life and step into a past exhibit that he liked more. Holden wants to go back to when the people he loves were the people he originally knew them as. He felt that it was his job to save his loved ones from themselves. The only problem is that life is not a museum; you cannot walk from one exhibit to the next, living in the one that is most pleasant. It is all your experiences- good and bad- that make you who you are.

            “The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything.” You cannot control people. Holden had these incredibly high expectations for everyone that he loved. He was upset with his brother D.B. for moving to Hollywood and becoming a sellout, he was upset with Jane for going out with Stradlater because Holden thought she was too good for him. During this page of the book Holden not only realizes he has to let Phoebe go and not be so afraid of losing her, but he also has to let the child in himself go, so that he can grow up. There is a point in everyone’s life where the child inside you dies to make room for a practical life. In the novel Holden is at this point of his life, though he is resisting it. He feels guilty for growing up when Allie never will and to Holden this feels like moving on. This death, or disappearance, of being a child brings up memories of Allie’s death, which forces Holden to mourn two deaths throughout the novel.

            “I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this field of rye and all. Thousands of kids, and nobody’s around- except me. And I’m standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do is catch everybody if they start to go off the cliff.” (pg. 191). This is how Holden acquired the name “The Catcher in the Rye.” He took it as his personal responsibility to save others, especially children, because no one was able to save Allie from death and no one could save Holden from his grief. Holden wants to blind children from pain, but you cannot do that forever. Without exposing children to pain they will expect to get everything they want whenever they want it and the world does not work like that. Death is a prominent part of life that you cannot hide yourself or other people from.

            Throughout the novel, Holden, asks repeatedly “where do the duck in central park go in the winter when the lake freezes over.”  Holden really could not care less about the ducks; he is using this question to ask where Allie went. One day the ducks were swimming in the lake, with the sun out, and the next day they are gone with no warning, leaving behind only a desolate frozen lake. The hardest part about death is after seeing someone every day for most of your life and then, with no warning, they are gone and you will never be able to see them again.

            The Catcher in the Rye is an amazing book for the simple fact that J.D. Salinger took these issues that most people have when confronted with adulthood and death. The novel talks about how when children find out about things they do not understand- such as curse words and death- it bothers them. One of the biggest indicators that Holden is not ready to grow up is how afraid of death he is. Holden is a timeless character that every person can relate to at one point or another in their life.

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

In Victorian England it was considerded beautiful to be very tall, full waistested, plump and have a pale complection; in 1920 it was beautiful to have a flat chest, bobbed hair, and a boyish figure; from the 1930s to the 50s women aspired to have a curvy hourglass shape; today most women want to have large breasts and bottom, flat stomach, and healthy skin. In each of these time periods the idea  of what is beautiful was a specific body type; not everyone looks like that. Does that mean they are not beautiful? Of course not. In the novel Jane Erye there are two very important aspects of the story that create the plot: beauty standards and money. Jane is classified as plain, but does that mean that she is not also classified as beautiful? Acording to dictionary.com beauty is “a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight”. Nothing in that definition says that if you are considered plain you cannot be beautiful. “If you get simply beauty and naught else, You get about the best thing God invents.”- R. Browning. In the novel, Jane Eyre was taught that there are more important things that beauty. It is better to be simple, smart, have multiple accomplishments, and be able to carry a conversation. Mr. Rochester could have just as easily married Miss. Ingrim as Jane Eyre. Miss. Ingram was considered beautiful, she could sing, play the piano, and draw; most of wich Jane could do. The one thing that she lacked that Jane didn’t was the ability to be intelectualy stimulating and to Mr. Rochester that made her more beautiful.

Jane Erye is described throughout the novel as plain. Most of the time she is describing herself this way because she has been brought up to believe that being plain is more attractive than being obviously beautiful. Jane had been forced her entire life to supresse her emotion and personality. Her plain style symbolizes how she was brought up. She grew up being taught that being practicle and smart was more beautiful. It is more practicle and smart to wear plain clothes than extravagent silks. There are more important things in life and Jane Eyre understood that. “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder”. Everyone finds different things, features, and characteristics beautiful. It is ignorant to say that someone is not beautiful because there is someone in the world that will worship them as the most beautiful person ever. The novel does not have the plot that it does because Jane is plain, it has the plot that it does because of who Jane is; which woud not be changed if she was beautiful. There is a misconseption about the book that Jane’s aunt did not like her because she was not beautiful. This however is wrong; Jane’s aunt did not accept her because she felt that her husband spent more time with Jane than his own children. While it is indiffernt to the story wether or not Jane was beautiful, it is important to the story that she did not believe that she was. This was cause for some of Jane’s growth throughout the novel. The book was written through Jane’s perspective so it is difficult to tell what others thought of her appearance. Miss. Ingram hated Jane. It never said this in the book, but I intrepreted that this was because Jane was beautiful and she knew that Mr. Rochester was in love with her.

