Aging Project: Analytical Essay

            It seems that people always talk about wanting to get the licenses of elderly people taken away because of how bad of drivers they are.  Sometimes, but not always, they’re right.  But it’s not their fault.  With aging come certain physical and mental changes that make it more difficult for an older person to drive. 

            As people age, some of the physical changes that take place are decline in eyesight and hearing, decline in reflexes, and stiffness in the back and neck.  These can obviously lead to trouble, because you need to be able to see and hear well enough while you’re driving, as well as being able to turn your head to check for cars while performing a turn or a lane change. 

            Another thing that could cause the elderly to drive poorly is their medications.  According to the article “Age & Driving…”: “Certain medications or combinations of medications can affect senses and reflexes.”  So it’s not necessarily the older person’s fault if they’re a “bad driver.” 

As shown above, there are many physical and medical reasons as to why they would be.  However, that doesn’t justify them being on the road.   If they are having problems like this, they should get evaluated by a doctor to make sure they’re still capable of driving because it can be very dangerous.  For example, in the article from the Westport News website titled “Should Elderly Drivers Be Retested?”: “…a 72-year-old New Canaan man faced vehicular manslaughter charges for allegedly striking and killing a motorcyclist last fall. In Darien, an 89-year-old man turned himself in after allegedly hitting and severely injuring 15-year-old pedestrian on Hoyt Street. He claimed he didn't know he hit anything until he saw the accident reported in the paper the next day.”  This raises some red flags, for me at least.  I don’t know if it was because they were just bad drivers, if they just weren’t capable anymore and needed to be reevaluated, or both.  If it is the second one, then we can do something.  If we are able to get people at a certain age to be evaluated regularly on their driving skills and physical and mental condition (say, sixty-five or seventy) and have their licenses confiscated when they’re deemed unsafe by a professional, then I feel like our roads would be a lot safer.  Sure there are a lot of younger drivers that get into a lot of trouble, but I feel it’s easier to be able to take care of the elderly first.  Besides, the younger people have plenty of restrictions on their driver’s licenses as it is.   

It’s difficult what age to put the restrictions, evaluations, or confiscation at because the elderly still do need to go places such as the pharmacy to refill prescriptions or sometimes just to get outside so they aren’t just bumming around their house all alone.  They might get angry and even feel betrayed if their family alerts them of their driving tendencies, so you need to be careful in telling them that they should get evaluated or stop driving.  But it’s necessary to do so, to help our roads become a safer place.  

Aging Project: Annotated Bibliography

Doheny, Kathleen. "Assessing Elderly Drivers: Ability Means More Than Age." N.p., 13 Nov. 2012. Web. 17 May 2013.
     This article emphasizes upon figuring out when to keep an elder from driving based on their abilities, not their age alone.  It tells about different ways to know when the elderly person in question isn't able to drive anymore or as much, and even helps by giving tips on how to tell that person that they should no longer be driving.  

Neighmond, Patti. "When Should Seniors Hang Up The Car Keys?" NPR. NPR, n.d. Web. 21 May 2013.
     This is another article about helping a person tell their parent or other elderly relative that it's time to stop driving, and why you should tell them before it's too late.  

"Senior Driving." : Safety Tips, Warning Signs, and When to Stop. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 May 2013.
     This article gives tips on safe driving for seniors, and warning signs that they maybe should limit or stop driving.  It gives suggestions on things to notice such as neck pain or stiffness, diminished arm strength, and failure to notice road signs that would aid in deciding when to stop.  

"Older Drivers, Elderly Driving, Seniors at the Wheel." Older Drivers, Elderly Driving, Seniors at the Wheel. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 May 2013.
     This article has statistics about the elderly and how they are related to car accidents, as well as different solutions that are being suggested and ways that the country is addressing the problem by means of mandatory driving tests.  


"Should Elderly Drivers Be Retested?" Westport News. N.p., 10 Mar. 2010. Web. 21 May 2013.
     This article talks a bit about the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety and their take on the natural decline in cognitive and physical abilities in the elderly and how it could affect their driving abilities. 

"Statistics On Accidents Involving Elderly Drivers." Wgrz.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 June 2013.
     This article had a few statistics that I thought would be useful.  It talks more about the other side, showing that the elderly maybe aren't that bad at driving after all.
     
     

Aging Project: Thesis

May 17:  I think that once people reach a certain age (i.e. 65 or 70) they should have to be retested or examined to make sure that they are still capable of driving safely.  They should also have these tests frequently and regularly to make sure that they maintain their driving ability.  The causes of poor driving in the elderly include stiff joints, declining eyesight and memory, and side effects from medication.

