Religion
Religion Seminar Reflection
The overall experience for me was that I really liked the idea of having a seminar at exhibition. Since there had never been an actual Seminar at an exhibition, it was definitely very interesting to see the outcome of it. It was new to have an actual audience at a seminar because usually seminars are held in private and having a public audience at the seminar was very cool. I also really thought the seminar let us express what we had been learning about over the last few months and the seminar let the public see that.
The seminar was very interesting because the main questions of the seminar that we discussed were the big questions about religion. And my peers and I were able to discuss the ideas of religion from many different viewpoints because not everyone participating the seminar were religious so it was interesting to hear the different perspectives on what people believe in. One thing that was said in the seminar that had impacted me was that religion had made me the person that I am today. And I say this because I hate the idea of believing in a higher power but I had gotten all my morals from religion and that’s why one of the biggest pieces of the seminar was is religion good or bad and there really isn’t a straight answer but I think religion is god because if anything it made me a better person than if I had grown up without it.
The seminar didn’t really change my perspective of religion because I still dislike the idea of a higher power and the doctrine of religion. But it did change my perspective on what religion had taught me. Because I used to just think religion didn’t teach me anything but I reality id did teach me all of the morals that I live by. I do think that religion does teach great morals to live by but I don’t like the reasons why you live by them because you are doing these good deeds to please god and I don’t like that. So the seminar did change my perspective to appreciate religion more for some of its more basic ideas like its morals and values.
The only connections I had made with the seminar and religion is how I used to believe in Catholicism but after the church’s teachings that I didn’t agree with, I despised the church. But this project has made me appreciate its ideas a lot more than I had because I had found a new found respect for religion.
I’m not saying that I think religion is good or bad because it is full of both. But this project has taught me many things and the main idea I have taken out of this project is for me to think for myself and accept what I want to accept. I think that a good project is a project that can give you a new perspective on a certain topic. And this project had changed my perspective on religion.
The overall experience for me was that I really liked the idea of having a seminar at exhibition. Since there had never been an actual Seminar at an exhibition, it was definitely very interesting to see the outcome of it. It was new to have an actual audience at a seminar because usually seminars are held in private and having a public audience at the seminar was very cool. I also really thought the seminar let us express what we had been learning about over the last few months and the seminar let the public see that.
The seminar was very interesting because the main questions of the seminar that we discussed were the big questions about religion. And my peers and I were able to discuss the ideas of religion from many different viewpoints because not everyone participating the seminar were religious so it was interesting to hear the different perspectives on what people believe in. One thing that was said in the seminar that had impacted me was that religion had made me the person that I am today. And I say this because I hate the idea of believing in a higher power but I had gotten all my morals from religion and that’s why one of the biggest pieces of the seminar was is religion good or bad and there really isn’t a straight answer but I think religion is god because if anything it made me a better person than if I had grown up without it.
The seminar didn’t really change my perspective of religion because I still dislike the idea of a higher power and the doctrine of religion. But it did change my perspective on what religion had taught me. Because I used to just think religion didn’t teach me anything but I reality id did teach me all of the morals that I live by. I do think that religion does teach great morals to live by but I don’t like the reasons why you live by them because you are doing these good deeds to please god and I don’t like that. So the seminar did change my perspective to appreciate religion more for some of its more basic ideas like its morals and values.
The only connections I had made with the seminar and religion is how I used to believe in Catholicism but after the church’s teachings that I didn’t agree with, I despised the church. But this project has made me appreciate its ideas a lot more than I had because I had found a new found respect for religion.
I’m not saying that I think religion is good or bad because it is full of both. But this project has taught me many things and the main idea I have taken out of this project is for me to think for myself and accept what I want to accept. I think that a good project is a project that can give you a new perspective on a certain topic. And this project had changed my perspective on religion.
Artist Statement
Imagine there is no Heaven
“Imagine there’s no heaven. It’s easy if you try. No hell below us, above the only sky. Imagine all the people, living for today.
