Soapbox

I haven't posted on this blog in over a year. In fact, I only ever posted once. Here comes number two.

I am writing a feminist analysis of a short story called The Story of an Hour, by Kate Chopin. In the story, a young woman is informed of the death of her husband. After crying for a few minutes, she locks herself in her room and is overcome by the joy of finally being "free". This line from the story demonstrates her feelings:

"There would be no one to live for her during those coming years; she would live for herself. There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature. A kind intention or a cruel intention made the act seem no less a crime as she looked upon it in that brief moment of illumination. And yet she had loved him-sometimes. Often she had not. What did it matter! What could love, the unsolved mystery, count for in the face of this possession of self-assertion which she suddenly recognized as the strongest impulse of her being!"

Normally, I would assume that the relationship had been abusive in some way, or that the man had treated his wife as an inferior, or limited her. The author, however, is very careful to explain that such was not the case. The narrator tells us, speaking of the new widow,

"She knew that she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death; the face that had never looked save with love upon her, fixed and gray and dead. But she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome."

This philosophy is at the heart of the disintegration of the family institution. To live alone, to live for oneself, to prize above all else the liberty of self assertion, is to remain forever below one's potential. This lust for autonomy, for a life independent of all other beings is akin to the other animal instincts of our fallen nature. It is comfortable, intoxicating, and is an incubator to self-absorption. To live in such a state is to leave our natural weakness and mediocrity unchallenged. It is the weak way, the path of least resistance. This belief, that ultimate freedom comes in undoing the ties of commitment that bind us to others, arouses and excites man’s most base nature and damns his up-reaching spirit. It smothers the divine.

There's my soapbox. 

Until next year.

Becoming carefully modern

On the plane from Puebla, Mexico to Houston, Texas you can't see the border. When you are up that high, there is no notable difference in the landscape below, much less in the surrounding clouds. However, when we landed in Houston, one of the first differences I noticed was the space age looking devices in everybodys hands. At first I was sure that they were some sort of x-ray machine, but soon found out they had names like "iphone" and "ipod touch". I vaguely remember hearing about them before my mission, but they were more on the level of newly released and still sort of secret military technology. Now they are as commonly found in peoples pockets as lint.

The world has changed quite a bit since I left the States 2 years ago. I have received an email telling me that my grandmother would like to add me as a friend on facebook. I seem to remember facebook as a community of highschool and college age young people. Now my grandma is adding me? Anyway, I've been home for two and a half weeks now, and have been resisting the technology wave as much as possible. I've tried to call people rather than text them etc... However, as one who highly values keeping a journal, I can't ignore the benefits and advantages of having a blog. I will still keep up my written journal, and still really trust more in paper (it doesn't ever crash).
So this is the beginning. The beginning of my blogging. Welcome, and don't get too bored.