In my e-portfolio, I’ve created a space to showcase the works I’ve created during my time at the College of Charleston. The theme and color scheme of my website are a direct reflection of my affinity for black-and-white photography. As both an English and photography student, I’m naturally inclined towards simplistic, traditional, and stripped-down expressions, which I’ve translated into the overall look and feel of my site.
I’ve not only emphasized a diverse array of works completed during my time at the college but have also highlighted my extensive portfolio of photography from this period. Writing and photography have been lifelong passions of mine, making their integration into this portfolio particularly meaningful.
Within the website, I’ve curated six literary pieces from courses I’ve taken at the College of Charleston. My first artifact is an essay on motherhood from my ENGL 299 class, chosen to represent traditional academic essays. The second is my rewriting of Alexander Pope’s The Rape of the Lock. What I enjoyed about this piece is that it was more creative than a typical paper, but I also changed its medium for English Day by making it a poster and presenting it that way. The third artifact is a poem I wrote for a poetry class, which I wanted to include because it is poetry that really got me into studying English and was the first literary medium that I began writing myself at 10 years old.
The fourth is a philosophy paper I wrote. I thought including this would be interesting, as it is still an academic paper, but it is written in a completely different context and writing style. The fifth is a close reading paper I wrote about Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye. I wanted to include this because I presented it at an academic conference and thought the script I made from my essay would be an interesting interpretation of my work. Finally, the sixth is another close reading paper on two poems for a romantic class. I wanted to include this because it is still a traditional-looking paper but is more of a close reading in a more creative context.
For this website, I think that I spent a lot of time on each individual page. I wanted to ensure that it was easy to follow but also really interesting to look at. If there was anything I feel like I can improve, it is that I feel I might have gone overboard in my work summaries. I am not sure if I should have made these shorter, but I wanted to give context for why everything is included. Overall, I really loved this assignment. Mostly because it is exciting to have all of my work in one place, particularly my photography.
In Richard N. Bolles’s book, What Color is Your Parachute? he creates a guidebook to better understand oneself, your preferences when it comes to your career, and what you have to offer in the workforce. Overall, this book is extremely helpful for those who don’t know what they wish to do in their professional lives, those who want to hone in on their ideal career paths, and those who are looking for different avenues they might be interested in taking. This book presents various steps and exercises designed to guide you toward valuable insights about yourself and your aspirations, helping you contemplate the life you envision.
This “Flower Exercise” is meant to get you to better understand yourself, your preferences, and your purpose regarding the work environment. By following each petal, you learn more about what you wish to gain from your career experience and what you believe you can offer.
At the beginning of completing this task myself, I was completely overwhelmed by the idea of the flower, but as I began with the first petal, the details I learned about myself proved worth the effort and contemplation.
When I began to write out the types of people I have worked with in the past, I found a pretty even split between working with coworkers who made my work life enjoyable and those who made it less so. I found myself writing things like “I don’t want to work with someone who is emotionally manipulative” and laughing at myself for even staying in a job like that, even for a short time. It made me realize that when it comes to coworker preferences, maybe my bar was a little too low. At the very least, I don’t want to work with someone who is actively mean to me, but that should be obvious…shouldn’t it?
In recollection of this, I began to think about what I wanted from my work relationships and what types of people I cared about being around. Although it wasn’t necessarily at the very top of my list, I found myself really wanting to be around people who inspire me. I want to work with people who have a strong, passionate curiosity about the world, much like myself. I want to work with someone who is interesting to talk to and teaches me new things all the time. I was surprised by my gravitation toward dynamic agency and shared intellect. In this, I found that wishing for my coworkers to be kind is a given to me, and beyond that, I want more.
June 18, 2023, 3:34 pm in Somis, CA
The second petal deals with your preferred working conditions. This petal was one of the least daunting of the group, mainly because I have always known I do not want to work in a cubicle. I have never seen myself in an office building or at a desk on the eleventh floor with little to no natural light.