“Imagine”-John Lennon
I feel that a religion is an idea that gives people an answer to life. I do not believe in the specific doctrines of any particular religion. I think that religion carries good morals, but I don’t think that you have to follow certain rules under an idea. As humans, we have the need to know unknown answers. Why are we living, what purpose are we supposed to fulfill with our lives, where are we supposed go when we die. Religion gives an answer for almost every question that needs to be asked about life. I just don’t believe in a religion.
I chose John Lennon as my symbol for my beliefs. The first time I heard the song “Imagine,” it gave me a new perspective. I had grown up Catholic and had lived by the rules of the church. Pray to God, live by his teachings, and you will be able to go to heaven. But when I heard the first line of the song, “Imagine there’s no heaven,” I thought to myself: why was I focused on trying to make my afterlife better? Why shouldn’t I think about living now, rather than focusing on after or before? I am living now so why don’t I try to make my life as enjoyable as it can be. And that was when I decided to live the John Lennon way of life, where it’s not about believing in God, it’s about believing in yourself.
Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one
“Imagine there’s no heaven. It’s easy if you try. No hell below us, above the only sky. Imagine all the people, living for today.
“Imagine”-John Lennon
I feel that a religion is an idea that gives people an answer to life. I do not believe in the specific doctrines of any particular religion. I think that religion carries good morals, but I don’t think that you have to follow certain rules under an idea. As humans, we have the need to know unknown answers. Why are we living, what purpose are we supposed to fulfill with our lives, where are we supposed go when we die. Religion gives an answer for almost every question that needs to be asked about life. I just don’t believe in a religion.
I chose John Lennon as my symbol for my beliefs. The first time I heard the song “Imagine,” it gave me a new perspective. I had grown up Catholic and had lived by the rules of the church. Pray to God, live by his teachings, and you will be able to go to heaven. But when I heard the first line of the song, “Imagine there’s no heaven,” I thought to myself: why was I focused on trying to make my afterlife better? Why shouldn’t I think about living now, rather than focusing on after or before? I am living now so why don’t I try to make my life as enjoyable as it can be. And that was when I decided to live the John Lennon way of life, where it’s not about believing in God, it’s about believing in yourself.
Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one
It Only Takes Eight Stages to Complete Genocide
“There is a place on earth that is a vast desolate wilderness, a place populated by shadows of the dead in their multitudes, a place where the living are dead, where only death, hate, and pain exist.” –Giuliana Tedschi, Holocaust Survivor
The Holocaust exemplifies genocide because it was considered the worst Genocide in the 20th century. It consisted of all eight stages of genocide: Classification, Symbolization, Dehumanization, Organization, Polarization, Preparation, and Extermination.
After the Nazis had first invaded Poland, the Jews were required to show their identities as being a Jewish person. The Jews would have to show their identity cards to prove that they were Jewish. After a short period of time, they were told to wear a Star of David to show that they were Jewish. Laws were made prohibiting Jews from being part of Germany. There was a time when they were not allowed to sit on public benches, eat in the same restaurants, and walk on public sidewalks.
The Jews were later moved to Ghettos, which let the Nazis organize what they were going to do with the Jews and alienate them from the outside world. They would then prepare to exterminate them by taking them out of the Ghettos and shipping them off to concentration camps. Once they arrived at a concentration camp they were put into gas chambers where they were exterminated, completing the eight stages of genocide.
In 1941, Germany attacked and invaded eastern Poland and the Soviet Union. From that point, Hitler, the leader of the Nazis, had begun his plan to exterminate the Jews. The Holocaust was a genocide that had been instigated from the second half of the 19th century. In the 19th century, the Völkisch movement had emerged. The main idea of the movement was that Jews were locked in a mortal struggle with the Aryan race for world domination.
