HW 21B

My comments posted on others:

Sophia,

Niiiice. I really liked how you explained thoroughly what your views on a hospice was before and how Beth brought you to a different realization/view of hospices opposed to dying at home. You made a strong connection to your father's story and about this "still feeling" there is when someone dies. I like the idea of having some type of closure and not wanting to die in an accident or in a sudden.


Elizabeth,

Niiiiiiice. It was beautifully written. You did really well analyzing the insights Beth gave us on a deeper level. I thought it was good that you connected back to your own experiences in the second paragraph. My favorite part of your post was "And left me personally with these words ringing in my ear, "The only way to not be hurt by death is to die first"." I thought this was written beautifully and it is a strong statement that also stuck with me.


Chris,

Niiiiiice. I like how you went deeper into what Beth said in the 2nd paragraph... "Personally if I was being introduced to someone while I was in one of the worse states in my life, I wouldn’t be want to be viewed by my lowest moment, just like Beth tried to do I would want to be loved for the things I have done, the people I have help, and anything I have helped created." I really liked this part because I completely agree and I think it is easy to easily get labeled as a disease. I also think you make a really good point in the last paragraph because I felt like everyone knew it was his last 10 days but it's not like he "had an expiration date" like you said.


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Comments posted on my post:

Sophia-
I liked this part, because you used things associated with a hospital to describe it, as opposed to only descriptive words:

"It just seemed so much more peaceful being at home opposed to the hospital which is just doctors in white coats and note pads in an isolated place. Home seems like a much more comfortable place and you can be with the people you love and you don't get covered with a blanket and wheeled away after you die."

You could have expanded on why you thought home seemed more comfortable, but other then that, the whole paragraph was really good.

Chris-

Hey Burt,

I think that the strongest paragraph you have in this was the second paragraph. In that short paragraph I think you stated something that not many people have stated in their blogs and it is one of the most key pieces to what was being said by Beth. You mentioned that we normally don't see people die. I think this was the beginning of a really good paragraph but you failed to make a follow up statement about this. I think your work could have been much better if you would have talked about this more or staying home helping someone more considering that you said it was something that jumped out to you immediately. Posing some questions and trying to dig deeper is something that I really encourage you to do for the remainder of the blog post. Also you seem to answer the questions pretty well but the questions do say compare and contrast the insights that you have and I would like to see how some of what you think. Then for the questions you do ask, I feel like some of these could have been questions that you tried to answer when you talk about other things in the beginning of the post. So what you overall need to focus on for later is expanding on your ideas because they will probably be good, maybe adding in something from personal experience and making sure you compare and contrast your thoughts. Doing this will completely answer the homework question.


Elizabeth-
Jasper,
This was a very nice, thoughtful post. I enjoyed how the last paragraph was full of insightful questions that would leave the reader thinking; not only about Erik's death, but of the overall picture of society's way of dealing with illness and dying.

What I think you could improve on is the beauty/grammar. This is just my personal opinion, but I think that grammar can be quite beautiful; adding semi-colons or commas here and there can make a piece look and flow beautifully.

There are a few places where I wanted to sneak in commas and semicolons or switch words around. Here is an example:
"It just seemed so much more peaceful being at home opposed to the hospital which is just doctors in white coats and note pads in an isolated place".
I would have changed that to:
"It just seemed much more peaceful being at home, as opposed to the ___(add adjectives here) hospital; an isolated place full of doctors wearing white coats and carrying note pads.

By changing around words in sentences and adding more punctuation (but not TOO much punctuation), you can create a beautifully flowing piece that will hit the reader even harder than it already did.


-Cecilia (Mom) comment

"Home seems like a much more comfortable place and you can be with the people you love and you don't get covered with a blanket and wheeled away after you die." I agree and it was not that long ago when it was common for families to take care of older people. Houses were bigger and it was common for grandparents to move in with the family if they became lonely and could not take care of themselves. They died at home with their family around them. Women stayed home so there was always someone there. Today women must work and it may very difficult to have someone at home and care for them during sickness and dying. You can further develop this idea and compare care of old people today and how both people in a couple are forced to work today to cover cost of living and care for elderly or sick.