To no surprise at all, I want to work somewhere that has natural light that feels open and inviting. A place that has dynamic energy instead of stagnation.
I then moved on to the next petal, “transferable skills.” Completing this petal and doing the exercises within it took me a while. Not because I didn’t feel like I had important skills to offer but because I had difficulty figuring out which ones I felt were the most important. Even now, I feel like there are some listed on there that might not be in the right order, or perhaps I feel like my order of preference will change. More so, I found that doing these exercises helped me better understand what skills of mine I find are really important. It made me wonder what other people would say about me. What would my skills be if I asked my closest friends, family, and professors what they felt stood out to them? It made me wonder what would change, what would remain on the list, and what might be added that I did not know about myself.
The fourth petal, “knowledges,” seemed to surprise me more than I anticipated. Having a family so deeply woven into the entertainment industry, I have found myself steering away from that avenue to give myself a sense of independence. And yet, this exercise made me realize how much I care about media. As someone who is extremely opinionated, I found myself writing about movies and television shows that I either loved or hated, and I find myself increasingly passionate about discussing them. If I were on a desert island, I would 100% talk about my favorite films and TV shows for days on end. For the most part, I think I just write it off as stupid leisure activities, but this exercise made me realize how deeply I care about the media I intake and that I am extremely opinionated and passionate about them. News to me (clearly, I am blind).
Oof. Petal five is all about money. This is where I felt that I learned the most. Growing up, my family never really talked about money, and to this day, they have been pretty hands-off in teaching me anything that has to do with the matter. I would say that my relationship with money is confusing, and I don’t understand many aspects of it at all. Learning about it and how to properly take care of myself as an individual has been something I am slowly learning on my own. And I am everything but good at it. But working through this petal and the exercises that went along with it, I feel closer to understanding that relationship and how I want it to look in the future.
June 18, 2023, 3:30 pm in Somis, CA
When it came to petal six, “places to live,” I found myself more attached to aspects of places versus actual places. Yes, I dream of living in Edinburgh, Syndey, and Osaka at some point in my life, but wherever I am called to, I will go. What I mean by this is that I want to follow opportunities, and I want to follow whatever in my life brings me joy. When it comes to physical places, I want to be somewhere that has lots of activities, great food, places to adventure to, interesting people, seasonal weather, and a place that celebrates holidays.
In making this list, I found what really matters to me is, in fact, the little things. I care about having fun things to do, trying new foods, meeting different people, and being in a place that loves Halloween as much as I do. Wherever I can find the little things that bring me joy is where I want to go.
Finally, on to the seventh petal, “purpose.” Although the idea of this petal is extremely overwhelming and, clearly, a very large and daunting question, I found this petal to be the easiest of them all. If there is anything I know about myself, it is my purpose. I might not know every aspect of my purpose in life, but I, at the very least, deeply believe that I know some.
As written in my flower: My goal, purpose, or mission in life is to…
“increase love, compassion, and beauty (in the form and legacy of art) in the world by deeply affecting individuals and evoking emotion and contemplation through my presence, words, and art. I wish to help individuals learn how to love themselves, each other, and the world around us.”
In John Milton’s Paradise Lost, he describes the world before the fall through monistic theory, arguing that God and all his creations are one and the same. This notion can be found in a particularly peculiar scene where Adam has the angel Raphael over for lunch. In this, we better understand Adam’s character, what he believes his place in the world is, and the reality of his place. In two instances, Adam mentions to Raphael that his “lowly” home and “food not of angels” must not compare to what they eat in Heaven, continually undermining and belittling his offerings and experience compared to the angels. To which Raphael replies with a beautifully encrypted metaphor:
Paradise Lost Book V, lines 469-490
In this excerpt, Raphael uses the example of a flower to help Adam better understand his relationship with God. He explains that everything God has created is a part of him, just with “various degrees” of his spirit. He goes even further to say that those who are “nearer to him placed” or “nearer tending” are those who are more spiritous and, therefore, more pure. This insinuates that Adam has the ability to “tend nearer” to God. Although Adam is more body than spirit compared to God and his angels, the more Adam connects to his spirit, the closer he will be to God and, ultimately, the purer he will become.
