The Other Wind Cont.

Alder finally got to see Sparrowhawk, but since it was such a far trip, when he got there he fell asleep. Once he woke up, he told Sparrowhawk of his dream. Not believing what Alder was telling him he asked how often this dream was occurring. After they finished with the conversation, Sparrowhawk came up with an idea. This idea was for Alder and Sparrowhawk to fall asleep at the same time and he would come into Alders dream. This idea worked and he got a chance to see what Alder was talking about. Even though Sparrowhawk got to be a part of Alder’s dream, he still does not know what he is having these dreams. Sparrowhawk send Alder to see a man with the power of healing. The plan was to have the healer touch Alders arm as he slept, to see if he could go without having this dream. This also worked; Alder finally got a good night sleep without having this dream. But still nobody knew why Alder was having this dream and they did not know what he could do to get it to go away. Not knowing what to do Sparrowhawk asked Alder to tell him all about his life and relationship with Lily and her death. Alder wasn’t sure he wanted to think about the time he spent with Lily, it hurt too much to think about. The reason Sparrowhawk was having him do this is because he thought maybe Alder never let Lily go. After hearing Alders story he was thinking that he was wrong and maybe it was not because he had to get a chance to say good bye. So they both were clueless on why Alder was having this dream, but neither one was ready to give up on understanding Alders dream.

In this book there are many different twists and turns. The author does a great job of making the characters very round and complex.

Enemy of the People

Choose a character and discuss how that character is presented and developed through the play.
Dr. Stockmann- he is a neighborhood doctor, a husband and also a father with 2 young boys. He makes a discovery about the towns spring, realizing that there are bacteria that could be harmful to people. This shows his caring and compassion for the people that swim in this spring. He tries to warn people but his brother, the mayor, doesn’t want people to know about this problem. Even though he means well, every time he tries to help it ends up that people keep turning against him like he is the one in the wrong. Everybody in the town turns against him, but he still doesn’t give in to the mayor and stands by his beliefs. This shows the integrity of the doctor and his perseverance through everything that happens.

Explain one or more of the main ideas explored in the play.

One of the main ideas of the play was how easily a group of people can be persuaded even when the information that they are receiving is completely false. Towards the end of the play, the doctor holds a town meeting to inform the people about the bacteria in the spring. Once the meeting starts, the mayor starts to tell the crowd of people things trying to get them to turn on the doctor before even hearing what he has to say. The mayor’s plan works out perfectly; before the doctor has a chance to speak the crowd tries to get a motion passed that would keep him from talking at all. After some bickering, the doctor gets a chance to speak as long as he doesn’t bring up anything about the springs. So he tries to explain to the crowd how the mayor is trying to make him look like the bad guy. He uses the story of how Jesus was made to look bad even though he was telling the truth. Even after this story, the crowd still doesn’t want to hear anything from the doctor. This proves that groups of people are so easily persuaded, even when the information they are getting is false and makes no sense.

The Other Wind

The Other Wind is the book I have been reading for my presentation in class. This is a story of a man named Alder, who is born the son of a witch. In this book every child that is born from a witch has a special power and his is the ability to mend things. He first notices this gift when a bowl fell out of his hand and dropped to the ground, causing it to break into many pieces. As he picked up the pieces, he started to mend it back together and made it whole again. When his mother found out her sons gift, she sent him to a local sorcerer to be able to master and harness this ability. After he had been there learning for a few weeks, a girl his age named Lily came with the same power as Alder and also wanting to learn from the sorcerer. As they spent a lot of time around each other critiquing there powers, Alder started to fall in love with this girl. He then found out that she was in love with him also, so they got married and Lily got pregnant. Something went wrong when she was about to give birth and both Lily and the baby died suddenly. This took Alder some time to get over but after a while he finally accepted that she was gone and not coming back. But then one night while he was sleeping, he had this dream that he was on top of a hill and his wife was calling him to her. As he got closer, he saw that there was a wall separating Alder from Lily. She kept yelling for him to save her, but for some reason he couldn’t move. She reached over the wall and touched his arm and gave him a kiss on the lips, right after the kiss he woke up. So now since that night, he has the same dream of him on that hill and his wife is calling him to save her but he can’t move. Alder goes to see many different sorcerers about this dream and all of them say that the only person they know of that has crossed the wall of the living dead and come back is a man called Sparrowhawk. Alder has to travel a far distance, but he finally gets to the home of Sparrowhawk and explains to him the dream that he keeps having.