May 23: I still think that by a certain age, people should be regularly tested and/or examined to make sure they are still fit to drive safely.  If they seem to pose danger on the roads, their license should be taken away, because if they are dangerous enough they pose a threat to not only themselves, but others as well.  No one should have to worry about the being in danger on the road, and I think that reckless, unable, or unfit drivers pose too much of a threat in keeping peace on the roads.

Aging Project: Proposal

     My topic is on the subject of elderly people and their driving.  I will focus on when it's time for elderly people to give up their license and how they should go about finding out when to do so.  I chose this topic because I just thought it would be interesting to find out some solutions to an elder's driving and what specific problems cause them to not drive as well.  

Caring for Aging Parents--Annotated Bibliography

Beck, Martha. "Caring for Aging Parents - Martha Beck Advice - Oprah.com."Oprah.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2013.

     This article is about helping you and your parents cope with their aging by means of nourishing a sick sense of humor and think about how much care is actually needed.  This goes well with King Lear because I think that Goneril and Regan need to learn some of these strategies to help not only themselves, but their father as well.  

How to Handle an Elderly Parent's Bad Behavior--Annotated Bibliography

Sollitto, Marlo. "How to Handle an Elderly Parent's Bad Behavior." AgingCare. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2013.

     This article is about, as the title says, how to handle an elderly parent's bad behavior.  It goes into detail about behavior such as yelling, swearing, not showering, paranoia, and hoarding.  This fits with King Lear because he's basically turning into an adult child, a brat.  He's becoming very cranky and yelling and going into long speeches and curses towards his daughters.  

    

Sibling Strife--Annotated Bibliography

Hulin, Belinda. "Sibling Strife: How to Resolve the 3 Senior Care Issues Siblings Fight About Most." N.p., 4 May 2011. Web. 25 Apr. 2013.

     

     This article is about how one woman lost a lot because she was completely occupied while she took care of her mom.  Her siblings didn't really help her at all, which sort of shows that different relationships with the parents will lead to different roles in caring for them.  This fits well with King Lear because Cordelia probably would have taken care of him if she wasn't banished, and Goneral and Regan are sort of turning on the king and don't really want to take care of him.  

Is a Family Member Ripping Off Your Aging Parent?--Annotated Bibliography

Rosenblatt, Carolyn. "Is A Family Member Ripping Off Your Aging Parent?" Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 22 Apr. 2013. Web. 25 Apr. 2013.
     This article is about some of the warning signs that may point to a family member abusing and elder's finances.  This relates to King Lear because his daughters are sort of turning against him and now he wants their forgiveness, and will probably give them riches and maybe more land in order to persuade them to forgive him.  

     

     

Room/Allegory of the Cave Intertextuality

Donoghue, Emma. Room: A Novel. New York: Little, Brown and, 2010. Print.

"ROOM, by Emma Donoghue." ROOM, by Emma Donoghue. Http://www.hachettebookgroup.com/ 2012. Web. 29 Jan. 2013.

Plato. Allegory of the Cave.

 

 

"And if he were made to look directly at the light of the fire, it would hurt his eyes and he would turn back and take refuge in the things which he could see, which he would think really far clearer than the things being shown him."

                                                          -Socrates, Allegory of the Cave


     The Allegory of the Cave is a hypothetical story told by Socrates that is used to explain appearence vs. reality.  It tells of a cave where prisoners are kept, they are bound so that they can't move and can only face forward while their captors project images on the wall in front of the prisoners.  One of the prisoners is set free and, since he's only seen the projections on the cave wall, is confused on what is real and what isn't.  Once he figures out that the world outside the cave is real and the projections aren't, he goes back to the cave but the prisoners reject him, stuck in their own false reality. 
     The reasons this is like Room is because Jack is sort of like the prisoner who escaped.  Room was the like the cave, and Jack was being held prisoner in it; it was all he knew to be reality.  When he finds out that there is a world outside Room, he's stunned, he can't wrap his mind around it properly, just as the prisoner was blinded by the sun when he left the cave for the first time.  Ma could be considered one of the formholders (the ones projecting shadows on the wall) since she sort of led him to believe that Room was the only real place there is.  She's a prisoner in the sense that she can't escape from Room, but she already knows there's a world outside of it, so she's not really considered to be a cave prisoner.     

