"your upwardly mobile lfie game that promises you to gain your true identity throught the acquisition of someones else's property, usually lower than you"(161)

I thought this was kind of iroic because its a game show that is promising all these things but really all of them are unrealistic in the first place. I though this quote was funny becasue it is a game shwo the "promises you to gain your true identity" i dont think anything has the right to promis this let alone a game show.

chile verte up to page 151

"We are all writing poetry. thats it. Poems wiht one hang on the chin. Poems with the left hand, clawlike, clutching the news. Poems with the mouth open for many more pretzels. Poems with the frontal image stepping and stuttering away form the mind" (141)

I liek this becaue it was talking aobut liek like 10 people in the cafe or wharever he was jusat writing their poems but really the poems werent really importent it was the fact that hey weren treally writing it. They were writing what sounds good and whats nice becasue the were or wanted to be "writers" not becasue what they had to say was importent or shoiuld be said but becasue they wanted to fit in the with imgage.

chile verte up to page 151

"You take verytthing here, everything you can from Tortilla flats except one thing, yourself, this you leave at the steps of the local mackine entrance way, the local mechanic displaces, tiem stepp and bend. "( 137)

I liked this quote becaue itshows how often we forget oruselves in everdyay life. we keep learning in changing that rarly anthing or very little actually stick with us and by the end we are not the same person we started as. and people leavingt the hometowns and their roots so often and forget themselves their andd leave themselves their becasue the places as negitive beginings for them

chile verte up to page 130

"MArgarita prays
for her 22-year-old brother, Ricky-
run over, late night, by a full truch
Next to 7/11

Sometimes, from a small envelope
she pulls out his broken bones,

or she finds his torn fingers
at the bottom of a cup of coffee"
(124)


This quote remeinds me of how after something huge happens you cna find sadness in small places. Doing everyday things without giving them a sounddt thoguh and then somthing liek that hits you"at the bottom of a cup of coffee" And this quote jsut struck me as ridiculously sad. And thats why it stuck out abecasue it so sad and so real and shwos how saddness can relaly take over your life at soem points

chile verte up to page 130

"But you stayed true to form when you denied a contract for your next book wihtout writing a single page. 'I didnt't want that kinda of pressure on myhead,' you said. Orale, carnal, treue to form. ( 115)

I liked this quote becasue it shows how the real writer doesnt write for the money or the publishee but for himself. IT is talking aobut Victor who is such a good writier and whose book jsut got enough press so that he could get a contract to print his new book wihtout even writing down a single word of it. Its a really intresting and impressesive trade becasue thats not what its aobut for him. for him he jsut want to write to wtire no for he moeny.

up to 105 chile verte

"Power from organizations, assembles,
collectives, instiutions. Perphaps here the question is,
do we quality?

that seems to be the question
most of our instiutions ask today.

do you quality, do you meet our critieria.
do you have proper papers,beliefs, ideologies
shape, form, values, language, affilliation?"


This quote stuck out because it takes the immigration process and really just shows everything that is wrong with it. The idea what you have to qualify for being a citizen, you have to have alllthese diffrent things. but what about the people who dont? are they any worse? Do these people not deserve the life that we have? If we take only the elite from foreight countries what are they left with? How do they grow?

up to 105 chile verte

"Battles missions random, intersections, chaos, time and culture boosters, explosions; I want writing to caontian all this because we contain all this" (94)

I feel like this quote explains his writing, becasue his writing isint the polished finished, nice sounding writing like most writiers, but it is real. Its staigh and its forward, its chaos. But like he says thats what we are too. It mimics the way he works and the way he thinks and by reading it you can get a glimps inside his head. Not just a few select thoughts that were worthy of writing down on paper but everything, evan the stuff that doesnt really matter, its still their because its importent to him to make it real. Becasue in reality not everyone can write to make things sound good but everyone thinks this way and its a way of connecting to the reader.

Up to 82 chile verte

"Fast taliing pst-mod existentialists that mean nothing?"
"Loud poets with tiny words"
"A $twenty at the food of the buddha"
(page 73)
this peom was about little subtleties, but little ones in a big way, that drive him crazy. Opposites that are very subtle but very real at the same time. To the average person they dont mean much at all but to someone out their it means everything and drives them crazy. Things that so obviously oppose themselves but never really meatters like a twenty at the foot of the buddha. Thats not what buddism is about but no one thinks twice about it.