This notion is extremely similar to an important concept that drives my life and is something I have been taught throughout it: spiritual alignment.
Similarly, the deep inspiration derived from Milton’s works and following the inward contemplation of alignment is what got Abigail Harmon, an English major alum from the College of Charleston, to where she is today.
After graduating from CofC in 2011, Abigail went straight to graduate school at Regent College in Vancouver, where she studied Theology. Her father, being a theologian himself, is one of the things that propelled her to choose this path. After graduating, she took some time away from school to really figure out how she wanted to use her degrees in her professional life.
It was during this time that Abigail really began to ask important questions about herself. What was she drawn to? What was she inspired by? In what moments did she feel most like herself? In this recollection, she realized she wanted to return to school to get her counseling degree and study therapy. It seemed to her that the common theme strung throughout her passions, her time being an English major at CofC, her graduate studies in theology, and her new mission of becoming a therapist had one important piece connecting them all: a deep love and appreciation for humanity.
Abigail realized she was drawn to understanding how people organized themselves and behaved societally throughout history and found that she cared deeply for people’s individual stories and backgrounds. In making the decision on where to go next, she states she paid close attention to “the moments in [her] life when she felt most like Abigail, the moments that made [her] feel completely centered.” In this reflection of herself and what purpose seemed to align with her the most, she asked:
“When do I feel like I have ten toes on the floor? In what moments do I feel completely in my body? When I’m present and when I feel alive…and it was when I was listening to someone.”
It was then that her next step felt clear. During the 2020 pandemic, Abigail got another master’s degree in mental health counseling at Walden University. Now, with her English degree and her master’s in theology and counseling, she currently has a private and group counseling practice and also does ghostwriting on the side. In her private practice, she focuses on helping people who have religious trauma, climate anxiety/depression, and those in the LGBTQ community. As a deep thinker and feeler herself, through her practice, she creates a safe and understanding space for those who feel easily misunderstood by the grandness of their emotions. As a therapist, she is dedicated to helping people be their “open, easy, wise, quirky, kiss-ass” selves, that is their natural state of being.
When asked if she had any regrets throughout her professional career, she took a second to wonder. After a couple moments of silence, she was surprised by her own answer: No. Everything she did, everything she learned, and everything she experienced genuinely helped her not only become the person she is but also the professional person she is today. She explains:
“My robust background in theological studies allowed me to adapt to any theological belief system that walks in the room. I can adapt and understand all the nuances of their different belief systems, specifically within Christianity but also just in world religions in general. And I just can’t overstate how well literature has prepared me for being a therapist. I’m so, so much more able to not only have the vocabulary to help people, but a lot of times, people just need the right language and being able to supply that for somebody who’s searching for the right word or can’t identify how they feel, I mean, it is like a weight comes off their shoulders. So simplifying language, having the vocabulary to articulate feelings, and being a keen listener. That’s what you’re doing when you’re reading and writing. You’re paying attention.”
In a passage from Ramsey and Grobman’s Major Decisions: College, Career, and the Case for the Humanities,” in their chapter called “Beyond Jobs and Careers: The Enduring Value of the Humanities,” the authors dive into the significance of an English degree in contributing to the collective welfare. They explain that pursuits in intellectual, artistic, and moral avenues possess a unique inherent value. These endeavors not only enhance people’s personal lives but enrich the lives of those around you, as seen through Abigail’s story and private practice.
When Abigail reflected back on her time at CofC, there was one class in particular that changed the trajectory of her life: ENGL 306 John Milton.
Yes, studying Milton’s works and writings was a deeply inspiring feat, but what made this class truly special was its professor, William Russell. Not only did he teach this class with such poised enthusiasm, but the way he listened to his students left lasting effects on Abigail.