In today’s time too much ephasis is placed on outward apperances and not enough empashis is placed on inward apperances and who people truly are. The world is too superficial. Before school started I got a pixie cut, maybe not for of the right reasons but because I felt that I had changed so much as a person, that it seemed foolish that my outward appearance did not reflect that. The day that school started (my sophmore year of highschool) I was welcomed back with comments such as “did you decide to be lesbian over the summer?”, “Oh so you’re like a really big femanist.” , “Does the word communism mean anything to you?” I was getting judged on such a simple thing as my hair and not by what type of person I am. After hearing insults like this over and over again it made me regret getting my hair cut…for a while. After a week or two into school I realized that it does not matter what these people thought as long as I liked my hair. Once I realized this it made me like my hair even more just for the fact that it wasn’t what people would call obviously beautiful on a girl. Like Jane portrayed in the novel it is much more important to be smart, kind, and witty than to be beautiful. Someone is always going to be prettier than you, or have better clothes, so if you are always trying to out do them you are never going to be happy. You have to be satisfied with who you are as a person. I think that this message is a little too over used, which makes sense because it is important, but it also makes people disregaurd it. That is why Jane Eyre is such an amazing book. She shares this message in such a nonchaluant way that it gets the message across without actually coming out and stating it.

            The story would be emensly different if Jane was rich instead of poor. In the novel Jane was humble, knew how to work, and wanted to be independent. She would have been brought up completely different if she had had money. Those morals would not have been instilled in her if she had been rich. Although it is hard to say what would happen if one essencial part of a story was changed, but from how I see it there would be no story. The entire story was based on Jane not having money. If she had inhareted a large amount of  money at birth then she would never have gone to work for Mr. Rochester. She would have never fallen in love or had the amazing experiences (good and bad) that she did. One of the major themes of the book is that money will not make you happy if you are not, as a person, already happy. Mr. Rochester, for example, had a great deal of money, but as a person he was misserable. He had made mistakes in the past that he would not forgive himself for and this caused him to hate life. If Jane was born rich and did not have to work for anything in her life she might have ended up being miserable. One of her greatest pleasures was teaching. When she went to visit her cousins before her aunt died you could see how miserable they were. Neither daghter shed a tear for their mother. They could not wait for the affair to be over so they could move on with their lives. Money does not buy happiness. That is a lesson that Jane was shown first hand. She never wanted to be rich, she just wanted to have enough money not to worry. She had the right idea in my opinion.

            These two asspects are essential to the story. The fact that Jane views herself as plain means that she is humble, modest, and apprecietes things more than if they had just been given to her. Jane is rich, she just does not know it. An uncle on her father’s side, who had a large sum of money,  would have been willing to adopt her but her aunt told him that Jane was dead. When this uncle died Jane receive a large inheritance. She gave a portion of the money to the family that had helped her onto her feet after she left Thornfeild. Without these key aspects of the novel there would be no plot. Charlotte Bronte was icredibly talented and smart for putting this into the story. She took true issues of that time and today and built a story around it. The concept of beauty has been a problematic subject matter since the beginning of time. Throughout the years the idea of beauty changes and will continue to change as long as there are women to contradict each theory.

The Tale of the Digeridoo by Kailey Norusis

1

I am the tale of the didgeridoo; remember me when all hope seems lost.

From your broken and shattered pieces,
I shall create a warrior who was meant to fight.
My tale is not a pleasant one,
Though it ends happily enough.
If you listen to my music- with willing and eager ears-,
My story will seep into your soul, allowing you to fly.

 2

The waning sun of the seventeenth hour halos me in light,
Standing swollen with pride, an extension of my family.
My leaves are ruffled by the blowing breeze; my roots are planted deep.
I see people walking through the day and wonder ‘bout their lives.
An old sun burnt man promises of many a good tale.
He whistles on his merry way stalking off towards sea.
A young native girl dances barefoot round my trunk and tickles me with delicate soft
hands.
A strong and gracious mother working, bearing child on her back,
Her eyes are soft with pain, but the smile never leaves her face.
Every night flames spark and fly; it’s story-telling time.
The great chiefs of the village tell histories afar.
I wish to join the party, but I am planted on the rim.
I yearn to be like them and have my story told.
My time is almost up; soon I will be no more.


3

A great storm has come, which shook me to my core and many of my brothers died.
The first refreshing shower soon turned angry and harsh.
My friends all moved away seeking shelter from the rain.
Once again I am left alone to suffer on my own.
When all is lost and in despair, the great sun reveals itself to wash away my tears.
Summer is here at last with the promise of new life.
The heat is wearing on my health,
My bones are dry and brittle.
I feel the painful gnawing working through my limbs.
The evil bugs work through every layer until I am emptied out, with nothing left.
My once beautiful body has been destroyed; no one wants me now.
All my dreams are crushed,
For I am sure to die of shame, surrounded by infantile and brilliant foliage;
Forsaken to shelter bugs from the pouring sun.

