Final Blog Portfolio

Photo Analyses

Porchside Memories

Down the Barrel

Creative Pieces

Choice

Sit

(New)

Letters

From the Heart

(New)

Dear Country, Dear Us

Group Entry

Strawberry Fields Forever

Unique Medium

Dear Sister

(New)

Gaining Control

(New)

Original

The Best War Never to Happen

Haikus

War and Peace

(New)

Dear Sister

The Office "Dear Sister" Spoof

The "Dear Sister" spoof is one that has many variations. Saturday Night Live has done one. There are many throughout YouTube. NBC's The Office has done the best. The source of "Dear Sister" is Fox's now cancelled show The OC in a particularly tense, teen-angst filled moment when the show's male lead is locked in a brutal fight with his apparently wicked brother. The female lead and girlfriend of the good-guy comes running in, and attempts to pull the two apart only to be punched across the room. Fearing for her boyfriend, who is now being choked, she grabs the bad brother's gun and shoots him. All are in shock, and Imogen Heap's balled Hide and Seek begins to play. As dramatic as this undoubtedly is for fans of The OC, for everyone else it is just a bit ridiculous. The Office spoof was put together by a brilliant YouTuber pairing together several of the show's funniest and most "dramatic" moments with verses of Hide and Seek. In my opinion, the best is the scene where Dwight maces half of the office staff while keeping Pam's fiancee from killing Jim. The purpose of this video as I see it is two-fold. First, it calls The OC out on it's ridiculousness. This show took itself way too seriously, and as consequence was liked almost exclusively by teenage girls who pick shows to watch based on the attractiveness of their male stars. Second, this video confirms The Office as being on of the funniest shows on the air today. While this video was not made by the show and is not the only one of it's kind, this comedy always seeks to push the envelope and keep viewers guessing as to what their cast of characters can possibly say next. It never disappoints.

From the Heart.

Dear Soldier,

            I do not know your name. I probably never will. I probably will never see your face, or hear what you did for me. But thank you. Thank you for your courage. Thank you for your loyalty, and for your commitment to our country. I can’t even pretend to know what you could be going through. No one can. Even though you are normal people, probably the same age that I am, you are different. Your experiences in war set you apart. I can’t relate to them. Who can? Only your fellow soldiers. But do not feel alone. Your family your friends, your admirers are all supporting you. The day you come home will be the happiest day of your mother’s life. Your father will never feel prouder. To see that, to know how much they truly love you and missed you is a special feeling. Not many people get to feel that that strongly from their parents, because their parents did not fear for you day and night for months on end. You are their hero. You are my hero too. You are not superhuman. You have no great strength, no impenetrable armor. But you still fight for your country, and the people that you love. That is because you possess something much more important than super-abilities: a heart. Your heart, and the sacrifices it compels you to make are what make you such a hero. Anybody can be brave. Only a few can be a soldier.

Thank you, and God bless,

Joey Durbin

  

Gaining Control.

When I read this "secret" on PostSecret.com, I immediately thought this person came from a very controlling family. The poster tells their family that they are not following them to Harvard even though it has become a kind of tradition. The family obviously expected it, even though the poster also points out that they do not have sufficient money to waste it on Harvard just for the name. I think, based on the little information given in this "secret", that the poster needed to defy their family in this. If they are so intent on their child going to this school, it is likely that they hold tight reins in many other aspects of their child's life as well. This is the poster's way of claiming their life as their own. The poster will make their own decisions about what they want in life, regardless of what the family thinks they should do. I believe that all children need to consider for themselves what is best for their lives when it comes to college. If they decide college isn't for them, that should be their own choice to make. As children, we will always value the advice and opinions of our parents, but at some point we need to take control of what we do and do not. 

War and Peace.

War is eternal

Humans will always have it

It should not be so

 

The soldiers die young

They fight to save their country

They are our heroes

 

The missiles will fall

They will fall like rain of death

To take away our hope

 

The night bleeds softly

Death is lurking in the air

Only they can help

 

The jungle turns orange

Orange as the color of death

War has no winners

Sit.

            I sat. I sat in what used to be my room. I sat in what used to be my room, in what used to be my house. I sat in what used to be my house in what used to be my town. I sat.

        We never even knew they were coming. There was no warning. I was on my way home from school. It had been a good day. I’d gotten a date with Lana, the girl I had been crazy about for the past year. I’d gotten an A on the hardest Calculus test ever conceived. It had been a good day.

   At first, I could only feel that something was wrong. The ground started shaking, like an earthquake. But this was Tucson. We don’t have earthquakes. The people in the cars around me all looked confused. Some started to pull over, but I kept going. I was only five minutes from home, I could figure out what was happening there.

            I was at the last light before home when the possibility of an earthquake became nonexistent. The light had just turned green. I was second in line. The car in front leapt out into the intersection. It never made it through. Simultaneous with the car’s movement, a jet streaked by overhead. The car exploded. Wrenching the wheel to the left, I tried to get away, as fast as I could. To my horror, the explosions continued. I couldn’t see anything, including the pickup that I ran into.

            The impact was enormous. The pickup has tried to get away the same as I had. My seatbelt snapped, and my head smashed into the windshield. Disoriented, I was only vaguely aware of my arm being bent in a way that was definitely not normal. I got out, and I ran.

            I hid in the desert as the explosions kept going. They lasted forever. Buildings were in ruin everywhere. Strange soldiers soon followed the explosions, shooting anybody they could see; men, women, and children.  Everybody. I hid, inching my way through the dirt and cactus, ignoring m body screaming in pain. I had to get home.

            I was too late. My family…they were gone. They were gone. My house was standing, but barely. In shock, I went into my room, and I sat.

            I’m still sitting here. It’s been almost an hour. I can hear the gunshots and the soldiers moving up my street, looking for survivors in the wreckage. They’re getting closer.  Soon, they will find me. But I can’t move. I have nothing to move to anymore. In silence, I sit. 

Choice.

"If a man cannot choose, he ceases to be a man."This quote is from Anthony Burgess' classic A Clockwork Orange. Young Alex is the leader of a small gang of "droogs" who terrorize their neighborhood nightly. The four boys work together until the day Alex is betrayed and ends up in prison, where he is forced to undergo psychological and physical conditioning to remove his bad behavior. Every time he sees or thinks of any of the horrible things he once did he is racked with pain. I agree with this novels point of free will is man's most important asset. Right or wrong, what we choose to do makes us who we are. That is something that cannot and definitely should not be taken away by anyone. Society makes the rules on what is and isn't allowed, and it is up to each individual to follow those or not. We as individuals are always at war with ourselves over what is right or wrong. Yes, many times people choose to do wrong. They steal, they lie, they murder. But it is their choice. To try and take away free will to do bad, as the doctors in ACO did to Alex, is the same as taking away the ability to choose Not to do wrong. If we cannot even think of doing wrong, we do not have the opportunity to reject it. Because in the end, that is exactly what we are: Our choices.

"Does God want goodness or the choice of goodness? Is a man who chooses to be bad perhaps in some way better than a man who has the good imposed upon him?"