Tuesday, November 26, 2019

Two Truths and a Lie 35 Good Lies for Tricking Others

Two Truths and a Lie 35 Good Lies for Tricking Others SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips Throwing a party or looking for an icebreaker to use at a work event? Whatever the case, Two Truths and a Lie is a unique game that's useful for getting to know other people- and for seeing how good you are at lying! Read on to learn what the game entails and what makes for a good lie. We also give you tons of Two Truths and a Lie ideas to help you have a wildly fun time! What Is Two Truths and a Lie? Two Truths and a Lie is a fun group-based game you can play at parties or use as ice breakers. No special equipment or preparation is needed, though you might want to use pencil and paper to keep track of scores (if playing for points). To play, everyone sits or stands in a circle. One by one, each person in the circle says three statements about him/herself. Two of these statements must be facts, or "truths," and one must be a lie. The other members then try to guess which statement is the lie. What Makes for a Good Lie? A Good Truth? A good lie is one that's ultimately believable: it'll sound like something you might've done or might want to do (but haven't actually done). A lie that's too farfetched will clearly sound fake, so try to think of lies that are similar to truths to make them as plausible-sounding as possible. For example, don't say, "I can speak 22 languages." This statement is clearly a lie (unless you're a famous polyglot!). Rather, say, "I can speak three languages fluently." This statement is just plausible enough to make people doubt whether you're telling the truth or not. When it comes to telling truths, you'll want to tell the truth in such a way that others think you're lying even though you're not. Therefore, a good truth will sound like something you usually wouldn't do or wouldn't want to do (but have actually done). For example, if you're normally a shy person but have been the first to get out on a dance floor, this would be a good truth to tell since other people won't expect you to have done it. 35 Two Truths and a Lie Ideas Below are tons of Two Truths and a Lie examples you can use for lies (or truths if applicable!). Just remember this: when choosing lies, always opt for those that will be most convincing for you! Likes/Dislikes My favorite animals are peacocks. I hate spicy food. I can't stand it when people pay with exact change. I am a vegetarian. My favorite place in the world is New York City. Skills I can play the piano. I'm really good at cooking Italian food. I can juggle. I never learned how to ride a bicycle. I'm a great whistler. Experiences I went to Europe as a high school student. I've met Tom Cruise. I've never seen any of the Star Wars movies. I've eaten poisonous puffer fish. I've never gotten a speeding ticket. Wishes/Dreams When I was younger, my dream was to be a firefighter. I've always wanted to try paragliding. One of the places I want to visit most is Thailand. I hope to eventually run a marathon. If I could, I would pay to visit the moon right now. Family I am a great-great grandniece/grandnephew of Abraham Lincoln. I am the youngest of five siblings. My mother has worked for the same company for 30 years. I own a pet hamster named Murray. I have 18 first cousins. Random/Weird I am colorblind. I am legally deaf in one ear. I was born with a tail. I still own a huge collection of Beanie Babies. I've never broken a bone. I am deathly afraid of clowns. I brush my teeth four times a day. I never use public restrooms. I'm allergic to strawberries. I am incredibly superstitious. Feel free to tweak these Two Truths and a Lie ideas so that they work better for you. Once you've got some ideas ready, get out and have fun!

Friday, November 22, 2019

The Story of Bonnie and Clyde by Bonnie Parker

The Story of Bonnie and Clyde by Bonnie Parker Bonnie and Clyde were legendary and historic outlaws who robbed banks and killed people. The authorities saw the couple as dangerous criminals, while the public viewed Bonnie and Clyde as modern-day Robin Hoods. The couples legend was in part helped along by Bonnies poems: The Story of Bonnie and Clyde, and The Story of Suicide Sal. Bonnie Parker wrote the poems in the middle of their 1934 crime spree, while she and Clyde Barrow were on the run from the law. This poem, The Story of Bonnie and Clyde, was the last one she wrote, and the legend reports that Bonnie gave a copy of the poem to her mother just weeks before the couple was gunned down. Bonnie and Clyde as Social Bandits Parkers poem is part of a long-established outlaw-folk hero tradition, what British historian Eric Hobsbawm called social bandits. The social bandit/outlaw-hero is a peoples champion who adheres to a higher law and defies the established authority of his time. The idea of a social bandit is a nearly universal social phenomenon found throughout history, and ballads and legends of them share a long set of characteristics. The main feature shared by ballads and legends around such historical figures as Jesse James, Sam Bass, Billy the Kid, and Pretty Boy Floyd is the enormous amount of distortion of the known facts. That distortion enables the transition of a violent criminal into a folk hero. In all cases, the peoples champion story the people need to hear is more important than the facts- during the Great Depression, the public needed reassurance that there were people working against a government perceived as callous to their predicament. The voice of the Depression, American balladeer Woody Guthrie, wrote just such a ballad about Pretty Boy Floyd after Floyd was killed six months after Bonnie and Clyde died. Curiously, many of the ballads, like Bonnies, also use the metaphor of the pen is mightier than the sword, stating that what newspapers have written about the bandit hero is false, but that the truth can be found written in their legends and ballads. 12 Characteristics of the Social Outlaw American historian Richard Meyer identified 12 characteristics that are common to social outlaw stories. Not all of them appear in every story, but many of them come from older ancient legends- tricksters, champions of the oppressed, and ancient betrayals. The social bandit hero is a man of the people who stands in opposition to certain established, oppressive economic, civil, and legal systems. He is a champion who wouldnt harm the little man.His first crime is brought about through extreme provocation by agents of the oppressive system.He steals from the rich and gives to the poor, serving as one who rights wrongs. (Robin Hood, Zorro)Despite his reputation, he is good-natured, kind-hearted, and frequently pious.His criminal exploits are audacious and daring.He frequently outwits and confounds his opponents by trickery, often expressed humorously. (Trickster)He is helped, supported, and admired by his own people.The authorities cant catch him through conventional means.His death is only brought about by the betrayal by a former friend. (Judas)His death provokes great mourning on the part of his people.After he dies, the hero manages to live on in a number of ways: stories say that he is not really dead, or that his ghost or spirit con tinues to help and inspire people. His actions and deeds may not always gain approval or admiration, but rather are sometimes decried in the ballads as mildly stated criticism to outright condemnation and refutation of all the other 11 elements. Bonnie Parkers Social Outlaw True to the form, in The Story of Bonnie and Clyde, Parker cements their image as social bandits. Clyde used to be honest and upright and clean, and she reports that he was locked up unjustly. The couple has supporters in the regular people like newsboys, and she foretells that the law will beat them in the end. Like most of us, Parker had heard ballads and legends of lost heroes as a child. She even references Jesse James in the first stanza. What is interesting about her poems is that we see her actively spinning their criminal history into a legend. The Story of Bonnie and ClydeYouve read the story of Jesse JamesOf how he lived and died;If youre still in needOf something to read,Heres the story of Bonnie and Clyde. Now Bonnie and Clyde are the Barrow gang,Im sure you all have readHow they rob and stealAnd those who squealAre usually found dying or dead. Theres lots of untruths to these write-ups;Theyre not so ruthless as that;Their nature is raw;They hate all the lawThe stool pigeons, spotters, and rats. They call them cold-blooded killers;They say they are heartless and mean;But I say this with pride,That I once knew ClydeWhen he was honest and upright and clean. But the laws fooled around,Kept taking him downAnd locking him up in a cell,Till he said to me,Ill never be free,So Ill meet a few of them in hell. The road was so dimly lighted;There were no highway signs to guide;But they made up their mindsIf all roads were blind,They wouldnt give up till they died. The road gets dimmer and dimmer;Sometimes you can hardly see;But its fight, man to man,And do all you can,For they know they can never be free. From heart-break some people have suffered;From weariness some people have died;But take it all in all,Our troubles are smallTill we get like Bonnie and Clyde. If a policeman is killed in Dallas,And they have no clue or guide;If they cant find a fiend,They just wipe their slate cleanAnd hand it on Bonnie and Clyde. Theres two crimes committed in AmericaNot accredited to the Barrow mob;They had no handIn the kidnap demand,Nor the Kansas City depot job. A newsboy once said to his buddy;I wish old Clyde would get jumped;In these awful hard timesWed make a few dimesIf five or six cops would get bumped. The police havent got the report yet,But Clyde called me up today;He said, Dont start any fightsWe arent working nightsWere joining the NRA. From Irving to West Dallas viaductIs known as the Great Divide,Where the women are kin,And the men are men,And they wont stool on Bonnie and Clyde. If they try to act like citizensAnd rent them a nice little flat,About the third nightTheyre invited to fightBy a sub-guns rat-tat-tat. They dont think theyre too tough or desperate,They know that the law always wins;Theyve been shot at before,But they do not ignoreThat death is the wages of sin. Some day theyll go down together;And theyll bury them side by side;To few itll be griefTo the law a reliefBut its death for Bonnie and Clyde. - Bonnie Parker 1934 Sources Hobsbawm, Eric. Bandits. Orion, 2010.Lundblad, Bonnie Jo. The Rebel-Victim: Past and Present. The English Journal 60.6 (1971): 763–66.Meyer, Richard E. The Outlaw: A Distinctive American Folktype. Journal of the Folklore Institute 17.2/3 (1980): 94–124.Muecke, Stephen, Alan Rumsey, and Banjo Wirrunmarra. Pigeon the Outlaw: History as Texts. Aboriginal History 9.1/2 (1985): 81–100.Roberts, John W. Railroad Bill and the American Outlaw Tradition. Western Folklore 40.4 (1981): 315–28.Seal, Graham. The Robin Hood Principle: Folklore, History, and the Social Bandit. Journal of Folklore Research 46.1 (2009): 67–89.

