Shanna Personal Choice 2 Tweeter

It was a dark and stormy April evening when my mother went in the garage only to be perplexed by a quiet tweet-tweetery sound. She glanced around and there, just inside the garage laying pitifully on the concrete was a bitty baby bird. He would soon be named Tweeter. He was just a fur ball no bigger than a chick. It was a windy night so we figure he must have blown out of his nest. His legs were too long for his tiny body which made walking impossible, much less flying. As he grew he developed puffy eyebrows, brown feathers, and a beige, brown-speckled breast. We found out he is a brown Thrasher, non-migratory, has one of the widest repetoirs of music, and is indistinguishable as to sex. He finally taught himself how to fly, first fluttering his wings as he perched on a moving finger. Soon he lost his eyebrows, gained whiskers around his beak, and was flying all around the house. He no longer had to be fed mushy cat food with tweezers, which is ironically the correct way to feed a baby bird. After we'd had him a month or two and he could fly and eat for himself, we decided to let him go. With tears in our eyes we took the cage on the backporch and opened the door. He hopped out, fluttered around the porch for a while, and went back in his cage. We repeated this every day for a week, at the end of which he finally ventured off the porch. All summer we would let Tweeter out in the afternoon, he would fly into the forest or wherever for hours on end, and before nightfall he would be back in his cage. As it goes he has been with us for a year now, and we still have Tweeter. We learned he is afraid of the dark. We still let him outside and he still returns faithfully every time.

Shanna Personal Choice 1

My favorite part about this class was learning so much about the Appalchian Trail. I never knew at least half of what I know now about the AT. I enjoyed the videos, and tough this might seem like a frivolous detail, I was shocked to see the hikers smoking cigarettes! I imagine a long hike would be just the trick for quitting. I didn't think it would even be possible due to the amount of stress on a hiker's lungs. It is encouraging for me because I smoke, and I would love to hike part of the AT one day. It seems like a very liberating and perhaps life changing experience. The bond among those hiking together must be a very close one indeed to spend that much time together in sometimes extreme and challenging circumstances. I wouldd like to hike the trial to reflect on my dream whcih is to be a writer. I know I cannot just be a writer, unfortunately I have to make money somehow... Oh to be independently wealthy! haha Perhaps a professor is the path for me... Anywho, I think a hike on the AT would provide a wonderful opportunity for me to gather my thoughts, material for subject matter, and write some amazing poetry.

Shanna Lion's Bridge & Poetry

I didn't have time to write much while we were at Lion's Bridge, but I liked this line: "Ivy youth in hidden hollow / As fading footprints bend and follow / The shortest story of every leaf, / a daunted poet's green relief." Poetry has been my past time since I was ten or eleven years old. This simple line might not attest to that, but it's true. It is no coincidence that poets have found so much inspiration in nature over the course of history. Men can build incredible things; ships that cross oceans, skyscrapers, damns... But whereas it takes humans so long to invent and create these things, it takes nature only moments to destroy them. A powerful force not be reckoned with. The creations of man can be impressive, but they will only impress me to an extent, and then comes the natural world. Men take lifetimes learning how to draw perfect circles. Nature forms them everyday from whirling eddies engraving stones, to the centers of daisies. Nature doesn't even have to try, it just happens! That is much more than impressive. Humans must hunt for food or grow it, plants create their food. Animals do not kill for sport or cruelty or vengeance... in a word, they're blameless. Of course, nature can be cruel, but all cruelty has an ultimate purpose which reaches far and beyond those frivolous purposes of man.

