The Finale

In spite of all that I may have objected to about this class, I really do think that I'll miss it. We really had a great group of people, and David did a fine job of encouraging a friendly sharing of ideas and experiences. It is not often that students at a University as large as this can discover such a intimate and convivial atmosphere in their classes, and this semester has been a pleasant shift away from the norm. I'd like to give my thanks to everyone and to wish you all a great summer.
The Low-Flow has officially become the No-Flow.

Best,

Jean Paul Jean Paul.

The Hits

I've wanted to include in some way the contents of this blog in my final portfolio. I have decided to to this by creating a separate Blog Page in which I pick out say seven or eight of my favorite blog posts, and reprint them. To each entry I will add two or three paragraphs embellishing on what I had written. I understand that for me my blog served more as blank canvas onto which I could just through random, raw ideas. This page gives me a chance to expand on those ideas and explain where I was coming from in greater detail. I'm sure that I will also find many places where I disagree with what I had written earlier and I will then be able to further demonstrate the growth and evolution of my way of thinking. I think I will call it "The Low-Flow Shower Head's Greatest Hits".

The Style

Hopefully this final project will emerge, stylistically, as one of the best pieces that I have written. I noticed that certain aspects of my writing style have been objected to in both the proposal and the progress report. They are duly noted, but the way I write is the way I write. Nevertheless, my goal for this, and most any other writing, is to illustrate my argument, topic and message with my words. That has always been the most enjoyable, rewarding and challenging part of writing. It is how I place my own personal mark on my writing and as a result I have a certain attachment to that style. I want to bring Fenway to life with this project, not merely restate facts and observations. That to me is what interesting writing is about. I wish I were Bruce Springsteen. Nobody paints with words like he does.

The Work

I'm happy with the where my project is at right now. A main area of consideration left unsettled is the incorporation of my service work into my final essay. I know I won'y be able to make the fit as perfect and as seamless as possible but I nevertheless feel that my strive to experience community in nature is both relevent and supportive of the picture that I endeavor to paint.

The Format

The four step model that was given for our final reports is helpful because it gives an idea as to the general questions that we ought to answer. This feature was something I found quite helpful. While it is true that this format sheds some light on a method for structuring our essay, its true value lies in the sense of direction that it affords us. I feel far less confused knowing that the various portions of my essay are meant to answer "what is?", "what next?", etc. I know that I have plenty to answer each with.

Drafts

I'm hoping that the reading I'm doing can help me furnish some kind of draft for next week. I'm reading a lot about the place of baseball in history, in American cultural heritage. What it's looking like now is that I could start putting together something of a draft of the introduction for my main essay. The notion of inherited cultural legacy is something that keeps popping up again and again. It points to a sense of cultural continuity as a way for meaning to be attached to a particular place. I'm not yet sure that I'm ready to say that that idea subsumes all the other things I want to write my final project about but, I do think that it is a forceful notion that has a lot to do with why Fenway Park is so significant.

Thanks Dave

The conference was really helpful in that it made clear the connection between the book I am reading and my project. In fact it was precicely the sort of connection I wanted to discover, and now I feel that a few of my sources are actually more relevant than I originally thought they were. I certainly left feeling much more confident about how everything is going to fit together.

Conferences

I'm planning on getting some good piece of writing for the conference. I've been reading some books and stuff. Good stuff. I'm counting this as my free meaningless blog post. Impasse, but at least not hungover.

The Hangover

I still find myelf confused about the reflective essay and exactly what it is that I'm supposed to write it about. I get the part about looking back on what it is that we have learned but not how much it is to focus on what I learned about my topic, over and against what I thought prior to taking the course as opposed discussing some metaphysical meaning of the words "learning" or "knowledge".

The Topic

What I love most about my topic is how "unacademic" it is. I'm writing about a game when there are certainly many more serious topics to look at. In the beginning it was kind of intimidating to be honest. I was in a way happy to do my presentation on the first day because I was afraid that after seeing everyone else present, people wouldn't take mine seriously. I think that such apprehensions were helpful though because a project based soley around the topic of Fenway Park and the game that is played inside of it, would fail to elicit a feeling of importance in a significant protion of my audience. A lot of people just don't care about baseball. So I made a stronger effort to incorporarte the historical, sociological and cultural aspects of Fenway. This way I think my project can engage the interests of many, for history, society and culture are sort of common denominators for most people.

The Pitch

Red Sox pitcher and Japanese phenom Daisuke Matsuzaka makes his first start at Fenway on Wednesday. It's amazing to see how important he is to Japanese popular culture. Hordes upon hordes of Japanese media personnel have descended upon Boston, scrutinizing every game, every pitch, practically every move this man makes. The popularity of the Boston Red Sox has taken on an international aspect and the benefits the team expects to derive from Dice-K's celebrity appears likely to offset the $100,000,000 they paid to secure his services. I think this could be yet another angle from which to look at my project. I think it would be interesting to look at a potential international significance for Fenway. Incidentally, all Matsuzaka's starts will be televised in Japan.