Thursday, November 21, 2019

Mentorship program Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Mentorship program - Research Paper Example Salami (2010) presented both formal and informal mentorship as manifesting sufficient efficacy in reducing turnovers of nurses, where the former is created through administrative partnership, while the latter is through unstructured mutual understanding. Marginally, the paper adapts formal mentoring program as resolution to high turnovers in The Jackson Veteran Health Administration (JVHA). Several steps are succinctly followed to determine overall reliance and appropriateness of proposed structure. General Steps in Implementation On mentorship program in JVHA, aspects on job satisfaction and social interaction in surgical wards are investigated. Complete project draft requires consensual approval from the Office of Policy and Planning and Office of Human Resource and Administration before proceeding (United States Department of Veterans Affairs, 2010). The program is also to obtain financial and administrative support through this department accordingly (Canadian Nurses Association, 2004). As the overall details of the program are smoothly planned out, the plan is ready for pilot implementation. With 1-year mentor program, phases orientation, training, and evaluation are performed. The committee-in-charge prepares for mentoring tasks ahead, with 16 staff nurses as mentors for the whole three work shifts--the number of mentees depend on job vacancies in surgical ward (VA hospital, 2011). In orientation, the program is extensively introduced and functional expectations are mutually established. This lasts for 15-20 weeks, as initial theories and practical nursing applications are reviewed and applied. In training, mentors serve as mentees’ active partners and support them in clinical practice and social interactions. As training proceeds, mentors not only act as role models for mentees to emulate, trusting associations support mentees’ psychological status. Through months of collaborative partnership, mentors gradually wean as educational coach, an d more as referred guide to practice. Periodically, communication patterns from nurses to involved administrative personnel are maintained through constant inspections and written memos. In evaluation, collected data determines whether the program fulfilled the parameters on work satisfaction. Should results meet expected outcomes, the program can proceed as formal policy in JVHA. Resource Identification Availability of resources in clinical areas is part of preparatory task. Block, Claffey, Korow, and McCaffrey (2005) emphasized mentors as prime indicator in a positive working environment. They are instructed on â€Å"phases of a mentor relationship, how to individualize the relationship...deal with any issues the mentor/mentee pair encounters,† while reviewing personal and professional attitudes (Hurst & Koplin-Baucum, 2005). Together with mentors, administrative personnel objectively monitor the progress of the program and existence of conducive functional environment (Al- Hussami, 2008). Resources are composed of materials during information campaigns and episodic post-tests. Written questionnaires are administered, requiring stocks of paper for reproducing copies. Sufficiently, resources for experiential learning are already available in actual settings, from medical equipments to patient charts, as well as conference halls for scheduled meetings. Aside from mentor compensation (minimum of $2/hour) and minimal educational expenditures, projected expenditure is lesser (Almada, Carafoli, Flattery, French, &

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Assignment 1 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 13

Assignment 1 - Essay Example The falling oil prices have forced oil producers to adopt survival measures that include layoffs of many employees. Other companies related to the oil industry are also feeling the effects of the continued reduction of oil prices. Indeed, the mining and logging industry fired 3,000 employees last month (Zumbrun 1). Moreover, Schlumberger seeks to lay off about 9,000 employees since the plunging oil prices are jeopardizing production (Strauss 1). Hercules Offshore Inc is also planning to fire about 324 employees since oil producers are not willing to renew contracts for their offshore drilling rigs (Sparshott 1). Most notable U.S. economists assert that suppliers of U.S oil and gas companies will fire about 40,000 employees while equipment manufacturers could lay off 5,500 employees by December this year (Zumbrun 1). I support the need to address the issue of plunging oil prices since they threaten employment rates in U.S. In addressing the issue, U.S will safeguard the jobs at oil companies, supplying, and manufacturing companies associated with the oil industry. I am grateful of your time and continued coverage of this

Saturday, November 16, 2019

Different Types of Narration Essay Example for Free

Different Types of Narration Essay There are a variety of ways to narrate a story, but essentially they can be broken down into two main groups: first person narrative, and third person narrative. In the use of the first person narrator, the story is told through the eyes of the I narrator. The first person narrator can only relate incidents that he or she has witnessed, and only he or she can interpreted the situation, therefore in this respect the first person narrative is limited. We must remember that a first person narrator in a novel is not the novelist but a character who sees things only in the light of his or her own point of view and coloured by his or her personality, therefore events are biased to the narrators opinion. This of course can be used to effect in books where the first person narrator is unreliable and therefore we are forced to see a false picture of events. For example in The Beach by Alex Garland, events are told by Richard, a backpacker in Bangkok. In the extract I have chosen, Richard recounts an encounter with Mister Duck, who, at the beginning of he book, commits suicide. In the extract below, it is only the second time that Richard meets Mister Duck, the first being when Richard was feverish. Therefore we can easily presume that Richard was hallucinating when he first met Mister Duck but in this extract, it is hard to tell, from the way Richard narrates it, that Mister Duck is imaginary: Mister Duck sat in his room on the Khao San Road. Hed pulled back one of the newspapers that covered the window and was peering down to the street. Behind him, strewn across his bed, were coloured pencils, obviously the ones hed used to draw the map. The map was nowhere in sight so maybe hed already tacked it to my door. I saw that his shoulders were shaking. Mister Duck? I said cautiously. He turned, scanned the room with a puzzled frown and, then spotted me through the strip of mosquito netting. Rich Hi. Of course, through first person narrative, we develop a more intimate relationship with the narrator because we have their character and way of thinking forced upon us, which in cases can make you sympathise more with this character, as you know their private emotions that they would not show openly. For example in The Remains of the Day the use of the first person narrator creates suspense and mystery over the intense relationship between Stevens and Miss Kenton. Also in this extract, we feel Stevens character imposed on the story as his unquestioning faith and dedication to his job cost him dearly his personal life. And finally Stevens unwavering sense of duty and reserve at all times leading him to deny his emotions eventually drive away the woman he loved. As demonstrated in the extract I have chosen: As I was bolting the door, I noticed Miss Kenton waiting for me, and said: I trust you had a pleasant evening, Miss Kenton. She made no reply, so I said again, as we were making our way across the darkened expanse of the kitchen floor; I trust you had a pleasant evening, Miss Kenton. I did, thank you, Mr Stevens. Im pleased to hear that. Behind me, Miss Kentons footsteps came to a sudden stop and I heard her say: Are you not in the least interested in what took place tonight between my acquaintance and I Mr Stevens? I do not mean to be rude, Miss Kenton, But I really must return upstairs without further delay. The fact is, events of a global significance are taking place in this house at this very moment. When are they not, Mr Stevens? Very well, if you must be rushing off, I shall just tell you that I accepted my acquaintances proposal. I beg your pardon, Miss Kenton? His proposal of marriage. Ah, is that so, Miss Kenton? Then may I offer you my congratulations. Thank you, Mr Stevens. Of course, Ill be happy to serve out my notice. However, should it be that you are able to release me earlier, we would be very grateful. My acquaintance begins his new job in the West Country in two weeks time. I will do my best to secure a replacement at the earliest opportunity, Miss Kenton. Now if you will excuse me, I must return upstairs. I started to walk away again, but then when I had all but reached the doors out to the corridor, I heard Miss Kenton say: Mr Stevens, and thus turned once more. She had not moved, and consequently she was obliged to raise her voice slightly in addressing me, so that it resonated rather oddly in the cavernous spaces of the dark and empty kitchen. Am I to take it she said, that after the many years of service I have given in this house, you have no more words to greet the news of my possible departure than those you have just uttered? Miss Kenton, you have my warmest congratulations. But I repeat, there are matters of global significance taking place upstairs and I must return to my post. Pages 218-219 In this extract we are frustrated by Stevens reserve and lack of emotion, and without the story being told form his side we might have felt Stevens to be cold hearted and distance and therefore dislike him. But in fact we pity his actions and feel moved. An autobiographical persona such as Pip in Dickens Great Expectations, are not to be taken as complete or even accurate portraits of their authors they are often no more than studies in self criticism: I was quite as dejected on the first working-day of my apprenticeship as in that after-time; but I am glad to know that I never breathed a murmur to Joe while my indentures lasted. It is about the only thing I am glad to know of myself in that connexion. For, though it includes what I proceed to add, all the merit of what I proceed to add was Joes. It was not because I was faithful, but because Joe was faithful, that I never ran away and went for a soldier or a sailor. It was not because I had a strong sense of the virtue of industry, but because Joe had a strong sense of the virtue of industry, that I worked with tolerable zeal against the grain. It is not possible to know how far the influence of any amiable honest-hearted duty-going man flies out into the world; but it is very possible to know how it has touched ones self in going by, and I know right well that any good that intermixed itself with my apprenticeship came of plain contented Joe, and not of restless aspiring discontented me. In the same way the innumerable portraits by artists of their friends, enemies or acquaintances are notoriously one sided, exaggerated and even on occasion, libellous. In a first person narrative, the use of interior monologue can be used where the reader is allowed inside the mind of the narrator and so we can hear their inner thought. For example in Ernest Hemingways A farewell to Arms, when Henry hears that his wife is gravely ill we receive an interior monologue: The nurse went into the room and shut the door. I sat outside in the hall. Everything was gone inside of me. I did not think. I could not think. I knew she was going to die and I prayed that she would not. Dont let her die. Oh, God, please dont let her die. Ill do anything for you if you wont let her die Please, please, please dear God, dont let her die. Dear God, dont let her die. Pleas, please, please dont let her die, God, please make her not die. Ill do anything you say if you dont let her die. You took the baby but dont let her die that was all right but dont let her die. Please, please, dear God, dont let her die. Here we feel that the character is deeply involved in his surroundings and what is happening, the events he is recounting are extremely emotional and moving, but this is not always the case. In Nausea by Jean-Paul Satre, it is the story of an observer of life in a small cafà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½, and here the narrator is totally withdrawn from his surrounding, as though watching it on television. The narrator is distanced from events and the book is almost like a third person narrative in the sense that he is telling the story of the lives of those sitting around him, but of course true to first person narration he is interpreting the situation into how he sees it: It is half past one. I am at the Cafà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½ Mably, eating a sandwich, and everything is more or less normal. In any case, everything is always normal in cafà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½s and especially in Cafà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½ Mably, because of the manager, Monsieur Fasquelle, who has a vulgar expression in his eyes which is very straightforward and reassuring. It will soon be time for his afternoon nap and his eyes are already pink, but his manner is still lively and decisive. He is walking among the tables and speaking confidentially to all the customers: Is everything all right, Monsieur? I smile at seeing him so lively: when his establishment empties, his head empties too. Between two and four the cafà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½ is deserted, and then Monsieur Fasquelle takes a few dazed steps, the waiter turn out the lights, and he slips into unconsciousness: when this man is alone, he falls asleep. The second type of narrative is third person narration. The narrator is omniscient, that is, able to move between characters, situations, and locations at any point, and granted full access to characters thoughts, feelings, and motivation. This is the advantage that third person narration has over first person, yet a sense of intimacy with the characters is harder to achieve. Some narrators might comment on the events taking place in the novel as they unfold, and even interpose their own views; the Victorian novelists such as Charles Dickens were adept at this manner of intervention, for example in A Christmas Carol, Dickens talks directly to the reader to convey his thoughts and ideas: Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooges name was good upon Change for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was dead as a door-nail. Mind! I dont mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of out ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the countrys done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail. Alternatively, the author might limit the narrators overt presence, and recount the narratives events as directly as possible. A third-person narrator might have a limited point of view, confined to only one or a few characters, as in much of Emily Brontà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½s Wuthering Heights, where the author is wholly absent and uses the characters to tell the story. Therefore she never directly interrupts the story to make a direct comment or moral judgement on the action of the characters. We notice that Emily Brontà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½ in Wuthering Heights uses narrators that are involved in the proceedings and therefore these people try to inflict their point of view on the reader. In this case it is to emphasise the point that the relationship between Heathcliff and Cathy is unique and not something that Nelly, or Lockwood (Wuthering Heights two main narrators) will never fully comprehend as only Heathcliff and Cathy can explain their love for each other. She rung the bell till it broke with a twang: I entered leisurely. It was enough to try the temper of a saint, such senseless, wicked rages! There she lay dashing her head against the arm of the sofa, and grinding her teeth, so that you might fancy she would crash them to splinters! Mr Linton stood looking at her in sudden compunction and fear. He told me to fetch some water. She had no breath for speaking. I brought a glass full; and, as she would not drink, I sprinkled it on her face. In a few seconds she stretched herself out stiff, and turned up her eyes, while her cheeks, at once blanched and livid, assumed the aspect of death. Linton looked terrified. There is nothing in the world the matter, I whispered. I did not want him to yield, though I could not help being afraid in my heart. She has blood on her lips! he said, shuddering. Never mind! I answered tartly. And I told him how she had resolved previous to his coming, on exhibiting a fit of frenzy. In some cases the events of the story are told through an impersonal narrative. This impersonal narrator then relates the story through the senses of different character, presenting the reader with a more rounded picture. For example in The Tesseract by Alex Garland, the story is told from many points of view, quickly changing between one characters perspective to another, each time the story being told from that characters sense and feeling. In the extract below we witness the situation from three of the character point of view The telephone made for an indifferent witness. But Seans reflection in the bathroom mirror, making contact as he turned away from the vent, was less detached. Even under pressure, the sight was arresting. His face seemed to be in a state of flux. Unable to resolve itself, like a cheap hologram or a bucket of snakes, the lips drew back while the jaw relaxed, the stare softened while the frown hardened. Fear, Sean thought distantly. Rare that one got to see what it actually looked like. Other peoples, sure, but not your own. Intrigued, he leaned close to the mirror, ignoring the footsteps that were already working their way up the stairs. Aaaah, were going to be late, said Don Pepe, breaking the tense silence of the last five minutes. Jojo nodded and nervously pushed his thumbs into the padding around the steering wheel. Yes, sir, we are. Im sorry. Jojo paused a moment before saying Yes, sir again. He was leaving time for Teroy to add his own apology. After all, hed been the one who had suggested Hotel Patay in the first place. But Teroy, sitting in the passenger seat, wasnt saying a word. No sense diverting Don Pepes irritation on to him, when he could keep his head down and his mouth shut and let Jojo take all the abuse. Fair enough. Jojo would have been doing the same if their roles had been reversed. The narrator is very important in a story as the narrator is responsible for the way a story is conveyed to its reader, or its point of view. The variety of ways that the author can manipulate the narrator and his or her point of view in order to gain maximum control over the work as a whole is often the essence of whether the reader gained the desired effect set by the author.