Up to 82 chile verte

"Maybe its about foriving myself currendering myself, consoling myselft. things are up. I dont know what it is. I am sitter here by a round table, fourth floor, california state univerity, Frensno. Library.& I am taing time out. Punchin Writin lay it out. Flow it out. Say it baby say i. Baby say it!"
([age 65)
this was a cool quote becuse it was in t he moment but it also had meaning to it. It wasnt just writing for writing. It was like he jsut realized this but at the same time it was real. It wasnt romaticizing it at all.He is jsut saying the truth wahre is is and whats going on. But at the same time his realized these things about himselfand things he should do ant that he should be so hard on himself he is jsut making it real and really thinking on paper. But hat dosntment make it bad at all it jsut makes it more realiztic and understanable

up to 58 chile verde

"You are the paper, oyeme, Mamita, you are the words you. Not me. Look at youself put words on paper-You"
(page58)

I like this becasue he is sating that it is not him who he wis writing for or aobut it is his mother and the stories she told. The things she said, the stories she told and the things she impressed onto her. She is the importent one. HE shouldnt be celebrating as a writer she should be celibrated not him. Because while she didnt write it it was here stories that inspired the writing and the things she said that made it worth writing aobut.

up to 58 chile verde

"Consider mango truskers"
"Consider the latest reverse discrimination scholorship"
"Consider you daily use of plastics"
"Consider rice as a key subject"
(pages 46 through47)

I like these quotes becasue they are simple and try to get you to understand how racism is a daily routine of so many of us. Maybe not straigh forward racism to the guy next to you but the daily things we do in our life. The stuff we buy, whare we buy it from, who makes it, the diffrence in cultures and our ignorece to other cultures. We never really consisder it and if we do its only for a secont untill we contiue on with our dail events and forget about it. MEans nothng to us, we do it everyday, with actions words or slang, but its never consiously we neverreally give it a secount thought but it still is their.

Up to page 29

"I worry about he day having hours, minutes and seconds"

"I worry about kidergarten teachers whose cloths match"

"I worry aobut artists who emphasize the word visual
I worry aobut Mexicans digging their stereotypes"

(Page27)

these are just a couple lines of the the poem "Dont Worry, Baby" I liked reading it, which dosnt usually happen with poems. I like the rytham and how it was repeditive and each line had a meaning and a deaper meaning inside of that. It was so well thought out and soo random at the same time. I think it combines eliments of both. these were lines that i found perticularly intresting. they sort of poke fun of society but at the same time greaving for it. Its light enough to understand and read but deep enough to remember.

How did you get involved in rainbow hippies?

What kind of effect has it had on your’ life?

Does you’re life with the rainbow hippies contrast your’ life hugely or is it similar to you’re everyday demenor?

What is something unique about rainbow hippies and/or their gatherings?

Do you use things you have learned from other rainbow hippies in you everyday life, if so how?

Is being a rainbow hippie a way that you live your life or is it just something you do to escape society.

What attracts you to the rainbow hippy organization?

Are their specific value that rainbow hippies value if so what?

Does being a rainbow hippie interfear with your regular life, if so how?

Why do you think go got in volved in the glan?

Notebooks of a Chile Verde Smuggler

"You name it, we've broken throiugh the wall, against all odds, from fijoles to murales from stealin sacks of chiles to reappropriating our language and sexuatlities. Now that's American, carnal, you tel me, with your raspy voice. Amercian Originals maybe this is the kay- invewnntion, IS it possible?

Original?"

I liked this becasueit question or originality and invention. Questioning it so that we wonder if any one person can realy invent so mthing, becasuse, some whare, someone(s) has done it befor us. And its alwaays the rich or well off that seem to invent things. ITs the people who hae been persecuded and that break though and question that. IS it all a hoex that whos on tom is whos on top because they deserve to be on top? Are they on top because thats where they were born and dits all a game. Because surely pople like them will never get their, they can do so many things people told them they woudl never be able to but they wotn be able to get their, right? Well these people are seeing that and questioning that, and its funny because its such and obvious little trick.

