Rhetoric, the Dominant Conqueror

Attended another UIL writing competition today…(I am an official member of the Ready Writing team here at Taft High School now.) This competition was at Medina Valley High School. Ah, there’s so much to say about it…but basically, the topics this time were REALLY hard and I took the first hour (out of two) just analyzing them. I didn’t have a topic chosen by the first hour! Mostly everybody was done by then; one person was finished within the first half hour. Three went from my school (27 participants in total,) and all three of us were the only ones there after an hour and we took both hours. When I was finished I returned to the Cafeteria and told my English teacher that my essay was even worse than last time and I just did really bad. I didn’t think I had much of a chance. She reminded me that’s what I said last time when I got third place, but I assured her that I did a lot worse this time…Well we waited for 5 hours for results…The two others from my school got 7th and 10th place, but I got 1st! I was so shocked… On my scoring sheet, I got a perfect on every category. But I realized I forgot the comma in my title, (I can’t believe I did that! I realized it right after I turned it in…) so they scribbled out the perfect for punctuation and took off a point. Still 1st place though. Anyways, my essay is after the topic. Reading it now, I still think it needs a lot of work, and I should have done a lot of things, but I got 1st, so I’m satisfied.

Topic: “The broad masses of a population are more amenable to the appeal of the rhetoric than to any other force.”
-Adolf Hitler (1889-1945), Mein Kampf

Use force on a man and he may follow for a year, but feed his mind with your ideas and he will follow for life. Speech has been known to be one of mankind’s most valuable tools and treasures, but when sharpened, can be more powerful than any other force. Many memorable leaders throughout history have caused action from their mastership of rhetoric, bringing change to the world through persuasive speeches and convincing words. New leaders continue to arise even to this day, using their sharp tongues to control our minds and manipulate our thoughts. Control people’s minds and you control the world.

My Thoughts – January 9, 2009

Been feeling kind of down lately…Just…miss things…Wrote this rant up during English class but had to stop suddenly when the bell rang…It’s retarded I know.

Let Freedom Ring Amongst Deaf Ears

I attended a UIL competition yesterday at James Madison High School because I was invited by my English teacher. It was last minute, however, so I hadn’t attended any meets or practices and really had no idea what was going to happen. I wasn’t very prepared. I participated in the Ready Writing Invitational Test, an expository writing competition. We were given the following topic and were just told to write. My essay follows the topic. After the competition, I waited for five hours, the last from my school to leave. My teachers left early, yet I decided to stay. Of course my contest was the last to be announced. Fortunately my wait was not in vain as I won a third place trophy out of about twenty-five contestants.

Topic: “Three hundred thousand bikers spent Memorial Day weekend roaring around Washington in tribute to our war dead….The street had been closed off for them and they motored on by, some flying the Stars and Stripes and the black MIA-POW flag, honking, revving their engines, an endless celebration of internal combustion….A patriotic bike rally is sort of like a patriotic toilet-papering or patriotic graffiti-the patriotism somehow gets lost in the sheer irritation of the thing….If anyone cared about the war dead, they could go read … any of a hundred books, and they would get a vision of what it was like to face death for your country, but the bikers riding in formation are more interested in being seen than in learning anything. They are grown men playing soldier, making a great hullabaloo without exposing themselves to danger…”
-Garrison Keillor, “The Roar of Hollow Patriotism,” Chicago Tribune, May 28, 2008

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America,” can be heard each morning within many schools across the country. Many view this act as a patriotic student display, although true patriotism does not support it. Blindly following routine, students moan as they pick themselves from their seats and slouch towards the small flag hanging from the chalkboard. Tired arms rest hands somewhere upon their chests, perhaps not always over the heart, and cold vocal chords force out mumbled words without thought. Patriotism is not often a real feeling expressed by proud citizens, but a figurehead in society, a meer image or thought. This idea wraps around America’s people as an unappreciated security blanket, gifted by those who valiantly sacrifice themselves to keep our nation a strong and supportive country.

Nick’s Silent Voice

For an English assignment we were given a partner to interview and write an essay about. We were supposed to emphasize on one part of that person’s life.

Writing enables one to express the many thoughts and images that emerge from his or her mind onto paper to transfer into the mind of another. From sheer words upon paper, entire worlds can be created and characters can be born. This power may seem minor to others, while some realize the true value of it. Nicholas Taylor is one of those who has become amazed by this ability and has been improving upon this skill over the years.

Veiled In Secrets

Given the assignment in English 3 AP to write a poem giving ourselves a name that describes something about ourselves such as “Eats Too Much” or “Smiles When Sad,” I wrote this poem describing my hidden insecurities about life. We were told to decorate our assignment to be hung on the classroom wall, so I used my Photoshop abilities to make it all pretty. If you can’t see the image, the written poem follows.