Thursday, November 14, 2019

The Importance of Learning Self-respect :: Personal Narrative, Autobiographical Essay

On a recent visit to Europe, I had the good fortune to participate in a study tour, focusing on teenage sexuality, sex-education in the schools, the impact of the media, and parent-child communication. While teen sexual activity, pregnancy rates, HIV and STI statistics are exceedingly high in the United States; the Netherlands, Germany and France all maintain a much healthier standard. While these European teens are not only beginning sexual activity a year later than our teens, on an average, the reason for their better health seems to me fairly obvious better mental health. These teens are being groomed with self-respect from a very young age. Â   In the Netherlands, I am struck by the honesty and integrity of parents and educators who believe that if a child is old enough to ask a question, he is old enough to get an answer. While these answers are age appropriate, children tend to develop healthier body images, better communication skills and the feeling that no topic is taboo when they are encouraged to ask questions. As this exchange boosts a child's confidence and trust, it also builds his self-esteem. And while life skills classes are an integral part of the school curriculum, one of the many lessons children learn in these classes is how to build and nurture a relationship and how to be a responsible friend. How's that for an education... Â   Germany's media campaigns in the area of safe sex are brilliant. Prominent athletes and politicians often endorse commercials promoting condom use. The commercials are witty, sexy, bold, edgey, and speak directly to a young audience of hormonal hipsters. By addressing, and not repressing their sexuality, these advertisers are successfully attracting their demographic while simultaneously educating youth about disease prevention. Teaching a young mind to respect his or her young body is teaching self-esteem. And, as we all know, self esteem is fostered by education and communication. Â   France, much like the Netherlands and Germany has normalized sex in a way that allows teenagers a healthy dialogue between parents and teens, educators and students and the media and its audience. The European attitude recognizes that emotional maturity goes hand in hand with sexuality. Casual or recreational sex often comes with a hefty price tag and while teenagers will always be curious, they should also be prepared with both the physical and spiritual tools to handle their growing libidos. The Importance of Learning Self-respect :: Personal Narrative, Autobiographical Essay On a recent visit to Europe, I had the good fortune to participate in a study tour, focusing on teenage sexuality, sex-education in the schools, the impact of the media, and parent-child communication. While teen sexual activity, pregnancy rates, HIV and STI statistics are exceedingly high in the United States; the Netherlands, Germany and France all maintain a much healthier standard. While these European teens are not only beginning sexual activity a year later than our teens, on an average, the reason for their better health seems to me fairly obvious better mental health. These teens are being groomed with self-respect from a very young age. Â   In the Netherlands, I am struck by the honesty and integrity of parents and educators who believe that if a child is old enough to ask a question, he is old enough to get an answer. While these answers are age appropriate, children tend to develop healthier body images, better communication skills and the feeling that no topic is taboo when they are encouraged to ask questions. As this exchange boosts a child's confidence and trust, it also builds his self-esteem. And while life skills classes are an integral part of the school curriculum, one of the many lessons children learn in these classes is how to build and nurture a relationship and how to be a responsible friend. How's that for an education... Â   Germany's media campaigns in the area of safe sex are brilliant. Prominent athletes and politicians often endorse commercials promoting condom use. The commercials are witty, sexy, bold, edgey, and speak directly to a young audience of hormonal hipsters. By addressing, and not repressing their sexuality, these advertisers are successfully attracting their demographic while simultaneously educating youth about disease prevention. Teaching a young mind to respect his or her young body is teaching self-esteem. And, as we all know, self esteem is fostered by education and communication. Â   France, much like the Netherlands and Germany has normalized sex in a way that allows teenagers a healthy dialogue between parents and teens, educators and students and the media and its audience. The European attitude recognizes that emotional maturity goes hand in hand with sexuality. Casual or recreational sex often comes with a hefty price tag and while teenagers will always be curious, they should also be prepared with both the physical and spiritual tools to handle their growing libidos.