The House on Mango Street

"There. I had to look to where she pointed- the third floor, the paint peeling, wooden bars Papa had nailed on the windows so we wouldn't fall out. You live there? The way she said it made me feel like nothing. There I lived there I nodded." (748)
I liekd this quote becasue i shows the power of what other people can do to you. this lady jsut said somthng to her in passing not thinking twice about it but it meant so much to her that she rethought the words over and over and over agian. Not only does this show the power of somones words to the person but also it makes the point that people should be consiocus of their own words. Becasue "that house" didn't mean anything to her but it meant everyhting to the girl.

"I am the man who watches the baseball game in silence in an empty stadium. I see the dame purely. I'm abstacted and dazed when its all over and the white suited players lope off the green fields to their shadowed dugouts, I leap to my feel, I cheer and Cheer" (705)
Here she is refffering to the other kind of seeing which is far more pure. And reminds me of jsut being completeely and totally present. In this quote she is describing a moment when you are soo presnt that nothing else matters. Nothing at all only the moment and only the abstaction of it just exactly how it works as is, no string attached just whats their. The beuty and simplicity of it, not the amospher of it but jsut it and the beauty of it in its sweet simplicty.

"I couldn't unpeach the peaches. Nor can I rember ever having seen wihtout understand" (703)

I like this quote because she is tlaking about seeing in a way that n o one does, seeing without getting it, just seeing for what it is, for shaps and dept and object and color. But we cant do that because we have learned things for what they are and what they mean and what they are for. We look at the science meaning of it, the mathmatic meaning of it, the language for it. But we dont really look at it. Do we? we see it for what it does.... not for what it is. We see it for the ripple effect it has, for what it will mean to us. But we never see it for just it. Becasue thats not what we have been taugh and thats not what we have learned. And we simply cant unlearn it.

"seeing" Annie Dillard

"Untill one by one, by the blindest of leaps, we light on the road to these places we must stumblew in the darkness and hunger." (700)

This quote is similar to the other quote i picked out and i liked it because it talks about how we are blind but we still blindly try to find out way making leaps as we try to light our road for our fellow human beings. Stuff like trying to figure out, who we are why were are hear and whare we came from. We know essentially nothing, or very very little when put into context and while we think its alot, in reality it isnt at all compared to everything we dont know. But we still try even though we may never light the way.

"seeing" Annie Dillard

"After Thousands of years we're still strangers to darkness fearful aliens in an enemy camp with our arms crossed over our chests," (697)
I liked this guote becasue it adressexs all the things we dont know which are things that are never really adddresed. We always talk about new leaps in sciences and new things we have discovered but in the greate sceme of things we are still caught up in the dark and dosnt really know what were doing in the world or much about the world. And Annie Dillard just straigh out says that, we really dont knwo that much and we probably will never know everything that their is in the world but we are making liitle leaps ever day nothing huge we are still walking blindly in a wold or darkness.

Darma The End

"I turned and knelt on the trail and said "Thank you, shack." Then I added "Blah," with a little grin, becasue I knew that shack and that mountain would understand what that meant, and turned and went on down the trail back to this world" (244)
I liked this quote becasue it was Kerouac who had just went thorught this huge thing and he realizes that he probably will neverlive that again. He knows he has to go back to the real world but dosn't want to, becasue he knows that he will never feel that ever again unles he goes back to the woods. He was sober for a long time and as soon as he re enters society he will go back to his old ways.

DARma THE END

"And suddenly I realised I was truly alone and had nothing to do but deed myself and rest and amuse myself and nobody could criticixe. The Little Flowers grew everywhere around the rocks and no one had asked them to grown or me to grow" ( Page 235)
I liked this quote becasue this is sutch a good time for jay, he is living the life he wants to live but isnt able to becasue it is too hard to do in society. In nature he can let go and be who he wants to be. HE can live the lifestyle he wants and not worry about anything else. Beging secluded and doing this is one thing b ut living in society and doing it is another. Jay didn't bring any alchol up to his cabin and as a result he is doing so well, but when the summer is over and he enters society again he will go bacck to his olds ways.

