My Childhood Memories: Men We Reaped By Jesmyn Ward

In the book There Are No Children Here written by Alex Kotlowitz, Lafeyette is sitting on the living room couch with his mother LaJoe. He is concerned for his mother over the recent loss of her public aid assistance. The children’s father, Paul, who does not live with them, had used their home as his permanent residence. This caused a red flag with the Public Aid Department for LaJoe receiving assistance. After she explains their current situation, along with the reason for loosing public aid, his reply back to his mother is “to put them out, all of them”. In his statement, he is referring to his father and his older sister. His mother does not have the heart to put anyone out on the streets for fear of what the street life will do to them.

Through my understanding of the book, Homeward Bound by Elaine Tyler May explores two traditional depictions of the 1950s, namely suburban domesticity and anticommunism. She intertwines both historical events into a captivating argument. Throughout the book, May aims to discover why “Post-war Americans accepted parenting as well as marriage with so much zeal” unlike their own parents and children. Her findings are that the “cold war ideology and domestic revival” were somewhat linked together. She saw “domestic containment” as an outgrowth of frights and desires that bloomed after the war. However, psychotherapeutic services were as much a boom then as now, and helped offer “private and personal solutions to social problems.” May reflects her views on the origin of domestic containment, and how it affected the lives of people who tried to live by it.

In Barbara Carey’s poem “Returning to the World,” a girl tries to get away from her troubles by isolating herself on the fire escape. The poem teaches us that in order for a person to understand their problems and become courageous, they must take a break from everything around them. Carey uses metaphor, imagery and personification to express this idea.

My mother, Lisa Dawn Hicks Kern, was born at Wadley Regional Medical Center, Texarkana, TX, on Sunday, June 15, 1969. Her father, James Kenneth Hicks, was 28 at the time of my mother’s birth; he was employed at Red River Army Depot as an electrical engineer. Her mother, Sharon Lee Clark Hicks, was 25 when my mother was born, at the time she was the home maker. My mother had an older sister who was a four year old toddler at the time of my mother’s birth. Kimberly Ann Hicks was born at Wadley Regional Medical Center, Texarkana, TX, on Monday, August 30, 1965.

In Danielle Allen’s essay, Our Declaration, she argues that all people should understand and recognize that the Declaration gives all people in the United States the undeniable freedom to self-govern. One person has the power to change the government; although this is not specifically stated, the freedom to self-govern implies every voice matters. She guides the reader to this idea by using simple and easy to follow examples to show the reader that they have the power to invoke a change the government. Allen also uses credible sources in order to give her reasoning credibility as well as using arguments that elicit an emotional connection.

Stephanie Coontz is a teacher, historian, author and a scholar activist. She has also very indulged in the world of public debate on families, this mostly due possible because of her extensive skills to study modern families as well as historical patterns. In her book The Way We Never Were, Coontz presents a historical look at the family and how it has changed over time. Her interest in the subject comes for her need to understand how families functioned in the past and present, and what lead to notion and definition of family nowadays.

In the past couple of weeks, there have been a string of sexual assault allegations against several famous and powerful men. While going through the details of these allegations, I began noticing a distinct pattern, these men have been committing their crimes for years. How they were able to commit their crimes for years, decades even, unscathed was no accident. Why is it so hard for women to be believed and listened to when they speak about the abuse that they have experienced at the hands of men? And how can we move towards true equality between men and women?

In Meredith Small’s article Our Babies, Ourselves she focuses on people’s social and psychological development through examining the different cultural aspects of raising a child. During this process she compares the American perspective of treating babies, to those of the Gusii and the Dutch. Throughout her examination many points are made that I believe can give the reader’s a valuable understanding of the impact of different means of parenthood on a child’s future development.

When I was only four years old, my life changed forever. It was the year I moved to North Carolina. My dad’s friend got him a job opportunity that he simply couldn’t give up. So, he quit his job and found a nice rental house to live in. I had moved before but I don’t remember. I moved from Indiana to North Carolina with my brother my cat and my parents. When I moved to North Carolina, I was aware of what was happening, but I never realized how different everything would be. The house we moved into we only lived in for a year, but it was a pretty hectic year.

I grew up a happy child. Like other kids, I was care-free, innocent and untroubled. I was impulsive; I couldn’t stand being inside the house for a long time. I played with a lot of my neighbors who were my age and I would enjoy every second of it. As a kid, I also grew up traveling a lot. My parents were fond of leaving the country to visit my cousins, uncles & aunts, and other beloved relatives living in the other side of the world.

The poem “Mothers and Daughters” is written by Pat Mora. Pat Mora is a contemporary award winning writer, who writes for children, youngsters and adults. She was born in El Paso, TX in the year 1942. She attains a title of a Hispanic writer; however, the most of her poems are in English. In her literary work, one can observe the different aspects of the immigrants’ lives such as language issues, family relationships, immigrants’ experiences and cultural differences (1187).

A friend of Charles and Nell Vyse, the artist William Stott 14 had lately leased one of the Cheyne Row studios, and not long after settling in he proposed that he should paint a conversation piece, depicting both the Vyses at work in their studio. Titled The Revivalists by Stott, the painting completed by 1921, and exhibited by him at the Royal Academy (RA 17) in the same year. It was an opportune advertising coup for the Vyses, as Vyse was showing two figurative works in the same exhibition. The following year when The Illustrated London News reproduced Stott’s painting, The Revivalists (Fig. 42), the Vyses found that they had gained a kind of fame. After some ninety years, the painting is an instructive piece of evidence documenting

Growing up, I never moved houses, I’ve always lived in the same neighborhood with the same neighbor since I was born. Though, my house was never home, the world was. Every summer, we would travel to a different country for up to 2 months at one point, and given that my birthday is in the summer, I always spent it in a different place than the last. My earliest memory of one of these travels is to Guatemala when I was 7 and I celebrated my birthday with my family and the locals deep in the forest. Then when I was 10, I spent my birthday on a sleeper train while traveling across China followed by special Chinese deserts later in a local restaurant. I began to call the friends I made but could sometimes barely understand my family, and included

As a child, my environment changed a few times. I was born in the United States but my parents were hispanic so I lived in Mexico up until I was around six. It was a cozy atmosphere back then since violence wasn’t a prominent thing ten years ago. As soon as my sister was on her way however, my parents decided to move us officially to America. It was not bad at all in Mexico and it definitely shows in pictures and videos that I was a very happy child even if I don’t fully remember most of it. Once in the United States, however, a lot changed. I’ve always been a positive person by nature 98% of the time, so moving at first wasn’t something bad. I was very happy with where we lived and how our house looked, but the actual going to school and making

‘All The Bright Places’ is a story about love and depression, where a boy, Finch, helps Violet find the will to live, while he has trouble keeping his head above water. My family has gone through the stress, anger and sadness of depression, too: my cousin, Mitch, committed suicide by hanging himself. Although it has been two years, the pain has still not completely gone away.