Epilogue: What Does it all Mean?

This will be my final post/assignment for Seeing Sideways. The question of the day: what is this class all about? Having attended a semester of this thing I'd say I'm an expert on the subject now, and I can tell you expertly that in my expert opinion I have no 'effin' clue what this class is about. Expertly.

We've done a lot of silly things in this class. We've had a lot of discussions about a lot of different things. This has been like the Leisure Studies major's wet dream. I think that, at the end of the day, what you take away from this class is entirely up to you. Depending on how much you participate and how much you listen you can learn a lot about yourself and how others perceive you. This class is like a blank slate to explore yourself with and permanently etch all your self-discoveries on. As I said, you get out of this class exactly what you want. If you walk in wanting to become more creative--like me--and you put in some real effort towards what you do, guess what? You will walk out more creative. You may not notice it immediately, but it'll happen.

This class has really helped me loosen up in regards to loosely-regimented assignments. Something I always knew was a fault of mine was how dependent high-school had made me on detailed instructions in my assignments, and how I'd always just follow the instructions to the letter, doing nothing more and nothing less. I think that, thanks to this class, I've really been able to open up and do some assignments for myself instead of just for a grade.

I walked in wanting creativity and flexibility in my work, and I believe I got it. What YOU see in this class is definitely what you get, So hopefully this class will give you a chance to change your perspective and, dare I say, see things a little sideways.

Hidden Pickles

So, we talked in class about hidden things and how our situation affects our perception of different things. For my random-pickle-with-a-hidden-twist I took my 6-year-old nephew and decided to show him some ink blots and compare our results. I chose to do this because I thought it tied in well with the "hidden" theme; everyone comes away seeing different things hidden in ink blots.

For this one, I saw a bat. My nephew saw an angel

I saw two people playing patty-cake. He saw two people, but didn't say they were doing anything

I saw crossbones. He saw palm trees.

I saw two people looking at eachother. He saw an arrow.

We both saw a butterfly.

So, from the results I...Ok, I'll be honest with you: I have no idea what the results mean. But it'll probably be fun to discuss what the class thinks it means. 

Inspiration Round Robin Part 2

Beth sent me an inspiration source to work with for the Round Robin, and that source was rain. She said that rain inspired her because a warm, summer rain makes her happy but a cool, fall-winter rain makes her sad. She takes inspiration from the fact that one thing can inspire two completely different feelings given different circumstances.

Personally, I think everyone thinks of the rain a little differently. Some people enjoy it; for others, it ruins their day. But, me? Rain makes me lethargic. Whenever it rains it effects me in a way that I really don't want to do anything productive; I just want to sit by my window, watching tv/playing video games while listening to/watching   it fall. That said, thinking of what the rain makes me feel inspired me to draw this simple (yet hopefully funny) drawing of a person sleeping through a ferocious rainstorm, in which the rain just happens to be sheep.

Get it? Raining sheep? Counting sheep puts people to sleep (does that actually work? I have no idea)? Yeah.

Inspiration Round Robin

So when I think of what inspires me, I think the biggest thing would be my parents. We've not by any stretch been wealthy, but my parents have always worked hard to make sure we had everything we needed and some of what we wanted. Watching them over the years, and wanting to live up to their expectations of me, has inspired me to work hard in college. Looking back at what they've done makes me think that if I try hard enough there's no way I won't be successful when I get out of school.

Class 11-15-10

So today we did a large discussion of our "Who the hell do you think you are?!" assignments. I ended up getting a lot of good questions during mine that I need to sit and think about.

I feel this post is suffering from my inability to permanently affix peoples' names to their faces. If I actually knew who everyone was I'd have more to say.

Who the Hell Do You Think You Are?

So when we went to see the "Notes to Noself" exhibit at Heron the first thing that struck me as we walked in was the atmosphere of the dense part of the forest. It was very gloomy and all the trees were covered in skulls and such. It really made me think of a game I've been playing recently called LIMBO. LIMBO is characterized by its grayscale artwork and very dark nature. After thinking about that for a little while I think one aspect of who I am that I'd like to touch on for this assignment is the fact that I like darker stories. I like stories where bad guys are protagonists. I like zombie stories and such. This assignment has me wondering why that is.

I think part of it is escapism. For any ordinary person the subjects of these stories do and experience very liberating things that a normal person just couldn't do. I think experiencing that indirectly through movies and video games helps keep you grounded in the real world. I think it helps serve as a release for your troubles.

So, that said here's what I made. I was just feeling like making something a little dark. Maybe I'll think of some poetic, better rationale by the time class rolls around.

Class 11-1-10

So, today we have no traditional class meeting. My first reaction, very first reaction, for reasons I will not go into, was "Thank God, I can rush home now!"

However, once that faded out I sorta realized I was a little disappointed. I have to say this is one of the few classes I've found myself looking forward to on a weekly basis.