Darma 227

"HE made a soup that night that i shall never forget and was really the best soup i'd eaten since I was a lionized young author in New York eating lunch at the Chambod or Henri Cru;s kitchen. This was nothing but a couple of envelopes of dried pea soup thwon into a pot of water with fied bacon, fat and all, and stirred till boiling. " (207)
this quote i liked, becassue even thought he is rambling on and on aobut this soup its not at all the actual soup that is goood. It's the situation that he loves so much. The fact that he is doing what he loves taht of course makes the soup tast so much better than it actually does, becaseue n reality that soup is probably really bad and horrible but its just what he needs that makes it so good. If it wasnt so cold, the warmth would mean little, if he wasnt so hungry it would taste half as good, IF he wsnt ecactly whare he wanted to be, the soup would be far less enjoyable. ITs not the soup tahts soo good its the moment

Darma 227

"Japhy was all talk this morning. He was like a kid again now that eh was out on the trail" (204 )
I likedd this quote becasue it was alot like what i am writing my paper about for this book, nature vs. society nature always wins whare the sole is concerned. Japhy is happier that he has been recently in the book and he is just plain gitty. and happ y to be outdoors free to feel, say or do whatever he pleases.

DARMA 197

"She said ' Ah i don't care, I want to start living." Her fiance had a lot of money" (186)
Japhys sister is the 'she' in this and i jut thought it was funny becasue Japhy thinks of her so hightly and she is alot like him, free spireited and diffrent. Yet she wants what everyone else ddoes and to her being happpy means having money and things and doing not much. Easy and happy are completely diffrent things and thats what people so often forget. Yes, their is somthing nice to the easy life yet its short it gets boring people end up taking depression meds or relaying or alcohal or drugs or anything really but thats not really 'living' in the way she uses it. Ironicly once she starts living that life she will stop really 'living'.

"I got an overwhelming urge to get drunk and feel good" (189)
This is at the beginging of chapter 27 when I really seriously nocticed his drinking problem. HE dosnt want to go to this buddist convention becasue he'd rather get drunk. Kinda ironic really, he lives this buddist lifesytle in order to escape from a lifestyle whare he needs somthing else to make its all good and yet thats what had ended up hapening to him. He really truely needs it and has started to truely relay on it.

150 -171 DARMA

'"Three hundred and sixty days out of the year we get sunshine and my wife just bought a cloths dryer!'" (158)
This was just a funny ironic quote that i liekd becasue this guy is living the typical american life with a wife who wants all these convenences liek a dryer simply because eveyrone else has one. But this guys sees how point blank stupid that is. Theirs enought sun to dry his cloths easily but people just get caugh up in the hectecness or society and forget.. point blank forget common sence. its stupid but so true, people jsut see things not the effects or how the things got to be these things but they want them without knowwing anything else it looks good at first sight. but look again and you see a diffrent view


"The whole trip had been as swift and as enlightening as a dream and i was back" (161)
I think that this is bull shit Keroake thinks that he has acheived enlightenment but he never really does all this stuff hes doing. i think is just a way for him to feel like hes diffrent from society and make him feel batter about what hes doing. When really he still feels that pain and needs alcohol to numb it. this guy knows as much about as enlightenment as i do.

"I felt free and therefore I was free" (138)
This is one of those quotes that is so short but every word is so powerfull, stringing together to create a sentance that just makes you stop for a moment and go wow. I dont think me explaining what exactly he means he will help. Half the battle of everything is with youself and in this case proably more than that. Yes, you have to get their yourself to a place whare you know that your doing somthing woth it but then you have to convince youself that you are for it to really be true. The mind does things subconsiouly but when you bring it to the point whare you are concious is when it becomes a truth.

Darma 120-149

"And he has a nice home in Ohio with wife, daughter, Christmas tree, two cars, garage, lawn, lawnmower, but he coul't enjoy any of it because he really wasn't free. It was sadly true. It didn't mean i was a better man than he was, however, he was a great man andd I likeed him and he liked me and said 'Welll I'll tell you, supposin I drive you all the way to Ohio'" (page 129)
I liked this quote becasue its an example of someone living a suburban, american lifestyle that has convinced himself he is happy to the point of thinking he really it. He says right befor the quote how he is licing the good life, doing what he needs to do to make money, but he says somthing along the lines of 'nows whos smart, you or me?' because he works so much and yhes he makes way more money that Kerouac but he dosnt get to enjoy any of it becuse he is working so much that its just sitting in his house collecting dust. His cars, lawn family, or house are all just sitting their. He has worked very hard for all of those things but isint truely free enoought to enjoy them. Its not that he unhappy its that he isnt happy.

