Hey guys, I won't be able to make it Monday until about 5pm.  Sorry for the late notice.  Give me a call or shoot me a text if you need to reach me or don't see me by 5.  I don't have your numbers. 523-7757

Here are my pictures:

 Light in the Darkness

 Isolation

 Memories Past

 Strength from Nothing

Poverty

Brooke- Photos for Film

tree roots

Four skinny trees w Esperanza

Four skinny trees

more trees...

trees....

tree roots growing out of concrete

shadow of trees against brick

wilted tulip

wilted tulips...

wilted tulips in glass

wilted tulip in glass

Outside book club meeting

Hello groupies-
I just wanted to re-cap what we talked about in class in regards to our meeting this coming Monday (3/14)

- For Sunday: upload 5 photos that you think would correspond well with our video for the "Four Skinny Trees" Vignette
-Monday: Meet at UB in Baldy common area at 4:30 pm, bring all black clothes (for shot of trees) anything else we should bring?

Please let me know if I left anything out! I'm excited to shoot our video and to share some Mexican comida together :)
-Brooke

The Strength Within-Post 6

                I am taking back my youth. No longer will I be your little Spanish girl who you love. I am me. I am not like my sisters. I am not beautiful. Yet. But I am not in a rush to become someone I’m not. I have begun my own quiet war. On the outside I am a meek little Spanish girl, but on the inside a fire rages within. I do not want to hear the words “I love you, I love you.” I will not become the girl locked up in the ivory tower, or afraid to go out the way Sally is. I will not be chained to a life I did not want. While I am grateful for my family and the life they have provided me, I am no longer willing to be anyone’s target for a good laugh or a good time. I want people to look back and tell stories about me, about how I was the girl who didn’t want to belong. My strength is concealed, invisible to many, but not me. My family and friends will become witnesses of my strength when I leave this place. I will be their voices, you’ll see. I do not want to belong to anyone or anything. I am a part of my family, I am a part of our house on Mango Street and the memories it has given me. They will always be a part of me as well. However I am much too strong to stay here forever. I will break free of the chains that bind me to this place. This house made of crumbling brick is just a reminder of what I have been through. It is a sad place and does little to show the memories we made in its four walls. People will talk. They will say I’m a coward and I’m not proud. They will ask how I could do it to my family. No one will understand what it felt like to be suffocating in a world in which I don’t belong. I will no longer be ashamed. I will have a house in which I call a home and it will be all mine. A house all my own.

-Video coming soon! I have to figure out how to use my webcam on this computer! 

Am I Mango Street? - Esperanza's Journal

Dear Diary,
Why does everyone keep telling me I'm Mango Street?  I don't get it!  First, it was Rachel and Lucy's aunts, telling me that I will always be Mango Street.  Then today I was talking with Alicia on Edna's steps, and she told me that if I like it or not, I'm Mango Street, just like she's Guadalajara.  She says one day I'll come back here, because this is where I come from.  The three sisters told me that I had to remember to come back one day, and help the others who can't leave as easily as I can.  But I don't think I ever want to come back here. 

I told Alicia I wanted to undo the year that I've lived here.  I guess I was okay with it here until the thing at the monkey garden happened and then that thing at the carnival.   I tried to save Sally from the boys in the monkey garden, so that they wouldn't do anything to her, and she told me to go home.  But then when I needed her to save me at  the carnival, she wasn't around and didn't even care when she heard me calling her name.  All I wanted to do was help her.  All I wanted was her help.  I don't get why no one wants to help each other.  Even Tito's mother didn't want to lift a finger when I came to get her when the boys were taking Sally's keys!  Why am I supposed to come back to help everyone when no one will help me, when no one will help each other?

I guess I am the only one who can help.  Rachel, Lucy, Sally and Nenny will go off and get married, mama will never get over the fact that she could've been someone, and the women on this street will keep doing what their men want - sitting in the house, looking out the window, and waiting.  But not me.  I never want to sit next to a window and just look.  I want to do!  I want to live!  I want to be!  I don't want to get married, not yet at least.  I want to be and be.  And I guess I'll have to come back to Mango Street, because I'm the only one who will get free.  I guess the only one who can come back to visit is me.

xo Ranza

Post 7??

Good evening Book Club members :) I am just interested in your thoughts on what we would like to do for post #7. Would you still like to get together to record video shots for the final post? Or would you like to do something that we could do independently? I was thinking that BigHugeLabs and other websites offer some interesting ideas that we could do for the final post. For example, we could choose to create a movie poster, or perhaps we could make a trailer for a film version of the book, or maybe we could write a synopsis for a "sequel"? We could choose one idea of we could all choose different formats for the final response. Any thoughts on this? What would you guys like to do for the final post?

Post #6 Alex

Post 6:

This post was challenging for me and I tried to write it as a vignette.  I found it challenging to write a journal entry for anyone other than Esperenza and I wasn’t sure what to focus on.  I have a good idea of the emerging themes of the novel and tried to incorporate them here. 

The Stars Shine for Sally, Not Me

I don’t know why but it seems as though the stars wink at me as I gaze up at them.  I can’t believe they would even acknowledge my presence.  My father gives me funny looks when I say this to him.  He says good girls don’t wish on stars, that’s for dreamers.  What is so wrong with being a dreamer?  Sometimes I think my whole life is a dream where everyone is stuck on Mango Street.  The only way dreams come true is if you move away from here.  Even Sally has dreams of moving away, but she doesn’t want to do it with me.  All I need is a boy so I can have my dreams come true.