* indicates inclusion of a response separate from the responses to the readings
Sept. 2, 1997 - Manual Photography:Hopkins, Ruskin, and Victorian Drawing*

Sept. 4, 1997 - F.E. Church and G. O'Keefe

Sept. 9, 1997 - J. Meyerowitz*

Sept. 11, 1997 - E. Abbey, J. Tallmadge, E.L. Harris, L. Eiseley, J. Daniel

Sept. 16, 1997 - M. Pollan

Sept. 18, 1997 - J. Ruskin

Sept. 25, 1997 - D. Wordsworth

Sept. 30, 1997 - N. Goldberg*

Oct. 2, 1997 - Burch

Oct. 7, 1997 - M. Kumin and W. Berry

Oct. 9, 1997 - Hopkins

Oct. 14, 1997 - The Worship of Nature

Oct. 23, 1997 - Sandra Cisneros

Oct. 28, 1997 - Wordsworth

Oct. 30, 1997 - Cobb,

Nov. 4, 1997 - Wordsworth

Nov. 6, 1997 - Hopkins and Wordsworth

Nov. 11, 1997 - Jerome Bump

Nov. 13, 1997 - Slovic/Dixon

Nov. 18, 1997 - Alice Walker

Nov. 20, 1997 - J. Frank Dobie

December 2, 1997 - Slovic/Dixon and W. Berry

Dec. 4, 1997 - Jerome Bump

After reading "Manual Photography: Hopkins, Ruskin, and Victorian Drawing," I was reminded of "the importance of personal 'attention and toil' in our appreciation of nature" (Bump 34). What I found most interesting was the differences between drawing and photography. Being a consumer in this fast-paced world, I often forget to look at things and to really observe the beautiful aspects of nature that I enjoy so much. I recently spent six weeks in Europe with my camera ready in hand. I visited the breathtaking gardens of Anne Hathaway's cottage, and what did I do? I snapped a quick picture and went on my way, thinking I would forever capture the essence of the flowers through the artificial lens of my camera. I was wrong. I continued snapping my pictures as I wandered through Avebury, Blenheim Palace and its Pleasure Gardens, Bath, and Paris's famous parks. After reading this article, I regret not taking out the time, as others did, to sit and observe what the natural beauty the world had to offer. I look back at the pictures I took and feel somewhat indifferent to them. I have no personal connection to the subject of my photographs; I have no response. It is not even the fact that I took photographs that disturbs me as much as that I did not take out any time to "long-look." On my way to the bus stop the other afternoon, I passed by the East Mall fountain on campus and decided to take some time to watch the water. I just sat and watched. I decided to jot down how I felt and how the water looked to me at that particular time. Because my artistic capabilities do not include the realm of water, i.e. I cannot draw water, I decided to write a poem instead.

Fall and Spring

The water falls together
like saran wrap
hitting the pooldown below
it forms a line of foam like milk
left on an upper lip;
a chain of water mountains is
surrounded by mutant seashells tied into a necklace.
The air is a rolling pin
the water cookie dough
dough of melted marbles as dim
as the lights of a movie theatre
a few minutes before showtime.

The sheets are now broken
like an old attic window;
they spurt out of the wall
that holds them back
like suicidal teenagers high
on death
they jump into a sea that moves like hair
on the back of a scared cat,
into a sea of vomit green
it's no longer even or smooth,
but patchy
like a cheap crocodile handbag.

It all starts from the top,
from fountains of dancing amoebas,
a neverending string
of paper dolls.
A circle of angelic girls,
long, flowy hair
tossed about while playing ring around the rosy.
They are dancing
on a bed of marshmallows,
a pile of unworn socks
and their hair keeps growing
into the pool down below.

The leaves are serrated like a maple leaf's. They vary from green to yellow, with some dead ones still hanging on. When I was drawing, I tried to focus on the trunk and branches as an outline. Then I looked at the leaf individually, gradually turning to the leaves as a mass of green.

September 4, 1997

"Mt. Ktaadn" - Frederic Edwin Church

The sky, peeking through a lumpy pink blanket of clouds, is a pale blue, the blue you might get if you washed a white t-shirt with denim. It hovers over the mountain the color of slate. The mountain looks somewhat rugged, but not rough. It is as though someone buffed the mountain with sandpaper to chip away the sharp edges. There are a group of trees to the left of the mountain, with a hint of the orange setting sun in between them. Even though the trees are far away, I can still see the details of the leaves. There is someone on the ground, leaning his back against one of the trees. He looks out onto the lake that mirrors the mountain, trees, and dimming sun around it. Also around the lake, directly across from the sitting man is a small forest with a group of cottages. There is one red cottage surrounded by less prominent brown ones. Along the lake between the man and the cottage is some wildlife (cattle?) drinking the water. To the right of the cattle is a worn path, turned into a bridge by the addition of some wooden planks. Beyond this bridge, the landscape looks less tame, with branches scattered on the ground and undeveloped trees. I can see some specks of red, blue, and dark brown. Perhaps it is people on horseback. The ground that covers the entire view is soft and overgrown. It looks like green plush velvet.