Shanna The Place, the Region, and the Commons

Snyder says, "few people today can announce themselves as someone from somewhere" (Snyder 25). This is very true and extremely sad. Being a native of Yorktown may not be extraordinary, but it has been my home for twenty years. Many "lifers" as I call myself, are more than ready to escape this smallish town and see the wide world. I certainly desire to travel and explore, but I believe I will always return to the heart of the home, what Snyder calls the hearth. The forest surrounding my house may be an illusion of sorts, since it is only half a mile from a major highway, but it has captured my heart nonetheless. When Lewis spoke of the two loves in his essay "Likings and Loves for the Subhuman," he mentioned Need-pleasures and Pleasures of Appreciation. I dare to claim both to describe my feelings toward Country Lane, my home. Lewis says Need pleasures "are not hated once we have had them, but they certainly 'die on us' with extraordinary abruptness..." (Lewis, 13). I may not have a physical need for the flora and fauna around my home, but it sure feels good to return after being away. Once I am there and sipping tea in my own backyard, I am contented; after a while I begin to take home for granted again, not understanding how I'll miss it so much if I leave. Of Appreciation pleasures Lewis says they have "not merely gratified our senses in fact but claimed our appreciation by right" (Lewis, 13). People do not realize how large Yorktown is compared to how microscopic it use to be. From a rural, country town considered the "boonies" to one of the top ranking places to live in America, Yorktown has grown significantly. Throughout all of this growth and development, Country lane has been left virtually untouched. This is how it claims my appreciation by right. Being surrounded by bustling commerce and every assorted military base has not effected Country Lane at all. It remains private property, unpaved, and shrouded in watershed not fit for building. A snapshot of times gone by when kids could rollerskate on 17, and the only hangout was the 7/11. It is still the home of several endangered species of newt, toad, and the luckless treehugger worried sick about inevitable "progress."

Shanna The Voice of the Wild

Redick says in his essay Wilderness as Axis Mundi, "The land is acknowledged as having intrinsic value and freed from a system that does not permit it voice" (Redick, 11). Though the Appalachian Trail is the topic of discussion in this essay, wilderness has been granted voice throughout history, and on a worldwide scale. Gary Snyder refers to the voice of the wild in his chapter Good, Wild, Sacred. Snyder talks about visiting the back country of Australia. In Australian lore, dreaming places are those which are ideal for the creatures that inhabit them, and are sometimes thought to be the places of origination for those creatures. He mentions the dreaming place of the green parrot. Wilderness is not only permitted a voice, it tells a story. "The stories will tell of the tracks of the ancestors going across the landscape and stopping at that dreaming place" (Snyder, 85). These stories define the course of Australian lore, and protect the land which provided the inspiration for those stories. These sites are considered sacred, not just to the the natives who value them, but to the creatures who call them home. The sacredness of land from a parrot's point of view holds value. The creature need not be endangered for its home to be protected, a notion unheard of to European inhabitants of America.

Shanna The Liminality of Wilderness, Especially When Lost

The natural world is often the baffling focus of science which tries to categorize it, and systematically tame the wild. This is mere amusing irony to a poetry major who laughs at science everytime nature tosses a kink in its attempts of organization. In his essay Wilderness as Axis Mundi, Redick says "Wilderness becomes symbolically active as a liminal place, a place of ambiguity, a bewildering place where nothing is as it seems because there are no points of orientation," (Redick, 5). Anyone who has been lost in the woods knows this feeling all too well. One path looks familiar, but darkness casts uncertainty on the decision of which path is the correct way home. Nothing is as it seems, or seemed to be in the light of day. One wrong turn leads to another, and soon you're tripping down railroad tracks hoping for the least glimpse of civilization. Dillard describes this overwhelming feeling in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. "What I see sets me swaying. Size and distance and the sudden swelling of meanings confuse me, bowl me over," (Dillard, 29). The size of the forrest, when coupled with the distance you have walked cause confusion. Meaning is tantamount as it hangs on every turn taken. Meaning: the cause for walking in the first place. Wilderness as a place of liminality is made painfully clear while traversing unknown territory, feeling tiny and insignificant when compared to the trees which reign in their natural homes. Paths are created in accordance with the trees, but none point to home. The wind may whisper through them, but the language is foreign and unparalled in wonder.

Shanna Imaginary Wilderness

In this post I will compare the hiker to the writer. Each are free, each rely, each know not what lies ahead. In The Writing Life, Dillard says writing a book is "life at its most free" (Dillard, 555). The hiker is also free to hike where he wants, when he wants to, regardless of circumstance. However, the hiker must rely on signs in nature to warn him of possible dangers ahead. The writer must rely on imagination, ink, and whatever they learned as far as style, grammar, etc. In Wilderness as Axis Mundi, Redick says "A wilderness [is] ... an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain" (Redick, 2). The world of imagination is much like the wilderness then. The imagination is somewhere "untrammeled by man, where man is a visitor who does not remain," though many wish they could. Like the wild, the imagination is different upon every encounter. Perilous at times, imagination can lead to fearful places, ones which can be much more frightening than reality. What lies just over that hill, just beyond that forrest, can be as much of a mystery as what will fill the pages of a blank book. What the end of a journey will hold, or the end of a book, must be left entirely to the imagination.