Marrying Absurd

What can you get for just five dollars?  You could get some candy bars, a gallon of gas, or even a classic five dollar foot-long from Subway (Eat Fresh).  According to Joan Didion, you could also get married!  In her essay, "Marrying Absurd," Didion mocks the wedding industry in Las Vegas and shows the meaninglessness of such weddings.

"There are nineteen such wedding chapels in Las Vegas, intensely competitive, each offering better, faster, and, by implication, more sincere services than the next" (102-103)  Didion's description of these chapels makes them appear to be similar to a fast food restaurant or a car service store, which also advertise that they are " the best and fastest service out there!"  Through this mocking diction, Didion shows that the marriages in Las Vegas are meaningless.  In addition, while describing the process of the marriages in Las Vegas, Didion writes, "One bride out, another in, and again the sign goes up on the chapel door:  'One moment please- Wedding'" (103).  These descriptions make act of marriage seem as important and special as buying a sandwich or going to the doctor's office.  This allows Didion to mock the business as a whole and to convey a condescending tone.

Marrying someone is a very big deal.  It is promising that you will always love and support the person you are marrying; that no matter what happens, you will go through it together.  When this is compared to the "better and faster" Las Vegas weddings, the powerful bond that marriage creates becomes absolutely insignificant.

Arm Wrestling with My Father

"Arm Wrestling with My Father," by Brad Manning, recounts the tale of Manning's relationship with his father.  Through physical means, Manning and his father are able to "communicate" to each other with emotions.  When Manning is a child, he is unable to beat his father; however, he grows older, strong, and smarter, and is finally able to beat his father, signifying his coming of age and becoming the protective arm of support for his family.  

While and after reading this story, I was able to connect Manning's relationship to his father to my own relationship with my father.  Since I am pretty weak, arm wrestling was not the physical means of communication.  However, the constant battles on the tennis court are the way my father and I communicate and express emotion.  Since I was 9, we have constantly headed to the tennis courts, with my only goal to finally beat him.  Just as Manning when he was a child, I would naively attempt to beat the unbeatable, and at the end of every defeat look at my father as if he was an all powerful tennis god.  Further, just as when Manning grows up, I have begun to beat my father at tennis.  Now 16, I am a smarter, larger, and stronger person and competitor.  Additionally, I constantly see that, although I am growing up and becoming a bigger and better man, my father is getting older.  And although I have not reached this full state of manhood that Manning achieve at the end of his piece, I do recognized the transition that many people face where they must switch roles with the person they once looked up to and admired.  They find that they must take over the responsibilities and powers that their role models had once done.

The Uncanny Indian Smell

    After reading "Fish Cheeks," by Amy Tan, I began to wonder about my own culture and heritage.  Both of my parents are Indian (although I have been repeatedly asked otherwise), and I frequently meet immerse in my culture.  I am Indian and proud, unlike adolescent Amy Tan toward her own culture; however, if there is one thing I am embarrassed by, it would be the uncanny Indian smell.

     The moment I walk by anyone with that distinct Indian smell, whether I see them or not, I instantly know their ethnic background and what they ate for dinner.  Although Indian food tastes amazing, it can have its draw backs.  Being very pungent, it often leaves a strong odor on people's clothes.  This is the very odor I have been running away from my entire life, working hard daily to avoid having it on my clothes.  I usually wear different clothes than those that I wear to school when eating dinner, and above all I make sure my mom has the air vents on while cooking, just to save myself from the strong odor.  To me, this smell is what the fish cheeks were for Amy Tan.  Although I am familiar with it, the moment others smell it, I instantly become embarrassed.  

     However, as I was saying before, although Indian culture has some of its humorous aspects (the Indian smell and the almighty Indian accent, as seen by the video), I still am proud of it.  The food, the people, the customs, and the holidays:  all of it makes me happy to know that whatever I choose to be on the outside, I will always be Indian on the inside.  

What Defines You?

What defines you? Is it your appearance, your character, or your actions?  For most, people, all of these attributes define who they are as a person.  Unfortunately, this is not the case for people such as author Nancy Mairs.  In her essay, "Disability," Mairs argues that people's disabilities define them, thus preventing their true complexities to be shown.

Mairs, a woman with Multiple Sclerosis, describes how she has noticed people's disabilities portrayed in media, such as television, are "the determining factor of [the person's] existence" (14).  In her essay, she explains a television drama where a young lady is diagnosed with MS.  Heartbroken she attempts to flee to live her life to the fullest until the disease fully takes effect.  She eventually succumbs to her reality and accepts her fate.  In her blunt candidness, Mairs points out that the woman's character is defined by this disability, and that this portrayal of disabled people is wrong.  "Take it from me, physical disability looms pretty large in one's life.  But it doesn't devour one wholly.  I'm not, for instance, Ms. MS, a walking, talking embodiment of a chronic incurable degenerative disease" (14).  I could not agree more.  As Mairs describes, people with disabilities are still people, with complexities and attribute that everyone else has.  To judge and view them solely based on their disabilities would prevent you from knowing someone who could truly be a great person.  In order to change this view, Mairs suggests that disabled people should be put into media while being portrayed as normal people to make the disabled appear natural in everyday life.

Now about two decades after "Disability" was published, I believe that Joe Swanson from the television show Family Guy perfectly embodies how all handicapped people should be viewed and portrayed in media.  Joe Swanson is an honorable policeman who carries on an ordinary life.  He has a wife, a daughter, an ordinary job, and an ordinary group of friends.  Although he is handicapped, the show rarely shows this as a problem or even focuses on this aspect of his life unless in a joking manner.  In fact, he is usually portrayed as the hero cop who makes his non-handicapped neighbor, Peter, jealous.