"From the Plains" - Georgia O' Keeffe

The albino cotton ball cloud hangs over the earth, but if you look carefully, you can see the blue sky. But is the sky really blue? The blue is more of a composite of blue and green and red and more blue, hanging on the sides of the cotton ball. The farther you go into the stratosphere, the darker it gets. The blues have bruised into blacks and the reds have shown its face in a string of purgatorial vivacity. This red is the blood that thickens the connection between the virgin Snow White heaven to the tainted white of the earth below, still separated though by the sharp gusts of wind. But we cannot see heaven. We do not know what the brightness is or why it's there. But from heaven we look upward and see the blue sky.

"Mt. Ktaadn" vs. "From the Plains"

"Mt. Ktaadn" has been said to "depict a scene of tranquility." I believe this holds true due to the soft edges of the painting as well as the images within the painting. The mountain is smooth, the lake is tranquil and undisturbed, even by the sipping cattle. The man is sitting in a relaxed position beside his fellow inhabitants of earth: the animals, the plants, and the landscape. The colors are neutral earth tones: pale blues and reds, leafy greens, and various shades of brown. O'Keeffe's "From the Plains" is more chaotic, with its jagged lines, round shapes, and wavy brush strokes all in one painting. The colors are deeper, darker and more noticeable than in the soft colors of "Mt. Ktaadn." O'Keefe's contrasting lines, shapes, strokes and bold colors easily describes the motion that is absent in Church's painting.

September 9, 1997

"Porch, Provincetown, 1977" - Joel Meyerowitz

If there was a photo that could capture the essence of serenity, Joel Meyerowitz's photograph, "Porch, Provincetown, 1977" does it. The usual rough edges of human-made objects like the porch is softened by the setting sun's reflection off the water. The color of the sky consists of blues fading into reds that is set against a gray-blue sea. You can hardly even notice the little boat with people in it, which adds to the idea that nature is magnanimous to people. I think that is a great touch because while this view makes me feel calm and peaceful, it does not make me feel lonely. I think that this photograph has great balance: balance between the sky and the sea, balance between natural and human-made objects, balance between red and blue, balance between night and day. The reddened part of the sky almost seems to fuse the blue sky and the blue sea below it. The porch takes over the left side whereas nature dominates the right. The timing of the photograph seems to be dawn or dusk, two times that sit between night and day. Everything is smooth…serene. It's as if I can glide my palm along the column, along the railings, along the sea surface, along the sky and feel the same thing. There are no signs of chaos. Even the water around the boat is still. The tiny ripples in the sea are similar to the streaks of white clouds in the sky and the hints of red along the porch.

The mass of leaves could not help but be the central subject of the sketch. I decided to start with everything that framed the leaves. First I started with the balcony itself, which served as a frame for the tree itself. Then I drew the trunk and the branches. There is another building behind the tree on the right hand side. When I started to draw it, I had a very difficult time getting the perspective right and the lines right. I constantly erased and redrew. It made me realize how much more natural it was for me to draw the natural objects in relation to the man-made ones. There is a sort of freedom and flow that comes with drawing nature that just does not come with geometrically-perfect buildings.

I saw the leaves as a mass and in order to capture that unity, I sketched in the open holes of sky that I saw instead. It is somewhat ironic that I drew everything surrounding the leaves in order to "draw" the leaves. When I started to color the leaves it made me think about how each leaf was a "green prism." The leaves would vary from deep green to yellow depending on how the light, in this case it was the sun, reflected off them. The sun was bright and obvious when I was sketching and you can distinguish (hopefully) where the sun was in relation to the tree by looking at the leaves' colors.

It is rather evident that I am no artist, but I enjoy the process. I enjoy the concentration and the careful coordination between eye and hand. Although the sketch itself is not one of immense detail, the amount of detailed concentration that was put into it was high. I am greatly influenced by the impressionists and the artwork that I do is often an "impression" rather than a realistic depiction.

Looking at the sketch, there are noticeably some flaws in my observation. The trunk is clearly seen without a single leaf in front of it. There must be leaves that block some part of the trunk, but I just overlooked it. I'm not sure why except when I sketch, I break up objects into parts, and because the part with the trunk was done, I did not bother to go back and fill in any leaves that my have covered it. Perhaps now when I sketch or paint, I will learn to look at the scene as a whole instead of the sum of its parts.