The Opening

The Red Sox have their home opener on Wed. night and I was able to jot down a few player opinions (especially first year Red Sox players) about why taking the field at Fenway has such a singular feel to it. I saw mostly the answers that I predicted: citing the history, the intensity, the nostalgia.. etc. Unfortunately pro baseball players aren't payed millions of dollars because they can articualte clearly or eloquently. Still it would be really nice to get something insightful, as seen from a player's perspective becuase I want this project to take on a wholistic approach, not relying exclusively on what fans and writers have to say. The players expericene a Fenway in way nobody else gets to and it's not a point of view that I can just ignore.

The Outdoors

Now that the weather is getting warmer I looking to get the majority of my service hours in. I was unwilling to work outside in the cold. The connection between my service work and my portfolio topic is one aspect that seems a little bit fuzzy right now so I hope that I have many enjoyable and thought-provocing hours to look forward to. As it stands right now, I'm not too sure where and how I'm going to incorporate the volunteer aspect in, but I know that that will all become clearer to me as I collect some first-hand experience.

The Spring Cleaning

Too hard to work on this shit over break. Too much baseball to watch. So I said to myself: wait isn't watching baseball kinda like working on a baseball-related project? I've found a pretext for slacking off.
Somethings never change: after Opening Day, people still don't go to Brewer games..... Sad.

Racism Discussion

I thought that the piece we read on white privilage was quite thought provocing. I really didn't know what to say or add because there was just such a rush of thoughts and feelings that my mind was just overwhelmed. I guess I never really thought about all the ways in which my skin color can make everyday living easier. Whether the things she said were more rooted in economics than in race I'm not quite sure, most likely they are ultimately connected. It's hard to know what is to be done. Many of the observations she noted were of things that happen almost subconsciously and unintentionally like seeing lots of music "of my race" at the record store. The first thing that comes to mind is that we can only try and control the things we intend to do. I think that a lot of the things that we enjoy, allegedly because we are white people, are not ones that we should feel guilty for.

Facts and Reason

I thought the matter that the book addressed about our society's bias towards fact in argument was very intreguing. It is not something that I had ever thought of before or ever thought to look for. Upon reflection I guess I can see, from a psychological standpoint, why that may be the case. Nobody is claiming that we currently have a tendency to just point to some number, law or graph an subsequently say that the case is closed, rather I think that this bias manifests itself in our feeling of security that comes out of having our claims backed up by something ostensibly indisputible and objective.

Class Discussion

It was great to see how the questions that were taken from the readings elicitied such an enthusiatic discussion. The free exchange of ideas really took on a life of its own and led to some compelling debates. I was worried that the questions that I posed to the class would only evoke responses of feigned interest or care, but people really got into it. I am happy to have been given this opportunity for involvement because it was a pleasnat break from normal class routine.

The Advice

Having someone else hear how my project is going and giving suggestions was most helpful. What I appreciated most about Wednesday's class was how I was able to both receive and offer practical suggestions regarding areas of difficulty. I feel like the hardest in getting a project started is making the transition from a broad, abstract, loosely defined idea to the actuall empirical implementation of that idea because there are always so many directions you can go in to give substance to the form provided by the project goal. For me, while it is nice to have a general outline of subtopics for how the project will be divided up, it really makes it no easier to decide in what manner those first concrete steps ought to be taken. There seem to be a million different angles from which to look at the cultural, linguistic, historical and personal significance of Fenway, and the in class workshop really helped to ease the confusion. I was able to get some really interesting suggestions.

The People

I have been very pleased so far with the print sources that I have found. One is a book that I read a few years ago and thouroughly enjoyed, and it works so well for my project because it contains many personal accounts and memoirs. This is great because that's the kind of evidence that I want to underscore my arguments the most and since there really aren't many Red Sox fans here in Madison that have such deep personal histories at Fenway and describe them as artfully as those in literature can, this is the best I can hope for.

The Evidence

The chapter on collecting evidence brings to light the a current challenge for my project. Most of the facts I offered in my presentation were just little bits of information that I learned long ago and have never forgotten, other declarative points came from my own observations and personal experience. Ideally my project would be supported by more evidence of that nature but sadly mine is not a topic that I can readily research personally. Nevertheless, given what I have notice thus far, the pool of secondary evidence form which to draw from is nothing to complain about. Fenway has a rich literary history but still it would be nice to be able to experiecne personally my topic while I'm researching it. Maybe I should have thought about that earlier.......damn.

The Report

I feel that it will be a good idea for me to write up a progress report. I never used to do any of these intermediate steps in writing. At the beginning I was quite incredulous about whether or not they were worth the time, but thus far I have been pleasantly surprised about how helpful they have been. The proposal and the drafts were useful and the proposal gave me a good opportunity to solidify the direction of mt project at an early date.

