Everything Means Nothing If There Isn't Happiness

In the book "Nothing," by Janne Teller, Agnes' class searches for the meaning of everything after Pierre Anthon says that nothing has meaning.  While Pierre sat in a tree hollering at them, her class decided to make a pile of meaning.  Each person would demand something important from someone, such as their shoes, and then that person would demand something from the next person.  However, by the end, they had grave robbed someone's little brother, cut off a finger, killed a dog, and more.  Things just got more gruesome as they went along, and they were all unhappy with their losses.  However, they were only doing this to feel content with themselves that there was actually a meaning to life and the world in general.  I believe that they shouldn't have made themselves miserable.  I think that the true meaning of anything shouldn't be fought over if nobody is happy.  To me enjoying what you have is the most important thing in life.

I think that happiness is more important than stressing over the meaning of everything because of what it led the kids in Agnes' class to do.  Almost every person cried or was miserable after they had to give up something.  For example, Ann Li cried when she had to give up her pet hamster, who ended up dying.  Holy Karl had to go against his religion and steal the statue of Jesus from the Church.  In the end, his parents said he wasn't a good Christian, and the book described him as one who appeared to have lost everything.  Unfortunately, after months os sacrifice and suffering, Pierre said the pile was a bunch of junk!  In fact, they were even going to sell the pile to a museum.  I think that all of those months could have been used for the class to enjoy their childhood.  Instead they saw and did things that were unnecessary and led them to no success.  In conclusion, I think that happiness and enjoying life is way too important to waste.  It is also something you can't put a price on, like they did for their pile.  I just didn't understand why they put so much tears into something that could probably never be answered.  This draws me to the conclusion that happiness is the true meaning of life, and overcomes everything else.

You Decide, When They Believe

Pretties, by Scott Westerfeld is the second book in his series "Uglies."  I the first book, the main character Tally was an ugly, or to us, a normal person.  But in the second book, she was turned pretty in order to test the cure, which takes out the lesions put into her brain during the operation.  However, when Tally finally escaped the city of Pretties, to go back to the Smokies who invented the cure, she had to choose between two boys when a tracking signal went off.  The result of her choice made me realize that if you ever have to pick one or another, you should choose the person who believes in you.

I think this because Tally chose Zane, her boyfriend from New Pretty Town.  The tracker device was in his tooth and couldn't be removed.  The Smokies insisted that they would have to abandon Zane in order to escape the Specials, who would end the Smokies and turn them into dumb Pretties.  Tally had to choose between going with the Smokies and David, her boyfriend from the Smoke, or stay and be captured with Zane.  However, when she said she would stay with Zane, David accused her of doing so just because he was Pretty.  David didn't believe in Tally's real reason (that she loved Zane), which made Tally's decision easier.  She knew that Zane would support her every move, unlike David.  I would have also chosen Zane.  I believe now that you should be with the people who believe in you the most.  What kind of relationship doesn't have mutual support?  In conclusion, I think that the best people are those who believe in and support you.

The Power of Self-Importance

Sad, alone, useless, unimportant.  These are words that you could use to describe how Jobyfelt about himself in the beginning of the short story, “The Drummer Boy of Shiloh,” by Ray Bradbury.  However, words such as self confident, hopeful, and important are words to describe Joby at the end of the story.  This sweet short story brought me to see the true power of self-importance because it is shown while the main character changes throughout the story.  At first he was miserable when he thought he had no importance, but when the General made him realize he did have a reason in this world, Joby seemed like a new and improved person.

When Joby thought that he wasn’t important and was useless to the others around him, he had no hope in himself and was very pessimistic.  For example, he had very little confidence in himself that he’d make it out of the war alive.  For example, the lines, “Me, thought the boy, I got only a drum, two sticks to beat it, and no shield,” and the fact that he thought that the soldiers were all thinking, “’Me, I’m the one, I’m the one of all the rest who won’t die.  I’ll live through it.  I’ll go home.  The band will play.  And I will be there to hear it.’”  These interpretations that the drummer boy made tell me that he felt weak.  Also in the text when the General first approached him, Joby “shut his eyes to hide inside himself,” and was caught off guard crying.  This shows me that he was insecure, frightened and depressed.  If I were him, I would’ve felt the same way, being all alone and scared like that. All together, these pieces of text evidence tell me that before Joby realized his importance, he was miserable.

When Joby was finally told his importance by the army’s General, he became a happier and more self-confident person.  The General said that he was “the heart of the army” and that “if he beat a sure, steady, ever faster rhythm, then, then, their knees would come up in a long line down over that hill, one knee after the other, like a wave on the ocean floor.”  Joby realized his importance of his drum, which he was told “He must keep at it, at it!  Long and steady, steady and long!  Then, even though shot or torn, those wounds got in hot blood-in blood he’d helped stir-would feel less pain.”  This section of the text, “He swallowed.  He wiped his eyes.  He cleared his throat.  He settled himself.  Then, at last, very slowly and firmly he turned the drum so it faced up toward the sky,” make me infer that Joby changed from an insecure boy to the ever so important Drummer Boy of Shiloh.  I think this because, he realized he had no need to cry and be afraid.  The General had told him to be proud of his role in the army.  I wonder how grand I would’ve felt if I were Joby.  Afterall, he was very important.

In conclusion, “The Drummer Boy of Shiloh” has shown me how powerful self-importance is.  It was all the drummer boy needed to feel like he had anything in life to cling on to.  Without it, I felt the worthlessness that he felt and the feelings he had about questioning his life altogether.  This makes me think about the depressed people in our world today.  Maybe they feel the way they do because they think that their life is meaningless.  I hear people talk about hope, but maybe you need something before you can hope.  Maybe you just need someone to tell you that you are important in this world, just like the army General told The Drummer Boy of Shiloh.