September 11, 1997

Floating - Edward Abbey

I'm not one for political statements, so when I read in the author's biographical information that he "cannot separate his own experiences on the river from broader - and often disturbing - issues concerning people and their effect on the natural world, I was sure that it would be a soapbox essay. But the further I got into the reading, the more I was drawn into the story and the parallels that Abbey made between the natural world and the societal one that we live in. Statements such as "[e]very river I touch turns to heartbreak" and "nothing is more vulnerable than the beautiful" stood out to me. It personifies the natural world. The description at the top of page 257 paints the picture of the group's trip down the river as vividly as if I was there with them. Abbey begins to make stronger statements later into the essay by comparing with more concrete modern-day examples such as "developer," "politician, "technetronic whatnots: dropouts... from the real world...." I would say that I am pro-Earth, and Abbey's essay captures the feelings of many people. Some people who are to involved in the me-me-me-let's-live-in-the-fast-line-go-go-go life look at environmentalists and say, "Why don't they get a real job...wait until they go out into the real world...." But what is real? What is important? What is lasting?

In the Mazes of Quetico - John Tallmadge

I enjoyed the descriptions of the four students and their separate and differing approaches to the experience of Quetico. It reminds me that people experience nature on all different levels and that where you come from, physically, emotionally, financially, and mentally, plays a very large role into your experience. When I studied abroad in England, I had a terrible case of homesickness. It was my first time away from home alone and I was embarrassed that I did not behave as other experienced travelers had behaved. But my experience was my own. I was awed by Christ Church Meadow differently than the others did. The magnificent lawns and gardens in England meant something else to me than it did for those who had seen it before. Not necessarily better, but different. We did a lot of hiking in England. Some waked through the fields straight to their destinations, while others hiked with wandering eyes onto the world around them. Tallmadge states: "I've noticed that my slides of canoe trips never seem to fit very well with my memories." This is exactly the case for me. I look at my pictures and the joy, awe, excitement, and wonder of the beautiful sites I saw can never be captured in a four by seven, two-dimensional piece of paper but in my very vivid soul.

Mississippi Solo: A River Quest - Eddy L. Harris

This is my favorite essay out of this section. I completely connected with Harris's ideas. He states that he sees himself "wearing tuxedoes and drinking champagne, not eating beans and weenies and wearing the same smelly clothes for weeks." I too feel this way daily. That's why I make myself do something "natural" at least once a semester to keep me connected with the simpler things in life. I haven't had many experiences of traveling alone, so I will often revert to my summer experience in Europe. It was a time of self-discovery. I'll never forget it. Just packing for the trip taught me a lot about "cut[ting] my list to the bone." I have similar sentiments to "Dallas looks like Denver looks like Tacoma looks like Tallahassee." Raised in Houston, I have a lot of pride in the city. I don't know why exactly because it seems to be a cookie-cutter city. What distinguishes it from other industrial big cities? I realized this especially when I visited San Francisco for the first time. Now THAT's a city. It has it's own personality and it's own charm. Only a few cities on the U.S. can claim this quality: New Orleans, New York.... I haven't been to many cities in the U.S., but I feel like it's all the same. All McDonald's. You can't even escape from Ronald McDonald in Europe. Harris says that "[t]he Mississippi offered this to me, promising that if I gave her a try she would be a part of me forever. It wouldn't matter if I finished...[t]he desire and the intention were what really mattered." This really hit home to me because I had felt so ashamed and embarrassed that I was homesick in Europe. "I can't believe you did not have fun. You're in EUROPE!" is the common response to my homesickness. But I did have fun. I did not go home early like some other students had done. I saw great sites and I made great friends. As the Mississippi did for Harris, Europe was "daring me to succeed...daring me to try something new, pushing me to be strong and courageous, preparing me for life."

The Winter of Man - Loren Eiseley

This was a very symbolic and poetic essay that perfectly paralleled the coldness of nature with that of man. I really enjoy the images that Eiseley presents mostly because of its subtlety. Some parts seem almost scientific and then the author nicely melts these images into the more poetic ones. The ending is a good blending of all the ideas: "There is a winter about us - the winter of man that has followed him relentlessly from the caverns and the ice. The old Eskimo spoke well. It is the winter of the heedless ones. We are in the winter. We have never left its breath."

The Impoverishment of Sightseeing - John Daniel This essay takes a good look at the active versus the passive. Recently, I have wanted to go hiking at Enchanted Rock, learn how to rock-climb, go roller-blading...anything to get my adrenaline pumping. I think this essay may have played a part. Statements like "the exhilarating playground," "that perpetual unknown that buzzed me with excitement," "opportunity to be actively involved with nature," and "observers...passing through" remind me of my former self. As a younger adult, I felt like I could conquer the world. CARPE DIEM was my daily motto as was "there is nothing to fear but fear itself." Even my graduation speech included the O' Shaugnessy poem about "movers and shakers." But what has happened to me since? Why have I not taken the opportunity to explore the nature-ridden city of Austin? Why do I watch Discovery channel instead of the animals that inspire them. I remember now, with the help of this essay, what inspires me to live - the living world around me.

