\”blog\” ryhmes with \”bog\”…

The ashes of memories made her cry.

House for rent, ghost included.

The chemists quickly discovered Hydrogen combusts exothermically.  

The slaughterhouse’s young calf never grew.

Say Yes, by Tobias Wolff is a story about racism, the belief that race accounts for the differences in abilities or personalities of human beings. The theme is conveyed through an argument between a husband and wife over whether a marriage between people of different races is possible or not. The husband is unconsciously racist. He believes African Americans and Caucasians cannot take part in an interracial marriage because “a person from their culture and a person from our culture could never really understand each other” (808). In other words, interracial marriages are not possible because people of two different races come from vastly different backgrounds and could not relate to each other. His wife continues to ask him about why he believes mixed marriages cannot work. She then poses the hypothetical question, “Let’s say I am black, but still me and we fall in love. Will you marry me?”, expecting her husband to say yes. Instead he says, “If you were black, you wouldn’t be you.” His statement reveals that he thinks race influences personality. His wife poses the question again, and he replies with a no. His wife takes this to mean that her husband does not love her. She thinks that if she belonged to a different race and nothing else had changed, her husband could not overcome the barrier to their marriage presented by the color of her skin. In reality, her husband is too racist to see that she could be the same person but belong to a different race

On a hot summer’s day in New York, the sidewalks are busy. Honking cars fill the streets, with drivers yelling out of their windows. Women do their shopping, pushing carts loaded with food in brown paper bags. Some men are striding purposefully, briefcases in hand, while others sit and read the newspaper on benches underneath the trees. Five school-aged boys step out of a shop, each holding half-empty soda bottles. The shop-keeper follows. “The next time you boys come into my store,” he says, “you better quiet down the first time I tell you.”

“Sure thing, mister,” the tallest says, and they all laugh. They trudge through the streets of the city, talking and drinking and laughing, relishing in the absence of school. They make their way uphill to a bridge to spit at the cars passing below them.  

“Say,” says one suddenly. “Let’s have a race.”

 “Allright,” the others chorus. “Where to?”

“First one to the river and Twenty-third wins,” he replies. “But here’s the catch—you gotta get there by truck.”

“How’s that a race?” another asks.

“I weren’t finished yet!” the boy complains. “You can’t just hitchhike. You gotta jump onto the trucks. It’s a race ‘cause the first boy to get to the river by hopping from one truck to another is the winner.”

“Hold up,” protests a third boy. “You mean we gotta jump ‘em while they’re moving?”

“Yeah,” the boy says boldly. “That’s not too much for you, is it? I’ve done it before.” 

One by one, three boys agree. They feel empowered by their daring. The fourth still hangs back. “Maybe this ain’t such a good idea,” he says. “How about a game of baseball instead?”

The four boys jump on him. “Wassamatter? You aren’t scared, are ya?” “Bet you anything he is, the chicken!” “Just look at him, he looks just like a scared baby!” “Poor widdle baby! Does you want your mommy?”

With a shout of laughter, they swing themselves over the bridge, landing lightly on the top of their first car. Men put down their briefcases and newspapers to watch. Women stare in horror, clutching at their hearts, covering their mouths. “My heavens!” one cries. “Those boys will be killed!”

“Stupid kids,” a man chimes in, then catches sight of the one left behind. “Smart of you not to join in,” he says. “We’ll find their bodies on the streets by 5:00 this evening.”

The boy doesn’t hear him. His ears ring with the laughter of his friends as he watches them make their way across the city, wishing baseball had never been invented.    

NB: the boy left behind grew up to become the man who pulled the emergency cord, causing Samuel to fall to his death.

