Parts Unknown

The Pillowman

After the older stories by the Grimm Brothers, A Picture of Dorian Gray, and The Lottery in high school--finding the newly written “The Pillowman” was like a breath of fresh air. Another story that twisted your world upside down and had an element of supernatural while also being so accurate about the aspects and attitudes of human nature, just made me feel so at peace. 

The Pillowman is fascinating to me as overall it’s a short story, quick read but has so much depth. There is very little filler, you find out what you need and that’s that. Also, there is great complexity and skill to someone who can make you sympathize with someone who should be seen as evil--whether or not they truly are evil or that sympathy is warranted

Mother: Maybe if you went out of the house more you'd have more friends

Ravenclaw: I already have two. What more do you want?

Pomona Sprout

Professor Sprout was the embodiment of Hufflepuff, mostly pertaining to her love of Herbology, sweetness, and lack of need to be worshipped. Plenty of potions need the careful, dedicated and complicated treatment of plants that is based in Herbology; something that Professor Sprout hints at but does not boast about. Her brilliance was shown not only in her famous care of Mandrake’s to help petrified students be restored, but the year before when she used Devil’s Snare to help protect the Sorcerer’s Stone so that the one who tried to get it would not need only intelligence but the ability to remain calm in a panic.

Similar to her brilliance, Professor Sprout also showed her generosity as the many lessons she taught the students in harvesting she gave to Madam Pomphrey to help students with all types of ailments from being petrified, to common acne or used for other aspects of her class (unlike other Professors). She also showed her loyalty and bravery not only to what was right in protecting her and other students in the year that Death Eaters had control of the school, but also to Albus Dumbledore in her agreeing that the school should be kept open after his passing. Most importantly, she didn’t care whose house you were in—she loved you all the same

Professor Flitwick

Professor Flitwick, my Head of House, was all I love about Ravenclaw. A proven underdog, he was passionate about learning, studied hard and had some serious talent. While we didn’t get to interact with him much, he was ecstatic by Hermione’s 112% in her first year and graded it as such, which to me showed how he didn’t care about whose house you were in and pushed for all to excel. From this, I would believe that he would have been a great supporter of Hermione’s efforts during her third year to try with the time-turner and learn as much as she could, would have worked with Neville so he could exceeds with getting a N.E.W.T. in Charms after the pep-talk from McGonagall and of course was in awe of Fred and George’s final salute to Umbridge and traditional education. So thank you Sir for your true intelligence about the type of learning that is truly important, how we learn in matters of personal exploration, kindness and individual creativity.

Bonus Points: Hogwarts School Choir!!

Robert Muller Testimony

Today's Robert Muller testimony highlights a very complicated, a long-haul change in how news and all media are shared, expressed and consumed. 

Both sides don't expect more to be said that has already been divulged in the report. But with the report being 400 pages and written as a legal document, it is confusing for those who do not have experience with law documents, that style of writing and that it is too long for the average American who is working and would need more background to understand the smaller details. Immediately 3% of the US was expected to read the Muller report based on Amazon sales, but buying something off Amazon is not the same as definitely reading the report and definitely not the entire report. Separately, understanding what is written is an entirely different arena. This brings us back to the overall shift in information (both fact and fiction) and the main purpose of today's hearing-- the idea is that those who cannot or aren't interested in all the nuances of the report, be told in a form they are used to so they may understand the majority and most crucial parts of Muller's research and findings. 

Breaking the hearing up and preparing it to be recorded allows us to consume the information how we're most used to it, short clips marked to become viral. But is the official line in the sand, separating the previous time of detailed, historic and verified facts from news and stories that we won't bother with until they can be easily binged; did we cross that line long ago, and if we have crossed it--how soon until we regret it

Relatable

Libraries

I love libraries, I always have. The insurmountable access to books and all the information they contain and may provide, always makes my heart completely burst (especially the reference sections that discuss religion, culture, and historical past times). 

Here is Trinity college, a famous library. Most people don't appreciate their local library as much as they fawn over this one thou. My local library, the library I grew up with, that’s the one that just makes me happy and comfortable, just thinking about it as I am now. 

Whether it’s those little boxes on a yard where people can exchange books for free, a large historic university library inside an old castle or cathedral where some King once studied, or your modern library down the street that lets you take out electronic books: love your local library! GO to your local library! There are movies, there is music, there are boos, there are sessions about plays and scientific questions and just so much can be done at libraries. 

