Farewells

Time has flown...
Or walked, or ran
Somehow moved
In spite of me!
Hopefully
Where we began
Will not be
The end for thee.
...
In other words, I hope you learned something. :)
So long.

~Huckleberry's Friend

"...We're after the same rainbow's end,
Waitin' round the bend,
My Huckleberry friend -
Moon River
and me."

Week Four, Creative Post

FIVE Interesting Vocab Words and their Definitions! :) These words were found in chapters 34-36 of Huckleberry Finn...

1. "ash-hopper" - a lie cask, or box for ashes, resembling a hopper in a mill (lengendsofamerica.com/we-slang.html)

2. "vittles" ("victuals") - food usable by man; supplies of food (Merriam-Webster Dictionary)

3. "seneskal" ("seneschal") - an agent or steward in charge of a lord's estate in feudal times (Merriam-Webster Dictionary)

4. "(by) jings" - a mild oath; short for jingo, from Jesus (Merriam-Webster Dictionary Online)

5. "muggins" - fool: a person who lacks good judgment (wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn)

So, there you have it. :) I especially like the "seneskal" one. It definitely seems like a word Tom would be fond of.

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~Huckleberry's Friend

Week Four, Post 2

Tom's a great guy, isn't he? :) I love that kid. I like how he's so "principled," too! - haha! It's interesting that even though Tom has a rather unusual sense of principle, he nonetheless has something to stick to, to guide him along. Huck, by contrast, does not use set standards for guiding his life. He just does what comes "handiest." A lot of people like that security that Tom must feel. He can justify his actions because he did what was right based on his standards. It's encouraging to be sure of something. Huck, on the other hand, seems to be a bit less secure than Tom. He feels guilt more easily - like with the tar-and-feathering of the duke and king - and in general he seems more cautious. You would think that people who believe in relativism feel free and guiltless, because who's to say they were wrong about something? But Huck seems to feel more negative than Tom, most of the time. It's interesting to see. Again, though, we see in the text that Tom chooses the more fantastically adventurous method of releasing Jim from his "prison" than any that Huck ever would have come up with. Huck's realism keeps him from thinking like Tom (thankfully). :) I think it's good to have a balance in the world of idealists and realists. I'm glad we have both.

~Huckleberry's Friend

Week Four, Post 1

Ok, well, I just wasted about 20 minutes trying to find the program for making videos on my laptop with the webcam so I could do a vlog. Fail. But moving on to Huck Finn...
Let's talk about one of our favorite controversal issues: Racism! Yay!... not really. It's a pretty big deal, and obviously it's not just a problem of today - it was a dark part of 19th-century American society as well. Aunt Sally hears Huck talk (lie) about a black man being killed on a steamboat, and she doesn't care at all about his death. She only cares that no white men were hurt in the explosion. I think Twain makes a good point here. Through this brief portion of a conversation, Twain shows the reader a sad reality of life. So not only is he telling us an interesting story, he's giving us a history lesson. However, it's not realistic to think of racism as only part of the past... or - dare I say it? - only something that whites do to blacks. Racism is alive today, too, and I'll be honest - sometimes I think that the issue of racism against blacks is escalated too much, just making people more hateful and vindictive about things that are part of the past, not the future. Don't get me wrong though. What Americans of "European descent" did to Americans of "African descent" in the past has been wicked, and they have no excuse. I wish racism didn't have to be such a big issue though. Like, who cares if I'm "white" (which doesn't make sense - nobody is actually white) or "black" (yeah, that doesn't make any sense either). I think that what makes racism come out in people is not so much the other person's skin color, but their different culture. They don't speak our language, so, we think they're dumb. Or they treat people differently than we would - we assume they're mean people - now we're racist against them too. I think it's more than just color. It's about culture. So, maybe we should just get over ourselves and try to enjoy the way other peoples live. :) Maybe then we'd find a cure for the problem of racism.