The deep care and attention to detail Professor Russell has with everything he does distills a sense of belonging and inherent support for his students. For Abigail, being in his class helped her trust that she did, in fact, have a lot to contribute. This class taught her that she had important opinions and things to say and that they were worth sharing with the world. As she learned more from Professor Russell, she began to understand herself better and pay attention to the moments when she felt most aligned within herself.
“He really saw me as a student, not just as a student, but just for who I am.”
Professor Russell’s centered presence in the room, his bright enthusiasm, his heartfelt understanding, and his open-minded attention to each student were a source of inspiration for Abigail. She, too, wanted to hold this space for people.
“I remember wanting to be more like him, so here I am.”
I vividly remember the first time I ever saw my father cry. I was in middle school at the time and had recently written a poem for my English class. Although I had been writing poems for quite some time, this was the first one I had ever shown anyone before, let alone read in front of the entire class. Based on George Ella Lyon’s poem, “Where I am From,” we were asked to write our own version, detailing the unique ways that we grew up and the home that we were being raised in.
At dinner, my father asked to hear what I had written, so I read it aloud after we ate. I remember my heart pounding out of my chest, the saliva in my mouth dissolving into thin air, and the temperature in my cheeks reaching a feverish temperature. When I had finished, silence filled the air, and I could only hear the loud pounding of my heart reverberating through my ears. I looked up from the printed paper my poem was typed on and looked at my dad. His eyes were red and wet with tears.
I had never seen him cry a day in my life. At first, I had no idea how to react or exactly what his tears meant. But then he broke the silence, “That was so beautiful,” he said, his voice soft and slightly cracking. For the first time, I realized that maybe my poetry had meant something, done something to someone, made someone feel enough to bring tears to their eyes. Just the thought of my writing conjuring such strong emotions in someone who had remained so stoic for most of my life felt like flying.
For as long as I can remember, I have felt deeper than those around me. Things have always mattered more to me, and I have deeply cared about things others seem to push aside or not notice. It was not until I shared my writing with people that I felt truly seen. Through their experience of reading my work, I finally felt they could truly understand me, understand the little things I cared about and why. And when I shared this poem with my father, it was one of the first moments I felt he understood me.
Poetry became my sanctuary, allowing me to express the complexities of my life more openly. Through writing, I could express the deep feelings I felt about my familial struggles, school friendships, and the small, overlooked details of daily life. This intimate connection to poetry resonates with Patrick Rosal’s notion, as discussed in the New York Times article “Poetry is Hospitable to Strangeness and Surprise,” where he highlights poetry’s capacity for observation, reflection, imagination, and discovery. These elements captivated me and drew me deeper into the world of poetry.
Even more so, in Kathleen Ossip’s article “Why All Poems Are Political,” she explores poetry’s role as a liberated realm for language and politics, raising numerous compelling questions that deeply resonated with me. She asks:
“Could it be that poetry aims to stir our consciousness of the profound yet nuanced spectrum of joy and suffering inherent in existence?”
This question encapsulates the essence of poetry for me. Poetry serves as a catalyst for awakening, urging us to perceive the world with heightened sensitivity, to acknowledge the often-overlooked nuances, and to empathize with the countless emotions swirling around us. It fosters a sense of community, connecting us with others who share our depth of perception and emotion, ultimately making people feel less alone. It was in this space (writing and sharing poetry) that I finally felt understood and seen for who I truly am: someone who deeply cares about the world around me.
As I got older and life got progressively more confusing and difficult, writing about it never felt like enough, so I buried myself in sports. For the longest time, that was the only thing I allowed myself to focus on. It was not until the pandemic that I had a chance to stop and sit in stillness. Stepping away from playing volleyball at Wake Forest University after two years allowed me the space I needed to properly reevaluate my life and what I was doing with it. Even then, it took me two years at the College of Charleston, majoring in Arts Management, before I jumped ship and declared an English major. It was not until then that I felt I had truly found my place, or at least a step in the right direction.