 

Cultural Factors: Generation

     I read the book Tuesdays with Morrie, and it was about a guy named Mitch who loses contact with his favorite college professor Morrie Schwartz.  Mitch gets back into contact with Morrie when he sees him in an interview on TV and finds out that he's deathly ill from a disease called ALS.  So every Tuesday, Mitch goes to meet with Morrie and talk to him about life and philosophy.  Mitch feels very happy to be able to spend time with his former professor again, and considers these meetings his "final class" with Morrie as the professor.  Eventually, Morrie is consumed and falls victim to ALS, slowly becoming a shell of his former self and dies. 
     This book is a memoir written in first person from Mitch's point of view.  It affects the way we understand the book because Mitch is from a newer generation than, say, Morrie, so he talks about more modern problems that he struggles with besides his former professor dying.  He seems to be much more concerned about his job and making money, which seems to be more of an issue now than in the past.  He apparently was concerned about his job enough to end up not having children with his wife.
     As I've said before, some of the issues Mitch faced are different than some of the issues Morrie faced because of the generational differences.  An example would be that when Morrie was young, his father tried to get him a job at a factory to help support the family, despite his young age.  Mitch never faced this, not only because his generation wouldn't allow them to work at a factory at such a young age, but also because of a difference in social class.  Morrie's family growing up was very poor, struggling to make ends meet, while Mitch's was likely somewhere in the middle class.       

Informal Narrative: Race

     As a caucasian male, I have a certain privelege over some of the minority races in the United States.  For example, I never had to ride the city bus to get where I needed to go.  I never had problems with getting my hair cut.  I've never experienced discrimination or prejudice because of my race firsthand.  To tell you the truth, white people have it pretty good compared to some of the minorities.

Informal Narrative: Social Class

     My social class is pretty average, I suppose.  We don't have a ton of extra money to throw around, but we've got enough to hold us for a while.  Although it's outside our Christmas budget to get a fancy new gaming system, we have a fair amount to spend for the holiday.  We have plenty of money for new clothes and shoes once we outgrow the old ones, so that's shows that we aren't too low in our social class.        

Informal Narrative: Gender

     Being an aspiring artist, I don't find it necessary to be as active or fit.  I usually spend more time inside reading or drawing, so I was never as fit as the other guys in my class, and was therefore not as active in gym class.  I couldn't lift as much, wasn't as coordinated, didn't have as much stamina, etc.  But that's okay; the majority of my gender can be fit if they want, I am an artist and I like it that way.

Informal Narrative: Religion

     I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm an atheist.  I don't believe in any sort of deity, and I don't think that I ever will; not in the forseeable future, anyway.  I've been openly atheist for nearly three years, but, looking back, I think I have been one all along. 
    I remember when my parents finally realized.  It was Easter in the year 2010, and my parents gave me the liberty of choosing for myself when I go to church since my Confirmation.  I told them that I wasn't going to go to church with them, even though both my sisters were going (and at the time, my older sister didn't go to church very often).  When my parents asked me why I didn't want to go, I simply stated that I don't believe in God.  They seemed sort of mad, and my mom even said, "Why should I bother buying you Christmas presents this year?"  And then my family left, and I was in the house all alone.  I felt a little betrayed, because my parents said at my Confirmation that they would support me no matter what I believed, and here they were mad at me because I stopped practicing religion altogether. 
     Now, they offer to bring me to church every once in a while, but I still decline respectfully and they don't seem to have so much of a problem with it.  Most of my friends know and have no problem with it, but no one in my family other than those in my house know.  I drop very subtle hints sometimes, but some of my extended family is pretty religious, so I'm going to hold off on flat out telling them for now. 

Predictably Irrational

    The chapter that I read was called "the Fallacy of Supply and Demand".  It started by telling the story of someone that made a ton of money from selling Japanese pearls and then trying to sell black pearls.  He set an extremely high price on them and, since people didn't normally buy black pearls, went for it.  It then goes into detail about "anchoring", which is described as basing what you're willing to pay for a given item based on the price of when you bought it the first time.  For example, when you buy your first house, you may tend to base your future house purchases based on that first house.
     I suppose anchoring applies to me in a few ways.  For example, I tend to base my video game pricing based on the price of my first gaming system.  If it is more, it seems expensive to me.  If it is less, then it seems cheap to me.

