A film I always go back to is Call Me By Your Name. This film found me at a time when I felt very alone, and in some aspects I felt connected to Elio, one of the characters. One of my favorite phrases from the film is “Is it better to speak or to die?” As someone who chooses to keep a lot to themselves, I felt dying was the obvious answer. Then I met some very interesting people who I became close with, and they would let me talk about anything that was on my mind, and I realized I didn’t have to wait until I died. I just had to talk to people who cared about me to let me express myself freely. My friends made me realize the people who care about you will try their best to understand you and your emotions instead of making you feel ashamed for them. Now at this point I felt like speaking was the better option, but at this point most of these people are gone and have cut contact with me. If you know me well, you probably know I would’ve sent a 3,000-word letter to each one of them about how I feel about them being gone and what they meant to me. But I don’t think it’s worth speaking anymore. 

I wish I didn’t care, but since I do, it’s much harder to just shut up and accept the reality from the people I once felt I could be completely open to. In Call Me By Your Name, Elio and Oliver get to know each other very deeply. They go on adventures and create a strong bond, but by the end Oliver goes back to America. Time passes, and he calls Oliver to let him know he will be getting married to a woman. At that point Elio had no other option but to accept reality; he couldn’t argue about how unfair it was or how he still cared for Oliver. Letting go of people is quite hard for me, but this film reminds me that it’s okay to feel and to remember that it happened and that it was real. I remember everything and the feeling of freedom that they offered me; for that, they will always exist in my memories. Although we have all changed, those moments were still real and I will hold onto them until I no longer can.

Call Me By Your Name, Luca Guadagnino

This speech is the reason I hold onto my memories so dearly. We have such limited time to make memories that are worth keeping,  it’s a waste to spend that time worrying about having to let go.

I got the inspiration for my essay when my class was assigned  to look for an op-ed that we can use as reference to what our op-eds were meant to look like. I had found an op-ed titled “ICE’s Reckless, Xenophobic Mission”, after reading it I wondered what other ways that the administration has been reckless. As a hispanic woman I am aware of how terrifying the actions of these ICE agents are , but I wanted to also find things that would make non-immigrants question the power that Ice holds as well. I wanted to show that ICE isn’t just attacking immigrants, they’re attacking all of us and we should be aware of this. This essay took me about 2-3 days to fully write. I didn’t outline much but as I read and looked through my references I tried to shape my claims so that I could easily use the quotes from the text to support my claims. 

I particularly like the last sentence from my conclusion which states “As Americans, it’s our duty to make sure the people in power aren’t using it in unmoral, unlawful, and unconstitutional ways.” I feel that currently many people act like they can’t do anything about what is going on in our country or that it’s just not of their concern, but i felt this sentence is like a wake up call. My government teacher once told us it’s our PRIVILEGE and DUTY to vote , and right now it’s important to vote for people who will fight and represent us ALL, not just the one percent. The rhetorical analysis of the Op-ed I chose helped me recognize how my identity also plays a role, so throughout my writing I tried to not to bring up things that would make me seem too biased on the topic. 

During the peer review I got to see what my classmates had come up with for their op-ed’s and I decided to add more statements that could leave an impact on the audience. If I had more time for this assignment I would try to find ways to put more information into the essay. I would like to improve my writing by planning out and outlining more before I actually start writing, that might help me focus specifically on one claim/topic at a time and save up on the editing process. I really enjoyed researching and learning more about ICE under the Trump administration. I hope next time I will have an easier time looking for a peer-reviewed scholarly article.

Wicked World By Black Sabbath

I choose this song to go along with the reflection because I feel like some of the lyrics relate to my op-ed. Black sabbath has many songs criticizing politicians and song such as this push me further to try and make a difference even if it’s small. I like taking the opportunity of these assignments to write on these kinds of issues because I really do care and want to know more and spread more information on it. I hate feeling like I can’t do anything and this feels like something, after I do research I usually talk to my friends about the new information I found out. And I hope that I can snap more people out of that “I can’t do anything about it” mindset.

The structure of the story was the first thing that caught my attention. I was quite confused on why she would choose to set up the story like that until she started talking about other lists she’s made. It seems she makes a list of things when she is going through a stressful situation. Maybe it is a way for her to cope with what is going on around her. The other list is a bit different from this one though since the other ones are things like a list of “spices in pho” and she names the spices. This list actually doesn’t give us any names, it just starts the paragraph with “one boy” or “one girl”. 

One of my classmates said it’s a list of her body count, and Gilbert, one of the members of my discussion group even counted how many people were in the story, it was twenty one. The narrator was never showing off the people she slept with or the number of people she slept with like most people do when referring to body count, especially something like a list. I feel that this list is deeper than just a name or a number. These people all played a factor in her life even if it’s a small one. Although the narrator goes into detail about her sexual experiences with these people she also mentions the details about them that stick with her. For example the man she lost her virginity to she mentions his grey eyes both times he is in the story. She also talked about her ex-wife’s blonde hair.

When she spoke of the older lady, the last person on the list, she spoke more about their bond. Clearly this lady meant a lot to her, since she was very vulnerable around her, the narrator told the lady about finding her mothers body which is something she felt she couldn’t tell the guy she lost her virginity to. Which is interesting since she was physically vulnerable with him, allowing him to take her virginity. She also tells the lady about her ex-wife and the lady also talks about personal things like having to put her cat down. 

The author chose this structure for this story to be list-like because it’s meant to be a list of people who left an impact on her. It’s only until the end when we are told about the other list she had made, that it’s clear this was also a list. To me it seems like this was her last list accepting the disease instead of running away from it or coping through list making.

