Because I could not stop for Death-

When reading "Because I could not stop for Death" by Emily Dickinson I could not help, but think about Connie. This story seems to answer the question of what happened to Connie right after she agreed to go with Arnold at the end of "Where are you going, Where have you been?" It seems that they drove in Arnold's gold "chariot" the entire day. They drove a long distance as well passing children in school to fields in the countryside. At the end of their trip they stop in front of a house that seemed "a swelling in the ground". This sounds like the entrance to Hell in my opinion. She speaks about how she will be spending eternity there which could mean that she was either dead, or that she became his wife. I prefer the former so this is what I am going to let myself think. I guess we will find out in the movie "Smooth Talk".

What really stood out

When flipping through "Retellings" there were many things that caught my eye. One that stood out above the rest was on page 885 and was titled "Ballad of Birmingham Bombing of a Church". This poem really took hold of my emotions when I was reading it. It is about a child who is practically begging his mother to allow him to go downtown to march in the Freedom Parade that is happening that day. His mother seems to be pretty protective of him and would rather her son go to church to pray for all of the people who are in the march and that they may be safe. As his mother wishes, he goes to the church to pray only to be bombarded with bombs and is, in my interpretation, killed. After hearing the noises of the bombs going off, the mother begins wailing, tears falling from her face. She runs into the streets calling for her child. When she gets to the church the mother finds one of her son's shoes in the rubble. The last two lines of the poem read, "O here's the shoe my baby wore, But, baby, where are you?" This poem really hit me with that last sentence. It just proved how fragile life really is, that you could go to where you think is the safest, and be blindsided and taken by death.

Red Weather

I googled catching tigers in red weather and found some very interesting interpretations of what this might mean. On the website knitandcontemplation.com, one reader thought that it was just a drunken dream that the sailor might be having and this might also reflect the alcoholism that Wallace Stevens suffered himself. Another very interesting explanation for this expression was that it was really referring to prostitutes and sex dreams. When reading this poem I do not see any evidence that this is what the sailor is dreaming about. She says that the sailor does not have a conscience and therefor is dreaming perverse dreams. I tend to lean with the first reader myself. Although I do not know much about Wallace Stevens' personal life, I think that since the sailor was drunk his dreams could very easily not make much sense and be jumbled up.

Her name was Connie

I was very disappointed with the ending of this story. I felt like Connie gave in too easily and that she should have stood her ground longer. The sense that I get from Arnold Friend is that he is almost not human. He can see things that are going on from and distance, he knew things about Connie and her family that he should not have known, even the way he spoke and moved around made him seem to be of another dimension. This story almost seemed like I was reading somebody's dream or in this case nightmare. I would like to know what happens after Connie goes with Arnold and if she survived. Did her parents look for her? Did the town get involved?

First Day of Class

I enjoyed the first day of class very much. Mr. Sexson started out by introducing himself and taking role of class. It seemed that he was very interested in the nationality of each persons' name. He told us the book that we needed to purchase online or at Barnes and Noble bookstore and how important it was to read a 700 page book. After all discussion was done, he had each person hold a sign with their name on it and have their picture taken so that he could better remember our names. John took the pictures and volunteered to be the resident geek. Koreena (sp?) also kept tabs on what time it was and when class was over. This first day gave me a good impression on how the rest of the class will be like. I am looking forward to the rest of the semester.