Blink

      I read Chapter Six: Seven Seconds in the Bronx: the Delicate Art of Mind Reading.  This chapter is all about how we can "read someone's mind" by closely reading their facial expressions.  It goes into the research of two scientists, Silvan Tomkins and Paul Ekman, and how they discovered that there are over ten thousand different facial configurations.  The two of them also researched people from all over the world and discovered that facial expressions remain the same in different cultures; so the faces, like the "choking signal", are basically a universal sign of whichever emotion that particular face would normally represent.  It also talks about a man that the police shot down because he "looked suspicious."  If they had read his face, the police would have realized he was afraid and not hostile.  This connects to the first chapter because it shows how the people looking at the tape of the married couple could tell exactly how they were feeling at a given point in time.
     My family and I frequently babysit a four year old girl by the name of Mya.  She's a really an interesting individual who at times says very weird and funny things.  There was a time a few months ago where she would, completely randomly, ask someone from my family: "You mad?"  We were almost never mad at the time she asked us, so it was really strange.  Perhaps a misreading of our facial expressions?  Perhaps a joke of some sort?  Or just plain randomness?  If this indeed was a misreading of facial expressions, what could she have seen in our faces to think that we were angry?  These are questions that connect to Blink and also need to be answered because it sort of confuses me what she could have been thinking. 
    
     

    
       
 
     

The Memorial Project

The Memorial Project

 

                I can be pretty boring and quiet.  When I’m in class, you can barely get a word out of me.  Now, when I’m with my friends…that’s a whole different story.  I talk and joke almost constantly, and the huge difference might seem strange if you don’t know me well.  My friends are pretty much what give me purpose.  Without them, I see myself as a hermit that sits in his house all day and never speaks out loud.

                I really like to paint and draw.  Most of what I do involves creating cartoon characters.  Sometimes I make a small backstory for these characters or sometimes I just doodle them all over my homework.  I have some sketchbooks at home and I only just got into painting last year.  I’ve been working on a painting for most of the summer and still haven’t finished it.  I have taken Drawing 1 with Ruder and 2 with Ingersoll, Painting 1 with Ruder and I’m taking 2 this year, and Commercial Arts 1 with Ingersoll.    

                I play a lot of video games, too.  My favorite games are probably Kingdom Hearts, God of War, and Halo.  I sort of use video games as a distraction because I don’t exactly think the world is working the way it should be right now. 

I like to watch TV, too.  Mostly comedies such as South Park, Family Guy, Tosh.0, the Big Bang Theory, Two and a Half Men, How I Met Your Mother, and the King of Queens.  I love to laugh and make jokes so these shows are just right for me.  A lot of my friends also watch most of these shows so it creates some common interests between us. 

How much I like school sort of is like a roller coaster.  There are lots of classes I hate and some that I really enjoy.  The class that I hate the most is probably math.  Most, if not, all of what they’ve been teaching us for math in high school is pointless and will never be used in real life; unless you were planning to be a math teacher, which just creates a cycle of pointless knowledge.  My favorite class is painting because I love to paint and want to have an artistic career at some point.  I haven’t painted much more than common objects or landscapes, but the painting I’ve been working on during the summer has people in it and flames in parts of the background, adding some challenge and new experience.  I also sort of like English because I really like to read and sort of like to write a little bit.  The only thing I don’t like about English is when the teacher provides us with a book that’s really boring and makes us read it.  At the moment my favorite class is anthropology because I think it’s very fascinating to learn about who we are and how we came to be the way we are.               

 

                 

Hedonism

I wish I could:
play video games all day
sleep in every day
watch TV all night every night instead of homework
buy all the seasons of South Park and Code Geass on DVD and watch them at school
skip school
cause a sudden black out in the school just for fun
ditch homeroom and fire drills
buy every book I've ever wanted to read.  Ever.
spend all day reading said books (instead of reading what the teacher assigns)
have summer vacation all year

Past Negative

I remember in sixth grade P.E., I had Mr. Nicolet.  At that time, I wasn't very good at swimming, so when the swimming unit came along, it wasn't fun for me.  I think I may have been a little hydrophobic, too, because I refused to go underwater.  I also didn't want to go to the deep end of the pool because I couldn't tread water.  I remember being nervous and shaking before class every day because I was so bad with this unit.  The whole experience was just not a fun one for me, and it resulted in my gym grade dropping down from an A to a D.  Needless to say, I was very happy once the unit was finished.

Past Positive

Most of my memories involve something happening at school. The positive things that definitely stick out the most are:
Putting corn on my pizza.
Running laps around the field at Flynn during recess.
Laughing so hard at lunch that chocolate milk comes out my nose.
Playing tag and Star Wars on the playground during recess.
The library lock-ins at South, which meant hanging out with my friends and reading all night.
Playing in the snow at recess in the winter and sliding down the icy hill on my belly.
All those funny but strange conversations during lunch with my friends.
And, of course, meeting all my awesome friends.