September 16, 1997

Why Mow? The Case Against Lawns - Michael Pollan

In the beginning of the essay, Pollan begins to talk about the importance placed on lawns in America. I never before noticed this importance. Visiting England, I discovered what grass and landscaping really means. Outside of my dormitory was a large field of grass. It was the softest grass I have ever felt in my life. It was velvet. The British treat their grass better than most people treat their children. It is watered every morning for at least two hours and they even designate "lawn hours." "Lawn hours" is when the student is allowed to set foot on the lawn: "1pm-11pm" at Brasenose College in Oxford. If you are caught using the lawn outside of these specified hours, you are fined a ridiculous amount. When I visited the Wimbledon Tennis Center, the museum has devoted a large section to grass: maintenance and growth habits of grass. But I realized that Pollan was talking about individual lawns, not those owned by parks, churches, or schools. He was talking about the American "democratized" lawn. When I was fourteen, my family moved back to the suburbs after living in the city. We bought a house in a "cul-de-sac," the part of the neighborhood that resides around a circular patch of grass. I find it interesting that we would take unspoken turns to mow this piece of green; we didn't have sign up sheets or assigned times per neighbor. It was as though the cul-de-sac was a social identity factor. It represented our street in a way that nothing else did, so we knew what we had to do once it became unruly. We even had a "dissident" on our street. He was there when I moved in and he is still there now that I'm in college. Neighbors have called the Health Department on him, but to no avail. I agree with Pollan that people should not have to be pulled into this "lawn cult," if you will, but I think that it has a lot more to do with aesthetics than just the unified lawn. My father has a fish pond fully equipped with Koi fish, fountains, and lilypads in our front lawn and no one complains to this diversion. But our "dissident" neighbor gets the Health Department on his back because front lawn is not considered to be pleasing to the eye.

September 18, 1997

From The Stones of Venice - John Ruskin

In section 41of the essay, Ruskin states that "[t]he third constituent element of the Gothic mind was stated to be NATURALISM: that is to say, the love of natural objects for their own sake, and the effort to represent them frankly unconstrained by artistical laws." In class on Tuesday, we explored the differences between various types of architecture, especially between the University of Texas and Oxford University. I spent my summer studying at Oxford and had the pleasure of exposing myself to the ambience of Oxford's gothic architecture. Outside of my bedroom window is a balcony of interlaced stone "vegetation." My windows were pointed arches, similar to many gothic cathedrals, which also had flower-like ridges. Along the exterior of my bedroom is a row of gargoyles in the shapes of happy faces, angry faces, demonic animals, and the like. The main entrance of Brasenose College, where I stayed, is rather bland in comparison to other colleges, but it does have clover structures (characteristic of gothic architecture), and gargoyles. The English emblem of the lion and unicorn are also at the main entrance. In front of Brasenose is the Radcliffe Camera. The camera has Corinthian columns with the usual decorative leaves at the capital. In between some columns is a row of ivy or other vegetation. St. Mary's spire, another example of gothic architecture nearby, is a prime example of man's use of nature in architecture. The verticality of the spire is similar to that of a mountain, as Professor Bump said in class, and its intricate qualities parallel those of nature.

September 25, 1997

British Nature Journals: Dorothy Wordsworth

After reading the article on Dorothy Wordsworth, it makes me think about how much support she must have given her brother: support and inspiration. This is the first time I have ever read any of Dorothy's journals or biographical information. As the saying goes, "there's always a good woman behind the man." When I read Tintern Abbey, I did not realize the closeness the two shared. Her daily entries are not lengthy, but very detailed. I especially enjoy her relation of one part of nature to another: "The ivy twisting round the oaks like bristled serpents." There is also an innocence that is captured with every "Query" that she jots in her journal. It establishes her as a true observer of nature, rather than an expert of it. Reading her entries made me realize how much I wish I continued to keep up with my journals from years ago, even if I was only to write a few lines each day. Beauty in nature can be found in the smallest flower, not just the Grand Canyon. The article also reminded me of how much I enjoy William Wordsworth's poetry. Two of them, "Expostulation and Reply" and "The Tables Turned" made me more appreciative of the knowledge that Nature can provide. In "Expostulation and Reply,", the first 4 stanzas discuss the analytical approaches to learning, whereas the next four vocalize W. Wordsworth's response to this idea. Our senses are always active. We learn best by observation, not by books. Nature is the real educator. In the second poem, the sentiments are similar. This anti-institutional poem is directed at "scientists." Again, experience and observation are the best method of obtaining knowledge. Books are limited and facts should not be attained just for the sake of attaining them.

September 30, 1997

Wild Mind: Living the Writer's Life - Natalie Goldberg

In two short pages, Natalie Goldberg has summed up a lot of my sentiments about life. I have always wanted to be a writer, but after four great years as an English major at UT, I'm seriously considering law as a practical career path. But I'm taking a year off after graduation before law school, probably stalling, to explore what the world has to offer.