Think of a library as the Wood Between the Worlds, every book can take you to an entirely different place, and you won’t feel so bored, or lonely. Love your local library, be loving to your local library

The Magician’s Nephew

Not a fan of Narnia, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardobe. It was ok, nothing as great as the first thou. Harry Potter is the book that I call home, but the first book that I became obsessed with, that I feel completely in love with, where the pages became warm, was the Magicians Nephew--and the beauty, intricacy and originality I felt for lost.

The Magician's Nephew was first great because it was real, it wasn't a story where they went on a grand adventure. These were two regular kids with regular lives that had death, greed and were just doing normal fun activities and were then forced on a "grand adventure".

This also was my first adult book, while wrote for children the adults and characters who were the antagonists weren't just evil or villainous, they were just normal. Filled with selfishness and greed, they weren't one dimensional, they showed the real consequences of human actions and loss of moral. This was a great novel, a great children's novel and a great story about humans, kids and human nature

Three protests in Five days

Three protest in Five days and I’m exhausted. 

With the hail coming down, hands and feet frozen, voice crackling, stomach empty I am so fully exhausted; but proud, because even though I feel dead, I also feel..

Last night it’s become clear to me that I must I must bring gloves to work to stand outside as the protest last Thursday, January 19th and last night, January 24th at Trump International Hotel Columbus Circle were last minute with the Women’s March in NYC on Saturday

There were definitely some eye-opening experiences in both good and bad ways; and I’m glad I experienced them both. First, I realized how bad my social anxiety is as it took me a while to feel comfortable chanting in the crowd. 

Second, and more global, was that I don’t believe in always chanting the phrases or agreeing with them just because I’m in the group and while for now I can just not chant what I don’t believe in, I wonder how I will feel in the long run. Being at the protest, demonstration is a show of one more person who doesn’t want the Dakota Access Pipeline, or is upset that woman are still not equal. But does my being there for one action, even though a lot of these are connected and I agree with most, automatically support the others.

Ones I agree with:

“Native Life Matters”

“We Stand with Standing Rock” and “City by City, Block by Block”-->This was probably my favorite overall as it encompasses not only the protest and the Dakota Access Pipeline itself by that those at Standing Rock and across the country were together 

“Water is Life”

“Show me what Democracy looks like, this is what Democracy looks like”

“Love Trumps Hate”

“Whose streets? Our streets!”

And Ones I didn’t agree with:

“Stop the pipeline, not the people” 

“Dump Trump”--> I don’t like him either, but this just isn’t going to solve anything now. I understand what is meant behind this when they say “Not My President”. They want to make it clear that all of the hate he spews is not representative of all of this. But I feel this is more of a divider than anything else

My final and most critical eye opening experience was the fear. I’ve been trying, as a white person, to see how those of other races feel walking down the street. I cannot fully ever understand it, I wasn’t raised to because I wasn’t raised to have to but I feel I got some of it last night. Walking from Trump International Hotel across Central Park South the police were at first just casually around and helped direct a few people and then escorted us blocking traffic as we went towards Trump Tower. but then, two blocks north of our destination we were stopped. Directed onto the left we were lead into, what seemed to be a trap. The gates went all around and we were not allowed to move them. For the next thirty minutes I saw the police officers surrounding the front of the protest grow, and I don’t mean grew as we were all closer together and now so were they grow, I mean REALLY GROW. 

At first nothing was going on, but when asked why we weren’t allowed to cross and why were trapped in we received no response (but this I understand as the officers around us surely weren’t the ones in charge and didn’t want to escalate any feelings). But as the Women’s March Protest on Saturday and the previous Trump International Hotel Protest on Thursday had been peaceful it didn’t make sense and obviously protesting two blocks north would not be effective as we are protesting the President’s actions that day of moving forward with the Dakota Access Pipeline and KeystoneXL. All I know is that the police number grew slowly at first and then in a surge. They had called for backup and where officers had stood comfortably apart, they were now forming a barricade; in a protest of an estimated two thousand, I felt overwhelmed by their presence. Overwhelmed and scared. Eventually the protest got around the barricade and moved all they way down to Time Square and I’ve yet to hear of any violence. 

Overall I am happy I went to these protests as it reminded me, if for nothing else, to get involved and was another way of casting a ballot for myself and against harmful policies. Now onto the next