TED Talk: A Broken Body Isn't a Broken Person

By: Meggie Vail 

The description for this TED Talk is "Cross-country skier Janine Shepherd hoped for an Olympic medal -- until she was hit by a truck during a training ..."

How could I not watch it?

So begins the tale of Janine, an Aussie skier, Olympic hopeful, recovered paraplegic, pilot, and much more. Janine was on a mountainous bike ride with her Olympic training team when the unthinkable happened; she was hit by a speeding truck. She recounts her horrifying injuries, how she broke almost all of the bones in her body, her body was cut open and filled with gravel, leaving a scar that cuts her in half. 

Trapped in the spinal ward, Janine never thought she would do anything she loved again, she would never ski or bike or do any other extreme sports-- she may never even walk. After a while she realized that if she would never ski again she would do something better, she would fly. Janine received her pilot's license and is now certified to fly a commercial aircraft. 

Through her struggles she learned something invaluable. You are not your body. Your body is merely a vessel that contains your spirit. Just because your body is broken does not mean you are broken.

One Reader: Madre

By: Meggie Vail

When I was younger, reading wasn't my thing; I was more interested in movies where things could be handed to me and I didn't have to think. I didn't think that reading could handle all of the ADHD pre-adolescent energy that I had bottled up inside of myself. I accepted it and so did everyone else. Becuse of my extrovert tendencies I started noticing that my mother was a very interesting specimen; an interesting balance of intro and extroversion.

As a teacher, she was expected to be outgoing, fun, and energized, but over long breaks from school she became the mother that I know now: the super reader. I realize now that my mother draws energy from within, only being able to recharge by being secluded and alone for a while. Her preferred method is reading. My mother is one of those all consumed readers, she doesn't just read for a little while, she reads for the whole day. She's also has this absolutely frightening, yet impressive, ability to completely shut out the world. I mean completely. She can't hear squat. I've had entire conversations with my mother without her actually hearing anything I've said. You have to physically touch to get her attention or she won't notice you're talking. It's amazing to see.

The other thing about my mother that I admire is her restraint. She never once pushed me to be a reader. My sister was a reader and I think that my mother sort of accepted that I was going to be a super extrovert like my father and she never pushed me to be anything different. You see some parents these days that make their kids have reading time each day, I just don't understand it. I'm glad that my parents (mother) never pushed me to do anything, if they would have I would've ended up detesting it (refer back to my piano vendetta.)  I was and still am a very free spirited person and when pushed too hard I recoil and refuse to participate. I like to do my own thing. Because I was never pushed to be a reader, or anything else for that matter, I was able to develop my own affinity naturally.

Now I can relate to my mother and I am still inspired by her. I'm inspired by her natural love for reading, her understanding, and her ability to feel for and identify with almost any character. That is a true talent.

Read If You Don't Like to Read

By Laura Zweig

Hey, let’s be honest here: reading’s not for everyone. Some people like to go outdoors and perform some strange activity called “socializing.” Whatever. The point is both are equally acceptable. But say you happen to be in an English class that requires some form of reading, here are a few suggestions to make the process a little less painful.

My Immortal Harry Potter/My Immortal Twilight- These fine specimens of literature are quite possibly the greatest bit of fanfiction ever written. Featuring more spelling errors than a kindergarten’s weekly test and a narrator who can’t seem to remember her character’s names, this “punk” take on popular fiction will completely transform the way you feel about everything. Warning: you may lose faith in humanity halfway through chapter one.

Watchmen- The classic graphic novel is mostly pictures. That’s easy, right? This illustrated epic chronicles the lives of ex-superheroes and the corruption in their dystopian world, asking “who watches the watchmen?” Mind blown. Also pretty pictures.

Power – This literary masterpiece by Linda Hogan will make you reexamine your entire life. Featuring exactly one plot point (spoiler alert: the wolf dies), this book allows you to pretend to read for hundreds of pages without actually having to absorb anything. Win-win!

Modelland- Tyra Bank’s latest contribution to the world is this bit of young adult literature intended to inspire us all to reach our full photographic potential. The synopsis reads: “A young, awkward looking girl by the name of Tookie De La Crème is invited to attend the legendary Modelland for the chance to become an Intoxibella. Along the way she meets a plus-sized girl named Dylan, a 4'7" girl named Shiraz, and an albino girl named Piper. Together they form a strong bond as they face the trials and tribulations of Modelland.” Everyone can relate to this tale of self-discovery, particularly if you have a name that isn’t actually a name and you’re talented in the art of smizing (smiling with one’s eyes). Get your copy now so you can say you read it before it won the Pulitzer.

Any Book on Tape- If you can’t stand to read or maybe you just never learned how, stop by your local library and pick up a book on tape. Then locate a tape player. Realize you no longer own one. Drive back to the library and get a CD. Now that you’ve finally got your story, press play and let the narrator’s voice lull you into a place of perfect serenity. Please don’t fall asleep while listening. It’s rude. 

On the eShelf: Hoosier Daddy

By Laura Zweig

“We’ve got banners on the wall. This is how we ball. Talkin’ bout the hoo-hoo-hoosiers.”