4

A brown boy with painted skin and decorated with dangling jewelry enters in my line of

sight.
He walks around with his chest puffed out, the emblem of who I desire to be.
Carrying an axe in hand he begins to search through trees.
I compare myself to all my fellow neighbors.
He shall never choose me, I cry, for I am old and ugly.
My limbs are hallowed out,
My branches frail and weak.
Oh how I wish to be young and handsome!
The boy takes his time, not offering most a second glance.
He turns his eye towards me and a smile stretches ‘long his face: Why you are exactly
what I need!
He swiftly strolls over to where I stand.
I slump down in embarrassment, my leaves draping toward the ground. 

5

He brings me to his workshop where, he lays me down to rest.

With a brush in dispense he begins the lengthy task at hand.
After hours long of endless labor, he leans back to admire all his work.
Satisfied he leaves so he may go and devour his late supper.
He has made me beautiful again!
Why what kind of magician is he?- I wonder
Maybe someday I shall return the favor.

6

The boy presses his soft and tender lips upon my hallow body.

He breathes a breath of life through me and a cry of war comes out: I am a fighter.
My friends all dance and chant around me.
I feel the flames from the burning inferno in the center.
My youth and beauty have been restored by this kind and careful boy who will forever
Hold my heart.
I am passed down from generation to generation.
My wish was granted and I will be remembered for all eternity, singing for my friends.

The Condemnation of Pluto

* To preface, I decided to try something new and post an original short story that I wrote. Feel fry to give any feedback, I would greatly appreciate your opinions. I hope you enjoy!           

            Loving her was like watching a bowl of water simmer. You stare down into the big brass pot full of water, there are bubbles forming on the bottom, but it never ends up boiling. I remember how much it hurt to love her. Although, nothing would have prepared me for how much loosing her would hurt. It felt as if someone had reached inside of my chest, through my rib cage, and was squeezing my heart, tighter each minute. There is nothing that I can do to ease the pain. I can’t eat; I can’t sleep, most days I do not even get out of bed. The days that I do get out of bed I roam around aimlessly, trying to find some meaning to my otherwise meaningless life.

            I sit at a mahogany dinning table, staring down blankly at a plate of food that I do not plan to eat. Sitting atop the golden plate lays a pomegranate salad. Pomegranate is the only fruit that will grow in the underworld. This is because of the original sin when Adam and Eve ate the pomegranate. It was banished into the underworld, the same as I was. I hold the jewel-encrusted fork, picking through the salad. I keep going back to when all of this started. I could have prevented everything, but I just had to get involved and mess everything up. She could have gone on perfectly fine without me, but I have no idea how I would have gone on without her; although that is what I am doing now.

            I take myself back to the first time I ever saw her. The white marble floor is cold under my bare feet as I make my way to the throne room, just like every other night at six O’clock. Every night all of the gods and goddesses come together in the throne room to have a meeting and, using the portal, watch over each of our territories. I just came from the main hall after having an amazing feast of wine, bread, and cheese. The truth is that I probably drank a smidge too much of the wine, but it helps me get through these meetings. As always I am the last to enter the throne room. I am slightly late and everyone stops what they are doing the second I enter, shifting their gaze on me. I flash the crowd a charming smile. “I know that I am incredibly handsome, but it would probably be easier to get work done if you stop staring at me,” I admitted with a smirk.

            Jupiter glared at me disapprovingly. “We are staring due to the fact that this is the third time in a row you have been late this week.” He admitted. Jupiter, my brother, sat on his throne. Even though all of the gods were supposed to be equal, Jupiter and his wife Juno were considered the king and queen of all the gods. My other brother, Neptune, is the god of the sea. They both have many sons and daughters spread all over the world. I am the god of fortune and jewels; which is reflected in my throne, and everyone else’s. Neptune’s throne is made up of running water, glistening from the sun shining on wherever the stream is that he took it from. Every now and then if you are lucky you will see a fish jump out of the water.

            I amble over to my throne. It is gold laced with millions of diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and other jewels; all of the jewels make the throne seem to sparkle. As I sit on top of the throne I laugh to myself at how pathetic I look barefoot, wearing jeans and a gray undershirt that clings to my muscles. The only thing that gives the impression I am not completely out of place is that the throne was made to fit me perfectly. As I sit I am comforted by the familiarity of the room, the constant chaos of the gods and goddesses yelling to get their point across. I could not tell if it was this or the wine, but I was smiling.

            After a brief introduction Jupiter opened the portal giving us an inside into the mortal world that we dictated to make sure that everything is safe. I always found this part the most interesting. The mortal world seemed so simple, carefree, easy. I envy the humans who do not have worry about keeping people safe and dealing with angry gods all of the time. We are now watching Neptune’s section of the world, which is all oceans, sea, rivers, and lakes. We see the mermaids and nymphs beckoning us to come closer.

            I snap back into reality as someone calls my name. “Pluto, my lord?”

            “What do you want?” I snap at the servant.

            “My lord, today is the day that you must come to the gate to greet people into the underworld.” He pleads. It is obvious that the servant is nervous around me still. I have only been in charge of the underworld for about a month now, and being banished to the underworld because of murder, does not exactly make people feel comfortable around you; even if they are dead.

