Important Ideas in Pages 115-151

Wisdom is the quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgment; the quality of being wise. Throughout this section of reading Ceremony Betonie is the main source of wisdom. He really acts like Tayo’s mentor in this section. Betonie tells Tayo all about witchery, change, and racism. One of the most powerful things he said was “‘She taught me this above all else: things which don’t grow are dead.” (Silko 126). In this quote he’s saying that if things aren’t constantly changing then they must be dead. If a person looks back at their life they’ll say they changed a lot in the past few years but also can’t imagine themselves changing anymore. Betonie talks about how the ceremonies have somewhat adapted to the way the world is now with white people.

Tayo still shows extreme amounts of guilt. Ceremony is riddled with Tayo’s psychological problems such as P.T.S and his extreme guilt. He thinks Rocky’s death was all his fault and even blames himself for his Uncle Josiah’s death. In the section of reading Tayo is talking to Betonie when he says “He loved me. He loved me, and I didn’t do anything to save him.” (Silko 124). The conversation continues about the death of Tayo’s loved ones and Betonie tries to comfort him. He says “You saw what the evil had done: you saw the witchery is ranging as wide as this world.” (Silko 124). Betonie has his work cut out for him trying to heal Tayo but readers may already be able to see progress in Tayo.

Broken Bottles and Broken Skin

As readers continue through Ceremony they learn more and more about the characters including Tayo, Rocky, and Emo. Tayo, the main character, constantly struggles with P.T.S and the memories of his cousin dying in front of him. In the book Old Grandma and Josiah are talking about letting Rocky and Tayo go to the war. Josiah doesn’t want them to go but Old Grandma says “They can look after each other, and bring each other home again.” (Silko 73). Knowing this could also make Tayo feel survivors guilt if he didn’t already. Just a few sentences later in the book Tayo says “I’ll bring him back safe, you don’t have to worry” (Silko 73). Saying that could’ve only intensified his guilt. Saying he’d bring him back and then not being able to save Rocky in war can only make memories worse. Tayo’s P.T.S and guilt can be triggered by anything at anytime.

Emo slowly becomes the symbol of evil in Ceremony. In the book Emo and Tayo are drinking with a few friends. Emo is telling a story that is visibly bothering Tayo. Tayo is drinking so that he loosens up and doesn’t act so serious. Emo continues to antagonize him and pulls out a bag of teeth as if they are souvenirs. Emo continues to show his true colors when it says “Emo fed off each man he killed, and the higher the rank of the dead man, the higher it made Emo.” (Silko 61). At this point Tayo becomes angry and slices Emo’s belly open with a bottle he broke in his hand. He sliced his belly open because that is where it is said that stories come from.

College?

I love West Virginia University. My brother went there along with my mom. I used to only live 4 hours from it so we would visit all the time and go to the football games. My sister went to the University of South Carolina so I also love it there. I used to think I would always go to West Virginia because that's what I grew up with and I had never been anywhere else. Now that I'm older I realize there are a lot more factors that go into choosing a college. I will probably stay in state because its a lot cheaper. But still I definitely would not mind going to either of those two schools.

This week in class we talked about college and our memoirs. I love my memoir so far. I'm only a few pages in and it is hilarious! It is just so twisted and slightly disturbing but hilarious at the same time. I'm eager to finish the book just to see how it will end. So far Augusten has gone in Dr. Finch's "Masturbatorium" and gotten bullied by his foul-mouthed children. They throw sardines out the window just for fun which sounds like something I would do. I don't think I would use sardines but I would do something stupid like that.

Make Sense of the World

One moment in my life that helped me understand the world around me was when I left my friends in Ohio. It taught me that not everything in this world is perfect and things go wrong sometimes. Sometimes we have to move on in order to forget those imperfections. But it also taught me that not all goodbye's are forever and they aren't all a bad thing.

Memoirs Talk

This week in class we talked all about memoirs. We discussed what a memoir was and took a look at a lot of different memoirs. There was one memoir that sounded interesting to me and that is Running With Scissors. The way my teacher explained it made it seem like it was the best book ever with it's twisted humor and interesting story line. Twisted humor is my kind of humor. I'm really excited to read this book. That's not something I say very often because I don't really like reading. Hopefully this book gives me things to relate to at the same time although I'm not sure how much the author and I will relate.

In class we also talked about six word memoirs. I didn't know that a memoir could be so short. I learned there are a lot of forms to a memoir. There are six word memoirs, books and even poetry can be memoirs. There are probably more forms of memoirs I don't know about like possibly forms of art. I made my own six word memoir. It is: "Make people laugh, not for popularity". This means a lot to me because I feel like a lot of people just try make people laugh so that people think they're funny. I think people should just try to make people laugh for the joy of making them laugh. I've never been one to enjoy popularity. I like just being myself and enjoy my time with the people that like me for who I am.

Everything That is Noah Galbreath

I moved here from Dayton, Ohio in the middle of 8th grade. I actually drove here and it took us about 20 hours but 20 hours in a Uhaul truck is not fun. It was just my mom and I that moved out here because my brother, Justin, had graduated from college and my sister, Abby, was in college at the time. The reason we moved here is a story for another day but basically my dad made a few too many mistakes. I had a lot of friends in Ohio that I grew up with that more or less made me who I am today. We were all practically the same people. We all had the same sense of humor, liked the same food, and did all the same stupid stuff. When I left it was a very emotional goodbye for all of us. I'm glad I moved here though, it's not all sad. It's nice here and I've made more friends than I could have ever hoped.

I used to play basketball everyday when I lived in Ohio. I never played on my middle school team and the first time I played on an actual team was my freshman year. There was definitely a learning curve when I joined the team. I first started playing basketball because I was a huge fan of the Cleveland Cavaliers. So being the Cavaliers fan that I am I was extremely upset when LeBron left. Now I'm ecstatic that he's back and I can't wait to watch them this year. I love basketball and everything about it. I love watching it, playing it, and talking about it. I wanted to be in the NBA but now that I realize that's unrealistic to play in it I want to be a part of one somehow. I would love to do sports marketing for an NBA team or eventually mange or own one.

I love movies! I love going to see movies in theaters and just watching them in my house. I love all kinds of movies but I'd have to say my favorite is action because who doesn't love fighting robots and giant explosions and stuff like that. There are very few movies I dislike. I especially love Marvel movies because there are superheroes, humor and some romance in some movies. I also love the Stan Lee cameos in them. I keep all my movie tickets in my wallet just as little souvenirs. My favorite movie I saw recently was probably Godzilla but Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is in a close second. Godzilla was really realistic and I enjoyed the new take on his story while keeping the classic 1950's feel to it. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was awesome because I grew up watching the shows and the original movies and the Turtles looked so realistic it was crazy. I actually have a movie review blog for all the movies I see.