The Myth of Sisyphus, part 1

I have just begun reading Albert Camus's essay, 'The Myth of Sisyphus.' In discussing the difficulty of understanding a man's thought pattern that leads to suicide Camus writes, "But one would have to know whether a friend of the desperate man had not that very day addressed him indifferently." To me this means that the suicidal person, when they feel that even their closest acquntances place little value on their life, their mind equates this to suicide having little impact on their closest friends lives and also that they have little to live for.

Why I think this part hit me hard today...
Earlier this afternoon poignant greif stirred up inside me when I felt as though a person whom I care for deeply was post-poning responding to me. This has always bothered me. I find myself overcome by anxiety when I get the sense that someone that I assumed to care deeply for me would respond more quickly to a new acquiantance's request than my own.

A direction

My original intent for this blog was expressing factual behavior using poetry, I suffered writer's block and attempted to use it for short book reviews, but my recent chain of intellectual interests have veered off the scientific path. I am seeking to answer the age old question of "how should one live." I find myself being overcome by palpable waves of confusion in regards to what direction I want to go with my time. I enjoy time spent in the out of doors, but I do not so much enjoy exploring nature in a purely scientific manner or in a destructive manner. I feel most alive in matters of ethics. I do not like to watch children picking up toads with little concern for the treatment of it. I do not see myself finding joy in laboratory experiments on animals regardless of what discovery is to be discovered because of it. I am most content observing animal and plant-life in nature and then drawing or writing about what I have observed. I also enjoy exploring other writer's and artist's observations and creations. This is a working construction in hopes of finding answers to what it is I would be happy and ful-filled spending my time working on.

Stellaluna is sweet, but not quite stellar

Janell Cannon's "Stellaluna" was a sweet and simple tale about a bat that grows up with birds. The story is beautifully illustrated, but lacks wit and preaches good behavior while teaching little about bats. The story begins with Stellaluna and her mother being attacked by an owl. Stellaluna gets seperated from her mom and winds up in a birds nest with three baby birds.

Stellaluna is fed insects (even though she is a fruit-eating pteropodid) which she dislikes but have no health consequnces for her. The story misleads kids to believe that a fruit-eating bat would be okay if fed insects. When Stellaluna teaches the baby birds to hang upside down she is scolded. This part did succeed in teaching kids that baby birds do not hang upside down like baby bats can, but it came off as threatening to Stellaluna. It carried the mantra that if a child does something different from what a parent desires they will be thrown out of the house. Finally it ended with Stellaluna saving the baby birds after showing them how well she could see in the dark. In actuality it is unlikely that a baby bat would have the strength to fly around with three baby birds in hand. Bats are light-weight beings which is essential for their flight abilities.

Though this book is beautifully illustrated it does not provide the best messages for impressionable young minds. I would love to see this author illustrate a more meaningful book about bats!