Hello, girl; why are you so late?; when you come up the stairs, open the door quickly so I know it’s you, I thought you were a burglar; take off your shoes, keep your socks on; if I am with a student, don’t just stand around in the hallway, enter and sit down; put your books on the table; give me your notebook, let’s see how much you’ve practiced; where is you theory book?;  not much practice this week; do you have a check for me?; sit down at the piano; get up, the bench is too high; to adjust the bench turn the knob on the right side; no, turn the knob towards you; do you understand?; sit down; play your scales; excuse me! What was that note?; play it again; no—keep your wrists loose; pick up your fingers; play it again; is that the right chord?, what is the dominant seventh of f harmonic minor?; don’t just stare at me blankly; play the Bach; play it again; come on girl, play the right notes!; no, move aside—this is how you play it; is that really what the music says?; wrong!; play the Clementi; put hands together; play it faster, move your fingers; excuse me! Is that the right note?; you need to bring all of your books each week; play Tocatta Chromatica; wrong!; much better; add the pedaling; dynamics, girl, and phrasing; play it again; you have very weak fingers; this is what the music says; COME ON GIRL, PLAY THE RIGHT NOTES; I am not yelling at you, why would you say that?; don’t just stare at me blankly; put the books away; take the notebook; correct the theory and do another lesson this week; you need to practice more; you can’t have that much homework; one of my students plays an hour a day, and she is a senior; by the time you graduate you will only be in level seven; you need to write bigger, I thought this said “c minor”; do you understand?; you need to do another lesson this week; finish this workbook by May; take your shoes with you; bring me my check next time; alright, goodbye, I’ll see you next week.

I woke up to an empty house. I could tell by the silence slowly thickening the air. No sounds of shuffling papers or the click-clacking of keyboard keys came from the study. No noises of pots clanging, timers beeping, or food sizzling wafted up from the kitchen. I could neither hear my dad’s clomping footsteps nor the rapid rhythmic pad of my mom’s feet. No one knocked on my door to ensure I was awake before entering my room. It was silent. I was home alone.

The silence thickened as I walked downstairs. It was broken only by the soft whirr the water heater made as the water within it boiled and the quiet hum of the refrigerator as cool air circulated through it. I walked toward the piano, unusually aware of the sound of my feet un-sticking themselves from the polished floorboards each time I took a step forward. I sat down on the piano bench, lifted my hands to the keys, and attempted to decrease the density of silence by playing a prelude by Bach. I stopped soon afterwards; the notes merely fell flat.

My dog and I jumped a mile when the mail was shoved through its slot, hitting the floor with a thud. I watched his silver-streaked muzzle quiver as he sniffed the air cautiously, trying to discern if anyone was there. He lay his head back on the couch and drifted off to sleep. I was alone again.

Upstairs at my desk, I listen to my pen scratch its way across the paper, filling out the answers to my study questions for history. I have only the ticking of the clock and the immaculate white walls for company. I wait for someone to return home.    

This passage contains a soliloquy spoken by Iago after he advises Cassio to ask Desdemona to attempt to convince Othello to reinstate Cassio as his lieutenant. In it he states that the audience may believe he is a kind man and a supportive friend of Cassio. However, he remains the true villain of the play. He goes on to say that he seems like a good person because he gave Cassio good advice: Desdemona is such a sympathetic and kind-hearted character that she would help anyone, and Othello loves Desdemona so much that he would do anything she asked him to. Iago then reveals his true plan: while Cassio urges Desdemona to help him and Desdemona urges Othello to forgive him, Iago will convince Othello that she “repeals him for her body’s lust,” meaning that Desdemona is helping Cassio not out of sympathy, but because she is in love with him. He believes that this will result in the downfall of all the other characters.

This passage is important because in it, Iago reveals another phase of his ongoing plan to destroy Othello. It foreshadows what will happen in the next scene. It also demonstrates Iago’s duplicity and the multi-sided aspect of his personality—he seems like a good man for helping Cassio but reveals himself to the audience as a villain in disguise.

The most interesting character in Shakespeare’s Othello is Iago, the man set out to destroy the Moor. He is in many ways the main character of the play, but he is also the villain of it. The fact that he often speaks about why he hates Othello and what he will do do ruin him make it easy for the reader to sympathize with him, though they should hate him.  Though he is harming the Othello, his soliloquies induce the readers to support him and even wish for him to succeed in his efforts to destroy the hero of the tragedy. They also give him a multi-dimensional personality, especially in contrast to the way he behaves in the presence of other characters. While Othello is present, Iago appears nothing more than a respectful and even caring ensign. While in the company of Roderigo, he plays the role of a supportive friend. But in his monologues, Iago reveals his true personality: a manipulative soldier who has been injured by his general and whose thoughts are fixed on revenge. In comparison to Iago, the other characters personalities fall flat. They seem to exist solely for Iago to use them. He is the true mastermind behind the entire plot of Shakespeare’s famous tragedy.  