notes for my hippie folk

• No leaders
• No actual orgnization
• Believe in
o Non violence
o Community building
o Alturitive lifestyle (gap)
o Take care of the the earth
o Peace and love
• Uses the term family
•
• Gatherings
o Camp out
o Fair
o Support group
o Theatre
o Are in a effort to grow, learn, celebrate, and become one with other human beings
o Native american influence, along with hindu/Buddhist

http://www.spiritwatch.org/rainbows.htm
http://www.welcomehome.org/rainbow/info/glossary.html < terms

" I smiled; I didnt say anything. He was a great coluble bum, and a bum who didnt drink, he was an idealistic hoboa and said 'That;s all there is to it, thats what i like to do, I rather hop freights around the country and cook my food out of tin cans over wood fires than be rich and how a home or work" (117-118)
This quote i know what i love it. This is the guy we should all really be this is a guy who is happy, who dosnt how to resurt to drugs, or alcohol or sex to be happy either, he just is. Hes doing it dilibritly, He knows this isnt the life that anyone wants to have growing up and hes knows it not 'ideal' or excepted by society. But hes happy and to him thats all that matters and when you get down to it. strip life of everything but the bare essientials thats what really matters. Are you happy? not how much money do you have? or what have you done iwth your life? Who gives a damn if you end up with that hallow void. The void that is their for my guess is 99% of the people in this world and its not nessisarly a bad feeling i dont think. The problem is its not a good one. It dosn't lift you up and make you feel like you doing somthing worth wild, for you. And for this guy its travilling its seeing the world and what it has to offer studieing society and it changes and happits and lifestyles. And at the end of the day really being what you want to be. The bum is AMZING.

Darma 94-120

"I didn't want to have anthing to do, really, either with Japhy's ideas about society (I figured it would be better just to avoid it altogether, walk around it) or with any or Alvah's ideas about grasping after life as much as you can becasue of its sweet sadness and becasue you would be ddead some day" (106)
I know why this stood out to me beacuse to me it relates back to our disucstion yesterday in class but I am having troubles quite wrapping my head around it. In the text befor this quote Kerouac is talking about going to a place of solitude and in a sence escaping, but not openly addmitting thats what hes doing. He says he wants to pray. Then I read the quote above and I dont think it was really all about praying, I think honestly he was starting to feel that void and subconsiouly realized that and wanted to do somthing about it. Society and Japhys ideas aobut it scares him and its easier to get away than to simply confront it. Although what confronting it really means is another story. And he probably dosn't know how anymore than i do. And I quess he sorta is by writing about it. But at the same time isn't becasue of what hes writing. He knows somthings going on, but dosnt know what to do with that truth. His solution: get away.

Darma 49-72

"'Is like Zen. Dont think. Just dance along. It's the easiest thing in the world, actuall easier than walking on flat ground which in monotonous. the cute little problems present themselves at each step and yet you never hesitate and you find youself on some other boulder you pciked out for no speacial reason at all just like Zen' Which it was" (page 66-650
This was a cool quote to me beacus it descrimed to me that feeling of running down a really steep hill with tons of roots in the middle of the woods, much like the cross country trails behind proctor. That feeling that you cant control youself and you just trust you instincts and go, yes you could fall and in that instance the fall would probably be really bad, but the secont you start to think aobut it is when you mess up. Its when you jsut trust youself going so fast that you cant contol it ttaht it seems to work outl. And this quote described it so clossly it is liek Zen that feeling of just going and trusting youself.