Reflecting back on all the schooling I had done, I quickly realized that throughout my educational career, it was the English classes and English teachers that I had loved and connected to the most. Looking around my room, I noticed my floor was covered in stacks of books, my bedside table engulfed in journals, and little notebooks were hidden around my room with short poems that popped into my mind from time to time. It was clear then which direction I was heading for the remainder of my college career and professional life.
An essential characteristic of the English discipline lies in its foundation in sensemaking, a concept introduced by Christian Madsjerg in his book “Sensemaking: The Power of the Humanities in the Age of the Algorithm.” Within this text, Madsjerg dissects various principles encapsulating the notion of sensemaking in humanities and their application in professional settings.
Of these principles, Principle 3: “The Savannah-Not the Zoo,” particularly resonated with me. Madsjerg explains that to properly understand and relay information about the human experience, you have to be a part of that human experience (16-18). Genuine understanding and insight into human nature cannot be attained merely through external observation but through personal experience. This awareness is acquired not only through the observation of others but through introspection.
When contemplating the practical applications of an English major in professional settings, I recalled a project from my 299 Intro to English Studies class where I had written an essay centered on the theme of motherhood in my favorite film, “Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms.” Delving into various aspects of motherhood, like love, sacrifice, and societal expectations, I researched extensively, drawing from books, personal accounts, and scholarly articles. This exploration led me to better understand the complexities of motherhood. Through this process, I gained a deeper insight into the motivations behind parenthood and the resilience required to nurture a child.
In an excerpt from “Major Decisions: College, Career, and the Case for the Humanities,” by Ramsey and Grobman, they emphasize the inherent value of intellectual, artistic, and moral pursuits, much like the essay I wrote. These projects enrich our lives, broaden our perspectives, and challenge outdated modes of thought and behavior (54-55).
Initially, I approached the essay intending to argue against the traditional notion of motherhood, questioning the extent of its role in today’s society. However, through the writing process, my perspective began to shift. While I still harbor my reservations about motherhood, my empathy and understanding of the complexities of parenthood expanded significantly.
It was through writing this essay that I tapped into the beauty and significance of what it means to be an English major and the intrinsic gifts that come out of such an experience. Through the research and composition of this essay, I learned more about the experiences of others while getting to know myself better along the way. I found, too, that when I write about things I deeply care about, much like in my early poetry days, my work is persuasive enough to change my own mind.
For me, my college career has been everything but straightforward. After majoring in Communications and playing volleyball at Wake Forest University for two years, I realized that if I continued to focus on my sport and major in something I had no particular interest in, I would end up completely lost at the end of my college career.
After transferring to the College of Charleston, I majored in arts management for two years until I realized that that was not my path either. It was during the summer of 2022 that I was registering for classes (to complete my arts management degree), and I called my parents crying because none of the classes I had to take were ones I felt passionate and curious about. Instead, they all felt like a chore. So, we began brainstorming my options, which I was completely reluctant to at first. But then, as the conversation continued, the idea of being an English major came up, and suddenly, it felt as though everything began to fit together.
I realized that when I looked around my room, it was covered in books. When I reflected on the things I enjoy the most in life, it was writing poetry, journaling, and reading. And when I thought back to my favorite classes and teachers growing up, they were always the English ones. At that moment, the lightbulb went off, and the steps forward became so clear.
It was then, too, that I thought of all the possibilities being an English major would offer me. All the things that I really love in life, all the things that bring me the most joy, were things I could be a part of, having majored in English.
One of the important aspects of English is that it is rooted in sensemaking, an idea presented by Christian Madsjerg in his book Sensemaking: The Power of the Humanities in the Age of the Algorithm. In this book, he breaks down several principles that make up this idea of “sensemaking” in the humanities and applies these skills to the professional world.