~Huckleberry's Friend

Week Three, Creative Post

Dear Tom,
I'm writin' 'cause I ain't been much of a friend to you these past couple weeks here. Sometimes lyin' suits the 'casions, as I'm sure you, Tom, already know; but I couldn't stand no longer makin' you think I was dead when I was livin', and livin' more 'ventures then you coulda shaken a stick at. They ain't been the kinds you like, though - the ones with genies an' all that make-believe pretendin' business you perfer - it's the real kinds I been havin'. Sometimes I's just plum scared at the real 'ventures I been havin' - but don't you go thinkin' me yeller now! - you'da been scared as I was if you'd met up with the kinds of dangers I been faced with! Why, me and Jim--Oh! that's right, I forgot to tell you that I been with Jim, Miss Watson's n***** this whole time. But don't go thinkin' I'm a abolisionist neither now! I ain't one and don't you say I am! But you know how it is - them's good sometimes and Jim's a real friend to me and been what saved my life a couple times too! Well, anyways, I was gonna tell you about our 'ventures! We near got killed by a steamboat, and storms and hurricanes and things, and by them aligators and wild beasts, and by the crossfire of feudin' families as woulda shot your head off afore you'd said, "G'mornin'" if they'd a knowed you was 'a' the other family - but you ain't heard the worst! We come across these two swindlers who call themselves a king and a duke (but I knows they're just fakin' it, though I ain't got the heart to tell Jim so), and they was 'a' lying a barefaced to people in every town we come to. I really been beginnin' to try gettin' away from them cheats because they's almost got me lynched and prisoned nearly I'm sure. Sometimes I give up on honesty, for sure, but they been takin' it so far as to make a body feel sick and want to tell the truth. It's just a hard life, Tom, but it's a good one. I been missin' you a bit, so I hope you read this here letter with enjoyment. I hope we get to see each other afore dyin'.
Sincerely,
Huck

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~Huckleberry's Friend

Week Three, Post 2

You know, in another sense, I think Mark Twain was being honest about the "notice." There's not much of a plot. Most of the time with books or movies with lame or non-existent plots, I find very little motivation to continue reading or watching. I mean... why? It's going nowhere! HOWEVER, Huck Finn - thankfully! - is different, because Twain has done a good enough job of making the story truly interesting despite the lack of plot. But, when you think about it, isn't his story a bit more realistic to life? Yes, we have times in life when it looks like a typical story: the episode has a beginning, some kind of rising action, a climax, and then it's "the end" of that. But life as a whole flows more like Huck's string of adventures than those stories. In most stories, see, you come to the end and that's it, because the author was trying to make a point, send a message, convey meaning, yada yada yada - not tell you the life story of John or Bob or whatever the character's name is. I think Twain's writing style here has value, and we shouldn't dismiss the book because there's not a plot. Twain is too good a writer for you to say that. :)

~Huckleberry's Friend

Week Three, Post 1

Once again we come face-to-face with Christless Christianity; only this time it's not merely exposed - it's exploited. The "king" and the "duke," who can be described as low-down, deceptive old cheats and liars, travel from town to town by means of Huck and Jim's raft (which they've commandeered) and proceed to use any method at all to acquire money. Well, the camp meeting "revival" service showed how dispicable they could be. Take a moment and ponder just how awful the camp meeting scene was. The entire affair was a mockery of what it proclaimed to be upholding. Christ was forgotten by the pastor, ignored by the people, and, to top it all off, all their "religion" was shamed by a scam. You know, I don't think Mark Twain was entirely telling the truth in his opening notice.... There are points to his story - important, pertinent points that get right to the heart of issues. Take this scene for example: he's making a point about the foolishness of emotional "religious" people who mindlessly succumb to lies. A great pastor once said (and I paraphrase) - If you stand for nothing, you'll fall for anything. What are these folks really standing for? Is there any depth, any foundation? ...Nope. Christ is not the basis for their "Christianity," nor is the Bible. So it's rather sad. But I think - not matter what Twain says! - there's a lesson we who are Christians can learn from that anecdote anyway. :)

~Huckleberry's Friend

Week 2, Creative Post

Huck and Jim on the River, by Huckleberry's Friend

Week 2, Post 2

Huck is still quite an interesting character. :) As a reader of his adventureous tales, I'm beginning to see even more of his personal struggles with ethical decisions. What kind of morals does the kid have anyway? One minute he feels deeply guilty about one thing or another - feeling bad for tricking Jim, or wondering if he really should be helping a runaway slave, and so on and so on - but then the next minute he talks with a stranger and lies to his face! Why doesn't he feel guilty for that? I just don't know. However, this makes me think of something... How often do we let hypocrisy in our own lives go unnoticed - hmmm? Oooo... Well, I'll get back to the story now.
Huck finally does come to a conclusion about his sense of morality: he will do whatever comes "handiest." Now there's a foundation for you! Not. That's called Relativism - a fancy word for a lame excuse to take no responsibility in life and pretend there aren't consequences because truth doesn't exist anyway! Riiiight. Now Huck - I'm going to give him some slack. This boy has not grown up in good circumstances, since the only genuinely godly influence on his life was the widow - and that for only a short while. That doesn't excuse him, but we can at least see that he has not had the same experiences we have had to learn more about good morals and so on. Anyway, Huck's had a rough life, but choosing what's most convenient at the time every time there's a moral decision to be made is not the best option to take.

