Apollo's Book Club

     The concept of this list is something I think is very relatable, sometimes reality is just way to much for me and I want an escape from everything. All the thoughts in my head building up swarming me until I really don’t feel like I’m in reality anymore. It's so overwhelming that I just want to shut them all up. While I know that blasting songs in my ears will most defiantly lead to irreparable hearing damage I can’t help but listen till every other sound in my head quiets down. The fact that these are in minor key is simply because I like minor key, I think while they are difficult to play I enjoy how they sound. Plus I really wanted to challenge myself for this. 

Moonlight Densetsu From “Sailor Moon” [Instrumental]

 Take Me To Church by Hozier

Pretty Little Things by The Crane Wives

 Like the Dawn by The Oh Hellos

Gasoline by Halsey

Megalovania by Toby Fox

Shatter Me by Lindsey Stirling Feat. Lzzy Hale

The Ballad of Jane Doe From the Ride the Cyclone 

World Burn from Mean Girls

Real Gone by Sheryl Crow

The Migration of African Americans from the delta south to the north. The movement was spurred on by the completion of the 1944 mechanical cotton-picker. Crowds gathered far and wide on the Hopson Plantation just outside highway 49 in clarksdale, MS to watch the unveiling of the machine that would put hundreds of people out of a job in only a few short months. 

Page: 206-209

If you put Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and Howlin’ Wolf in the same room Sam Phillips would say that Howlin’ Wolf was the most extraordinary to record with. In 1951 Chester Burnette walked in the Memphis Recording Service studio setting off a chain events that the old 6′0 harmonica playing man could have never seen coming. 

page: 273

Discovery of Mattie May Thomas in 1939 during the exploration of Parchman Prison. She was recorded in an empty sewing room used by female prisoners to work producing only 3 solo songs, and 3 accompanied songs in total. The Solo songs consisted of Dangerous Blues, Big Mac From Macamere and, No Mo' Freedom. 

The history nerd in me also screams to bring up the prohibition era which lasted from the 1920′s till 1933. This played a huge role in the blues as many people began to sing about Canned heat and other substances that they used to help their addiction. I also believe that this caused a lot of famous blues players an earlier death.

The first chapter of Delta Blues is an introduction into the background for blues giving us the contextualization for what could have caused the blues to surge in Mississippi. The book uses the record of electricity power in rural compared to urban areas to show the disproportionate wealth.

https://ecm.coop/about_us/history

Chapter Two 

PreWarning there are spoilers for Part 3 of things fall apart.

      Things Fall Apart is a brilliant novel and i annoyed reading every second of it. The ending however is a little worse for wear, I enjoyed it but it was very confusing. I understood the plot really right until the last chapter which practically does a complete 180. 

Warning for spoilers for Things Fall Apart

I’ve been reading Things Fall Apart by Achebe, So far its been a very good book although I’m a bit unnerved by the beatings I understand why they are there.  I personally am not a realistic fiction person I’m more of a YA romance novelist or possibly a slice of life person, so I wanted to touch on probably one of my now new favorite parts of this book. 

Our main character Okonokwo is shown to be tough and harsh, his first response to one of his wives or children doing something he considers wrong is to beat them. In this scene however his second wife’s daughter has just recovered from a illness and the clans priestess Chielo had come for her for some reason, we are not disclosed yet what reason she had to retrieve the child. His second wife Ekwefi followed the priestess despite being told not, as the reader you expect Okonokwo to step in immediately and put his wife back into line but instead he clears his throat and just brings his snuff bottle from his goatskin bag. Nothing else. In the next chapter on page 112 we find out he actually made four trips to the cave where he thought the priestess was going and by the fourth trip when he finally met with Ekwefi the book expresses he was quite worried. When he says she should go home and rest and she refuses he doesn’t fight back, he merely sits with her until the priestess returns from the cave. 

Personally this changes how I feel about him and his character, I would be curious to see how other people feel about this scene in the book. If it changed how they feel about Okonokwo especially after he killed Ikemefuna, everyone favorite character, and Ezeudu’s warning of not to do that. 

A Year In Celebration

Zadie Smith’s essay “Screengrabs” is composed of multiple small essays from before the pandemic. With the attention being thrown randomly around from character to character her writing style pops from the page.

I have decided to tell my story using my favorite two techniques I saw while reading; Using lists and using asterisk to explain a subject in the footnotes. The specific sub-essays that I got these writing styles from is ‘The Elder At The 98 Bus Stop’ and ‘A Hovering Young Man’ respectfully.  The use of lists in ‘The Elder At The 98 Bus Stop’ really push the onomatopoeia of the characters speech. In addition is helps us the readers understand two things about smith talking to her mom.

They have a set routine in what to talk about

They must call regularly as to make this routine

Without smith having to say anything we can conclude that her and her mom also have a healthy relationship.  

With ‘A Hovering Young Man’ Smith uses the footnote feature as a way to better explain herself and continue on a topic. Her sub-essay revolves around the style and energy of a IT guy she knows. When talking about the IT guy she related to her own personal feeling of youth* that he gave off.