One of the principles that stood out to me was principle 3: “The Savannah-Not the Zoo.” In this, Madsjerg explains that to properly understand and relay information about the human experience, you have to be a part of that human experience (16-18). True knowledge and wisdom, when it comes to human nature, cannot be simply observed from an outsider’s perspective. It is something that you, too, have to personally experience. This knowledge not only comes from observing others on the inside but also from observing yourself.
Part 2: The Potential of Projects
When I considered how an English major might translate to the working world, the first project that came to mind was an essay I wrote for my 299 class. My primary source was my favorite film, Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms, and I focused on the film’s theme of motherhood. Through researching and writing, I dove into the multifaceted aspects of motherhood, exploring its themes of love, sacrifice, and societal expectations. By studying and pulling from books, personal memoirs, and scholarly articles, I gained insight into the different experiences of motherhood. I learned more about adoption versus birth mothers and the evolution of the mother-child relationship as both parties age. Through this research process, I got to better understand why people have children and the deep dedication and grit it takes to be a parent.
In an excerpt from Ramsey and Grobman, Major Decisions: College, Career, and the Case for the Humanities (2020): Chapter 4, “Beyond Jobs and Careers: The Enduring Value of the Humanities,” they discuss how English contributes to the common good. They explain that intellectual, artistic, and moral pursuits have intrinsic value. These types of pursuits (much like this essay) “enrich our lives and the lives of those around us. They open up new worlds and new ways of thinking to us, and they challenge our traditional, and sometimes even mindless or outdated, ways of thinking and acting” (54-55).
Going into this essay, I was convinced I would argue against being a mother. I sometimes feel as though having children as the main goal in everyone’s life is incredibly outdated. When I think about the world we live in and how difficult it is to be a “good” parent, I wonder why we do it. It was not until writing this essay that I began to change my mind. Not entirely, as I still have my reservations, but my empathy and understanding of this human experience expanded exponentially and can be applied in my future ventures.
The second project that seemed to have a sense of viability was a poem I wrote for a 220 poetry course over the summer. Poetry is something that I have loved my entire life but have not really been keen on sharing with other people. It was not until this class that I realized how important it is to share. The feedback I got from this particular poem was overwhelmingly positive and made me realize the power of sharing your work. I wrote about my memories in the house I grew up in, and although my childhood was pretty unorthodox, everyone commented about how they, too, had felt they grew up in that house. It was through this experience that I learned how easy it is to find commonality between people and how important it is to share your life through words.
The third project is a final paper I wrote for my ENGL 300 class. I chose to do the more creative writing option, and I ended up rewriting a couple of chapters of Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels from the perspective of a woman. As a primarily “man vs nature” novel, I found it incredibly interesting to reinvent it through the eyes of a woman. Going back to Ramsey and Grobman’s book, they discuss the importance of reading canon.
“Simply put, we teach the canon because it’s important to see where we’ve been, and much of the work is valuable…We believe that teaching the canon and challenges to the canon encourages students to question, interrogate, evaluate, and judge through and within all the complexities of history, power, ethics, justice, reason, facts, science, and more” (54).
I think being an English major, you can easily get bored or annoyed by how often we read “classics,” but I believe there is so much value in taking the time to do so. Through a project like this, I got to reimagine this old story from a completely new perspective. I began asking questions about what would change about the story (little things, big things)? How would the relationships in the novel develop differently? Would the portrayal of the relationship between humans and nature be different? Through this type of evaluation, I feel as though we gain so much from reading canon and classics. We better understand where we have been, where we are now, and where we want to go.
To be honest with you, I’ve spent a lot of time in the last two days crying. That sounds so silly when I write it out like that, but it’s true. This last week has been anything but easy. Having this assignment in the back of my head since Monday, I have tried so desperately to think of delights. They are, after all, happening around me all the time. As much as I have wanted to see them, it seems that every day, they illude me.