            “I just need to change and then I will begin the journey.” I quietly breathe the words, which are barely audible. I make my way up the staircase lined with velvet carpet and into my chambers. I put something on that is much more appropriate for encountering a new batch of the dead and glance into the mirror before I leave. I stop dead as I look at myself noticing some of my qualities that seem so foreign to me now. I am tall with dark brown hair. My eyes are brown with specs of green close to the iris, with a wild look in them. I used to be extremely tan, my skin borderline brown; although with each passing day spent here it becomes paler. I cannot help wondering if this is what she saw when she looked at me. And again I am transported to the first time I ever saw her.

            We were now looking at the portal onto Jupiter’s territory, which included the small town in South Egypt. There was a raging storm over this town that had been going on for the past few hours. Most villagers were inside of their homes trying to stay dry. There was one girl who was still working in the fields even though she was drenched with water and the storm was getting worse. Jupiter zoomed in closer on her face. She had beautiful black curly hair, and fair skin. Her cheeks were slightly flushed a light pink color that matched her full lips. The girl had a scarf wrapped around her head that was attempting to keep the rain out of her eyes. I was enchanted by not only her beauty, but that she was working in a storm that had the potential to kill her. Suddenly Jupiter turned the portal off. Everyone was staring at me again. This time not because I was late, but because I was standing in the middle of the room.

            I force the image out of my mind and focus on the mirror in front of me. Very calmly I walk over to the mirror and without realizing what I had decided to do, I punch the glass with all of the force in my body. In slow motion I can see each piece of glass fall to the floor, breaking into smaller pieces. Reluctantly I look down at my hand that I used to punch the glass. It is torn open and bleeding. I back up and look at what I have done. In a sick way the mess is beautiful. I stumble into the bathroom, half aware of the situation and half not caring, to wash my hand off. I rinse the blood off in cold water. Then move to a cabinet to find tweezers. Once I find them I try to pick out the rest of the glass remaining in my hand. After it is out I bandage it up to prevent more bleeding.

            On the way out, I look at everything and then at the time. I decide that it would be best for me to just clean everything up when I get back. Like a pouting child I stomp out of my chamber and into the halls, annoyed at what I remembered. I cannot get her face, soaked with water, out of my head. It is driving me mad. I dream about her, see visions of her, and imagine the past. I would never want to forget her, but I want to move forward and I can’t. I am still in love with her.

            My servant is waiting for me at the end of the stairs. I know that he is concerned with me arriving on time and he is responsible for me. As we walk out of my castle doors I am surrounded by darkness. If it was not for the lantern held by my servant, I would not be able to see anything. There is a chariot up ahead. I know, without being told, that it is meant for me. The entire chariot, including the reigns, is made out of metal. Leading it are three skeletons of horses, with fire burning in their eyes. The front horse’s hove scrapes against the dust ground, as if he is getting ready to take off running.

            I step inside of the chariot and as soon I shut the door we begin at the fastest speed imaginable. If I were mortal I would have fallen back, but because I am immortal I calmly take my seat across from my servant. I decide that it would be a good idea for me to get some sleep. I have not been able to sleep for a month now. I begin to drift off slowly and then the next thing I know I am back turning over in my bed on Mount Olympus.

            Why can I not get this girl out of my head? I wonder. She is just a mortal girl. There are more beautiful than her and I have never met her, so why can I not stop thinking of her. I need to see her face again. I need to hear her voice. I give up on the attempt to sleep and crawl out of bed, flinching as my toes reach the floor. I fumble around in the dark, putting on some clothes. I slowly open the door hoping that it will not creek. I then proceed to tiptoe back to the throne room. It looks different at night. Even though I am not supposed to, I turn on the portal into the mortal world. I spend what feels like an eternity looking for the girl. I have almost given up hope and then I see her, asleep in the fields, with a basket of collected crops by her side. It has ceased to rain, but she is still wet. The girl looks so peaceful. I wish I knew her name. The sun has started to descend over the horizon and begins to light the throne room. I have to know her. I know what I must do.

            With a start I awaken from my deep sleep and find my servant sitting in front of me watching the darkness in the window. “How long was I asleep?” I ask him hesitantly.

            “About an hour, sir. We should be arriving in thirty minutes.” He then went back to looking outside the window. Remembering her hurts so much. The rest of the trip goes by relatively quickly. I focus mainly on what I plan to say. I fear that after everything that has occurred I have grown cruel.

            When we arrive to the pond of the afterlife I get out of the chariot and am greeted by Charon. We climb into his gondola. Charon is standing at the front drifting through the Styx River where bodies of the dead fight and reach their hands up, trying to climb into the gondola. Pale, bloody, and broken fingers wrap around the side of the boat. Before they have time to lift themselves up or even touch the boat with another hand, Charon swats them away like an unwanted bug. We head inside of a cave that is built out of bones. More lifeless bodies cling to the side the cave. The lantern flashes along the side of the cave, just long enough for me to see a face. It is cracked open, with rotted flesh still held on to part of the skull.

            As I stare into the face, a shiver wonders its way up my spine, making all of my hair stand up. My servant forces his way in front of me. “My lord, you should not be looking at this.” He tries to explain. He is probably right; I should not be looking at the bodies of the dead. She had to make it into the afterlife. She was a good person and I would know if she didn’t. Somehow that made everything worse and better at the same time.