Monday, November 11, 2019

Summary of the Yellow Wallpaper

Summary of â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper† by Charlotte Gillman In â€Å"The Yellow Wallpaper,† Charlotte Gillman tells a story of a woman, her husband, and their three month stay at a beautiful home with hideous yellow wallpaper in the master bedroom. The story begins with the woman’s complaints to her husband John about his choice to use the room with the yellow wallpaper instead of one with roses on the window being denied because he felt it would be good for her â€Å"nervous condition†.The woman thought that there was something strange about the house but John told her that her feelings were mere nonsense and that she should get plenty of rest during their stay to try and help her condition. He told her that she should also stay away from her love of writing while he is away treating his patients because it would be too stressful for her condition. During John’s frequent absences the woman begins to obsess over the yellow wallpaper, even going as f ar as to stare at it all night. The woman began to hallucinate about a lady being trapped within the wallpaper after dark and creeping around the garden by day.Her husband thought she was getting better when all that was occurring was his wife was going crazy trying not to bother him. The woman spoke of a recurrent spot where the pattern lolls like a broken neck and two bulbous eyes staring at you upside down. By the end of the story the woman barricaded herself in the master bedroom, ripping down wallpaper in a desperate attempt to free the lady that creeps in the garden by day and is trapped in the walls at night. The purpose of the story is to show how both men and women should have a purpose in society.