~Huckleberry's Friend

Week 2, Post 1

So, I've been thinking about it, and I've concluded that I really find Huck and Jim's arguments about Solomon and Frenchmen interesting. In particular, I'm somewhat intrigued by Jim's thought process. Jim seems to look at things in the simplist and most practical way, overlooking deeper meanings or as Huck would say, "the point." It's like he's on the surface level and spreads his ideas across that hypothetical horizontal plane exclusively. (<--Heheh, that was a fun phrase to write) And Jim is so centered around his own life experiences that he can't comprehend things beyond it - like different peoples and their languages. He doesn't even understand language! But if that's all you've ever known or been taught, then why or how could you believe differently? Surely it would be difficult to change your whole perception of the world like that, and clearly it was too much for Jim. But let me ask you something - Is Jim's ignorance really all that bad? I mean, look at our country now - it's jumped to the other extreme, hasn't it? Now your means of education (be it tv/news, school, friends, professors) is probably wasting your time and money telling you that your nation and your language are not special and certainly nothing to be proud of. And if you say otherwise, you're a "racist" or a "radical, narrow-minded conservative." Aaaah, there's no way to win. Might as well just live in a hole like Jim and leave the world to worry about itself. :) Just kidding. But seriously - it's alright to be patriotic and love your language. It's OK. :)

~Huckleberry's Friend

Week One, Creative Post

The Poem I Wrote Up - By Huck Finn (*but I only dictatored it - somebody else put it on the paper, if you'd wanted to know)

"I ain't got learnin' like ol' Tom
Nor want it neither any how;
Them books and all that 'rithmatic -
I'll leave 'em by the side for now
Since much a-doin' there I'll find
Upon the river strong and wide
Where 'ventures better - real too -
Are waitin' patient to be tried.
I knows they're not of make believe -
I thought it over real good;
I'd bet my life and all my things -
The river'd take me where it should."

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~Huckleberry's Friend

Week One, Post 2

Huck Finn's honest perceptions of religion serve as a sad warning to those who claim to be Christians, because the characters trying to teach him about religion are presenting a Christ-less Christianity. I wonder what Twain (or Clemens, whichever you prefer) really thought about Jesus. What we can know for sure from the text, though, is that Huck sees through the falseness and inconsistency and discerns hypocrisy. Also, he expresses how he would rather be with Tom in Hell (where Miss Watson said he would go), than be in Heaven with her, which show us that he doesn't really understand the seriousness of these issues. He hasn't been taught very well. But additionally, she tells him to do good things for other people and he concludes after some thinking that he'd rather just look out for himself. It's sort of cute and funny, since it's coming from a little boy and all, but at the same time it's pretty sad and sobering. First, he's being presented merely morality - not Christianity; it's not by our kindness to others that we'll reach Heaven. Second, he doesn't realize how important these religious topics really are for his soul - one way or the other, he doesn't seem to care much. Twain is cynical, but honest. I'm still wondering what he really thought....

~Huckleberry's Friend

Week One: Post 1

So, Huckleberry Finn. It's certainly an interesting, unique name. Huck's character is less creative than his name, though, because he seems to represent "the Realists" of his day. Tom Sawyer, on the other hand, is quite the imaginitive one. :) In fact, Tom Sawyer reminds me of Peter Pan! - the boy who never grew up, living his life in adventurous, care-free childhood.
Huck seems older even if he's not - more sober, pondersome. He really thinks about things. In the first couple chapters, Huck mentions a few instances when he took the time to go think about something. He's like the kid at school who's not necessarily academic, but you know he's always thinking about something and not floating through the classrooms like others. Tom Sawyer has book-learning, but he doesn't think like Huck does - not in the same way, at least. Tom thinks about things as they could be, while Huck thinks about things as they are.
Maybe if I was to categorize them as "optimists," "pessimists," or "realists," I'd say that (so far, anyway) Tom seems to be an optimist, and Huck seems to be (like I said before) a realist. But let me just plug this in here at the end: I think it's funny how so many people consider themselves realists. :) It is my belief that a lot more people are pessimists than would like to admit it. Duhh, you know you're not an optimist - but that doesn't mean you're a realist. I'll confess that I finally came to terms with my pessimism :) - to the best of my reckoning, I'm a pessimist with moments of optimism who would rather be a realist. A pessimist doesn't necessarily equal Eeyore or the cranky old neighbor stereotype. I believe it's just where really thinking about things can take you... sadly.

~Huckleberry's
Friend

P.S. You probably don't know where I'm really coming from with "Huckleberry's Friend." I'll just say, it has nothing to do with Adventures of Huckleberry Finn... :)