These writing styles are going to be used in my essays to show off the thought process of past me and show in a comedic way the quantity of a subject. In the start of the story I used a list to show how I felt behind on planning the date and how the task made past me feel overwhelmed to even start. Then later used to show off just the number of ways my family decided to mess with my date for that evening, creating a sense of humor and allowing a deeper insight to how my family viewed Ven.

Much like how Smith uses her footnotes to continue on a subject, I use them to add small continuations of my thought process that would otherwise just be cut from the writing. I use it show that while my tone in the story is more upbeat and joking I do understand the actual consequences that happened because of it. In contrast I also use it to makes jokes and give little facts about me and Ven’s relationship as to show a deeper connection between us.

_____________

No one ever forgets their first serious relationship: walking into a date with nothing but a small flickering ember of attraction, only for it to slowly grow into a bond of trust over years of commitment and love. That is how it starts, two people meeting for the first time, then decide to date slowly building a bond of trust as the world around them slowly shuts down with death at every corner. 

The pandemic started a few months into my first, although I did not know at the time, serious relationship. So it was pretty awesome*, I got to spend hours upon hours with someone who I liked and learned more about them. There were days where me and Ven, my partner, would wake up to each other only to fall asleep that same night together without ever having to hang up the phone. Over the course of the pandemic we slowly gained each other’s trusts, developing rules and boundaries that we still follow to this day. 

As the pandemic raged on I realized that a very special date was coming up, October 24, me and Ven’s one year anniversary, then I realized three other things.

I had nothing planned.

I did not know if Ven even wanted to do something.

I had not fully introduced Ven to my parents.

Thus began my September panic where I thought long and hard about what I wanted the first date to be. Ven had given their approval to whatever date with a big maybe on if they were going to dress up. I do not know why it popped in my head but I wanted to do a Lady and the Tramp theme for our anniversary.  Once the theme was picked and the date set it all there was to do was day dream and wait till the day arrived. 

Friday night I was buzzing with excitement, half wanting to sleep so I get an early start and the other half wanting to stay up all night talking to Ven about my plans. They only knew the key details of making sure they looked nice and having spaghetti for dinner that night. I had decided to get my hair cut that day and make the dinner for the date myself. Around 5 pm I started preparing everything putting the spaghetti in the boiling water and running upstairs to put on my church clothes. I luckily had my family around because I looked like a chicken with its head cut off, running up the stairs to put on makeup only for the pot downstairs to boil over because I dared to stop watching it. I had to admit defeat as my sibling took over making the dinner and I focused on getting ready. By 7pm the spaghetti was almost done and it was time to get on a video call with Ven, the most nerve wrecking and calm moment of the night. 

Pressing the call button on Skype I waited patiently as it rung before the other line picked up, Ven’s voice filled my ears finally making me settle down. The hard part of the date was over, now I just got to eat food and say stupid things with my stupid person. I showed off my amateur makeup skills along with my dress before Ven turned on their camera to reveal they had worn  a two piece suit with sweat pants instead of dress pants. It was quite a sight to see them dressed up. With our fashion show over it was now time to begin our ‘date’. The appetizer I had chosen like any respectful Italian restaurant would serve was just a humble house salad*. It was really nice, sitting and eating with Ven. We poked fun at each other and said a lot of sappy gay things before switching over to mundane topics as our salads were swapped with our pastas. Sadly as all parents must, my parents soon decided it was time to put Ven to the ‘How Weird Can We Be Before We Scare Them Off’ test. Specifically my mother and sibling, my father decided to walk through at random intervals just to watch us like a ACT test coordinator, making sure no ones  was cheating. 

The following is a list of things family decided to do to try and scared off my partner:

Crawled on the table to look at Ven upside down.

My parents kissed in the background.

T-posed to show dominance.

Stole my laptop so that they could have personal Ven time.

Flapped their arms like a bird to show dominance.

Stole my food even though there was plenty extra for them to eat.

Called me out about my height, bad driving, and general dyslexia.

Screeched.

Thankfully all their efforts failed and only brought out the chaos in my partner as our tired brains slowly dissolved into chaos. I had eaten too much pasta and they are an old lady at heart, so we were tired. Packing up our dinner I carried my laptop sized partner and together we went upstairs to go to bed. Except we did not go to sleep, we actually stayed up late just talking about stupid things, day dreaming about the future, and falling asleep in the middle of our conversation*. 

In one month and thirteen days it will officially be me and Ven’s three year anniversary. Ven’s in charge of planning it out this year, and I can’t be more excited. I know that even if we just sit and play video games for a hour or if we set up another authentic Italian dinner I know that I’ll enjoy it. __________________

1*:  I understand the virus cost a lot of people their lives and many people were crushed under this new weight of loneliness. Im not stating that merely expressing that for me it was easier to deal with the new restrictions.  2*: In my very Italian official girl scouts ice cream bowl with probably just a tiny bit too much ranch.