My Character Story

Once upon a time, there was a high school kid named Steve. You couldn’t tell by just looking at him, but he also played backup quarterback on the varsity football team. He was a tall skinny kid, who could not have weighed more than one hundred and sixty pounds and didn’t carry himself like all of the other football players. While the football players would not show up to class and try to be the class clown when they were in attendance. Steve was the opposite, a 4.0 student and he was really to himself. Steve never got a chance to play because Ben the starting quarterback was the best in the state, he had offers from most of the major Division I schools. This didn’t bother Steve; still he would show up at practice every day knowing that the coach wasn’t going to put him in the game on Friday. The only time the coach did talk to him was to ask him to help tutor some of the players on the team. He didn’t understand how the players on the team could get bad grades or get in trouble like they did and still get to play over him. Steve came up with the idea that when a coach is winning, he doesn’t care what his players do as long as they keep on winning. One Friday night after the game Steve got a phone call from Ben, he was drunk and wanted Steve to come pick him up then drive him home. So Steve went to get him, picked him up and took him home. On his way back home Steve kept asking him-self a couple questions, why would someone go out and get drunk and take a chance on ruining their future?

Friday night’s game started like any other game with Steve on the bench but it turned out that this would be a game he would never forget. A freak accident occurred during the game, Ben got sacked and when he was being taken to the ground twisted his knee. He was in a tremendous amount of pain and those who looked on just prayed it wasn’t a serious injury. After the trainers helped carry Ben off the field, with the crowd hushed, Steve felt all eyes were on him. As he was putting on his helmet the coach came up to him and said ‘don’t worry son, I know you have what it takes, you will be fine’. His heart was racing as he ran onto the field and into the huddle. He knew the play call, but for some reason he kept stuttering as he tried to tell his offense. He finally got said the play and the huddle braked, as he walked to the line he kept saying to himself, “relax, it’s just like you have done a million times in practice. Set, hike”, as he took the snap from the center, he fumbled, but was fortunate that his own team fell on the ball. He could see his coach with a worried look on his face and knew that the crowd must think this team has no chance without Ben. As he walked back into the huddle, his teammates were telling him to relax and pick up the first down. This time he took the snap from center, dropped back and threw a forty yard touchdown pass and the nerves were gone. He ended up being the reason the team won the game and was getting congratulated by all of his teammates in the locker room after the game. “Dude you have to come out and party to celebrate this win with us” said one his teammates, not wanting to be rude, he said “why not”. The party was at a kid’s house from school that he didn’t know, but once Steve walked in the door of the party, everyone started yelling “Steve, Steve”. He couldn’t believe how much things could change in one night and one football game. After not drinking all his life and thinking the people who did were stupid, Steve had his first drink and after that came another and another. He woke up the next day in one of the bed rooms of the house that held the party, with a pounding headache and not a lot of recollection of what happened last night. As he walked home, he couldn’t stop trying to remember what happened last night and hoped that he didn’t do anything too embarrassing. Still nervous about that night, Steve walked into school Monday morning not knowing what the kids were going to say to him, hoping that maybe if he did do anything embarrassing they didn’t remember either. The only thing he heard all day was congratulations about Friday night’s game and how we needed to win again this week. On his way to second period, a couple of teammates came up to him and said how they were going to skip class and get something to eat and wanted Steve to come with them. Trying to fit in with the team, he decided to go get something to eat and skip class. This became a daily routine for a couple weeks, his grades started slipping and he became just like all the other typical jocks. The next couple games Steve did great, leading his team to the playoffs and a number one ranking in the state polls.