Saturday, November 9, 2019

Black House Chapter Twenty

20 AROUND THE TIME Mouse and Beezer first fail to see the little road and the NO TRESPASSING sign beside it, Jack Sawyer answers the annoying signal of his cell phone, hoping that his caller will turn out to be Henry Leyden with information about the voice on the 911 tape. Although an identification would be wonderful, he does not expect Henry to I.D. the voice; the Fisherman?CBurnside is Potsie's age, and Jack does not suppose the old villain has much of a social life, here or in the Territories. What Henry can do, however, is to apply his finely tuned ears to the nuances of Burnside's voice and describe what he hears in it. If we did not know that Jack's faith in his friend's capacity to hear distinctions and patterns inaudible to other people was justified, that faith would seem as irrational as the belief in magic: Jack trusts that a refreshed, invigorated Henry Leyden will pick up at least one or two crucial details of history or character that will narrow the search. Anything that Henry picks up will interest Jack. If someone else is calling him, he intends to get rid of whoever it is, fast. The voice that answers his greeting revises his plans. Fred Marshall wants to talk to him, and Fred is so wound up and incoherent that Jack must ask him to slow down and start over. â€Å"Judy's flipping out again,† Fred says. â€Å"Just . . . babbling and raving, and getting crazy like before, trying to rip through the walls oh God, they put her in restraints and she hates that, she wants to help Ty, it's all because of that tape. Christ, it's getting to be too much to handle, Jack, Mr. Sawyer, I mean it, and I know I'm running off at the mouth, but I'm really worried.† â€Å"Don't tell me someone sent her the 911 tape,† Jack says. â€Å"No, not . . . what 911 tape? I'm talking about the one that was delivered to the hospital today. Addressed to Judy. Can you believe they let her listen to that thing? I want to strangle Dr. Spiegleman and that nurse, Jane Bond. What's the matter with these people? The tape comes in, they say, oh goody, here's a nice tape for you to listen to, Mrs. Marshall, hold on, I'll be right back with a cassette player. On a mental ward? They don't even bother to listen to it first? Look, whatever you're doing, I'd be eternally grateful if you'd let me pick you up, so I could drive you over there. You could talk to her. You're the only person who can calm her down.† â€Å"You don't have to pick me up, because I'm already on the way. What was on the tape?† â€Å"I don't get it.† Fred Marshall has become considerably more lucid. â€Å"Why are you going there without me?† After a second of thought, Jack tells him an outright lie. â€Å"I thought you would probably be there already. It's a pity you weren't.† â€Å"I would have had the sense to screen that tape before letting her hear it. Do you know what was on that thing?† â€Å"The Fisherman,† Jack says. â€Å"How did you know?† â€Å"He's a great communicator,† Jack says. â€Å"How bad was it?† â€Å"You tell me, and then we'll both know. I'm piecing it together from what I gathered from Judy and what Dr. Spiegleman told me later.† Fred Marshall's voice begins to waver. â€Å"The Fisherman was taunting her. Can you believe that? He said, Your little boy is very lonely. Then he said something like, He's been begging and begging to call home and say hello to his mommy. Except Judy says he had a weird foreign accent, or a speech impediment, or something, so he wasn't easy to understand right away. Then he says, Say hello to your mommy, Tyler, and Tyler . . .† Fred's voice breaks, and Jack can hear him stifling his agony before he begins again. â€Å"Tyler, ah, Tyler was apparently too distressed to do much but scream for help.† A long, uncertain inhalation comes over the phone. â€Å"And he cried, Jack, he cried.† Unable to contain his feelings any longer, Fred weeps openly, unguardedly. His breath rattles in his throat; Jack listens to all the wet, undignified, helpless noises people make when grief and sorrow cancel every other feeling, and his heart moves for Fred Marshall. The sobbing relents. â€Å"Sorry. Sometimes I think they'll have to put me in restraints.† â€Å"Was that the end of the tape?† â€Å"He got on again.† Fred breathes noisily for a moment, clearing his head. â€Å"Boasting about what he was going to do. Dere vill be morrr mur-derts, and morrr afder dat, Choo-dee, we are all goink zu haff sotch fun Spiegleman quoted this junk to me! The children of French Landing will be harvested like wheat. Havv-uz-ted like wheed. Who talks like that? What kind of person is this?† â€Å"I wish I knew,† Jack says. â€Å"Maybe he was putting on an accent to sound even scarier. Or to disguise his voice.† He'd never disguise his voice, Jack thinks, he's too delighted with himself to hide behind an accent. â€Å"I'll have to get the tape from the hospital and listen to it myself. And I'll call you as soon as I have some information.† â€Å"There's one more thing,† Marshall says. â€Å"I probably made a mistake. Wendell Green came over about an hour ago.† â€Å"Anything involving Wendell Green is automatically a mistake. So what happened?† â€Å"It was like he knew all about Tyler and just needed me to confirm it. I thought he must have heard from Dale, or the state troopers. But Dale hasn't made us public yet, has he?† â€Å"Wendell has a network of little weasels that feed him information. If he knows anything, that's how he heard about it. What did you tell him?† â€Å"More or less everything,† Marshall says. â€Å"Including the tape. Oh, God, I'm such a dope. But I thought it'd be all right I thought it would all get out anyhow.† â€Å"Fred, did you tell him anything about me?† â€Å"Only that Judy trusts you and that we're both grateful for your help. And I think I said that you would probably be going in to see her this afternoon.† â€Å"Did you mention Ty's baseball cap?† â€Å"Do you think I'm nuts? As far as I'm concerned, that stuff is between you and Judy. If I don't get it, I'm not going to talk about it to Wendell Green. At least I got him to promise to stay away from Judy. He has a great reputation, but I got the feeling he isn't everything he's cracked up to be.† â€Å"You said a mouthful,† Jack says. â€Å"I'll be in touch.† When Fred Marshall hangs up, Jack punches in Henry's number. â€Å"I may be a little late, Henry. I'm on my way to French County Lutheran. Judy Marshall got a tape from the Fisherman, and if they'll let me have it, I'll bring it over. There's something strange going on here on Judy's tape, I guess he has some kind of foreign accent.† Henry tells Jack there is no rush. He has not listened to the first tape yet, and now will wait until Jack comes over with the second one. He might hear something useful if he plays them in sequence. At least, he could tell Jack if they were made by the same man. â€Å"And don't worry about me, Jack. In a little while, Mrs. Morton is coming by to take me over to KDCU. George Rathbun butters my bread today, baby six or seven radio ads. ‘Even a blind man knows you want to treat your honey, your sweetheart, your lovey-dovey, your wife, your best friend through thick and thin, to a mm-mmm fine dinner tonight, and there's no better place to show your appreciation to the old ball and chain than to take her to Cousin Buddy's Rib Crib on South Wabash Street in beautiful downtown La Riviere!' â€Å" † ‘The old ball and chain'?† â€Å"You pay for George Rathbun, you get George Rathbun, warts and all.† Laughing, Jack tells Henry he will see him later that day, and pushes the Ram up to seventy. What is Dale going to do, give him a speeding ticket? He parks in front of the hospital instead of driving around to the parking lot, and trots across the concrete with his mind filled with the Territories and Judy Marshall. Things are hurtling forward, picking up pace, and Jack has the sense that everything converges on Judy no, on Judy and him. The Fisherman has chosen them more purposefully than he did his first three victims: Amy St. Pierre, Johnny Irkenham, and Irma Freneau were simply the right age any three children would have done but Tyler was Judy Marshall's son, and that set him apart. Judy has glimpsed the Territories, Jack has traveled through them, and the Fisherman lives there the way a cancer cell lives in a healthy organism. The Fisherman sent Judy a tape, Jack a grisly present. At Tansy Freneau's, he had seen Judy as his key and the door it opened, and where did that door lead but into Judy's Faraway? Faraway. God, that's pretty. Beautiful, in fact. Aaah . . . the word evokes Judy Marshall's face, and when he sees that face, a door in his mind, a door that is his and his alone, flies open, and for a moment Jack Sawyer stops moving altogether, and in shock, dread, and joyous expectation, freezes on the concrete six feet from the hospital's entrance. Through the door in his mind pours a stream of disconnected images: a stalled Ferris wheel, Santa Monica cops milling behind a strip of yellow crime-scene tape, light reflected off a black man's bald head. Yes, a bald man's black head, that which he really and truly, in fact most desperately, had not wished to see, so take a good look, kiddo, here it is again. There had been a guitar, but the guitar was elsewhere; the guitar belonged to the magnificent demanding comforting comfortless Speedy Parker, God bless him God damn his eyes God love him Speedy, who touched its strings and sang Travelin' Jack, ole Travelin' Jack, Got a far long way to go, Longer way to come back. Worlds spin around him, worlds within worlds and other worlds alongside them, separated by a thin membrane composed of a thousand thousand doors, if only you know how to find them. A thousand thousand red feathers, tiny ones, feathers from a robin redbreast, hundreds of robin redbreasts, flew through one of those doors, Speedy's. Robin, as in robin's-egg blue, thank you, Speedy, and a song that said Wake up, wake up, you sleepyhead. Or: Wake up, wake up, you DUNDERHEAD! Crazily, Jack hears George Rathbun's now-not-so genial roar: Eeeven a BLIIIND MAAAN coulda seen THIS one coming, you KNOTHEAD! â€Å"Oh, yeah?† Jack says out loud. It is a good thing Head Nurse Jane Bond, Warden Bond, Agent OO Zero, cannot hear him. She's tough, but on the other hand, she's unfair, and if she were to appear beside him now, she would probably clap him in irons, sedate him, and drag him back to her domain. â€Å"Well, I know something you don't know, old buddy: Judy Marshall has a Twinner, and the Twinner has been whispering through the wall for a considerable old time now. It's no surprise she finally started to shout.† A red-haired teenager in an ARDEN H.S. BASEBALL T-shirt shoves open the literal door six feet from Jack and gives him a wary, disconcerted look. Man, grown-ups are weird, the look says; aren't I glad I'm a kid? Since he is a high school student and not a mental-health professional, he does not clap our hero in irons and drag him sedated away to the padded room. He simply takes care to steer a wide course around the madman and keeps walking, albeit with a touch of self-conscious stiffness in his gait. It is all about Twinners, of course. Rebuking his stupidity, Jack raps his knuckles against the side of his head. He should have seen it before; he should have understood immediately. If he has any excuse, it is that at first he refused to think about the case despite Speedy's efforts to wake him up, then became so caught up in concentrating on the Fisherman that until this morning, while watching his mother on the Sand Bar's big TV, he had neglected to consider the monster's Twinner. In Judy Marshall's childhood, her Twinner had spoken to her through that membrane between the two worlds; growing more and more alarmed over the past month, the Twinner had all but thrust her arms through the membrane and shaken Judy senseless. Because Jack is single-natured and has no Twinner, the corresponding task fell to Speedy. Now that everything seems to make sense, Jack cannot believe it has taken him so long to see the pattern. And this is why he has resented everything that kept him from standing before Judy Marshall: Judy is the doorway to her Twinner, to Tyler, and to the destruction of both the Fisherman and his opposite number in the Territories, the builder of the satanic, fiery structure a crow named Gorg showed Tansy Freneau. Whatever happens on Ward D today, it is going to be world-altering. Heart thrumming in anticipation, Jack passes from intense sunlight into the vast ocher space of the lobby. The same bathrobed patients seem to occupy the many chairs; in a distant corner, the same doctors discuss a troublesome case or, who knows, that tricky tenth hole at Arden Country Club; the same golden lilies raise their luxuriant, attentive heads outside the gift shop. This repetition reassures Jack, it hastens his step, for it surrounds and cushions the unforeseeable events awaiting him on the fifth floor. The same bored clerk responds to the proffer of the same password with an identical, if not the same, green card stamped VISITOR. The elevator surprisingly similar to one in the Ritz H?tel on the Place Vend?me obediently trembles upward past floors two, three, and four, in its dowager-like progress pausing to admit a gaunt young doctor who summons the memory of Roderick Usher, then releases Jack on five, where the beautiful ocher light seems a shade or two darker than down there in the huge lobby. From the elevator Jack retraces the steps he took with his guide Fred Marshall down the corridor, through the two sets of double doors and past the way stations of Gerontology and Ambulatory Ophthalmology and Records Annex, getting closer and closer to the unforeseen unforeseeable as the corridors grow narrower and darker, and emerges as before into the century-old room with high, skinny windows and a lot of walnut-colored wood. And there the spell breaks, for the attendant seated behind the polished counter, the person currently the guardian of this realm, is taller, younger, and considerably more sullen than his counterpart of the day before. When Jack asks to see Mrs. Marshall, the young person glances in disdain at his VISITOR card and inquires if he should happen to be a relative or another glance at the card a medical professional. Neither, Jack admits, but if the young person could trouble himself to inform Nurse Bond that Mr. Sawyer wishes to speak to Mrs. Marshall, Nurse Bond is practically guaranteed to swing open the forbidding metal doors and wave him inward, since that is more or less what she did yesterday. That is all well and good, if it happens to be true, the young person allows, but Nurse Bond is not going to be doing any door opening and waving in today, for today Nurse Bond is off duty. Could it be that when Mr. Sawyer showed up to see Mrs. Marshall yesterday he was accompanied by a family member, say Mr. Marshall? Yes. And if Mr. Marshall were to be consulted, say via the telephone, he would urge the young fellow presently discussing the matter in a commendably responsible fashion with Mr. Sawyer to admit the gentleman promptly. That may be the case, the young person grants, but hospital regulations require that nonmedical personnel in positions such as the young person's obtain authorization for any outside telephone calls. And from whom, Jack wishes to know, would this authorization be obtained? From the acting head nurse, Nurse Rack. Jack, who is growing a little hot, as they say, under the collar, suggests in that case that the young person seek out the excellent Nurse Rack and obtain the required authorization, so that things might progress in the manner Mr. Marshall, the patient's husband, would wish. No, the young person sees no reason to pursue such a course, the reason being that doing so would represent a pitiful waste of time and effort. Mr. Sawyer is not a member of Mrs. Marshall's family; therefore the excellent Nurse Rack would under no circumstances grant the authorization. â€Å"Okay,† Jack says, wishing he could strangle this irritating pip-squeak, â€Å"let's move a step up the administrative ladder, shall we? Is Dr. Spiegleman somewhere on the premises?