That one dream

We were living in a simple house. I was nine years old. In that one house my mother did all the cleaning and cooking while my father hanged out in the dark alleys without notifying us of  his whereabouts. My father ran away. He ran of with his new wife, whose nicknames "Grissy." Grissy was a very pretty lady. She had black hair, it reminded me of the sheen of a black stallion, her eyes were the brown of a caramel and the blush of her cheeks was faint but admirable. I had wished that Grissy was me and that I was Grissy, so my father could take me away. I did not want to live in that house where the peach tree sank in sorrow. The peach tree which never bared fruit.

The peach tree is where the story begin and lives end. It was surrounded by white chrysanthemums . They were beautiful, always in bloom and they would always point up straight towards my eyes looking down on them. The peach tree did not nourish much as the chrysanthemums did. The tree did not reflect the life the flowers evicted. It never bloomed its buds which turned into flowers which transformed into peaches that would eventually be picked by us or picked at by the crows. There never was a plop nor splatter of the fruit for the fruit was never there. The tree was dead; if it did not provide fruits for my mother and I to enjoy it was dead and so the tree took the dead with it.

A week later I saw my mom, she was floating off a branch of the tree. I tugged at her foot and she simply spun a little. Her foot was stiff. As a child, I knew she had died. I don't like peaches. They separated me from my mom and sent me off. Months later, after staying in that one house where all the lonely children stayed my aunt came to pick me up. She asked me to live with her and I went. Her house was very big, blue and had no peach trees; I was very happy. But soon my aunt was sent to the hospital and never came back until I saw her in the casket; my uncle angrily tossed me back in the simple house I lived in and I stayed there a few hours until my neighbor came. I was saved.

I eventually grew up in that house. I did not live there though, my life was in m,y neighbor's house, with his child, around my age, who was named Tom. Tom gave me life and while I spent my nights in torture, to try to heal myself from my backyards memento, I focused on the life in the daytime where I loved to hang out with Tom. Eventually, Tom's father told me I should continue my education and so I did. I did not only that but worked so I could eat my own food and pay my own bills. I fell in love with Tom and we got married. We moved to another city and as a memoir of my mother I planted a peach tree and surrounded it with chrysanthemums. I felt like good things had finally begun to happen. I had a child. I lost that child. Tom lost me. We lost each other. All that remained was the peach tree and myself. I then felt my mother's heart ache. I climbed up the tree and positioned the rope my mother had done so years ago. I then slid down and let myself drop. It was the end of my attempt on life. The peach tree stayed there. It eventually withered and the chrysanthemums died as well.  I suppose the peach tree was my companion from the beginning.

Celebrating December

As my brother opens the gates, Mocoñoño walks up and greets my brother while panting happily. My brother tauntingly shakes the black plastic bag filled with secrets only the children,including myself, could identify: fireworks. These are not the fireworks one who lives in the United States sees, they are not super flashy and don't fly so high up  they can be seen across your city, they are small and feisty. I even remember one time my cousin, at the time my best friend, burned her finger as one, we call "cebollitas"  exploded on her as she stubbornly held it to see the sparks fly in front of her. Since then , I've been scared of those little bombs.

Typically, every year, the Sotos convince whoever they can to go back to their homeland down to a small town called Zinapecuaro. For the Soto family, an activity  and is infamous for its fire, sparks, burns, smiles and laughter is when the older, but adventure-filled relatives, such as my brother, go down to "el mercado" to buy a bagful or two of fireworks and the magic that results of that purchase happen in the night. The smaller of the children carelessly handle the cebollitas while the big kids ruthlessly scare the smaller children, and sometimes the adults, with the louder, smokier, and more colorful of the fireworks. I have often been scared for one time the abejita flew right in between my clumsy feet and seemed like it would cause a fire, on my shoelace. Then again, I was always the scaredy-cat of the group the one who let her imagination run wild on ideas of getting hurt, considering every single possibility. Yet, I always was deeply entertained while watching others, eventually joining in myself. I remember thinking, as we would drive into the gate of my grandmother's home how excited I was for Christmas in order to light up the fireworks. It was a time of festivity, the only time I felt I was surrounded with magic.

Even now, I love joining on the fun that I felt ten years ago. Flashing fireworks, will always flood down memories of my family coming together, without religious differences, family grudges, skin color differences tagged along with accents and cultural barriers ; the flick of the match and the roll of the lighter to set the wick on fire have always been a sign of unity.

Response to the Articles

Both articles, "The Essayification of Everything" by Christy Wampole and "Blogs vs. Term Papers" by Matt Richtel, suggest a negative depiction upon the difference in cognitive process and "meditative deficiency" which is displayed through essays rather than blogs which more commonly contain posts about occurring events in someone's life. Wampole's essay, which to my surprise could be considered and essay, seems to have more of  a persuasive tone when compared to Richtel's article which does not connect with the reader as easily and lacks the detail Wampole adds to interest the reader more and convince the reader of her knowledge upon the subject of "essayification."