Click on the image to enlarge it.

Relic She’s Become

This was the first assignment I was given in this little class I attended at the Public Library. Read a few paragraphs from the book, Cold Mountain, describing this goat woman, and rearranged the words to form a poem, throwing in a few of my own here and there.

Living so remote,
The woman observes the world with blue eyes, still bright.
The contentious world but a fading memory,
As is she.
Her mind still grasping a picture of herself some decades previous,
Only grooming her long, pale, cobweb hair by feel,
Never glancing at her reflection.
Only the sagging, puckering folds of hide about her eyes and jowls
Meet her fingertips and brindle across her brow.
With pink cheeks and a mind turned only toward God’s finer productions,
She lives, unaware of the relic she’s become.

Our Place

Another poem…I know I am not the best poet, but this was an assignment, and I was just thinking…So, here you go.

There is a place that only he and I know of…
Our place and no one else’s.
It resides deep in the forest,
Waiting there, alone and hidden.
Birds sing sweetly around with chirps and tweets.
Squirrels explore, climbing about the many trees.
Insects live, constantly moving about.
In this place, there is a bench, aged and lonely.
It has heard many songs composed by the birds,
It has felt many fingers caress its wooden surface,
It has offered a place to rest to many explorers.
With a rough exterior, formed from experiences,
It finds comfort in the forest, hidden from the world.
In this place, many memories reside.
A few of our own have been added,
Unseen and unheard to all, but us.
Warm feelings of joy have been felt here.
Sweet fragrances of the crimson petals and ferns fill our souls and lighten our hearts.
A breeze sweeps through and whispers across my skin,
Tickling me with its cool, soft breath.
This wind, untamed and free to roam, gently persuades the trees from side to side,
Allowing them to sing out through creaks and moans.
This place is our place…
Shielding our memories and keeping them safe,
Until the next time we return with smiles upon our faces,
Remembering and reliving…

Moving

Okay, first off, I am very sorry for not writing much lately…Seriously, I suck, but there has been so much going on in my life…Maybe I’ll rant about it later. Anyways, for now I just popped on to break some news to you. I have to do chores and then get some sleep for Summer School again tomorrow…Joy, joy…so this will be fast.

I just found out yesterday that I am moving…Returning to San Antonio, Texas, my birthplace, hometown…where I grew up for almost 11 of my years. I’m pretty excited, but there are some things I am going to miss here. So I won’t be moving until Octoberish, and that’s about all I know at the moment…

Now, let’s just see who’s still alive and checking blogs.

Reusing for a Brighter Future

Ah, the dreaded English Persuasion Paper…Unfortuantely for me, our teacher has been absent off and on so we didn’t really learn this very well and I have had all of these things happening…I just wrote this in about two hours, so it’s crap and I don’t like how it turned out.

As you glance at your watch, you find that it’s almost time to start heading for work. After dumping the newspaper that you had been reading into the garbage can beside you, you rush to your car and drive to the nearest convenience store to pick up your daily dose of Diet Coke. After consuming your beverage, you dump the empty plastic bottle along with the thin shopping bag it came in. After work, you pull into a gas station to fill up your close-to-empty tank and grumble at the high prices. Purchasing another snack while throwing away the wrapper and shopping bag, you find that the tax has risen and even all of the prices are a bit higher than before. To prevent this conflict from arising, communities should enforce recycling programs, which help the economy, preserve the environment, and benefit the inhabitants.

Burden Secret

Not sure if you’ve heard…It feels like I’ve told the story a hundred times by now, but I guess I’ll just quickly paraphrase it or something. I really, really need to talk to somebody, but I can’t and I need to write a story for tomorrow’s meeting, so I guess I’ll just write this. Anyways, one of my best friends who I haven’t seen in years called me yesterday. She was in tears and told me of this horrifically terrible thing that happened to her. She’s dropping out of school, leaving her family, and was asking if she can come live with me. She wants to move cross-country to here and finish her last year of high school here at Minot High. The cops are looking into everything and she’s alive, so it’s not all bad, but it’s still…and the worst thing for me is that she told me not to tell anybody, so I’m keeping my promise. But it hurts…

I had to draw this picture to clear my head, (and even that didn’t help)…I physically couldn’t do anything else. So this story is basically one of my rants in disguise…

Click on the image to enlarge it.

So this little short story will be about my ghost zafara, Rohashi. Know nothing about him? Please go read his story.

Rohashi’s Webpage

“Hey, Rohashi…” I heard some one say with an exasperated sigh from behind me. Without glancing back I continued to stare forward at the ocean spread out in front of me. I was resting in the sand beneath a few trees, but I couldn’t feel the sand’s comforting warmth or the refreshing shade from the sun. Within the slight dim of the trees I faintly gave a turquoise glow.