In my time thinking about the delights of my life, I found myself researching “What is a delight?” and reading several articles on Ross Gay’s definition of it (from his book, The Book of Delights). In one article by Sage Van Wing, where he presents the transcript of an interview between Ross Gay and Dave Miller. In this, Gay explains what “delight” means to him, how it typically forms in each day of his life, and how writing this book made him realize that delight grows when it is shared. He states:
“I feel like, actually the sort of inclination of the gift, like the way that the gift… the true gift actually happens is when we give it away. Maybe that’s a measure of how that’s a measure of what kind of a gift something is actually. In the process of writing this book, I did notice two things. I think how often the thing that delighted me would be some kind of exchange of sharing and how often my inclination, almost immediately upon witnessing the exchanges sharing, which is the exchange of gifting, is to immediately tell someone else. It wasn’t like I had to think hard about it. It was just I was inclined to be like, yo! you see this thing happening?“
This answer of his really seemed to stick out to me. I had thought over and over of the things in the last couple of days that have given me delight, been a delight, but the only real things I thought of were just the ways I have attempted to help other people. And I am not truly sure that, in the very specific definition of a delight, those count.
The other night, on a day when my tears had finally run out, my friend called me crying. And so, of course, without a second thought, I got into my car and drove to her. As the night progressed, we just talked, and I mostly listened to everything she had to say. And when I think back on that, on times when my role in my friendships is to listen, I love it more than anything. And, truly, a delight of mine is to hold space.
To me, holding space for someone is allowing them to be exactly as they are. But not in a way like, “Oh, I am not judging,” it’s a physical thing. The world around us is made of energy, right? I have energy, and everyone else has it too. And so, while in my energy field, I imagine space for this person – for her, while we talk. And although it really only happens in my head, it seems to work, and I can see evidence of it in the physical. I truly believe that when she is in my presence, she feels safe enough to be exactly as she is at that moment. And when it comes to delight, my ability to do this for the people, the people that I love so deeply in my life, is, in fact, a delight.
To be the person she calls when she is crying, to be the person she feels comfortable snot sobbing in front of, to be the person she can tell the truth to is such a delight of mine that all the time I had spent in the last couple of days crying (myself) was worth feeling and releasing so that I would have the capacity to hold that space for her when she needed it.
I sat down yesterday to write about this in more detail, but I just couldn’t get the words out. I began to wonder if that really was a delight at all. And maybe it isn’t- not in the true sense of the word, anyway.
And so here I am, again, thinking about delight. While blowing out my hair and rolling up its pieces in rollers, it hit me. Music. Every single day I have woken up this week, I have been oddly excited to find out what my “daylist” on Spotify is. From my understanding, a “daylist” is a playlist made by Spotify based on your listening history at certain times each day. They come up with a theme that represents it, and they create a playlist that includes songs you already enjoy and songs that they recommend based off of your listening history. I am not sure if I explained that well at all, but you get the point (or maybe you don’t, and I am sorry).
As someone who absolutely adores listening to new music and has a serious appreciation for ambient vibes, this playlist has been such an exciting experience. I not only find new music so easily but the vibe of that time of day is already set for me (which I love). Although this week has been a tough one, hopping on my Spotify to find out what new playlist they have curated for me has definitely been a daily delight.
2. Another Delight
My name is Madison McMahon, and for a while now, I have been thinking a lot about the word “delight.” Not only have I spent a significant amount of time reading and discussing Ross Gay’s The Book of Delights, which is linked above, but I have been attempting to figure out what exactly it means. Obviously, it means one thing to Gay, and it shows up in my life very differently from his, but it got me thinking about what delight meant for other people.
As I was looking for poems that I could potentially connect to The Book of Delights and the meaning of delight, I came across this work. And upon my first time reading it, it felt as if all the air in the room had been sucked up and swallowed.
To me, reading this poem felt very similar to jumping from a ledge. The walk up, the looking over, the leap, and the sharpness of the fall. This poem feels like a heavy weight but also the pinching of the air that surrounds you on your way down, whistling in your ears and ripping the air out of your lungs.