† â€Å"Could be,† the young person says. â€Å"How'm I supposed to know? Dr. Spiegleman doesn't tell me everything he does.† Jack points to the telephone at the end of the counter. â€Å"I don't expect you to know, I expect you to find out. Get on that phone now.† The young man slouches down the counter to the telephone, rolls his eyes, punches two numbered keys, and leans against the counter with his back to the room. Jack hears him muttering about Spiegleman, sigh, then say, â€Å"All right, transfer me, whatever.† Transferred, he mutters something that includes Jack's name. Whatever he hears in response causes him to jerk himself upright and sneak a wide-eyed look over his shoulder at Jack. â€Å"Yes, sir. He's here now, yes. I'll tell him.† He replaces the receiver. â€Å"Dr. Spiegleman'll be here right away.† The boy he is no more than twenty steps back and shoves his hands in his pockets. â€Å"You're that cop, huh?† â€Å"What cop?† Jack says, still irritated. â€Å"The one from California that came here and arrested Mr. Kinderling.† â€Å"Yes, that's me.† â€Å"I'm from French Landing, and boy, that was some shock. To the whole town. Nobody would have guessed. Mr. Kinderling? Are you kidding? You'd never believe that someone like that would . . . you know, kill people.† â€Å"Did you know him?† â€Å"Well, in a town like French Landing, everybody sort of knows everybody, but I didn't really know Mr. Kinderling, except to say hi. The one I knew was his wife. She used to be my Sunday school teacher at Mount Hebron Lutheran.† Jack cannot help it; he laughs at the incongruity of the murderer's wife teaching Sunday school classes. The memory of Wanda Kinderling radiating hatred at him during her husband's sentencing stops his laughter, but it is too late. He sees that he has offended the young man. â€Å"What was she like?† he asks. â€Å"As a teacher.† â€Å"Just a teacher,† the boy says. His voice is uninflected, resentful. â€Å"She made us memorize all the books of the Bible.† He turns away and mutters, â€Å"Some people think he didn't do it.† â€Å"What did you say?† The boy half-turns toward Jack but looks at the brown wall in front of him. â€Å"I said, Some people think he didn't do it. Mr. Kinderling. They think he got put in jail because he was a small-town guy who didn't know anybody out there.† â€Å"That's too bad,† Jack says. â€Å"Do you want to know the real reason Mr. Kinderling went to prison?† The boy turns the rest of the way and looks at Jack. â€Å"Because he was guilty of murder, and he confessed. That's it, that's all. Two witnesses put him at the scene, and two other people saw him on a plane to L.A. when he told everyone he was flying to Denver. After that, he said, Okay, I did it. I always wanted to know what it was like to kill a girl, and one day I couldn't stand it anymore, so I went out and killed two whores. His lawyer tried to get him off on an insanity plea, but the jury at his hearing found him sane, and he went to prison.† The boy lowers his head and mumbles something. â€Å"I couldn't hear that,† Jack says. â€Å"Lots of ways to make a guy confess.† The boy repeats the sentence just loud enough to be heard. Then footsteps ring in the hallway, and a plump, white-coated man with steel-rimmed glasses and a goatee comes striding toward Jack with his hand out. The boy has turned away. The opportunity to convince the attendant that he did not beat a confession out of Thornberg Kinderling has slipped away. The smiling man with the white jacket and the goatee seizes Jack's hand, introduces himself as Dr. Spiegleman, and declares it a pleasure to meet such a famous personage. (Personage, persiflage, Jack thinks.) From one step behind the doctor, a man unnoticed until this moment steps fully into view and says, â€Å"Hey, Doctor, do you know what would be perfect? If Mr. Famous and I interview the lady together. Twice the information in half the time perfect.† Jack's stomach turns sour. Wendell Green has joined the party. After greeting the doctor, Jack turns to the other man. â€Å"What are you doing here, Wendell? You promised Fred Marshall you'd stay away from his wife.† Wendell Green holds up his hands and dances back on the balls of his feet. â€Å"Are we calmer today, Lieutenant Sawyer? Not inclined to use a sucker punch on the hardworking press, are we? I have to say, I'm getting a little tired of being assaulted by the police.† Dr. Spiegleman frowns at him. â€Å"What are you saying, Mr. Green?† â€Å"Yesterday, before that cop knocked me out with his flashlight, Lieutenant Sawyer here punched me in the stomach for no real reason at all. It's a good thing I'm a reasonable man, or I'd have filed lawsuits already. But, Doctor, you know what? I don't do things that way. I believe everything works out better if we cooperate with each other.† Halfway through this self-serving speech, Jack thinks, Oh hell, and glances at the young attendant. The boy's eyes burn with loathing. A lost cause: now Jack will never persuade the boy that he did not mistreat Kinderling. By the time Wendell Green finishes congratulating himself, Jack has had a bellyful of his specious, smarmy affability. â€Å"Mr. Green offered to give me a percentage of his take, if I let him sell photographs of Irma Freneau's corpse,† he tells the doctor. â€Å"What he is asking now is equally unthinkable. Mr. Marshall urged me to come here and see his wife, and he made Mr. Green promise not to come.† â€Å"Technically, that may be true,† Green says. â€Å"As an experienced journalist, I know that people often say things they don't mean and will eventually regret. Fred Marshall understands that his wife's story is going to come out sooner or later.† â€Å"Does he?† â€Å"Especially in the light of the Fisherman's latest communication,† Green says. â€Å"This tape proves that Tyler Marshall is his fourth victim, and that, miraculously, he is still alive. How long do you think that can be kept from the public? And wouldn't you agree that the boy's mother should be able to explain the situation in her own words?† â€Å"I refuse to be badgered like this.† The doctor scowls at Green and gives Jack a look of warning. â€Å"Mr. Green, I am very close to ordering you out of this hospital. I wish to discuss several matters with Lieutenant Sawyer, in private. If you and the lieutenant can work out some agreement between the two of you, that is your affair. I am certainly not going to permit a joint interview with my patient. I am in no way certain that she should talk to Lieutenant Sawyer, either. She is calmer than she was this morning, but she is still fragile.† â€Å"The best way to deal with her problem is to let her express herself,† Green says. â€Å"You will be quiet now, Mr. Green,† Dr. Spiegleman says. The double chins that fold under his goatee turn a warm pink. He glares at Jack. â€Å"What specifically is it that you request, Lieutenant?† â€Å"Do you have an office in this hospital, Doctor?† â€Å"I do.† â€Å"Ideally, I'd like to spend about half an hour, maybe less, talking to Mrs. Marshall in a safe, quiet environment where our conversation would be completely confidential. Your office would probably be perfect. There are too many people on the ward, and you can't talk without being interrupted or having other patients listen in.† â€Å"My office,† Spiegleman says. â€Å"If you're willing.† â€Å"Come with me,† the doctor says. â€Å"Mr. Green, you will please stand back next to the counter while Lieutenant Sawyer and I step into the hallway.† â€Å"Anything you say.† Green executes a mocking bow and moves lightly, with a suggestion of dance steps, to the counter. â€Å"In your absence, I'm sure this handsome young man and I will find something to talk about.† Smiling, Wendell Green props his elbows on the counter and watches Jack and Dr. Spiegleman leave the room. Their footsteps click against the floor tiles until it sounds as though they have gone more than halfway down the corridor. Then there is silence. Still smiling, Wendell about-faces and finds the attendant openly staring at him. â€Å"I read you all the time,† the boy says. â€Å"You write real good.† Wendell's smile becomes beatific. â€Å"Handsome and intelligent. What a stunning combination. Tell me your name.† â€Å"Ethan Evans.† â€Å"Ethan, we do not have much time here, so let's make this snappy. Do you think responsible members of the press should have access to information the public needs?† â€Å"You bet.† â€Å"And wouldn't you agree that an informed press is one of our best weapons against monsters like the Fisherman?† A single, vertical wrinkle appears between Ethan Evans's eyebrows. â€Å"Weapons?† â€Å"Let me put it this way. Isn't it true that the more we know about the Fisherman, the better chance we have of stopping him?† The boy nods, and the wrinkle disappears. â€Å"Tell me, do you think the doctor is going to let Sawyer use his office?† â€Å"Prob'ly, yeah,† Evans says. â€Å"But I don't like the way that Sawyer guy works. He's a police brutality. Like when they hit people to make them confess. That's brutality.† â€Å"I have another question for you. Two questions, really. Is there a closet in Dr. Spiegleman's office? And is there some way you could take me there without going through that corridor?† â€Å"Oh.† Evans's dim eyes momentarily shine with understanding. â€Å"You want to listen.† â€Å"Listen and record.† Wendell Green taps the pocket that contains his cassette recorder. â€Å"For the good of the public at large, God bless 'em one and all.† â€Å"Well, maybe, yeah,† the boy says. â€Å"But Dr. Spiegleman, he . . .† A twenty-dollar bill has magically appeared folded around the second finger of Wendell Green's right hand. â€Å"Act fast, and Dr. Spiegleman will never know a thing. Right, Ethan?† Ethan Evans snatches the bill from Wendell's hand and motions him back behind the counter, where he opens a door and says, â€Å"Come on, hurry.† Low lights burn at both ends of the dark corridor. Dr. Spiegleman says, â€Å"I gather that my patient's husband told you about the tape she received this morning.† â€Å"He did. How did it get here, do you know?† â€Å"Believe me, Lieutenant, after I saw the effect that tape had on Mrs. Marshall and listened to it myself, I tried to learn how it reached my patient. All of our mail goes through the hospital's mailroom before being delivered, all of it, whether to patients, medical staff, or administrative offices. From there, a couple of volunteers deliver it to the addressees. I gather that the package containing the tape was in the hospital mailroom when a volunteer looked in there this morning. Because the package was addressed only with my patient's name, the volunteer went to our general information office. One of the girls brought it up.† â€Å"Shouldn't someone have consulted you before giving the tape and a cassette player to Judy?† â€Å"Of course. Nurse Bond would have done so immediately, but she is not on duty today. Nurse Rack, who is on duty, assumed that the address referred to a childhood nickname and thought that one of Mrs. Marshall's old friends had sent her some music to cheer her up. And there is a cassette player in the nurses' station, so she put the tape in the player and gave it to Mrs. Marshall.† In the gloom of the corridor, the doctor's eyes take on a sardonic glint. â€Å"Then, as you might imagine, all hell broke loose. Mrs. Marshall reverted to the condition in which she was first hospitalized, which takes in a range of alarming behaviors. Fortunately, I happened to be in the hospital, and when I heard what had happened, I ordered her sedated and placed in a secure room. A secure room, Lieutenant, has padded walls Mrs. Marshall had reopened the wounds to her fingers, and I did not want her to do any more damage to herself. Once the sedative had taken effect, I went in and talked to her. I listened to the tape. Perhaps I should have called the police immediately, but my first responsibility is to my patient, and I called Mr. Marshall instead.† â€Å"From where?† â€Å"From the secure room, with my cell phone. Mr. Marshall of course insisted on speaking to his wife, and she wanted to speak to him. She became very distraught during their conversation, and I had to give her another mild sedative. When she calmed down, I went out of the room and called Mr. Marshall again, to tell him more specifically about the contents of the tape. Do you want to hear it?† â€Å"Not now, Doctor, thanks. But I do want to ask you about one aspect of it.† â€Å"Then ask.† â€Å"Fred Marshall tried to imitate the way you had reproduced the accent of the man who made the tape. Did it sound like any recognizable accent to you? German, maybe?† â€Å"I've been thinking about that. It was sort of like a Germanic pronunciation of English, but not really. If it sounded like anything recognizable, it was English spoken by a Frenchman trying to put on a German accent, if that makes sense to you. But really, I've never heard anything like it.† From the start of this conversation, Dr. Spiegleman has been measuring Jack, assessing him according to standards Jack cannot even begin to guess. His expression remains as neutral and impersonal as that of a traffic cop. â€Å"Mr. Marshall informed me that he intended to call you. It seems that you and Mrs. Marshall have formed a rather extraordinary bond. She respects your skill at what you do, which is to be expected, but she also seems to trust you. Mr. Marshall asks that you be allowed to interview his wife, and his wife tells me that she must talk to you.† â€Å"Then you should have no problems with letting me see her in private for half an hour.† Dr. Spiegleman's smile is gone as soon as it appears. â€Å"My patient and her husband have demonstrated their trust in you, Lieutenant Sawyer, but that is not the issue. The issue is whether or not I can trust you.† â€Å"Trust me to do what?† â€Å"A number of things. Primarily, to act in the best interest of my patient. To refrain from unduly distressing her, also from giving her false hopes. My patient has developed a number of delusions centered on the existence of another world somehow contiguous to ours. She thinks her son is being held captive in this other world. I must tell you, Lieutenant, that both my patient and her husband believe you are familiar with this fantasy-world that is, my patient accepts this belief wholly, and her husband accepts it only provisionally, on the grounds that it comforts his wife.† â€Å"I understand that.† There is only one thing Jack can tell the doctor now, and he says it. â€Å"And what you should understand is that in all of my conversations with the Marshalls, I have been acting in my unofficial capacity as a consultant to the French Landing Police Department and its chief, Dale Gilbertson.† â€Å"Your unofficial capacity.† â€Å"Chief Gilbertson has been asking me to advise him on his conduct of the Fisherman investigation, and two days ago, after the disappearance of Tyler Marshall, I finally agreed to do what I could. I have no official status whatsoever. I'm just giving the chief and his officers the benefit of my experience.† â€Å"Let me get this straight, Lieutenant. You have been misleading the Marshalls as to your familiarity with Mrs. Marshall's delusional fantasy-world?