             We woke up at four A.M. that morning, both with a craving for fruit loops. After switching cars several times for fear that they would both break down, my friend and I found ourselves sitting in the back of my mom’s minivan wearing hats, sunscreen, and several layers, listening to my mom shriek directions. Of course we got lost. After racing onto the boat seconds before it left, we were introduced to all of the smiling relatives whose names I had forgotten over the course of a year. We walked up and down the boat as it set out for Mexico, watching the sun rise. I spent the day with a fishing rod in hand, staring down into the dark waters of the deep sea, out at the uninhabited islands ruled by wild goats that we passed, and into the face of the sun that burned my arms and face. My friend spent the day in the boat’s galley, sleeping off her seasickness. She woke up for the ride home and convinced me to accompany her up to the stern of the boat. We leaned over the sides, letting the waves we raced through leap up to splash us in the face. We were soaked through with ice cold salt water by the time I nearly fell overboard, and spent the remainder of the trip sitting on the bow, drinking hot chocolate. Now we sit at a metal table outside the grocery store my parents are shopping in, still feeling the waves roll beneath our feet. We are eating chocolate cake and both smell like dead fish and both of us have messy hair and sunburns. Unsurprisingly, many customers are staring at us.     

I sit quietly on a beige sofa in a yellow room. The floor is of dark, stained wood, the walls are bare, and the blinds have been drawn for the first time since December, revealing spotlessly clean windows we barely knew existed. I sit with my feet tucked under me and my head resting in the palms of my hands. My friend sits behind me on the back of the couch. For once, she is too tired to care about her appearance: her eyes are puffy and red. Her hair is pulled back into a messy bun, and she is wearing blue sweat pants and a baggy maroon sweatshirt. Although I can’t see her, I can hear her sniff and cough and feel her tracing shapes on my back with a bottle cap.            

A man passionately drones in a monotone about his savior, Jesus Christ. He tells us of hell and the punishments that await us there, urging us to give up our agnostic and atheist lives and to join his church. The girl next to me is texting inside her pocket. Another watches over her shoulder, sneaking pieces of popcorn into her mouth one by one. Across the room, a teacher tries to hide a yawn, and a glance at his watch. I try not to fall asleep.            

My eyes close repeatedly; I force them open again and again. Idly, I play with the charm on my cell phone, feeling my consciousness slip under waves of fatigue. I listen to the birds chirp and stare out of the window long enough to watch a squirrel run across the top of the neighbor’s fence with half a sandwich in his mouth.           

  I sit there for half an hour longer, feeling the warm, sleepy atmosphere of the room become warmer and sleepier. I think of the beach and wish I could go.  I think of lemon sorbet and wish I had some. I cruelly think of a world where the man attempting to convert us to Christianity had never been born and wish it existed. I think of the mounds of homework I have to do and wish they didn’t exist either. I think of summer and wish it was already here.      

Thesis: Although Mr. Collins acts in a polite and modest manner, he is pompous through and through and only behaves obsequiously to appear charming to others. His attempt to disguise his pomposity makes him appear ridiculous to those that can see through him.  “‘There is something very pompous in his style—And what can he mean by apologizing for being next in the entail?—We cannot suppose he would help it if he could’” (62-63).  -Mr. Collins is described as pompous, not as servile by Elizabeth, who has a talent for determining people’s personalities.   -Mr. Collins is not able to decline his inheritance, but would accept the entail and deprive his cousins of money even if he could. -He is just apologizing for something he cannot prevent to make his cousins think that he is a good man.   “’I sometimes amuse myself with suggesting and arranging such little elegant compliments which may be adapted to ordinary occasions, I always wish to give them as unstudied an air as possible.’” (67).  -Mr. Collins is pleased at his own compliments to others- He thinks up compliments for others purely to please himself, not out of politeness or obligation. -Mr. Collins wants others to think that he comes up with compliments on the spur of the moment so that he can appear charming.   “She received him with her very best politeness, which he returned with as much more, apologizing for his intrusion, without any previous acquaintance with her, which he could not help flattering himself however might be justified by his relationship to the young ladies which introduced him to her notice” (72).  -Mr. Collins is being obsequious and unnecessarily polite to appear charming. -He is not really sorry for intruding and thinks his presence is justified by his relationship with his cousins, who are welcome there.  -Mr. Collins only apologizes to appear polite; he really feels that he has the right to be there.