            Then suddenly I was back there again. As the sun rose higher and higher into the sky, I knew that I had to act quickly. I could not wait another second. I shrunk myself down to mortal size, and passed through the portal, which was still focused on the field. As I was transported into the other world, it felt as if I was falling. I felt the ground slip out from under my feet. The next thing I knew there was a soft warm barrier between my body and the hard ground. I look up dazed, at the blue sky. The sun was so bright that it caused me to squint my eyes. I could feel the heat radiating onto my skin. I excitedly stand up, remembering why I am here.

            I look over, but the girl is no longer asleep on the ground. Faintly in the distant I can hear the sweetest voice humming. The sound was soft and rich like pouring molasses. That must be her, I thought. I recognized the song that she was humming. It was a lullaby, usually sung to small children. As I approached her I suddenly stopped, still a ways away and just watched her. She was cutting the wheat and putting it in the basket, but the way she did this made it look so graceful. She reminded me of a tiger, beautiful and graceful, yet fierce and independent.

            As if she could sense me watching her she turned around and gazed right into my eyes, as if she could see into the innermost parts of my soul, parts of me that I could not bare to let anyone else see. She smiled a taunting smile, parting her pink lips, and then continued to work. I followed her with my eyes for a while, until I finally built up the courage to go and talk to her. “What is your name?” This has been the question that I have been most interested in.

            “My name is Ariadne.” Her voice felt like velvet. I just stood there bewildered and stunned with everything about her. “And you are?” She asked, slightly confused with my silence.

            “I am Pluto.” Her face lit up with the realization of who I am. She seemed almost afraid of me. She turned to leave. “Please don’t leave. I am sorry to make an introduction this way, but I saw you and could not resist meeting you.”

            “So you really are a god?” She asked aghast.

            “Yes, I am. Although I do not like to focus on that fact.” I half smiled. We talked for some time and I completely fell in love with her. I vowed to her that I would give up immortality to be with her. Before we parted I placed a white flower in her hair. “To remember me by, until I come back.” I promised her that I would give it up and then come right back and we would go into hiding, so that we could be together.

            I transported myself back to Mount Olympus. By the time I got back the light was already beginning to fade and I was smiling like an idiot. When I stepped out of the portal, Jupiter was sitting in his throne. He must have seen everything, for he looked extremely grim. “Brother, what have you done?” He asked in sadness. “You must know that I can not allow you to do this.”

            “Jupiter, please. I have to.” I pleaded, although I knew that it was useless.

            “Guards!” Five guards grabbed me and forced me down the hall, locking me inside of my chamber. The night felt as if it would never end. I destroyed the entire room, put it back together, and then still had time to pace. It felt like years had gone by when the guards came back into my room and ordered me out. They guided me back into the throne room. And then everything seemed to happen in slow motion yet at light speed at the same time. I saw a body lying on the floor. No! It cannot be her. 

            “Ariadne!” I screamed, finally breaking free of the guards ran over, and fell overtop of her. “What have you done?’ I cried.

            Jupiter spoke first. “What have we done? We found your knife embedded in this mortal women’s chest. You killed her.”

            “Killed her? I am in love with her!” I screamed. I didn’t even care anymore. This is not happening. It is just a dream; it has to be. The more I tried to convince myself the less I believed it.

            “Brother, you know that there is punishment for killing a mortal.” Neptune whispered disappointed.

            “We have decided that you will be banished to the underworld and you cannot leave, unless we send for you.” Jupiter continued to speak, but I could no longer hear him. I looked into Ariadne’s face and I could not breathe.

            The gondola ride is finally over and we step off of the boat and away from the river. I do not even want to think of having to cross it again. We pass through the gates and are faced with the three-headed dog. It pants at my feet, hoping for me to pet it. I scratch behind each set of ears and then focus on the crowd of dead standing in front of me now. I am not sure what to say, but I begin to speak anyway. I am so preoccupied with the past that even as I am talking, it does not fully register what I am saying. I cannot live like this, I think. I have to go back to Olympus, once and for all to find out who actually killed and framed me for my beloved’s murder.

            I finally finish speaking and then wait until everyone has entered the gate to turn to my servant. “We are going to take a little trip.” I told him smugly.

            “My lord, with all due respect, I am not sure that would be an entirely good idea. You know that you mustn’t leave the underworld.”

            “Well Mercury, I am tired of being told what I can and cannot do. She deserves justice and we are going to get that for her.”

 “You want me to go with you, my lord?” he asked shocked.

 “Of course I do. I am going to need backup.” I said smiling. Mercury looks terribly excited that I would ask him to come with me. “The portal tapes everything that happens in the universe. If we can get to the portal and watch it then we can find out who truly killed Ariadne.” Before long we were at the gates of Mount Olympus. They were made out of pure gold only allowing those pure of heart to enter into the palace. For some unknown reason as I put my hand on the gates to try and climb them they flew open without warning. Well that was easy enough, I think, laughing.