Darma 49-72

"Gross gows out between crowded rocks and boulder; distanct sweeps of scree ccan be seen making gashes down the sides of the morning" (page 54)
The whole paragraph this was in stood out for me but it was too long to but it was too long to put as a quote so i chose this becasue it has such great imagery. I can picture it and it sounds like a nice place to be. I think to write anything you first need to write somthing. Write that somthing clear the way Jack Kerouak does in that exert. Becaous he can write somthing in fount of him so well i think that makes writing about ideas, conceptions and situations a lot easier and frankly much better. And writing with such imagery makes it much more enjoyable to to read becasue the reader can picute it clearly in their mind. PEACE RL

Dharma 24-49

"We sighed when we saw the huge amounts of junk he wanted to take on the climb even canned goods, and besides his rubber air matters a whole lot of pickax and whatnot equipment we'd really never need"
This reminded me of the materialism of our present world. Buying things to make ourselvs feel better evan though they wont. This guys is supposed to be going agesnt the current. but he is still going with the current by being so materialistic. He has a pickaxe evan though he wont evan need it just like our excess or furniture or clothing or jewlry we have to many excesses things. Just like he has to many excess camping things but becasue its camping things its a little diffrent so hes rebellious but in his rebellion hes an conformist, its sorta ironic/

Darma 24-49

"'Dont you think it's much more interesting just to be like Japhy and have girls and studies and good times and really be doing somthing that all this silly sitting under trees?'
'Nope,' I said and meant it, and i knew Japhy would agre with me, "All JAphy's doing is amuzing himself in the void'" (page 33)
This quote stood out about becasue it was talking about the void. That void that we all feel somtimes that society gives us. That we dont consiously realize is their but it is. That "good times" and "girls" are just our attempts to fill that void. Becasue its easier to fill it and Japhy is conciously doing that he knows he has the void but he also knows that eh wants it to be filled and that. People try to push aside that void and do other things instead like drinking or girls or drugs or somthing that fills the void for a moment but just for that moment because the void is one that cant be filled with material things.

Darma 1 -28

“I cooked hot-dogs on freshly cut and sharpened sticks over the coals of a big wood fire, and heated a can of beans and a can of cheese macaroni in the redhot hollows, and drank my newly baought wine and exulted in one of the most pleasant nights of my life.”
(Darma bumns page 7)
I loved this quote because to me it shows the paradox of the 1950s. Heres this guys living in different places everyday eating essentially crap with nothing that sticks in this life, and yet he is really truly happy. While the guy a mile away is with his family in a nice house in suburbia with everything perfect and he’s so unhappy. And Yet to everyone else he has the perfect life and the guy on the beach is the bumn and yet which one is happy. It’s the one on the beach living on nothing.

Darma

“It esd s local and I intended to sleep on the beach at Santa Barbara that night and carch either another local to San Luis Obsipo and the next morning por the firstc;ass freight all the way to San Fransosco at seven p.m. Somewhere near Camarillo where Charlie Parker’d been mad and relaxed back to normal health, a thin old little bum climbed into my gondola as we headed into sidding to give a train right of way and looked surprised to see me there.” (darma Bumns page 3-4)
I liked this quote because it mimicked what we were talking about in class. The whole dropping out idea. This guy isint living with regrets like so many people in the fifties . This guy dosnt live in suburbia with a wife and children going to work but really just living unhappily this guys is doing exactly what everyone else isn’t doing.l He is living day to day instead of pay check to pay check. Hes hopping trains and living sparingly but he seems happy with it.

Are these Actual Miles?2

“ ‘Go ahead,’ she says thickly. She stands there swaying. Then she makes a noise and lunges, batches his shirt, tears it down the front. ‘Bankrupt!’ she screams. She twists loose, grabs and tears his undershirt at the neck. ‘You son of a bitch,’ she says clawing.”
(page 589 Are these actual Miles?)
This quote is cool because it the truth. She isn’t hiding behind and façade she is upset. Earlier in the book she is so calm and collected while Leo is the one who is freaking out the whole time but here she is being honest, mostly because she’s drunk but it’s a real moment. A moment of the hurt and pain she has been feeling the last few months but she clearly hasn’t been able to let it out under normal circumstances. Like so many people she has gotten caught up in normalcy living life like her happy and ‘normal’ but like everyone she isn’t and has suddenly been thrown in this problem but doesn’t know how to react, so like so many people she has turned to alcohol to hide her pain and with it she can voice her true opinions where sober she was not brave enough to. Here she is mad and hurt in a world or seemingly happy people and that’s what makes it real.

Are these actual Miles?