I am not "into money." It's never really ever been about money for me, but I want to be comfortable. I don't ever want to "need" anything in life. I'm not talking about needing a Porsche or Armani suits; I'm talking about necessities like, food, rent, and clean clothes. I grew up in a lower middle class family, so I know what it means not to have the things I want. I'm O.K. wiht that.

So why do I want to go to law school, when I know I want to be in the arts? The anwer is: I'm scared. I look at that "dot" everyday; I listen to my "monkey-mind" more than I should. That is part of the reason why I'm taking this seminar class: responses to nature...writing about nature...being one with nature. I need to surround myself this last year with things that incite ny "wild mind." I'm sick of looking at that dot in the sky. I hope it's made with an erasable marker.

But even as I'm second-guessing law school, I'm preparing to go to an interview for a "real" job with a "real" company...tonight! I've been brought up with too much control. I NEED to be in control of my life and my decisions. I never experimented with drugs because I need to be in control. I refused to even consider getting drunk until my 21st birthday because I need to be in control. I study, study, study because I need to be in control. See a pattern? But I'm getting tired of it. DOn't worry, I'm not going to drop out of school and become a junkie/alcoholic, but I need to "lose control and let wild mind take over." Because, as Goldberg says, "it is the best way to write. To live, too."

Sycamore - Part 2

I tried really hard to pretend that I was a six year old encountering this gigantic sycamore, but you will notice the twenty-one years old resurfacing in my comments. I just can't shake the idea that trees are here, not only to look pretty, but also as our protector. Whoever invented the umbrella stole the idea from a tree. It is a scorcher today, but I can't even feel the sun; I can only see it poking its way through the leaves of the hovering sycamore leaves. It's so big and pretty. If I was six right now, I certainly would not be sitting here and writing about the tree. I would chase the squirrels in order to feed them, play hide-and-seek behind the tree, climb it, collect its leaves. Squirrels have very interesting tails. So fuzzy. I want to be that squirrel running among the fallen leaves and along the tree trunk. Yellow, green, darker green, parched, and crmbly the leaves are. The su highlights it all. I wonder how the tree would look to me at night. What kind of feelings would come about under this tree, under the moon. A bird jsut flew onto the lowest branch. It's black - I wonder what kind it is. (I'm not a bird-watcher). WHy did it choose this tree? There's a pigeon on the ground in front of me. Does it like the tree too? Did they come to this tree for the same reason we did? To observe it? What are the animals' criteria for choosing a tree or field to play in? Aesthetics? Location? Convenience? I just saw a cobweb in the leaves. Why did the spider pick this tree instead of a musty corner of a house? Is it a Thoreau spider? Maybe it's because the tree is cheap rent.

October 2, 1997

Vocabularies of Nature - Burch

Under An equal among equals, Burch states that "unlike the myths in our society, the myths of tribal groups seldom contain the tendency to subordinate and exceed the natural habitat." Last year, I took an anthropology course which focused on tribal groups. I was fascinated by their rituals, such as the medicine man trances. Burch's line made me think about how our society as a whole often views nature as something to conquer. You always hear people "conquering" the Grand Canyon, or the white water rapids, or Yosemite. For exapmle, when I went capming iat Lake Sommerville with soem friends, it was as if they had overcome something after the trip. It was such a big deal for some of them because camping and nature are not a part of their daily regimen. I don't think that the feeling that my friends and others have about "conquering" nature is actually about nature being subordinate. In fact, I feel the opposite. Nature is something so great that when we climb a mountain or sky dive, we feel like we have indeed conquered something. But then again, there are those who litter parks and oceans and could care less.

Burch goes on to say that "[l]ife possesses the same religious dignity in its humblest and its highest forms." I was a vegetarian for 3 years because I believed this at the time. I'm sure I still do. With a religious mother, it was hard to convince her that my vegetarianism was not brought about due to a religious conversion. I don't really know why I'm not a vegetarian anymore. Maybe it's the hypocrisy of being a vegetarian who wore leather shoes.

October 7, 1997

Menial Labor and the Muse - Maxine Kumin

I've never lived the farm life, but it was not that difficult for me to relate to what Kumin says about how "writing depends on the well-being that devolves from [her] abbreviated list of chores undertaken and completed." My writing often stems from actively doing little: sitting in my room listening to just the right music or relaxing in a park people-watching. Kumin goes on to say how rewarding it is to write after a hard day of work. I recall trying to write a poem about my mother in my apartment, television set on full blast and roommates gabbing to no immediate end. It was impossible. I could not get inspired at all. My "mom" was nowhere to be found. I decided to go upstairs into my room, shut the door, turn on music and write. A poem was never born so fast. Like Kumin, "[m]y writing time needs to surround itself with empty stretches, or at least unpeopled ones...."

A Country of Edges - Wendell Berry

This essay made me thirsty with references to the refreshing water, leaping "off the rock lip." I love the phrase "[o]ne drinks in the sense of being in a good place." I am thirsty. Not only for water, but for the experience that Berry is having. I thrst for the river, the trees, the unpolluted air. Living in Austin, it's not terribly difficult to go to the lake. But I get caught up in the daily grind: drinking coffee, going to work, running to class, studying...where does it end? When can I quench my thirst?