We walk straight into the palace. Everyone is in the dinning hall at the moment so the throne room should be free. As I walk down these halls memories claw at the edge of my mind that I keep trying to force away. We make it into the throne room and turn the portal on, rewinding it to the day of her murder. I see Jupiter in the throne room with a body in a heap on the floor. No! Jupiter grabs a dagger off of my throne and thrusts it into Ariadne’s chest. I sit there my mouth open. The portal has shut off by now. Mercury is hovering over me, not knowing what to say. Before either of us knows it, we start to hear voices coming down the hall. “I have to stay. Get yourself out.”

“Pluto, there is no way I am going to leave you now.” He gives me a pitiful smile that I return. I thank him with my eyes and then our time is over. Jupiter is the first to walk in. I walk up and punch him directly in the nose.

“You killed her!” I shout. I punch him again. Two guards grab my arms so that I can no longer move.

“I had to. I did what was best for you. You were going to become mortal and give all of this up for some girl. A girl that you did not even know.” He rebutted.

“I know that there has not been one second since the moment that I first saw her that I have not thought about her!” I scream. I know that I should calm down, but frankly I do not want to.

“We all agreed and we all agreed that sending you to the underworld was the best thing for you.” His guards moved Mercury and I towards the portal. Jupiter rotates the dial until he finds the place he is looking for. “This really is for your own good,” is the last thing my brother says to me before throwing me into the portal where I am destined to be alone and miserable the rest of eternity.

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson

            Why do people feel a sympathetic connection to some of the most horrid villains that literature and the media conjure up? Why is it that sometimes even the nicest of people annoy us to the utmost levels? What makes someone a bad person? What makes someone a good person? None of these questions have a clear answer. Everything depends on the situation or intention. The truth is that people are not just good or bad, this is impossible; there are varied mixtures of both inside of every person. This principle of life seems to be so elementary that we know this in the back of our head, but when it counts we can never quite remember.

            The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was written by Robert Louis Stevenson in an effort to make us understand this principle. We classify people as good or bad depending on their actions, but the flaw with this type of judgment is that we do not know why a person may have committed this action. “We’ve all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act on. That’s who we really are.” (From Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde). In the novel the scientist Dr. Jekyll drinks an elixir that he believes will conquer evil, although what this potion truly does is turn him into the embodiment of evil. The Doctor can drink tonics to subdue these transformations, but he always ends up as his evil once the medicine has warn off. These transformations are described as internal fights, with the character struggling to overcome his evil but never quite being able to do so.

            The hardest part for everyone is deciding that they want to be good, that they want to change. A good majority of the time this is because people feel that they do not deserve to be good. This may sound somewhat humorous, but think back to a time when you know that you did something bad, perverse, or that you know you should not have done. How long did it take other people to forgive you? How long did it take you to forgive yourself? I would argue in most cases the later question took more time; this is also proven to be true in the book. This is because when people mess up and are truly sorry for what they have done they feel as if they are not worthy of other people’s forgiveness and believe themselves to be a bad person and sometimes maybe even evil. So they succumb to their evil urges because that is who they believe themselves to be. “We accept the love we think we deserve.” (The Perks of Being a Wallflower). This quote also works with love towards oneself. A comfort may be that everyone goes through these times were they do not even believe themselves to be worthy of their own love.

            “Jesus didn’t die for the good parts of you. He didn’t die for your potential. He died for the nastiest, worst parts of you, for the lowest points of your life. He died to save you and free you from that.” (Brody Holloway) I, myself, am a very religious person and I know that not everyone else is, nor do I expect them to be, but this quote gets a point across even if you are not Christian or even religious. The Bible talks a lot about good and bad which is why it is a good example for this topic. When Jesus came into a Jewish temple and saw tax collector booths set up everywhere he became enraged because he knew that a temple, a place of worship, should not be weighed down by earthly values and possessions. He walked around flipping over tables and making a huge scene. The point is that even Jesus was not perfect. He made mistakes and got angry. How can we expect ourselves to be perfect and always do the right thing if even Jesus made mistakes sometimes? It is simple we can’t.

            The original theme that everything cannot be categorized as good or bad seemed so simple, but when beginning to discuss the topic more in depth we realize that it is not simple at all and even though we realize this does not mean we act upon it as we should. Robert Louis Stevenson must have realized the importance of realizing this and wrote a story attempting to make people understand. There is no way to find out how many people understood this from the novel written 131 years ago, or even if this is what the author meant to convey when writing his book. Although given the world today where we judge everyone and categorize everyone into these two boxes we need a book like this to show and prove to us that there is no such thing as good and evil, but only some strange grey area that resides in everyone.

            If Dr. Hyde had not dwelled on his evil and instead attempted to preserver, there is a good chance that he would not have continued to morph into his alternative self. In life everyone is always so focused on the negative that they cannot see everything that is good. All people see is what they do not have, the places they have not been, and the person that they are not, that they forget everything they do have, all of the places that they have been, and the person that they are. Maybe this war that we are fighting is not good against evil, but optimism against pessimism. Everyone has a war surging on inside of them right now. Which side will you let win?

