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InLovingMemory 10 - 28 Mar 2012 - Main.SkylarPolansky
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| | In Loving Memory
I walked into Print Services in the basement of Columbia’s Journalism School to see my dad, as I usually do after classes and before going home. Instead of the usual cheerful dispositions, I was met with a melancholy so overwhelming that, without reason, my eyes watered. I asked what had happened. My dad replied: “He said he was stressed but no one listened. John died this morning.” | | |
-- ArleneOrtizLeytte - 28 Mar 2012 | |
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< | Lissette - If you would like help reading your father's union contract I would be happy to help. | >
> | Lissette - I would be happy to help you read your father's union contract. | | | | |
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< | Arlene - I think that you are definitely on to something when you said that forgetting our fears enables us to develop a lack of empathy and compassion. The feeling of fear is uncomfortable. As animals we either fight or take flight in response. For me, taking flight often appears as the easier path, because the prospect of fighting and failing at the end is terrifying. Tharaud was an interesting character for me to read because Tharaud chose to fight against an injustice she perceived in the world of employment, yet is nearing the end of her career and did not fully accomplish her goal. By reading Tharaud I was able to delve into the consciousness of one of my greatest fears - fighting and failing. Tharaud seemed more at peace with herself than Cerriere. She appeared to appreciate the subtle beauty of her surroundings more than Cerriere (or at least more than the narrator let us see) - Tharaud noticed the irony of the poster on the wall in Ying's listing workers rights, juxtaposed with the Ying's waitress who probably did not know her worker's rights, Tharaud takes is aware of her surroundings and the history of the changing landscape of lower Manhattan. She might not have accomplished her goal but her eyes are still wide open. | >
> | Arlene - I think that you are definitely on to something when you said that forgetting our fears enables us to develop a lack of empathy and compassion. I think this process is exemplified by the narrator's articulation of his response to the discovery Bartleby has been living in his office (in Bartleby, The Scrivener) - "My first emotions had been those of pure melancholy and sincerest pity; but just in prportion as the forlornness of Bartleby grew and grew to my imagination, did that same melancholy merge into fear, that pity into repulsion. So true it is, and so terrible too, that up to a certain point the thought or sight of misery enlists our best affections; but, in certain special cases, beyond that point it does not."
A feeling of pity can quickly trigger a feeling of fear (perhaps a fear that we too, could be in the same situation as the person we are pitying). The feeling of fear is uncomfortable. As animals we either fight or take flight in response. For me, taking flight often appears as the easier path, because the prospect of fighting and failing at the end is terrifying. Tharaud was an interesting character for me to read because Tharaud chose to fight against an injustice she perceived in the world of employment, yet is nearing the end of her career and did not fully accomplish her goal. By reading Tharaud I was able to delve into the consciousness of one of my greatest fears - fighting and failing. Tharaud seemed more at peace with herself than Cerriere. She appeared to appreciate the subtle beauty of her surroundings more than Cerriere (or at least more than the narrator let us see) - Tharaud noticed the irony of the poster on the wall in Ying's listing workers rights, juxtaposed with the Ying's waitress who probably did not know her worker's rights, Tharaud takes is aware of her surroundings and the history of the changing landscape of lower Manhattan. She might not have accomplished her goal but her eyes are still wide open. | | | Because the process of fighting and failing is what scares me, and I think is partially what inhibits me from fighting, I know I need to familiarize myself with this feeling, become comfortable with it so that I don't flee from it. I think in order to stop the process of encountering fear and pretending it's not there/forgetting about it, we need to recognize what particularly about that fear is making us feel uncomfortable. Once we recognize what it is that makes us uncomfortable we will be closer to trying to fix it, and thus closer to re-establishing our sense of empathy. |
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