The imagery in this essay is vivid: "bright jaunty clumps like Sunday bouquets," "Easter gone wild," "craving dry land like a frightened swimmer," swallowtail butterflies...are like a bouquet of flowers." I always admire those who can be poetically analytical. Too often I'm one or the other. My left and right brains ahve a hard time mingling. They are thirsty for each other. When can they quench their thirsts?

October 9, 1997

The Sea and the Skylark - Hopkins

Structure-wise, I really enjoyed his use of alliteration throughout the poem. It makes the piece flow like the sea. When you read it aloud, your tongue is like a sea wave and the words are the skylarks flying around the sea. "How these two shame this shallow and frail town!" There is nothing in this world that can compare to the majestic qualitites of nature. The buildings, how big are, will always be smaller. Technology will never catch up to reality. In Batman Returns, the visual effects artisits made fake penguins. It was a good try but nowhere close to the mechanics of the real thing.

"We, life's pride and cared-for crown, Have lost that cheer and charm of earth's past prime." Why have we forgotton the joy that nature can bring? I was sifting through old family photos last weekend at my mom's house. The joy on my face when I was at the beach, even one as brown as Galveston, is not one that I've seen in awhile. How can I get that genuine smile again?

October 14, 1997

The Worship of Nature

Reading this article in conjunction with "The Disappearance of God" by Miller made me realize how much I do "worship" nature. I am Catholic, and growing up with a religious mother has never really given me room to explore other "religions." I really wouldn't go so far as to say that I worship nature, but I enjoy nature as an extension of God's work. It makes me closer to God when I'm out and about with nature: the flowers, the wind, the water.... In a way, I worship nature because I worship God. It's like the old algebraic equation of a+b=c. You know, if I worship God, and nature is a creation/extension of God, then I worship nature. I am babbling. I haven't been having very good days - worrying about what I'm going to do with the rest of my life. Last night, I went to get coffee at a shop off Lake Austin. It was absolutely wonderful. The weather was great and the city lights reflected off of the glistening water. Everything looks really peaceful at night. Going there and being with nature really helped me relax. The trees were massaging my back and the wind nourishing my soul.

October 23, 1997

Four Skinny Trees - Sandra Cisneros

I really enjoyed this short piece. A couple of years ago, I adapted a short script from one of her stories from Woman Hollering Creek entitled "One Holy Night." There is so much that she says in such few words. It could very easily be written as a poem. The parallel imagery of four trees and four children reinforce the idea that humans are just as natural and vulnerable as trees. This essay reminds me very much of my family. I was always close to my four brothers and four sisters and there was a time in our lives when we had to move out of suburbia into the "bowels" of the city because of financial matters. There, we had few trees and greenery, just a large parking lot for a backyard. But we "grew despite concrete." I love the way this essay is written and I envy, envy, envy. So much that I have to make a sorry attempt at her style for myself. Here goes...

One stone was hard, solid, polished.
The other weathered, imperfect, rough.
The two collided,
creating nine separate pieces,
each its own size, shape, character.
Each its own stone,
perfectly capable of being alone,
but happier to be a part of something larger, original,
puzzle pieces pushing and pulling,
wanting to be whole.

October 28, 1997

The world is too much with us - William Wordsworth

I remember reading this poem in high school, it having a great effect on me. I like the fact that he calls it "the world" because I've always made a distinction between the "world" and the "earth." This poem is simialr to how I feel about people and their realtion to the world versus the earth. We are more obsessed with "getting and spending" than we are with "this sea that bares her bosom to the moon - it moves us not." Someone once told me that he thought my love for nature included a hatred for humanity and its creations. I don't believe that at all - but I must admit that I am wary of where we as a people are going to end up. Imagine how Wordsworth would react if he knew what the world is like today.

October 30, 1997

The Ecology of Imagination in Childhood - Edith Cobb

I remember studying in a Linguistics class about the time period when a child acquires language the easiest and most proficient. It's called the critical age hypothesis, occurring somewhere between the ages of five and ten. However, I don't think that this critical age is reserved to only language. I am currently taking a creative drama class focusing on teaching children. All of these things reinforce, for me, the importance od letting the child explore the world around him/her. This article also reminds me of Wordsworths's "Calm and beauteous evening" (I'm not sure this is what its called), the one where he talks about the little girl and how her reactions differ from his reactions as an adult. It's the one with the famous line, "The child is father of the man."

I also think that it is interesting that people are so amazed by child prodigies - Why are we adults so vain as to think that a person can only attain greatness thorugh age and experience? I think if the child is exposed to enough and is supported at their window of learning, he/she can doa lot more than an adult. Of course I'm not dismissing the awe present when a child can paint like Picasso, but there is something special in a child that naturally sparks this creativity. I'm not really sure what I'm talking about - I'm just writing aloud. I love the part that where Cobb says that "what a child wanted to do most of all was to make a world in which to find a place to discover a self." So true...aren't we all?