MacDemarco – Preoccupied

I feel that this song fits the the description of the last bit of the story. If I was in the narrator’s shoes I would listen to this song if I was alone on an island while a deadly disease is killing everybody. I find this song to be very calming and to me the ending of this story feels like an end to the storm.

The label of “good” or “bad” is difficult to place on someone as it can be quite subjective. Clearly the narrator never actually says what she thinks about her husband but we see the way she treats her throughout the story. To some people her husband might seem like a good guy because he doesn’t directly hurt her. As well as the fact that she never stopped any of his perverted actions she let him do as he wished until it basically killed her. 

I personally believe he is a terrible person and an even worse husband. Throughout the story he is pushing her boundaries around the bow, something she has made clear is significant to her. If my partner has a bow around his neck or really anything on his body that he asks me not to touch I just wouldn’t, I’d listen to him because I respect him as a person with their own autonomy. I believe her husband didn’t see her as her own person but as an extension of himself. Since she had always always given into whatever fantasies or activities he wanted to do he just felt she would be happy with whatever he chose for her. He never asked if it was what she wanted; he just did them and expected her to be okay with it. He didn’t see her as a person with her own ideas, beliefs and emotions that is why he always pushed and tried to alter her beliefs about the bow. 

Lastly he asked for her body to be altered without asking her if it was okay beforehand this was when i came to the conclusion of how evil this man really was. He asked the doctor about the extra stitch in the moment when she was falling asleep, probably to stop her from refusing to get the procedure done. The doctor’s comments were perverted and weird but he didn’t bring up the extra stitch, he didn’t even make these comments before the husband brought it up. It’s likely he had researched what a husband stitch was so it’s hard to believe that in 2019 he didn’t see any reports on the negatives of said procedure.

Overall I can see how the narrator is partly at fault for allowing her husband’s behavior to go on for 20 years. But as humans we should have common decency and not just make decisions for other people especially if it is somebody who you really love and care about.

I found this image on Pinterest the artist is Dizlarka and the painting is called “Puppet Doll”.

I choose this image because it represents to me what the narrator of the story was. I felt that a lot of the things she did she just went along with whatever her husband wanted, she ended up becoming his puppet and toy like figure who he had full control of. Many women turn into puppets for men only reaching as far as their partners field of vision, never reaching as far as they could.

When the on community assignment was first announced, I didn’t know what to write about. Once my classmates started speaking about what defines community for them, I realized I had felt that before with certain people. The problem was that I had never considered myself as really fully part of a community. As I wrote about my experience with the community and how I felt I didn’t reach certain requirements, I realized some things I hadn’t thought of before. Like how I had felt like I would be questioned on how American I was, but I never questioned how American my friend was. It took less than a week to write the essay; I had it mostly done for the in-class peer review. That night I took their advice and finished the final draft. When I first started writing, I wanted to get my ideas down on paper, so I ended up doing my body paragraphs first and then my introduction and conclusion.

My favorite part about my essay was how I talked about how the label “illegal alien” brought me back to my elementary school classroom. I felt that it was important to mention how even though along the way I lost some of my roots trying to assimilate to American culture, I still get reminded I don’t reach all the “legal requirements.” These legal blockades exist that prevent me and others like me from feeling like we’re a part of the American community, but we are still here. It is important to remember the “Legal Americans” that are protesting and fighting for our rights because they are showing us how they see us as part of the community even if the government does not.

From the peer review I learned how important a personal anecdote was in an essay like this. One of my group members had a personal anecdote, while the other one didn’t. I felt like I could better understand my peer’s position in their community more with the anecdote. After I received feedback on my work, I decided to revise my introduction. I cut out the extra information and added it where it made more sense along the body paragraphs. If I had more time on this essay, I would’ve loved to include more information about the effects that ICE is having on our communities right now. As somebody who has a family with many immigrants, it’s hard to hear about how worried they are, especially the ones who live in red states. I’ve heard of plans to hide and even just giving up and going back on their own. I would’ve liked to spend some time with my communities to gather my thoughts better on what the community really means for me. I hope that in my writing I get better at talking about my own experiences. This essay opened my eyes to things I hadn’t noticed before, and I want to keep learning more about myself so I can further grow.

I choose to add this video because I saw it a couple days after writing the essay and it made me cry happy tears. As I had written about how I felt alienated in my classroom it’s good to see younger generations of latinos feeling included.

After reading “Ghostland” by Colin Dickey a quote that stood out to me while reading was the line “But what is clear is that history is not just written by the victors; it’s written by the literate”. This quote made me realize how even though black people have won against the awful treatment they experienced back in the day, full responsibility and acknowledgement for their pain and suffering that white people caused will never come. The white people of this time were very vicious, attempting to strip away all humanity from black people. So that they couldn’t feel guilt or compassion for the people they tortured on a daily basis.   

The literate demographic during slavery was mainly white men and who else has a particularly white male demographic? Slave owners. As a literate white man during this time if you were writing on the topic of slavery why would you want to paint your demographic in a bad light? I doubt these writers wanted to paint their fathers, brothers, uncles and grandfathers as horrible monsters even if that’s what they were. So to me in a sense I feel the stripping of humanity from black slaves was meant to put a blindfold on us, to allow us to move on without question and not hold slave owners accountable.

Let’s say a white writer was interested in telling all the truth of what has happened in the south, how would he know what it was like for the slave. Somebody who isn’t a part of the community can only see so much, because even though slave owners were ruthless and proud there is only so much evil they are willing to show the world they are capable of. Most of the horrible hunting stories slaves shared with each other will never be heard, and will most likely remain unknown, what is not unknown is the monster in all those stories.

The song is Get Up, Stand Up By Bob Marley & The Wailers, while I was writing this, this song was playing in my head, especially around 2:12 because of how white colonizers pushed their own religious beliefs onto their slaves and other minorities they came across like the Native Americans.