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

               The novel Little Women published in 1868, teaches an extremely important lesson: Life does not always turn out how you originally plan it. The main character Jo has aspired to be a writer her entire life. She has published a few short stories in newspapers, but nothing to her satisfaction. Although in the end, she does not end up writing for a living, like she always plans, she gets married to a professor and they start a boarding school for boys and have a family. This is just one example out of many in the novel where life takes you on a different course than you originally expect. At a certain point in everyone’s lives they have goals, something they want to accomplish, or somewhere they want to go. This is amazing and gives life purpose, although accomplishing these things will not make us happy if we are not happy within ourselves. This is a piece of advice I have been given more times than I can count, although it was not until after I read Little Women that I actually started listening.

            Along the way to getting to where you want to go there will be many pit stops where you lose track of who are and what you want to do. It is so easy to lose track of what is truly important in life. The thing that most people do not understand when going through this is that it happens to everyone. This book taught me that these pit stops are essential to get where you want to go. How you handle getting back on the correct path defines who you are as a person and can make getting to that destination even more important and more satisfactory that it would have been before. In the book the March family lost a daughter when she was very young and reading about it was devastating because you could feel the pain of each character as they dealt with it in their own ways. Although the truth is that even though I hated to see Beth die, most of the characters would not have reached their full potential if she did not. Now they had something to fight for

No matter how much you may want to at certain times, you cannot go through life on your own. Little Women shows the importance of family and friends, not only through the tragedies, but also more importantly through the successes. There are very few people that will ever be there for you no matter what and when you do find them you need to hold on to them. You can never achieve what you want in life on your own, you have to have people in your corner who support you but are not afraid to tell you the truth. Everyone needs someone in their life who will give them constructive criticism. For Jo this was her father and her mother. Her father helped her with writing and her mother helped her with personal problems. This is a metaphor for balance in life. Balance is incredibly important especially in this day and age where it is so easy to get tipped over.

            Family values have been steadily decreasing for a long time now. Most families do not eat together at a table and make conversation; most families do not share the good and bad parts about their days; most families do not trust or respect each other. Personally I find this very sad because even though a lot of the times they drive me insane, I have no idea what I would do without my family. The idea of family is losing value as times go on. Who your family is does not matter so much as long as you have someone who loves you unconditionally. No family is perfect, but if one were it would be the family that Louisa May Alcott created when she wrote the novel. The March family went through so many hardships that would tear most people apart, but it only made them stronger and that is what a family should be.

            At the end of Little Women everyone was happy and in their “Castles in the sky”. Life does not always end happy, but it will if you want it to. You decide if you are happy or not. It is a conscious choice that everyone makes everyday and it is never too late. All of these little moments and insignificant events in life are adding up to this huge grand finale. Everything is intertwined and everything happens for a reason. Bad things happen, but that does not mean you can walk around with a grudge against the world, you just have to look at the bigger picture and realize that everything is meant to be.

              Little Women is a beautiful book that is surprisingly relatable. All of the characters are different parts of who everyone is with good and bad traits, but they are all there for each other no matter what.

Watership Down by Richard Adams

            The author of Watership Down, Richard Adams, created the story on a long car ride to entertain his children. The story ended up lasting longer than the road trip did so he used it as a bedtime story for his two daughters. It was not until one of them suggested that it should be a book, that he even considered writing it down. The story itself has a very romantic theme, dealing with rabbits representing us as single-minded people and nature giving us different obstacles to overcome. Even though it was created for children it is not only entertaining, but also has broad themes that relate to everyday lives for adults.

After Fiver had a premonition about his warren being destroyed by humans the rabbits that chose to leave become very wary of people. They spend half of the novel searching for a safe place that they can settle, where people cannot hurt them. The rabbits’ main enemy throughout the book is humans. Although, in the last few chapters Hazel is mulled half to death when a young girl finds and picks him up, changing the way he feels about people. She keeps him safe until her mother’s doctor arrives and shows him. These two people save Hazels life.

Society cannot put everyone into a category, which is what most people do. A few blonde girls make a stupid remark and now all blondes are dumb; a few girls are shy and now all women are inferior; a few Spanish come over illegally and now they are all criminals; a few African American people are uneducated and now they are all low class; a few radicals attacked and terrorized people and now all Muslims are terrorists; a few white people had slaves and now they are all racist. As a human race we categorize people based on the first detail we know about them and separate them into a tiny boxes with other people who may or may not happen to share that one same detail as them. This is a habit that everyone has and that everyone has trouble breaking, even if they know it is wrong. But it needs to be broken. Sadly, usually the first detail we can find out about a person is their race and ethnicity. If we can stop making premature judgments about others, we can wipe away our prejudices and focus on what lays behind the masks we create, whether it is good or bad.