“They gorged on good. He figures thousands on luxury items alone. Toni would go to the grocery and put in everything she saw. “I had to do without when I was a kid,” she says.”
(Page 586 Are These actual Miles?)
I like this quote because I think we have seen a lot of stuff that happens in the fifties that we mimic today and this is one of them. People use credit to buy what they want but they don’t think about the actual end result of their actions they seem to think that they wont have to pay for it in the end but it is barrowed money. And that’s how these people got into the financial trouble that they did just as we do today. And this was just one of the examples mentioned in the book they also talked about buying a lot of books on credit and a puppy who later got run over. It seems like a void is being needed to be filled with these material things in the fifties that is present to the world today. I think that the slope of materialism started to really take off in the fifties and today we see the result of that.

The PErsistence of Desire

P598
"'Where could I get a drink of water?” he asked plaintively, assuming the hunch and whine of a blind beggar. In truth, he had without knowing it, become thirsty”
This quote stood out to me in the story because it come at such a time of disappointment and right after is climax of seeing his ex lover for the first time in so long. I think that when he admits that he truly thirsty the author is not refereeing to water he is referring to the thirst he know has for the this life that Janet reminds him off. Asking for water was clearly just a cover up for why he was out of his room but the thirst he is refereeing to came at too much of an ironic moment to just mean water. He admits he is happy in life but he realizes that desire is what drives him. He misses this woman that he once had but is now out of his reach. But people always seem to want what they cant have.

The PErsistence of Desire

P. 562
“He would wear eyebrow-style glasses, be a griper, or have some not quite negotiable talent, like playing the clarinet or drawing political cartoons, and now be starting up a drab avenue of business. Selling insurance, most likely.”

I just thought this quote was kind of funny, because Clyde is talking about this woman that he’s in love with husband. But the guy seems to be the perfect classic 50s guy. Everything that is mentioned here would be so classic to the nuclear family yet this is the guy Clyde is competing with. He plays the clarinet and is starting up is own business, this guy seems like a catch and that makes Clyde hate him even more because that not at all like him.

TOPIC

My topic is home improvements in the 1950s

swimmer page 1496

“What he needed was a drink, come company, and some clean dry clothes, and while he could have but directly across the road to his home he went to the Gilmartins’ pool”
This just another example of how he is going througth a mid life crisis and so he is just trying to ignore the problems in this life and pretend like everything is okay. But its really not at all okay. He is reaching the tale end of his journey and the novelty has worn off so he is relaying more and more on alcohol and he cant focus on his journey and more because the people aren’t being nice to him anymore

swimmer 1490

“Making his way home by an uncommon route gave him t eh feeling that he was a pilgrim, an explorer, a man with a destiny, and he knew that he would find friends all along the way, friends would line the banks of the Lucinda river.”
I liked this quote because that’s what so many people try to do in a min life crisis, they just want to do something different or new that makes them feel young again. People spend the first 20 or 30 years or their lives exploring and then they settle down, but after awhile they start to miss the journey and stop enjoying the destination. They want to do something new like swim the county. But that wont for fill their thirst for a adventure, so they do so and rely on things like alcohol to make it ok. It lift their spirits. But in the end reality hits again.

“The priest was a friends and a cheerful sight, but the undertaker and his helpers, hiding behind their limousines, were not, and aren’t they at the root of most of our troubles with their claim that death is a violet-flavored kiss? How can a people who do not mean to understand death hope to understand love and who will sound the alarm”
I like this quotes because it went to the root of thing, simple and staight. It was about living, and dieing. People get in the their daily rutines and have to stand back and de-personalize things making it difficult to then personalize things when they are living. The undertaker and “his helpers” are just their doing their jobs but they forget that someone really died and that people are really affected by it. And when they go home they can’t re-attach to things and they cant love easily. Death is such a casual part of their lives that it has lost its importants to them, which makes the writer question weather they can really understand love.

“When I abstain from sin it is more often a fear of scandal thean a private resolve to improve on the purity of my hear,”
I picked this quote because I think it relates to the American society. More often than not people change because society dictates it not because that’s what they truly feel is right. People do things more out of guilt or fear of what others think if they simply don’t do it than anything else. There is little that people actually change about themselves for themselves: to make them happy, not to keep people from gossiping about them. And people do the same when they decide to stop drinking or smoking like in the story they only do it because society tells them they should, and for that matter they only start because society tells them to.

welcome to by blog, here you can connect with the inner me. See whats really doing on in that head of mine. My head is your playground so enjoy.