† â€Å"I'll answer you this way, Doctor. We know from the tape that the Fisherman really is holding Tyler Marshall captive. We could say that he is no longer in this world, but in the Fisherman's.† Dr. Spiegleman raises his eyebrows. â€Å"Do you think this monster inhabits the same universe that we do?† asks Jack. â€Å"I don't, and neither do you. The Fisherman lives in a world all his own, one that operates according to fantastically detailed rules he has made up or invented over the years. With all due respect, my experience has made me far more familiar with structures like this than the Marshalls, the police, and, unless you have done a great deal of work with psychopathic criminals, even you. I'm sorry if that sounds arrogant, because I don't mean it that way.† â€Å"You're talking about profiling? Something like that?† â€Å"Years ago, I was invited into a special VICAP profiling unit run by the FBI, and I learned a lot there, but what I'm talking about now goes beyond profiling.† And that's the understatement of the year, Jack says to himself. Now it's in your court, Doctor. Spiegleman nods, slowly. The distant glow flashes in the lenses of his glasses. â€Å"I think I see, yes.† He ponders. He sighs, crosses his arms over his chest, and ponders some more. Then he raises his eyes to Jack's. â€Å"All right. I'll let you see her. Alone. In my office. For thirty minutes. I wouldn't want to stand in the way of advanced investigative procedure.† â€Å"Thank you,† Jack says. â€Å"This will be extremely helpful, I promise you.† â€Å"I have been a psychiatrist too long to believe in promises like that, Lieutenant Sawyer, but I hope you succeed in rescuing Tyler Marshall. Let me take you to my office. You can wait there while I get my patient and bring her there by another hallway. It's a little quicker.† Dr. Spiegleman marches to the end of the dark corridor and turns left, then left again, pulls a fat ball of keys from his pocket, and opens an unmarked door. Jack follows him into a room that looks as though it had been created by combining two small offices into one. Half of the room is taken up by a long wooden desk, a chair, a glass-topped coffee table stacked with journals, and filing cabinets; the other half is dominated by a couch and the leather recliner placed at its head. Georgia O'Keeffe posters decorate the walls. Behind the desk stands a door Jack assumes opens into a small closet; the door directly opposite, behind the recliner and at the midpoint between the two halves of the office, looks as though it leads into an adjoining room. â€Å"As you see,† Dr. Spiegleman says, â€Å"I use this space as both an office and a supplementary consulting room. Most of my patients come in through the waiting room, and I'll bring Mrs. Marshall in that way. Give me two or three minutes.† Jack thanks him, and the doctor hurries out through the door to the waiting room. In the little closet, Wendell Green slides his cassette recorder from the pocket of his jacket and presses both it and his ear to the door. His thumb rests on the RECORD button, and his heart is racing. Once again, western Wisconsin's most distinguished journalist is doing his duty for the man in the street. Too bad it's so blasted dark in that closet, but being stuffed into a black hole is not the first sacrifice Wendell has made for his sacred calling; besides, all he really needs to see is the little red light on his tape recorder. Then, a surprise: although Doctor Spiegleman has left the room, here is his voice, asking for Lieutenant Sawyer. How did that Freudian quack get back in without opening or closing a door, and what happened to Judy Marshall? Lieutenant Sawyer, I must speak to you. Pick up the receiver. You have a call, and it sounds urgent. Of course he is on the intercom. Who can be calling Jack Sawyer, and why the urgency? Wendell hopes that Golden Boy will push the telephone's SPEAKER button, but alas Golden Boy does not, and Wendell must be content with hearing only one side of the conversation. â€Å"A call?† Jack says. â€Å"Who's it from?† â€Å"He refused to identify himself,† the doctor says. â€Å"Someone you told you'd be visiting Ward D.† Beezer, with news of Black House. â€Å"How do I take the call?† â€Å"Just punch the flashing button,† the doctor says. â€Å"Line one. I'll bring in Mrs. Marshall when I see you're off the line.† Jack hits the button and says, â€Å"Jack Sawyer.† â€Å"Thank God,† says Beezer St. Pierre's honey-and-tobacco voice. â€Å"Hey man, you gotta get over to my place, the sooner the better. Everything got messed up.† â€Å"Did you find it?† â€Å"Oh yeah, we found Black House, all right. It didn't exactly welcome us. That place wants to stay hidden, and it lets you know. Some of the guys are hurting. Most of us will be okay, but Mouse, I don't know. He got something terrible from a dog bite, if it was a dog, which I doubt. Doc did what he could, but Hell, the guy is out of his mind, and he won't let us take him to the hospital.† â€Å"Beezer, why don't you take him anyway, if that's what he needs?† â€Å"We don't do things that way. Mouse hasn't stepped inside a hospital since his old man croaked in one. He's twice as scared of hospitals as of what's happening to his leg. If we took him to La Riviere General, he'd probably drop dead in the E.R.† â€Å"And if he didn't, he'd never forgive you.† â€Å"You got it. How soon can you be here?† â€Å"I still have to see the woman I told you about. Maybe an hour not much longer than that, anyhow.† â€Å"Didn't you hear me? Mouse is dying on us. We got a whole lot of things to say to each other.† â€Å"I agree,† Jack says. â€Å"Work with me on this, Beez.† He hangs up, turns to the door near the consulting-room chair, and waits for his world to change. What the hell was that all about? Wendell wonders. He has squandered two minutes' worth of tape on a conversation between Jack Sawyer and the dumb SOB who spoiled the film that should have paid for a nice car and a fancy house on a bluff above the river, and all he got was worthless crap. Wendell deserves the nice car and the fancy house, has earned them thrice over, and his sense of deprivation makes him seethe with resentment. Golden Boys get everything handed to them on diamond-studded salvers, people fall all over themselves to give them stuff they don't even need, but a legendary, selfless working stiff and gentleman of the press like Wendell Green? It costs Wendell Green twenty bucks to hide in a dark, crowded little closet just to do his job! His ears tingle when he hears the door open. The red light burns, the faithful recorder passes the ready tape from spool to spool, and whatever happens now is going to change everything: Wendell's gut, that infallible organ, his best friend, warms with the assurance that justice will soon be his. Dr. Spiegleman's voice filters through the closet door and registers on the spooling tape: â€Å"I'll leave you two alone now.† Golden Boy: â€Å"Thank you, Doctor. I'm very grateful.† Dr. Spiegleman: â€Å"Thirty minutes, right? That means I'll be back at, umm, ten past two.† Golden Boy: â€Å"Fine.† The soft closing of the door, the click of the latch. Then long seconds of silence. Why aren't they talking to each other? But of course . . . the question answers itself. They're waiting for fat-ass Spiegleman to move out of hearing range. Oh, this is just delicious, that's what this is! The whisper of Golden Boy's footsteps moving toward that door all but confirms the sterling reporter's intuition. O gut of Wendell Green, O Instrument Marvelous and Trustworthy, once more you come through with the journalistic goods! Wendell hears, the machine records, the inevitable next sound: the click of the lock. Judy Marshall: â€Å"Don't forget the door behind you.† Golden Boy: â€Å"How are you?† Judy Marshall: â€Å"Much, much better, now that you're here. The door, Jack.† Another set of footsteps, another unmistakable sliding into place of a metal bolt. Soon-To-Be-Ruined Boy: â€Å"I've been thinking about you all day. I've been thinking about this.† The Harlot, the Whore, the Slut: â€Å"Is half an hour long enough?† Him With Foot In Bear Trap: â€Å"If it isn't, he'll just have to bang on the doors.† Wendell barely restrains himself from crowing with delight. These two people are actually going to have sex together, they are going to rip off their clothes and have at it like animals. Man, talk about your pay-backs! When Wendell Green is done with him, Jack Sawyer's reputation will be lower than the Fisherman's. Judy's eyes look tired, her hair is limp, and her fingertips wear the startling white of fresh gauze, but besides registering the depth of her feeling, her face glows with the clear, hard-won beauty of the imaginative strength she called upon to earn what she has seen. To Jack, Judy Marshall looks like a queen falsely imprisoned. Instead of disguising her innate nobility of spirit, the hospital gown and the faded nightdress make it all the more apparent. Jack takes his eyes from her long enough to lock the second door, then takes a step toward her. He sees that he cannot tell her anything she does not already know. Judy completes the movement he has begun; she moves before him and holds out her hands to be grasped. â€Å"I've been thinking about you all day,† he says, taking her hands. â€Å"I've been thinking about this.† Her response takes in everything she has come to see, everything they must do. â€Å"Is half an hour long enough?† â€Å"If it isn't, he'll just have to bang on the doors.† They smile; she increases the pressure on his hands. â€Å"Then let him bang.† With the smallest, slightest tug, she pulls him forward, and Jack's heart pounds with the expectation of an embrace. What she does is far more extraordinary than a mere embrace: she lowers her head and, with two light, dry brushes of her lips, kisses his hands. Then she presses the back of his right hand against her cheek, and steps back. Her eyes kindle. â€Å"You know about the tape.† He nods. â€Å"I went mad when I heard it, but sending it to me was a mistake. He pushed me too hard. Because I fell right back into being that child who listened to another child whispering through a wall. I went crazy and I tried to rip the wall apart. I heard my son screaming for my help. And he was there on the other side of the wall. Where you have to go.† â€Å"Where we have to go.† â€Å"Where we have to go. Yes. But I can't get through the wall, and you can. So you have work to do, the most important work there could be. You have to find Ty, and you have to stop the abbalah. I don't know what that is, exactly, but stopping it is your job. Am I saying this right: you are a coppiceman?† â€Å"You're saying it right,† Jack says. â€Å"I am a coppiceman. That's why it's my job.† â€Å"Then this is right, too. You have to get rid of Gorg and his master, Mr. Munshun. That's not what his name really is, but it's what it sounds like: Mr. Munshun. When I went mad, and I tried to rip through the world, she told me, and she could whisper straight into my ear. I was so close!† What does Wendell Green, ear and whirling tape recorder pressed to the door, make of this conversation? It is hardly what he expected to hear: the animal grunts and moans of desire busily being satisfied. Wendell Green grinds his teeth, he stretches his face into a grimace of frustration. â€Å"I love that you've let yourself see,† says Jack. â€Å"You're an amazing human being. There isn't a person in a thousand who could even understand what that means, much less do it.† â€Å"You talk too much,† Judy says. â€Å"I mean, I love you.† â€Å"In your way, you love me. But you know what? Just by coming here, you made me more than I was. There's this sort of beam that comes out of you, and I just locked on to that beam. Jack, you lived there, and all I could do was peek at it for a little while. That's enough, though. I'm satisfied. You and Ward D, you let me travel.† â€Å"What you have inside you lets you travel.† â€Å"Okay, three cheers for a well-examined spell of craziness. Now it's time. You have to be a coppiceman. I can only come halfway, but you'll need all your strength.† â€Å"I think your strength is going to surprise you.† â€Å"Take my hands and do it, Jack. Go over. She's waiting, and I have to give you to her. You know her name, don't you?† He opens his mouth, but cannot speak. A force that seems to come from the center of the earth surges into his body, rolling electricity through his bloodstream, tightening his scalp, sealing his trembling fingers to Judy Marshall's, which also tremble. A feeling of tremendous lightness and mobility gathers within all the hollow spaces of his body; at the same time he has never been so aware of his body's obduracy, its resistance to flight. When they leave, he thinks, it'll be like a rocket launch. The floor seems to vibrate beneath his feet. He manages to look down the length of his arms to Judy Marshall, who leans back with her head parallel to the shaking floor, eyes closed, smiling in a trance of accomplishment. A band of shivery white light surrounds her. Her beautiful knees, her legs shining beneath the hem of the old blue garment, her bare feet planted. That light shivers around him, too. All of this comes from her, Jack thinks, and from A rushing sound fills the air, and the Georgia O'Keeffe prints fly off the walls. The low couch dances away from the wall; papers swirl up from the jittering desk. A skinny halogen lamp crashes to the ground. All through the hospital, on every floor, in every room and ward, beds vibrate, television sets go black, instruments rattle in their rattling trays, lights flicker. Toys drop from the gift-shop shelves, and the tall lilies skid across the marble in their vases. On the fifth floor, light bulbs detonate into showers of golden sparks. The hurricane noise builds, builds, and with a great whooshing sound becomes a wide, white sheet of light, which immediately vanishes into a pinpoint and is gone. Gone, too, is Jack Sawyer; and gone from the closet is Wendell Green. Sucked into the Territories, blown out of one world and sucked into another, blasted and dragged, man, we're a hundred levels up from the simple, well-known flip. Jack is lying down, looking up at a ripped white sheet that flaps like a torn sail. A quarter of a second ago, he saw another white sheet, one made of pure light and not literal, like this one. The soft, fragrant air blesses him. At first, he is conscious only that his right hand is being held, then that an astonishing woman lies beside him. Judy Marshall. No, not Judy Marshall, whom he does love, in his way, but another astonishing woman, who once whispered to Judy through a wall of night and has lately drawn a great deal closer. He had been about to speak her name when Into his field of vision moves a lovely face both like and unlike Judy's. It was turned on the same lathe, baked in the same kiln, chiseled by the same besotted sculptor, but more delicately, with a lighter, more caressing touch. Jack cannot move for wonder. He is barely capable of breathing. This woman whose face is above him now, smiling down with a tender impatience, has never borne a child, never traveled beyond her native Territories, never flown in an airplane, driven a car, switched on a television, scooped ice ready-made from the freezer, or used a microwave: and she is radiant with spirit and inner grace. She is, he sees, lit from within. Humor, tenderness, compassion, intelligence, strength, glow in her eyes and speak from the curves of her mouth, from the very molding of her face. He knows her name, and her name is perfect for her. It seems to Jack that he has fallen in love with this woman in an instant, that he enlisted in her cause on the spot, and at last he finds he can speak her perfect name: Sophie.