It got me thinking about a whole new world of “delight.” One where the delight is not something beautiful or good but something like a failure. That maybe delight is not only found in those pretty special moments in life, but in the “evasions” and “losses” that we all experience daily. And then the “fall” of the poem, “And occasionally, / something larger…anything / you think you can’t get back.”
And then, as I thought about it more, perhaps delight is always beautiful, but just not in the way we assume it to be. In moments of deep loss, there are strange tingles of delight, of beauty. Like the beautiful human reaction to blame other people or to wish grief had hands. Or the realization that you hold the power to push and direct your life in any direction you desire. Or the simple act of crying and having someone stand there and cry with you.
For as long as I can remember, I have deeply cared about the little things. I was always overly sensitive to those around me, overly in tune with people’s emotions, and spent my time constantly observing everything and everyone closely.
Still, to this day, I find myself in the same position. It means a lot to me to pay attention, to notice, to watch, and to feel. And although this was characteristic of me during my early childhood, throughout my teenage years, I so desperately wanted to get away from that part of me.
Through those years, it felt like I paid too much attention, noticed too much, and felt too deeply every second of it. I always felt like no one else saw all the little things I did, nor did they care about them like me. And in the mix of my awkward teenage angst and constant emotional turmoil, I found poetry.
This newfound world of reading and writing was a world where I felt, for the first time, completely understood. All of a sudden, I was surrounded by other people who noticed, watched, and felt the same way I did. At the same depth that I did. And as I was introduced to this new world, I found myself writing poetry every single day.
For me, it felt like the only place I could truly be honest about everything happening in my life. I wrote poems about my familial issues, my relationships with friends at school, overwhelming thoughts of my existence and my place in the world, the great burden of my feelings and how much I cared, and about all the little things around me that everyone else seemed to take for granted but I didn’t.
This fundamental aspect of poetry is what Patrick Rosal mentions in the New York Times article we read for class, “Poetry is Hospitable to Strangeness and Surprise.” He describes poetry as encompassing “observation and attention, reflection and memory, description, imagination, re-seeing and discovery.” All of these are what drew me into poetry.
In middle school was the first time that poetry was taught in my English class. My teacher, Mr. Eleftheriadis, introduced me to Homer and Shakespeare, and it was that class that changed everything.
Not only did I fall in love with literature, poetry, and epics, but I fell in love with the details in every story. A part of his class I enjoyed the most was picking apart works line by line. As a middle schooler, my little brain was not nearly prepared for the sheer wisdom and magic that are laced between every line of the Odyssey and Macbeth, just to name a few.
In his class, I felt that I truly belonged. In every English class since then, I have always felt that way. The peers in them, the teachers and professors, and most of all, the literature have always been so inspiring and remain reminders that when it comes to noticing and feeling, I am not alone.
Since then and throughout my college career, I have been learning each and every day to return back to that little girl version of myself. I have been realizing that I want to notice, I want to watch closely, and I want to feel every second of it. I take pride in noticing the small things, paying attention, and caring immensely about the details.
As I have gotten older, I have learned that these are actually great strengths of mine, and the places where I can cultivate and grow them are in my English classes and in my photography classes. In both art mediums, I have found that my particular gift of noticing and feeling can be used to create narratives and stories, cultivate emotion through images, and learn how to intersect the two.
In an article that discusses the value and significance of poetry as a free space for language and politics, “Why All Poems Are Political” by Kathleen Ossip, she says so many things about poetry that I found incredibly intriguing, inspiring, and thought-provoking. One of the questions she asks in this article is:
“Is it possible that poetry wants to awaken your awareness of the essential and infinitely subtle suffering and joy of being alive?”
I found this question incredibly reflective of what poetry does to us. And I think it is true that poetry is about awakening, awakening to the world around us, taking note of all the things people fail to notice, and feeling all the emotions swirling about in the world. Poetry is about awakening to a world full of people who see and feel at the same depth that you do. Poetry is about a community of people who care; it is about no longer feeling alone.