November 4, 1997

WORDSWORTH

Tintern Abbey

This poem is resonant of another of Wordsworth's poems, "It is a calm and beauteous evening." Lines 50-55, Wordsworth talks about how nature is a source consolation "in darkness and amid the many shapes of joyless daylight." It is interesting to me how often people turn to nature for comfort. Is it because there is a certain peacefulness in the cool wind breezing through the leaves? Or is it the calm sound, the noise-free arena of the greens that offers solace? I think that nature offers comfort because it reminds us that there is something greater than us, beyond our daily problems. We see that life is not only what goes on with us as people, but includes those things that cannot speak...at least not like we do. In lines 60-75, Wordsworth discusses how he has changed from his first visit ti Tintern Abbey. He states that "[w]hile here I stand, not only with the sense / Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts / That in this moment there is life and food / For future years. And so I dare to hope, / Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first / I came among these hills...I cannot paint / What then I was." I'll never forget how I felt when I first went to England and saw what grass should be, but I have no idea what I'll be like when I return, Will I still have the same sense of awe and breathtaking muteness? Or will I "have learned / To look on nature, not as in the hour / Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes / The still, sad music of humanity?" My favorite lines are 93-111. There's really nothing I can say about it that will do it any justice, so you'll have to read it on your own and feel its greatness. In lines115-120, Wordsworth seems to be addressing his sister Dorothy, and discussing how he sees his old self in her voice, her "wild eyes" and her awe.

Ode to Immortality

This is a serious, somber treatment of a high subject like death. Questions that Wordsworth seems to be raising is "Have I changed?" and "How does someone retain enthusiasm for life?" Sound replaces sight to rekindle feelings of nature (Be now forever taken from my sight). In stanza five, Wordsworth states that "Heaven lies in our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close / Upon the growing Boy / But he beholds the light, and whence it flows, / He sees it in his joy." What does WW mean when he says the "prison-house?" Perhaps he's talking about custom, imitation and other aspects of society. In stanza seven, WW discusses how children revel in learned things, that there is little creativity, and that this is a type of "prison-house." But in line 99, there is hope that "this be thrown aside, / And with new joy and pride / The little Actor cons another part." In stanza ten, WW states that there are things in childhood that we can never regain (Though nothing can bring back the hour / Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower), but there are also things that only come with age (Strength in what remains behind; / In the primal sympathy / Which having been must ever be; / In the soothing thoughts that spring / Out of human suffering; / In the faith that looks through death, / In the years that bring the philosophic mind).

November 6, 1997

HOPKINS AND WORDSWORTH

The selections from this reading are filled with personification. Examples include:
Hopkin's Spring: "they brush the descending blue"

Hopkin's The Woodlark: This entire poem is a personification because Hopkin's takes on the role of the woodlark - "Teevo cheevo cheevio chee"

WW's The Green Linnet: "birds and flowers once more to greet, my last year's friends together"

WW's Prelude to the Edition of 1814: "Beauty...waits upon my steps: Pitches her tents before me"

WW's I wandered lonely as a cloud: "the daffodils...stretched...along the margin of the bay...tossing their heads in a sprightly dance"

WW's Lines Written in Early Spring: "twigs spread out their fan," "periwinkle trailed its wreaths"

Personification of nature and her inhabitants give charm to the poetry. There is a certain anthropocentricity in our society and personification of nature is one example of this. It is easier to comprehend something that you are familiar with - something you know. So, people tend to bring human characteristics to things that are difficult to understand, such as the life of plants and such.

November 11, 1997

SCIENCE, RELIGION, and PERSONIFICATION in POETRY - Bump

This entry is somewhat of an extension of last time's entry. As Bump states, "one of the most powerful and meaningful of all dominant metaphors of Western civilization is the personification of nature - the assertion of some sense of identity between man and nature, powerful because it is one of the languages that puts man in the landscape and the landscape in the man." Personification helps us understand/relate/become closer to nature because there seems to be this feeling that humans can only really relate to other human-like things. Our society's anthropocentricity forces us to anthropomorphize things. It is a form of analogy in that we relate one thing to another in order to help us understand.

November 13, 1997

Encounters with the Otherness of Nature - Slovic/Dixon

To quote from the book, "This chapter emphasizes the idea that the natural world is 'out there,' alien, something other than what's familiar and human. This otherness causes distress, confusion, and even revulsion.... Henry David Thoreau confesses facetiously on the opening page of Walden that 'I should not talk so much about myself if there were any body else whom I knew so well." This is just another example of the man-centered world we live in. It also proves man's uncomfortability with anything different, whether it be non-human or just unfamiliar. People are often fascinated by the different. Think about how many books, movies, television shows, and such center around aliens and U.F.O.s. What about the fascination with nature? While it causes confusion, the "otherness" represented in nature is compelling in the same way.

