Innocence in Bliss

Innocence in Bliss, in my opinion, perfectly describes that one summer everyone has before finally entering the "hell" we call High School. I felt like I could really connect with this piece. As I too was a former Woodside Warrior, I can remember the building, Home EC class, and 8th grade graduation. I remember having that same feeling of endless time and being invincible. I loved how both pieces, Innocence in Bliss and Hooked, made a clear image of a wonderful summer vacation, but Innocence in Bliss was just more familiar to me. It seems like that has to be every one's summer before High School, feeling like nothing could ever make you feel like this again, but knowing in the back of your mind that once August rolls around, everything will change. Also, I can resonate with the the first two sentences in the first paragraph, "As I was cruising down 69 in my baby blue Focus, Alicia Keys and Usher’s acclaimed song, “My Boo” began to blare on the radio. My mind immediately raced to the summer before I became a freshman at Homestead High School." Just hearing a song, lyric, or melody can trigger a storm of memories, good or bad. But whether we like it or not, those memories are there, and sometimes they can remind us of what life used to be, and maybe we can change our futures just by remembering.

Painting With Neil: S.L.

I thought "Painting With Neil" was very well written. I loved how I could read about a familiar person and event. Even though the writer was not feeling the emotions that he or she was writing about, they did a very good job of portraying the TRUE emotions someone would have at a soccer game like they were: mad, frustrated, excited, tired, and so on. I also liked this piece because I could connect with Neil's first reaction to the scoreboard walking into the game. Like just about anyone who walks into a game after it has already started, you would first look at the scoreboard to try to get "DL" of whats going on in the game. Also like anyone else, if at first you see that your team is already down by one or more points, you would probably feel the same way he felt. But as the game rages on, anyone would still continue to cheer and hope for their team. Not only did S.L. write about a soccer game, they wrote about one of the biggest games for both Homestead's Boys and Girls soccer teams, Homestead vs. Canterbury. Lastly, when the writer compared Neil to "just a dot among the people," I could really vision a tired, frustrated painter walking away from the stadium after a rewarding win for the girls, but such a tough defeat for the boys.

Ground Zero: Suzanne Berne

     The descriptions given by Berne of the crowds dissatisfaction while looking at Ground Zero made me think the theme of this piece is that things in life are not always what we think they are or what they should be. She said "And then they would turn to each other, dissatisfied." But I can't imagine how they could be dissatisfied. Ground Zero represents much more than just destroyed buildings, it represents death, sorrow, terrorism, and a national unification. Also, all of these people who are really coming to see "nothing," know that there will be nothing more than crumbled buildings, but have to see it for themselves to understand that it is not the sight of Ground Zero that matters, but the significance of what happened there is what really matters.
     And why else would this be true if not for the author's description of Ground Zero itself: "the wooden scaffolding; the cranes, the bulldozers, and forklifts....," looking like nothing more than a construction site. But then, they would see the cross made of two rusted girders, the cemetery at St. Paul's Chapel, the fence covered with banners, wreaths, ribbons, poems prayers, pictures, hats, teddy bears, and flowers. In that moment, any human being would have to understand the essence of Ground Zero.