forces from the battle

Different situations I found from the story that include the prostitute are;
when they walk deeper into the middle of the ballroom where the naked prostitute is, '...Yet I was strongly attracted and looked in spite of myself.' Since the prostitute symbolizes America, him being attracted to her is showing us that he likes America. But the prostitute is naked and being exploited by the white men for entertainment, the narrator hates this and does not want to look at her, but does in spite of how much he disagrees with what is happening.
Once they are all around her, she begins to dance, slowly and sensually. 'I felt transported. Then became aware of the clarinet playing and the big shots yelling at us.' The author is showing us that America is being trashed away for the pleasure of the with higher power. The narrator sees that the prostitute (America) is beautiful and become entranced by her 'sensual' dancing, but the he notices the clarinet and realizes that this woman is just being used to entertainment and nothing more. The wealthy white men are waisting America's attributes and turning them into a past time.
To back this up is when one of the surrounding merchants begins to watch her a little too intently. He was an 'intoxicated panda....This creature was completely hypnotizes.' All these people have grown so used to manipulating these prostitutes into sexual entertainment, and they have been doing it for long enough to not even realize or even care what they look like while all of this is going on.
These images and symbols contribute the story because they show what the character is being put through, the things he faces and the emotions he emits. And although the first time I read the story it sounded completely bazaar, and was rather random. It doesn't like a lot of things that happened in this story would really have ever happened but its right on the verge. Meaning, you have to really look for the symbols and know that they are there.

who is this old feathered man?

is he just a man with feathers of an angel?

i think he is a man, but we have to believe that he is an angel. the story wants you to believe that he is an angel.
i think he is a man because if angels are immortal then how did he get so old? why is having so many problems flying? but if he is an angel then maybe the problems he if having is because pelayo and elisenda don't want to give up their new born child and the reason he came was to take the child to heaven.
or since he is only an old man, its all just a coincidence.
i don't really know how this changes the story, its open for personal interpretation.
ok that doesn't really answer the question but thats what i think.

cathedral of irony

the irony that shapes the story.

all throughout the story the narrator has a tinge of jealousy because he doesn't understand what is going on with his wife and the blind man. when his wife tells him about how she will always remember when he touched her face, he feels like she has some sort of feeling for the blind man that she doesn't have for him. he had never met never met blind man and when he heard he would be staying at their house, he didn't want to meet him. he was intimidated and uncomfortable with it.
and then when they are watching the show about cathedrals he feels sad for the man because he cannot see these beautiful buildings and feels compelled to explain them as best he can. then finally the man asks to draw it together. he tells the man to close him eyes and as they draw the cathedral together he understands the blind man, and what he understands beauty to be. he can't see beauty he has to feel and imagine it.
the irony is beauty, and the man is a metaphor for understanding it. when the blind man tells him to open his eyes to see if it looks like a cathedral, he doesn't open his eyes because he doesn't need to. it doesn't matter what it physically looks like, it feels beautiful.

final drapt

for as long as i can remember my dad's favorite thing to do is sail. i could never really understand why or how someone could love something so much. but on the summer before 7th grade i figured it out.


every summer i would go and visit my dad for two months, and as nice as it was to see him, i never truly enjoyed it because i didn't know anyone, and i would end up spending a majority of my summer inside watching t.v, but on this particular summer my dad had planned a little treat. he had signed me up in a sailing program. it was like the y.m.c.a. of sailing and when he told me that i had to do it, excitement wasn't my first reaction.


all i could think about was how stupid i would look trying to sail, by myself, with no friends to laugh about it with. on the first day i had to wake up way too early for summer, drive 30 minutes to some random place, and do something i didn't want to do. but there was no escaping it, and i had to do it.


yet as the days went on, and i began to meet some of the people, and learn more about sailing, i grew to love it. i quickly became an Erkle of sailing. i would eat, sleep, and breathe sailing. waking up at 6:10 and driving to anxious 30 minutes just to see if i could beet everybody to the sign in sheet, became an easy routine. i would sail from 7 to 7 day in day out. and i couldn't have been happier.

it wasn't really the act of sailing that i loved so much. it was the feeling that sailing gave me. it gave me a sense of independence which gave me a sense of self satisfaction. i had done this all on my own.

and then it hit me. my dad began sailing as a kid and will probably sail for the rest of his life. he learned at a young age that he was passionate about sailing. my dad wanted me to be passionate about something, thats why he had me sail. and thats why i believe in childhood passions.

wake up

If the children don’t grow up,
our bodies get bigger but our hearts get torn up.
We’re just a million little god’s causin rain storms turnin’ every good thing to rust.

I guess we’ll just have to adjust.