People all too often associate their identity with their apperances. Where you are from is an important part of who you are, but you should not hide behind it. There are many people who go along with these stereotypes just because they think that is what they are supposed to be, when in reality they just need to stop focusing on it so much. We can never find out whom a person truly is if we cannot get past these stereotypes to get to know them. The person may be good, bad, or somewhere in between, but at least the judgment will be based on them as a person and not their external appearances. Everyone is capable of good and evil, not just someone who is different. It is easier to blame people who are different because not as many people will stand up for them, but if we look a little deeper we are all the same and we all want the same things. We all have the power to stop stereotypes. If we as a society decided that it was no longer an issue than it would cease to be one.

            The rabbits did not realize this until they came across an evil warren that they tried to take does from, but they have spent so long focusing on all of these other potential threats that they did not realize that their biggest enemy is other rabbits. This directly translates over into our lives because we spend so much time worrying about everyone else that we do not realize that the only thing that can hold you back from achieving what you want in life is you. The main reason that people judge others is because of a lack of self-esteem, which is also the same reason that people hold themselves back. I do not believe that this is a coincidence. The same people who burden themselves with this confinement are also holding themselves back because of this. If we could move past all of this and rise above it as a people then the world would be a much better place to live in and that was the main message the book was trying to convey. There is a war at the end of the novel between the two warrens because they feel as if they cannot coexist. One group’s success does not make another group less successful. Watership Down is a timeless classic that everyone must read in their lifetime. It is an astonishing story about a group of rabbits that are just looking for a better life for themselves and their family, with an elusive deeper meaning. 

Candide by Voltaire

Voltaire's Candide was not considered to be his best work during his time, so he would most likely be very surprised at the success that has come out of it. Voltaire focused on philosophical novels and essays. He began writing at the start of the Enlightenment, which was a literary and artistic movement in Europe during the end of the seventeenth century to the beginning of eighteenth century that focused on logic, order, and the law. This influenced Voltaire's writing a great deal. Voltaire did not have close relationships with his family. His mother died when he was ten years old, while he and his father had a falling out when Voltaire became a writer instead of a lawyer as his father hoped. He spoke of many issues that have a religious undertone and are still relevant today.
The novel is incredibly philosophical and has a central theme that is one of the hardest questions mankind has ever asked itself: Is there a greater purpose for all of the suffering that is endured during life? Throughout the novel Candide and his companions suffered many great losses. Pangloss believed that everything happened for a reason. In the first chapter Candide follows Pangloss's teachings devotedly and wholeheartedly believes that everything happens for a reason, until he is kicked out of the castle in Westphalia and his life begins to spiral from there. From that point through the rest of the novel Candide asked himself if his mentor was right, or if it was just a lie that humans tell each other to sleep easier. It is easy to believe that everything happens for a reason when life is great. The only time people begin to question things they have believed are when tragedies occur. This happens to everyone at some point in their life. I have always believed that everything happens for a reason and that everything will turn out okay in the end. A few months ago a traveling priest visited from South America. He recalled vivid stories of tragedies that occurred while he was staying there. He conjured up images of dead children dead in the streets being eaten by rats and dogs, babies dying of hunger, families surviving on dirt and mud causing them to get worms. He told us that because he has had to undergo these things he, a priest, has struggled with his faith. When you see these horrific events come upon good people it is hard to believe that everything happens for a reason. Last week I found out that a priest, at the church I attend, had died. I was quite fond of Father Pazko, and I have never known anyone who has died before. I attended a funeral yesterday morning. This event may cause one to wonder why such a holy man would be taken from the world, but an ordinary person who has done nothing great with  their life was allowed to live. The only possible answer to that question could be fate. As a Catholic I believe in something called the mystery of fate, which is even if you have no proof you believe something. I have no proof that things happen for a reason, or no proof that this theory was not come up with by humans to make the thought of death easier; although I do completely believe it. Not because it makes me feel better, but because it would not make sense for us to be here for eighty years and then to just disappear into nothing.
The characters also struggled on if we have free will or if our lives are predestined. They eventually came to the conclusion "'All events are linked together in the best of possible worlds.' 'but we must cultivate our garden'". I took this statement to mean that the only thing we know for sure is that the main events in our lives impact other events. We do not know if our lives are predestined or not, but that does not mean we can just sit idly by. The choices that we make matter and in many instances define us. I believe that there is some mixture of both. I believe that God gave us free will, but he knows what choices that we will make and has planned how things turn out. Not only do our events affect other events, but the choices that other people make affect us. Everything we do has a ripple affect and those ripples turn into waves. Every small ripple and large wave hitting against the side of a lake causes erosion slightly altering and affecting the land. Our choices are ripples that affect other people and us.
The last substantial characteristic talked about in the book was the human characteristic that, no matter how much suffering is endured, humans will fight to live. All of the characters went through traumatic pasts and near death experiences, but when it truly came down to it they wanted to live and because of that persevered. As humans the thought of death scares us, so even when bad things happen repeatedly we still want to live.
Overall I enjoyed the book extremely well. It was enlightening; discussing issues that are still relevant today. Although the book talked about many issues such as these, there was still a broader storyline. I found it to be a very quick and entertaining read. Candide was a very witty character who added much needed sarcasm, dark humor, and comic relief to liven the story up. This is a book that everyone should read at one point or another in their lifetime.