Thursday, November 7, 2019

Internet Intervention essays

Internet Intervention essays The Internet is a method of communication and a source of information that is becoming more popular among those who are interested in, and have the time to surf the information superhighway. The problem with much information being accessible to this many people is that some of it is deemed inappropriate for minors. The government wants censorship, but a segment of the population does not. Within this examination of the topic of, Government Intervention of the Internet, I will attempt to express both side s of this issue. During the past decade, our society has become based solely on the ability to move large amounts of information across large distances quickly. Computerization has influenced everyone's life. The natural evolution of computers and this need for ultra-fas t communications has caused a global network of interconnected computers to develop. This global net allows a person to send E-mail across the world in mere fractions of a second, and enables even the common person to access information worldwide. With th e advances with software that allows users with a sound card to use the Internet as a carrier for long distance voice calls and video conferencing, this network is the key to the future of the knowledge society. At present this net is the epitome of the F irst Amendment: freedom of speech. It is a place where people can speak their mind without being reprimanded for what they say, or how they choose to Recently, Congress has been considering passing laws that will make it a crime punishable by jail to send "vulgar" language over the net. The government wants to maintain control over this new form of communication, and they are trying to use the protect ion of children as a smoke screen to pass laws that will allow them to regulate and censor the Internet, while banning techniques that could eliminate the need for regulation. Censorship of the Internet threatens to ...

Tuesday, November 5, 2019

How to Efficiently Publish Content With Shawn Smith From Trizone

How to Efficiently Publish Content With Shawn Smith From Trizone Have you thought about what makes someone a thought leader? One of the best ways is to publish content consistently. Today we’re talking to Shawn Smith, the co-owner of Trizone. Shawn knows all about how to create high-quality content with limited resources, how to involve subject matter experts in creating your content, and why automating processes can help you get everything done. You’ll want to stay tuned to hear about all of this and more! A bit about Trizone and what Shawn does there as a â€Å"jack of all trades. What it’s like working with a small team and how they work as efficiently as possible. What fluidity means to Shawn and how it helps his team be more effective and productive when it comes to creating great content. How automating some of the process helps Shawn and his team be more efficient and save time. How and why the Trizone team works with subject matters to help them with their content creation and thought-leadership. Also, Shawn talks about how he gets into contact with them and gets them to contribute. Shawn’s best tips for working with subject matter experts and collaborating with a remote team of people. Information about the Trizone workflow process and why it works for them. Advice for a small team who is looking to become an authority in their niche through content creation. Links: Shawn Smith Trizone Slack If you liked today’s show, please subscribe on iTunes to The Actionable Content Marketing Podcast! The podcast is also available on SoundCloud, Stitcher, and Google Play. Quotes by Shawn: â€Å"Once we’ve built a piece of content, we start to go and jiggle it. We use the social media template and then we start building it out. It’s so quick and easy.† â€Å"We spend a lot of time with [experts] talking about their subject matters in depth because they do bring a wealth of information that, clearly, we will never have.† â€Å"Stay on point. Whatever you believe is right, stick with it.

Saturday, November 2, 2019

Ethics even in the Worst Circumstances Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Ethics even in the Worst Circumstances - Essay Example This philosophy was clearly exemplified by one parent, a former FBI agent, who urged his son to turn himself in and face the legal consequences for the murders his son admittedly committed. The current essay aims to proffer pertinent issues that surround ethics even in the worst circumstances. A story written by the Associated Press and published in The Augusta Chronicle narrated the story of John Cook, a former FBI agent, who was faced with the confounding ethical dilemma of duty, prevailing on doing the right things, and respecting the moral law despite knowing that it is his son, Andrew Cook, who is to be convicted. The initial reaction for parents when children face challenges and trials in life is to be supportive and to provide whatever assistance is necessary. In this case, Andrew Cook committed murders of two university students, supposedly for no apparent reasons (Associated Press par. 11). When his father confronted him to determine the veracity of the allegations, Andrew admitted he murdered those students. Despite the pain and the initial natural response to protect his son from impending conviction, his concept of good will prevailed, consistent with Kant’s philosophy. The story clearly indicates that the concept of doing right, conformity to morality and legal rules, codes of conduct and proper behavior, is universal. Parents could not hide their children who erred from justice. In worst circumstances, no one could hide from the law: not even a former FBI agent could protect his son from the imposition of justice. In the end, justice will still