November 18, 1997

AM I BLUE? - Alice Walker

Alice Walker's essay wonderfully compares horses like Blue to slaves in early America. But on a different note, I was touched by the "forgetting" part of this essay, how people forget "that human animals and nonhuman animals can communicate" and have a relationship beyond that of predator and prey.

I was a vegetarian for three years from the age of fourteen to seventeen. I really hate saying "was" because I wish I was still a vegetarian. It takes a strong person - stronger than I am.

My original journal goes on and on about why I became a vegetarian and why I stopped, but the point of all of it was my passion. How I had so much to believe in as a teenager and how it has somewhat disappeared throughout the years. I live with hypocrisy everyday - I would definitely say that I am all for animal rights, but how can I really be if I wear leather? Where is the impassioned teenager inside of me?

November 20, 1997

A Texan in England - J. Frank Dobie

Like the majority of dairy men in this country, he has "dual purpose" cows - good for both milk and beef
This passage reminded me of the "beef" ordeal this summer at Oxford. I cannot recall a single dinner in the five weeks that I was there that involved beef. It was on the tails of the mad-cow scare and the Oxford administration did not want to send Americans home sick. The final banquet of the program was supposed to be really nice, so we decided on Beef Wellington. It did not really matter to me because I don't eat beef, but there was a "beef" meeting a couple of weeks before the banquet. The topic of the meeting - "Where did we want the beef to come from, Scotland or Argentina?" It ended up being Argentina. But anyway, this made me think about the dairy farmers in England now? How did the mad-cow disease affect their lives?

The people don't seem driven into rushing after a happiness that money can't buy
I found this to be true. People don't seem to be preoccupied with fast money, cars, and insane luxuries as we do in the U.S. People are content to listen to the birds, enjoy a nice day in the meadows - maybe we in the U.S. (as a whole) would be too if we had places of refuge even close to being as beautiful (an understatement) and relaxing as England does.

What constantly strikes an American is that so much wild life is preserved in a country so densely populated
Again I concur with my fellow Texan. On my first night in England, I walked through a common (about three miles) to the Trout Pub. Cows and sheep (including their messes) covered almost every inch of this common. Natives may have been watching me and my friends stop to take picture and examine the mounds of feces present - they must have thought us strange. I have never been around so many animals except at the zoo. I didn't grow up on a farm so this was all new to me.

Many of the best farmers of this country stay with the same ground as renters for generations
This passage made me think of Wordsworth's poem "Michael" and how he was so afraid that his farm would end up in strangers' hands. I don't know much about farm life, but I think it must be horrible to see the land you worked so hard on passed on. I get attached to my apartment that I only live in for a year - I can't imagine what it is like for farmers who till the land, treat it like their children, and watch it be taken away.

December 2, 1997

A Sense of Place - Slovic/Dixon

A sense of place demonstrated in literature is difficult because "of using words to convey a sense of place." Several times in class we have discussed the power of words - or the lack of power. Words play an interesting role in our society - we would often be lost without them. They can cause happiness, sadness, pain, joy - a variety of emotions and consequences. But what words simply can not do is be. What do I mean by this? I'm not really sure. What I'm trying to say is the word "bird" and the images it conjures will never be what a bird is. Words are limited. How can you capture the essence of a place? People have asked me what England is like and I could never describe it well enough. You can only experience the place - perhaps that is why it called the "sense of place" instead of "the place." One of my favorite essays about the sense of place is Wendell Berry's " A Country of Edges."

Berry does a fantastic job of using words to capture an image: "water leaps," "fresh...as a cold drink of water," and when discussing the Red River, he states that "in its being it is too small and too large, too complex and too simple, too powerful and too delicate, too transient and too ancient and durable ever to be comprehended within the limits of a human life, much less human words.

December 4, 1997

HOPKINS, THE HUMANITIES, AND THE ENVIRONMENT - Bump

I decided to focus on industrialization and pollution. I experienced the pollution first hand when I was in London over the summer. What this made me think of was Darwin's study on the London moths. For those of you who are not familiar with this study, here is a summary as I understand it: Certain moths that used to be white started to turn black over a relatively short span of time. Why was this happening? Apparently the pollution from industrialization cause mutations in the white moths - causing many to be born black. Of course not all the moths were black, but it seemed so because of Darwin's theory of "survival of the fittest." The black moths camouflaged in the dirty air so that it was more difficult for their predators to see them - the white ones stood out and were quickly eaten.

This made me think about industrialization, pollution, and their roles in the environment and in nature. Many people say that what we do the earth is so small - nature will outlive us and our deeds. Hopkins states in "God's Grandeur" that "for all this, nature is never spent." I agree that our lives and our time here is relatively short in comparison to nature's time span, but we still have to be responsible for what we do to the earth and how we treat her. Our actions do have consequences in one way or another.