Christy Wampole adds intriguing facts such as historical ones and fancies others' creative terms while adding some of her own, essayificaiton and essayism, making her viewpoint more entertaining and proving her point on how essays cannot be categorized. Although similarly both Richtel and Wampole argue that nontextual essays lack critical thinking and depth when compared to the term paper or written assignment, Wampole does not add many solutions to the problem. She instead adds to why students prefer the format of a blog rather than the format of writing an essay. Generally, most welcome quick feedback and interaction between his or her reader, whether it be through a "like, follow, tag, etc." Of course, the majority of students should receive feedback on their essays, whether the feedback is positive or negative, but although there is a satisfaction observing how teachers have looked analyzed student's  papers and shown  that they have acknowledged it, one person is simply not enough for attention nowadays. It does add that it was someone most would admire but quantity seems to overwhelm quality when needing feedback. While the internet provides instantaneous responses from many places, although some are not very valid nor fair, the student/person immediately is tangled by the numbers rather than the quality of the commentary or views.Although not all blogs are essays they still have some traits such as visualizing an opinion and explaining that opinion though still are insufficient when the concept of critical thinking is considered.

Richtel on the other hand, supplies the reader with the less focus on the concept of the essay but instead focuses on the contrast between papers, term papers to be specific, and blogs. He clearly defines how the term paper is superior in any perspective and how blogs basically should not be considered par t of the academic criteria. Though his backup nformaiton is sometimes a little over a decade old, "A study in 2002 estimated that about 80 percent of high school students were not asked to write a history term paper of more than 15 pages" and contains some crude commentary from sources " Writing is being murdered... We don't pay taxes so kids can talk about themselves and their home lives." Although his biased opinion lack updated information and may be frank at times it does acknowledge both sides of the arguement, though there is an obvious lean towards the traditional term paper. He states how the "new literacy," blogs and such, are becoming more popular than the "old literacy," essays and research papers. Later on Richtel argues that althouhg blogging is not the best of forms it does adapt better than bad writing as Professor Davidson stated in his point.

Some facts about myself

Hello world, in order to keep this blog  more private I have decided to call myself Soto. Soto is my last name which sounds very Japanese like, and I have looked it up and it means outside in Japanese and grove in Spanish, but it' is not Japanese for racially I am categorized as a Mexican. Being part of a Mexican family, I have many cousins, so many in fact those that those my mom mentions do not interest me for I have never met them. My close family is large compared to the average white american family, I have four siblings and two parents. All of my siblings are older than me, and even though we are siblings we do not have much in common, one looks like a blonde, another like a typical Mexican, and the other two look white. Of course, based on my parents genetics I'd expect them to be pale for my parents are/were quite pale themselves. My mom is what in Mexico they call "blanquita" which is a light-skinned person, in other words white but the meaning is much softer than that in Spanish. My father was quite pale, but as he joined my grandfather out in the fields of celery and paved the concrete with the company he burnt and crisped, now it's quite a remarkable sight to see today for when one lifts up his arm sleeve is skin is white while on the outside he is a very scary and intimidating dark  man. Now I, myself look a lot like my mom. I have her green/hazel eyes which slant downwards making me look either tired or sad, her pale complexion (well not so much because I tanned), her ex-straightish hair, and her petite height. What runs through all my family is our shyness. Now, my father is very loud and can make anyone fear him but that is simply because of his high blood pressure and in my childhood I suffered and cried a lot, but I was just a cry baby. I was a crazy child. I broke my dad's new thousand stereo, painted on the wall with some human bodily brown stuff, called England, people had to call the firefighters twice to get me out of the house which I locked, almost threw my potty training toilet at my uncle and broke my front teeth because I tripped on my birthday shoes. Everyone knew me as "traviesa" which means troublemaker. I made my mother suffer quite a lot I was the most troublesome of the five, I cried all through out the night as an infant my mother did everything: she changed my diaper, gave me medicine in case my head hurt, gave me food, milk, made me burp, tried to rock me to sleep, took me on a walk and so many more but I was  a very demanding child and simply wanted a bath... What an odd child. I grew through elementary school as a very enthusiastic wild child who didn't mind being Mexican and played with whomever she wanted. Soon after entering middle school. That's just a weird stage for everyone so lets keep it that way;I switched into shy mode in middle school and have stayed there since. In eighth grade I met Sara, my Upward Bound English teacher she was crazy and has one of the most ridiculous laughs. She taught me about racial differences and criticism and to analyze the text more but also made me less trustworthy of human nature. Instead of being encouraged, which she was trying to do, to be proud of my heritage I became ashamed.  From there came high school where my most memorable experience was in tenth grade, where I went experienced la Ruta Quetzal. The summer after tenth grade I went to Colombia and Spain for free and met so many Latinos people who were friendly and were one of the only who have truly given me strength to be inspired. It was there where I learned so many things about commitment, friendship, cultural, and happiness. Now I am a senior striving to succeed.