Monday, February 15, 2010

My Random Essay

This is my random essay that I (on Sunday) just sat down and literally wrote. I've been inspired by Lewis Thomas. I'm reading a book of his called "The Medusa and the Snail", which is just a collection of essays of his/his observations in essay form!! He's funny, intellectual, and expresses himself in such a way that makes you awed at his writing skills. (In fact I'm very jealous. Jk) But, he's one of those author's who you just SO WISH that you could've known him personally. I'm telling you, I'm a stalker! It's sad! I love my peers, but I'm drawn towards adults. I love them. They are beautiful. First off they're by far, more wise than I. Secondly, they have a profoundness (prob comes with the wisdom) that is easily reached by a chillun like me! Or chillun (i.e. children) in general! I mean what are we missing here!? We can be typical teens and just sit in our little "clicks" of friends, and gain what!? I have quite a few adult friends that I love and admire dearly that I LOVE to socialize with and can't wait to whenever given the chance. The adults are waiting for us to reach out to them, love them as they love us, and have them show us how to see the world through their eyes. By doing so, we trigger 3 things: 1) Profoundness in simplicity (i.e. you can even rephrase it to beauty in the simple things in life!) 2) Hopefully we can add some of their humor to ours (hem..I mean learn to be funny by ...ok whatever just disregard this one..)/their coolness and wisdom will rub off on us!! and knowledge might I add!? Basically we learn from them! 3) THEIR FRIENDSHIP! I find it easier to be myself in front of adults, then my peers at times! Crazy I know.

TANGENT MUCH!? Anyways here's my essay. I did what the real writer would do. I had an idea that was thrown at me by texting a friend actually...(the friend doesn't know though lol..) So what did I do? I made it a point to at some time in the future, sit down and put my IDEA to paper!! Plus with all the quotes, and intellectual observations of Lewis Thomas floating in my mind it was quite easy to write this essay! Here it is! Hope you enjoy!

On Reading by Elisabeth Darcy

Sometimes we just need to escape reality for a little while. The only problem is, where to go? A first resort would be grocery shopping. Your list would probably look something like this: Milk, Eggs, Bread, and dog food. And then you'd go shopping to escape the four walls of your house. Only to come back from the store with 20 other things that are everything BUT what was on your list. Bang goes that theory.

What about a vacation? Not enough money, or time. A girl's night out? Oh, yeah have to stay home with the kids tonight. I know! Somewhere quiet, somewhere peaceful, like THE LIBRARY!!!!!!!! You can pick up a book, and choose the perfect escape pad from reality! You can go, anywhere you want to go. When reading, anything can happen.

When you pick up a book something beautiful happens, something out of the ordinary, something magical. As you read, a combination of the book and your imagination starts to spin a web of dreamy magic around you. Once the sounds of ordinary life fade into the background, you're no longer watching the character(s). You are the character(s). You know then, you're sucked in. The web of dreamy magic has pulled you completely out of your world, out of reality. You become entangled in the web of dreamy magic in the new world in which you're in. In this new world where anything can happen, where nothing is as it would be in our world, where nothing is as it seems. This then, is dangerous.

The dangers in falling into another world is: attachment and submitting. By attachment, I mean you become so attached to the characters that you hate to lose them. It's like they become a part of you. When the book ends you're sad to leave them. it's like closing a part of you're life (i.e. in the sense that you're losing friends). You're sad to leave them, because you feel like you've only JUST become good friends! The second danger is submitting. How is this dangerous? And what has, "submitting" got to do with, "reading"? As a reader, you must submit to whatever the author has in store for the characters. Say one of them dies. What can you do about it? you aren't the one spinning the tale. You're not the author. You're the reader. Accept that fact, and let the author finish his/her story! That's the beauty of a book, it's not your story. It's a different one for a change. Enjoy it, and get sucked in!

When you do get sucked in, you forget about reality. You forget about worrying about what to make for dinner. You forget about how the sun decided to hide itself behind those grey clouds. In fact, the whole earth seems to have stopped spinning. Every fiber in your being seems to dance in synchronized rhythm to the beat of the new world in which you got sucked into. Everything's new and beautiful. There's places to go and people to meet and greet. There seems to be music on every corner of the street in this new world. When suddenly, something happens.

The kids wake up from their nap, and you wake up to reality. The music stops and the magic dies. You are no longer tangled in a web of the new world. Reality entangles it's web around you. Sadly, the earth starts spinning again. All in all, reading is by far, the best escape from reality!


~Lissie Darcy

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