The Presentation (Part 2)

I'm really impressed by everyone's presentations. They are all so well prepared, much more so than mine was. People are able to just get up there and talk, without much hesitation or uncertainty. People definately have put a lot of time into these and their preformance reflects that.

The Presentation

The presentation wasn't as stressful as I thought it would be. Having a slide show made it easier, I didn't really have to memorize the exact layout for what I was going to talk about because I could just address what was written on each slide and just go from personal knowledge. Sitting down, with the lights off and having people watching a screen rather than me didn't hurt either. It didn't have the feeling that comes with standing in front of a bunch of people and giving a speech. That I was quite thankful for.

The Computer

I am terribly inept with anything to do with remotely complicated computer stuff. I excell at Word and Facebook, but with things like PowerPoint, coincidentally, well, I suck, to put it succinctly. Despite having what I feel to be quality ideas, I wish myself the best of luck in pulling off this presentation. I appologize in advance for what is sure to be shitty attempt to make my 10-12 minutes worth anyone's time. All of this in spite of my most noble efforts, kind of tragic.


"She's got a little Marisa Tomei thing going on"
-"Ah. Too bad you've got a little George Costanza thing going on"

The Proposal

I felt my ideas really came together well when composing the proposal. It helped having the drafts to look at as a starting point if nothing else. There wasn't that pressure that I normally feel when I have to write a whole paper with nothing to look at. I basically felt I could start the proposal feeling confident that I already had nearly half of it done. There were plenty of ideas that I liked from the draft and I carried them over onto the proposal. All in all, I felt that my proposal was well written, in terms of style and somewhat in terms of structure. I could have gotten into the actual resarch a little more, but there is plenty of time for that

The Discussion

Friday's discussion was quite interesting in that it really brought to light the importance and sensitivity of language. It really is amazing how so much can hinge on the way something is worded or labeled. The boundary between what is acceptable and what is not is clearly quite sensitive and when transgressed, society appears considerably unforgiving. The task of naming, labeling and articulating is a precarious one indeed

The Draft

Writting the first draft of my proposal ostensibly seems more helpful than I first thought that it would. Normally I elect to forego the intermediate steps in writting, leaving only the haphazzard outlining/prewritting and of course the final draft. After writing those brief few pages, however it does seem helpful to have ideas already formulated into prose and with plenty of time to revise them.

The Community

I can't seem to get away from the theme of community when I ask myself about what it is about Fenway that comes to mind as the most salient theme. When I went there, I could certainly sense a communal aspect. This is a place where 40,000 plus people congregate at least 81 times a year and engage in a tacit understanding that they share a common belonging. It is a sort of community that seemed to transform me, if only for a little while, and brought me out of my self-seeking state of mind and into consciousness of something greater. Togetherness, belonging and community are things the excitemet of Fenway Park are deeply rooted in.

Kramer:"There are no delicatessens under communism."
Mickey: "Woah, why not?"
Kramer:"Well, because the meats are divided into a class system. You've got pastrami and corned beef in one class and salami and bologna in another. That's not right."
Mickey:"So you can't get corned beef?"
Kramer:"Well, you know, if you're in the Politburo, maybe."

The Park

Untill most recently I found myself considerably frustrated by the ambiguous manner in which we were instructed to approach the semester project. Luckily after meeting with David, I was able to discern some semblence of clarity regarding some appropriate means. I spontaneously mentioned my affinity for baseball and the Boston Red Sox ans he and I mutually agreed that it might be quite intersting and rewarding if I were to write about Boston's Fenway Park given that it is place that posesses great importance for thousands of people. For me it evokes many profound and intimate emotions, and I would love to look into the metaphysical profundity that makes Fenway so much more than just a building. I believe that it has, in some way, a quasi-spiritual aspect to it that is capable of leaving indelible and magical impacts in the people who visit it.


Newman: June 14, 1987.... Mets Phillies. We're enjoying a beautiful afternoon in the right field stands when a crucial Hernandez error gave way to a five run Phillies ninth. Cost the Mets the game.
Kramer: Our day was ruined. There was a lot of people, you know, they were waiting by the player's parking lot. Now we're coming down the ramp... Newman was in front of me. Keith was coming toward us, as he passes Newman turns and says, "Nice game pretty boy." Keith continued past us up the ramp.
Newman: A second later, something happened that changed us in a deep and profound way front that day forward.
Elaine: What was it?
Kramer: He spit on us.... and I screamed out, "I'm hit!"
Newman: Then I turned and the spit ricochet of him and it hit me

the flow

I've tried writing stuff like this before, journals and the like, but I always end up without anything to say that arises out of spontaneity. Eventually, regardless of how hard I apply myself, I end up with either nothing to say that is really helpful, genuine or important. Rather everything comes out contrived, like a chore, a response to an obligatory need to fill space.

"What's the matter?"
"There's no water pressure, I can't get the shampoo out. If I don't have a good shower, I'm not myself. I feel weak and ineffectual. I'm not Kramer."