Third Person Madness

The humble blogger who maintains this site was recently asked by his professor to write an autobiography in Spanish. John was pleased with this because he felt he could handle this, and also the fact that first person verbs are the first ones that all Spanish students learn(Yo estoy, Yo Soy, Yo digo, etc..).

Then, the assignment changed. The professor decided that the assignment would still be a biography of the student, but instead of first person, it would be in the third person. John confided to this writer that he felt a little strange about this. Certainly its not as schitsophrenic as describing yourself in the first person plural, "We are writing a biography about ourselves." or "We felt very strange about this turn of events."

But nevertheless, John struggled with the ideas of trying to define himself as if looking from the outside in. He described it as like losing some inward compass, and finally having to look at yourself as others see you. I started to think that the blogger felt a little lost and insecure at looking at his life through the eyes of others. He could always explain the delays in his dreams, his procrastinations, and the large and small failures in his life through the lens of his good intentions his very typical, yet few personal faults. But without that internal narration that the first person view provides all of us, all of these shortcomings would certainly not be as justifiable through the third person voice. "Don't you see? Speaking of yourself in the first person just seems to justify any mediocrity so much easier", he explained, lifting one eyebrow in that mischevious way we all find so charming about him. This writer believes that John actually fears someone in the world might yet determine he was less than perfect.

But over a cup of John's favorite coffee Henry's Blend(Seattle's Best), (1 Nutrasweet, 1 Sugar-in-the-Raw, Skim milk) in the homey IUSB Cafe, he mused that maybe his reluctance to write about himself in the third person was because it also exposed his own real desire for self-promotion, self-agrandizement. Its a very common, underlying motivation for all bloggers. But not just them, everyone wants to be publicized and celebrated for the individuals that they are. Maybe not with overwhelming fame that takes all privacy, but the idea that everyone knows what is unique about us.

When John considers the two problems of writing a biography in third person, he finally agreed within himself that if he could not change these feelings, he would acknowledge they were real. He told this writer that if he could not overcome this, he would at least not deny that within himself he wanted to promote all the good things about himself to the world, and deny the existence of his failings, delays, and faults.

This seemed to satisfy John, he knew that total transparency to the world was probabally not possible. He also reminded himself it was just one assignment and that he has a tendency to take himself entirely too seriously sometimes...

El 16 de septiembre

This Thursday was Mexico's Independence Day. 194 years ago Father Miguel Hidalgo gave his grito(cry) for independencia. The picture above is from the Mexican muralist Orozco, one of the "Tres Grandes" muralists of México commemorating Father Hidalgo. Check out this link for more information about this part of México's history: Hidalgo Archive

Giving credit where it is due, I found this link on The Daily Texican".

John

Gmail Invitations

I don't know if you have heard about this, but Google has an free e-mail system called Gmail. It is very cool, you have 1 gig of email storage, no popups, and very smart filing and other assorted cutting edge features. I have 5 invitations left.
If you want one, just drop me a line at :

casadejuanito at gmail.com

Thanks

More Diego Rivera

Here's a link to a Power Point presentation I did about Diego Rivera:

"Identidad Mexicana Por los Ojos De Diego Rivera"

It's all in Spanish, a lot of good pictures and some history of the murals of México.

-John

Travel Journal

Those of you who have not read my travel journal to México, look on the sidebar below the archive and I have managed to put all the entries in by date using my meager HTML knowledge.

-Thanks

Back in the Saddle Again..and already a little sore..

Well, school has started again and I am already in the thick of things. I am a student at Indiana University, specifically I attend IUSB-Indiana University at South Bend.

Click Here for a Photo Tour of the Campus
I like most things about going to school. It was really strange at first, and I felt out of place, but now I feel very comfortable. There are a lot of other older students also. I also have to watch myself, so I don't go into old-guy mode and start talking too much or telling stories.

This is my third year going to school, I have about 36 credits. I'm attempting an Associate Degree in Spanish, and may go farther after that. I've done much better than I thought I could, I have been on the Dean's list three times, but I have only just started taking Algebra after 15 years away-we'll see how that goes.

Besides Algebra, I'm also taking Writing Spanish I. I really enjoy this class, if I have any good papers, I'll put up a link.

My least favorite part of school is.......


PARKING..."
There are simply not enough parking places for all of the students. On Wednesday, I had to feed a meter and was 15 minutes late for class, after I payed $30.00 to the school for my parking permit. I normally love irony, but not this time...