                Indiana basketball is a time-honored tradition that has been memorialized in many a fan song or critically-acclaimed film. Grantland’s article takes a look at this year’s team, which is currently posed to take the championship as it is ranked number one in the nation. The story profiles the team’s coach Tom Crean, detailing his illustrious affair with basketball, culminating with his tenure with the cream and crimson in Bloomington. The story encapsulates what it means to be a Hoosier, whether it is a player on the court or a fan in the stands, and the importance of tradition. He says, “"You can forget about the tradition. You can lose track of the history. You can lose culture. We lost culture. We never lost the tradition. If we'd lost the tradition, we wouldn't have this. We did lose the culture and that's where the former players had to come back and help us get that, and they did. But you can't lose the tradition. It's always there."

Article can be found here: http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/8703897/tom-crean-indiana-basketball-tradition

My Literary Hero: Kathryn Stockett

By Morgan Scherrer

My Literary Hero

                Describing the ruff and scary life as an African American maid in Jackson, Mississippi around the 1960s era when the country was still extremely racial could be hard and somewhat of a touchy subject, but  Kathryn Stockett is able to make it seem easy to write about.  Kathryn was born in Jackson Mississippi as well.  The book is not an autobiography about her life but she does add her personality and opinions carefully into the novel.  The Character Skeeter attends college and graduates from the University of Mississippi with a degree, like wise Kathryn graduates from Alabama University with a degree in English and Creative Writing.  In this time not many women graduate college let alone go to college.  Skeeter is different she wants to follow her dreams and become a journalist or an author, she does not want to do what white women her age were supposed to do and that was stay home and pretend to take care of the kids and do all the house chores while the husband was at work making money, while in reality you have a maid come over and doing everything for you, while you sit and chat with all your friends who are doing the exact same thing. 

The maids were treated terribly and they received little to what they deserved.  Skeeter enjoyed to be around the maids and wanted to write an article that interviewed the maids and their opinions about their life.  In the end of the book Skeeter ends up writing a book about all that she learned from her interviews.  Kathryn stated “in 1970s Mississippi I didn’t have a single black friend or black neighbor.  Yet one of the closest people to me was Demetrie, out family’s black housekeeper.”  She loved Demetrie and she knew that the way that the maids were treated was wrong.  Kathryn is able to bring across the attention to the United States about how brutal the lives of these maids were. 

The tone is set in the novel as they would have spoken in the 1960s in Jackson, with not so proper English and a lot of “yalls” and southern accents.  Kathryn inspires me because she wrote about something that is not easy to write about.  She is able to bring back a horrible and sad time for African Americans in a classy and educational way.  The book is by no means a historical novel, there are some references but for the most part the books is fun loving and tells a lot about what life was really like.

On the eShelf: The Science and Art of Listening

By Morgan Scherrer

The Science and Art of Listening

After reading the Long article about not just hearing sounds but listening, it is amazing to know the complete difference between the two.   Sitting causally in a room in your house you might hear a dog bark or a car go by maybe the hmmmmm sound of the computer running.  When you actually listen to the sounds there is more to it than just noise, for example your dog doesn’t bark just to bark they have a reason behind their barking.  They could be saying they are hungry or want to go outside, maybe there is a rabbit that they are ready to pounce on at any second.   Next time you are bored out of your mind and sitting at home listen to the sounds that are happening around you, not just the noise itself, and comprehend what is going on.

This article is found at http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/11/opinion/sunday/why-listening-is-so-much-more-than-hearing.html?_r=1&

Book Review: Beautiful Creatures

By Meggie Vail

     At 563 pages, Beautiful Creatures is a brick. They're not short pages either, mind you. Written by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, this is a tale made for lovers of the Twilight Saga. This epic centers on a small town teenage boy, Ethan, living in Gatlin, South Carolina. Like any small town boy with a superiority complex, a dead historian mom, recluse writer dad, and an elderly voodoo-master-housekeeper-pseudo-grandma, he's just ready to bust out and explore a world that is far more intelligent and interesting than Gatlin. Everyone in Gatlin is hypercritical, disapproving, and dripping with an off-tasting, artificially flavored dumb-Southerner typecast. Imagine a town filled with nitpicking, brownie making, Chrysler minivan driving soccer moms congregating at the Baptist church for book burnings and video game protests. This is Gatlin. 
     Garcia and Stohl put no effort into developing any characters, not even the main characters are well developed. Ethan’s bored out of his oversized skull until suddenly, the girl of his (literal) dreams, Lena, appears in a hearse (because the Oscar Meyer Weiner mobile had already been rented) beginning a whirlwind, star-crossed romance filled with a forbidden love at first sight, stereotypes, dead parents, the Civil War and magic (obviously). 
     As we would expect, Lena is unrealistically ostracized by the angry villagers of Gatlin because she doesn't fit in. Spoiler-but-actually-not-a-spoiler-alert, Lena is a witch or “Caster” who has a special telepathic connection with Ethan that no one can explain and they take mini-vacations to battles in the Civil War. Lena also smells like rosemary and lemons, which apparently is a very appealing scent, even when you’re not a chicken. My favorite part was when they spent five pages talking about how they couldn’t be together because she was too dangerous, but he was so in love with her that he couldn’t stay away. Sound like Twilight yet? 
     I picked this baby up because I heard it's going to be a movie with Jeremy Irons and Viola Davis and the trailer looked interesting. I need to find my receipt. This book is about 300 pages too long and is horrifically unoriginal and repetitive. For your own safety I suggest you avoid it, unless you're into Ulysses sized novels about supernatural star-crossed lovers, chicken perfume, and impending doom. If this sounds like you, you can have my copy.

(Cough, cough, Twilight)