Just when he started getting used to this life style, he heard from a teammate that Ben’s knee is doing a lot better and that there is a chance he could play this week. Showing up to practice not knowing what to think, Steve saw Ben in his practice uniform looking like he was healthy and ready to play. The coach explained to Steve that this is Ben’s team and now that he is healthy, he would be the starting quarterback for this week’s game. Steve couldn’t believe what he was hearing, after all the hard work and games that he won to get them in the playoffs. He was just being thrown to the side for someone who was the starting quarterback but hasn’t been there for the last couple weeks. There was nothing he could do, the coach has made up his mind and that meant back to the bench. Friday night’s game was a tough battle through all four quarters, as Steve watched the game from the bench cheering for his team to win even though he wasn’t the person leading them. A late touchdown pass from Ben sealed the victory for his team and made him the hero again in everyone’s eyes. After the game Steve wasn’t asked by any of his teammates to the celebration party and it seemed like he was back to the old times before he got to be the starting quarterback. On his way home after the game, he started to think about all the stupid stuff he has done in the last couple weeks and how much he got caught up in that lifestyle. After that night, everything went back to the way it was before Ben got injured. Ben was back to the role of the hero in the school and Steve was back to being the quiet kid that kept to himself and got good grades.

Movie Night

The Tale of Despereaux. I went into movie night last Thursday with a mindset of why do I have to watch this little kids movie, in what way is a story about some rats going to help my character story. Then when there was trouble with the volume, I started thinking ok come on tell everyone they don’t have to wory about watching the movie and all can go home. So you could say I didn’t have the best mindset going into this movie. But as the movie went on my mindset started to change from why are we here to wow this movie does have some good messages. So, as the movie went on I started to think about all the different characters and what they represented and if they were round or flat characters.
The thing that first got me thinking was seeing how the mouse had courage and chivalry, this was interesting because the whole time his parents were telling him this isnt the way a mouse should act. This caused me to think about how we act today, how often do you see people today show courage when it causes them to be looked at as not normal. How about Chivalry, it seems like men don’t even know what this word means anymore.
It wasn’t just the main character Despereaux, but the rat was also a well rounded character. It was this rat that started all the problems that happened in the story, by him falling into a bowl of soup and causing the queen to faint to die. From this the princesses started to hate all rats and she ended up being sad all the time. But the rat ended up saving the princesses life from the other rats that were attacking her. After this she ended up forgiving him and everything went back to the way it was before he fell into the soup. This shows that the rat is well rounded because he doesn’t act like all the other rats and try to eat the princess, instead he saves her and shows his courage and remorse for the pain he has caused her.

Character

Win. Win. Win. Losing will not be tolerated, is what she has heard from her coaches for most of her life. She can’t even imagine the last time she actually had fun playing soccer. Yes, scoring a goal was exciting, but it was only a momentary happiness then it is back to the same old mood. As long as this sport was paying for her college, she tried to put a smile on her face and kept thinking about how she only had to put up with it for four years.

• I went to a place called skate world, where it was 70’s night and I sat there and watched all the people that were dressed up


• The 1st person I saw was a guy wearing cut off jean shorts and a flannel shirt. He reminded me of Kelso from That 70’s Show.


• The next person I saw was a girl wearing bell bottom pants and a tie-dye shirt and a brown vest. She had a look on her face that made it seem like she was nervous, like she was hoping people like her outfit.

Thursdays Poem

Reading and analyzing the poem we read in class was a fun assignment. When I first saw the title, I was like wow a poem about an onion. But when I read through it the first time I started to think that the poem was about some of the things that we all take for granted. Since the poem was about food, I started thinking about all the different fruits and vegetables we eat every day. Not thinking about the farming that went into getting us those fruits and vegetables or about the manufactures that had to pack and ship it, so all we have to do is go down to the local grocery store.
Then I read it for a second time and stopped thinking about food and started to think about parents and/or friends. What I mean is that sometimes we take our parents or friends for granted, without even wondering about their life history. Also, I started thinking about how people look back on their life as a finished product and forget about the things that went into their life to get them where they are now. Just like in the story when they eat the finished product and think about the meat that went in, but forget about the taste that comes from the onion added to make the finished product.
Another thing that helped me analyze the poem was getting into new groups and hearing different people’s views and understandings of the same poem. An example, a girl in my group told me how she understood the poem to be talking about woman’s rights. At first I didn’t understand where she was going with this thought but then she explained about how woman used to have no rights. So woman were like that onion, no one worrying about their history and not realizing the major influence woman put on the world.
After all of this I came to believe that there is no correct way to analyze this poem, it is all about the readers personal views.