HW 21b - Comments

Larche G said...

Willie,

I thought you listed some good insights from the guest speaker that you could have talked about further. I liked how in your first paragraph you connected with some of the things the speaker said when your grandfather died. However, the assignment was to write three paragraphs addressing the insights you got from the speaker and your own thoughts /connections regarding them. I definitely think you could have expanded on your thoughts and made further connections by writing more about your experiences with illness or death. You were off to a good start.

Kayla R said...

Willie,
I thnk you did a good job with connections. Connecting it to personal life is always a good way to help the reader understand what the author might be going through. Especially for someone that has never read this book. Maybe you could try like more connections. Like connections to you, or to the world or to another book you have read. Maybe put more of your opnion in there along with the facts. I liked how you gave facts so we can get a better interpretation of the book. You did a good job. Also maybe try some predictions on what you think this could lead to in life, and why this could be happeneing. Good job thought

HW 22 - Illness & Dying Book Part 1

          The book I am reading is Tuesday's with Morrie, and so far it is about a guy who has a major illness and the doctors gave him about 2 years to live.  But over the course of those months in the first year, Morrie has made the best of it.  He still had continued his daily routine as a teacher in a university.  But he was going to retire anyway due to his illness.  He had told his students as soon as he got into the classroom.  As the time went by Morrie had lost a lot of weight and had gotten so skinny that it looks like you were able to see his bones.  And soon after that he wasn't able to do things on his own, he was too weak. 
          Basically the story was a flashback within a flashback, it was almost told from his perspective, but it wasn't, and after each chapter, there would be another flashback within the flashback that shows his years in high school.  A quote that I found interesting n the book was, :finally, one student, a thin, quiet, dark-haired girlwhom I notice almost always wears bulky white fisherman sweaters, crosses her arms over her chest, closes her chest, leans back, and does not flinch, like one of those lipton tea commercials where the model splashes into the pool.  Basically I chose this quote because I thought that it was saying don't believe what your eyes tell you.  Your eyes will lie to you.  See with your body, not your eyes.  This quote was on pages 60-61.

HW 21 - Expert #1

          While listening to the story about her husband, there were a couple of things that I thought were very interesting.  Those things were...
- was how he never had a bad illness in the past before the illness he had now
- he was one of those men who didn't go to the doctor as soon as they felt something wrong, and it wasn't entirely his fault because something was wrong with there insurance, so he couldn't go until 11 months had passed (how long it took to get insured).
- It wasn't one big long rush of pain and sickness, one time he might of felt bad and weak, and at another time, he could of felt really good, like she said he was well enough to go on the family vacation to play mini-golf, but then after, he asked for a oxygen tank.
- In the whole time he was sick, they never talked about death, and didn't even mention it.
- She had no less respect for death after he died.
          I can connect some of these things to myself because for one thing, before my grandfather died, I would pray to god not to take him, and I would do this every night, then one day my mom got that phone call and my grandmother said, that's it, he is gone, at first, I didn't know what to feel, it felt like a big hole inside of me where all of my emotions would just pour out into I was a hollow shell of emptyness.

HW 20 - Thinking/Writing Groups

1)
Willie Rich
wwandthechocofactory@gmail.com
http://treystar3.blogspot.com/

2)
Older: sister-cin.anthony@gmail.com
Younger: sister-bsgrule511@gmail.com

3)
Older: Cineca
Younger: Kayla

HW 19 - Family Perspectives on Illness & Dying

         When I asked my mom about illness, and dying, she said that I should protect my body, and take care of, because if you don't, it is just a bomb of sickness waiting to explode at any moment.  She knows that everyone is going to die eventually, and has accepted that.  And if you were good on earth, God will reach his hand out and welcome you to his gateway of heave, and if you weren't like you have murdered and raped people, then you are not welcome to go to heaven.  Then I had a lot to think about because I also have opinions on dying.  Why are we even put on earth just to be taken away at some part of your life, whether it is early or later than expected.  It is really confusing to think about what happens when you die, it is almost impossible to think about

HW 18 - Health & Illness & Feasting

         Another year another thanksgiving.  Although this thanksgiving was a lot different from last years one.  There were a lot of empty chairs, my family members aren't dead, it is just that they are all getting older, so it is harder for them to get up and travel to different places like they used to.  The food was the same, the same amount, but every year only one thing changes, and that is the amount of people that show up there.  Before we  start eating, all of us gather around the table, join hands, and thank the lord for this feast that is in front of us. We also think of those who don't have all the materials needed to make a nice Thanksgiving dinner.  Then we go and eat, I eat, and get more, I don't really watch football, if everyone is crowded around the game and watching, then I will watch, but most of the time, i just go in the room, and play video games.  I usually do this every thanksgiving.  I am not active on thanksgiving, my body is put on park for the whole day-the anti-body.

          Once thanksgiving is over, everyone hangs around and starts talking because this is the actual only moment that our whole family could spend time together and see each other.  I mostly play video games after talking for a couple of hours with my cousins.  They all arrive around 6:30pm and leave about 11:30pm, by the time they leave, it is about time for everyone, and e to go to bed, but me and cousin stay up thinking about the next day and thinking about another past thanksgiving.  I see Thanksgiving as not another holiday, but a time for family to be together.  The food and football are not really what is important, it is about family gathering together.

HW 17 - First Thoughts on the Illness & Dying Unit

1) I have never really did anything in the past that has to do with illness and dying.

2) I have always seen illness as a consequence of not taking care of your body better, like eating healthy and exercising when they are young.  But some illnesses are preventable and just come out of nowhere.  Also most young kids and people are diagnosed with these diseases.  Most people start taking care of themselves when they are young, and say I am never gonna get fat or big.  But as they get older, there food metabolism slows down and they don't know it and just keeps on eating.  Then they get lazy, its not a lot of extra fat, just a couple of walks and jogs will get rid of it, but then you say, i will do it tomorrow, but your lazy, and forget, and eat like you would normally eat, then you get bigger, and all that fat surrounds your heart.  And then the next thing you know, you probably get diabetes, and the fat stays around your heart, and forces your heart to pump harder, and that leads to heart attacks.
 
3) There are more poor black people than white people so a lot more people can't afford to pay for a yearly check up, resulting in a lot of sick black people.  I don't know why, but most black people are born poor, and a lot of there jobs are taken away.. like in the Freakonomics movie, it takes about a week to 2 weeks for a white person to find a job, and it takes up to about 12 weeks to get there letter answered, and when they work at the same job, the white person would get payed more.

4) My family especially approaches this seriously. Especially my older sister because she had wanted to become a doctor, so she knows about these illnesses and knows how to approach this situation if it had ever come up.  My dad has diabetes, he was skinny and thin when he was younger, but than he stared to let go and became bigger, but now he is starting to take care of himself and sets goals for himself.  But those goals sometimes he forgets, and doesn't do them for a while and then he'll say that he'll do them again, but he forgets again, and today he says he sets goals fro himself.  But I don't know how long he'll keep it up before he stops.

5) I never want to become so sick that I was going to die, for some reason I am scared to die.  Most of those sicknesses are most of the time a slow and painful death, for every second that those people are sick they are sad and miserable.  We can get most young adults to take care of themselves by telling them that healthy food is good too, and show them down the path thay they are heading if they continue to eat and not exercise.  Once they see how hard it is too do this, maybe they will have a change in there food ways and eat healthier.