At the time, Jews were considered to be a race rather than a religion. The movement believed that Jews should be exterminated for the good of the German people. The Völkisch movement thought that all German Jews should be stripped of their German citizenship and considered outsiders. It also wanted Jews to be cut out of from all aspects of German life; forbidden to own land, hold public office, or participate in journalism, banking, and the liberal professions. Right from the beginning, Nazi leaders proclaimed the existence of a Utopia. Nazi policies divided the population into two categories, the Volksgenossen (German comrades) and the Gemeinschaftsfremde (Community Foreigners.)
Hitler was open about his hatred toward the Jews. In his book Mein Kampf, he gave warnings of his intention to drive the Jews out of Germany’s political and cultural life. He did not write that he would attempt to exterminate them, but he was reported to have been more explicit in private. Hitler had told a journalist;
“Once I really am in power, my first and foremost task will be the annihilation of the Jews. As soon as I have the power to do so, I will have gallows built in rows at the Marienplatz in Munich, for examples many as traffic allows. Then the Jews will be hanged indiscriminately, and they will remain hanging until they stink; they will hang there as long as the principles of hygiene permit. As soon as they have been untied, the next batch will be strung up, and so on down the line, until the last Jew in Munich has been exterminated. Other cities will follow suit, precisely in this fashion, until all Germany has been completely cleansed of Jews.” (–Hitler 1940)
A concentration camp is a place where large numbers of political prisoners or members of persecuted minorities are imprisoned. After the Jews were taken out of the Ghettos, the Jews were put onto trains and shipped off to one of several concentration camps. But the most known and the worst concentration camp during World War II was the Auschwitz extermination camp.
The camp was a place where the Jews were sent to die. Right as soon as the gates were opened from the trains, people were thrown left to right deciding on who would be sent to labor, or who was sent to the gas chambers were the Jews were told they were going to take a shower. Once they entered the gas chambers, the toxic chemical “Zyklon B” was released into the chamber, killing everyone in the room within 20 minutes.
The Holocaust killed over 6 million people. After the Holocaust, the United Nations was established to prevent such horrific events from happening ever again. The United Nations decided to create a term that specifies a massacre which is when they came up with the term genocide which means the intent to destroy a targeted group. Imagine having everything taken away from you, being treated like animals and losing everyone you love. The holocaust affected millions of people for the rest of their lives.
“The Holocaust is not only a tragedy of the Jewish people; it is a failure of humanity as a whole.”
-Moshe Katsay, Israeli President
The Holocaust exemplifies genocide because it was considered the worst Genocide in the 20th century. It consisted of all eight stages of genocide: Classification, Symbolization, Dehumanization, Organization, Polarization, Preparation, and Extermination.
After the Nazis had first invaded Poland, the Jews were required to show their identities as being a Jewish person. The Jews would have to show their identity cards to prove that they were Jewish. After a short period of time, they were told to wear a Star of David to show that they were Jewish. Laws were made prohibiting Jews from being part of Germany. There was a time when they were not allowed to sit on public benches, eat in the same restaurants, and walk on public sidewalks.
The Jews were later moved to Ghettos, which let the Nazis organize what they were going to do with the Jews and alienate them from the outside world. They would then prepare to exterminate them by taking them out of the Ghettos and shipping them off to concentration camps. Once they arrived at a concentration camp they were put into gas chambers where they were exterminated, completing the eight stages of genocide.
In 1941, Germany attacked and invaded eastern Poland and the Soviet Union. From that point, Hitler, the leader of the Nazis, had begun his plan to exterminate the Jews. The Holocaust was a genocide that had been instigated from the second half of the 19th century. In the 19th century, the Völkisch movement had emerged. The main idea of the movement was that Jews were locked in a mortal struggle with the Aryan race for world domination.
At the time, Jews were considered to be a race rather than a religion. The movement believed that Jews should be exterminated for the good of the German people. The Völkisch movement thought that all German Jews should be stripped of their German citizenship and considered outsiders. It also wanted Jews to be cut out of from all aspects of German life; forbidden to own land, hold public office, or participate in journalism, banking, and the liberal professions. Right from the beginning, Nazi leaders proclaimed the existence of a Utopia. Nazi policies divided the population into two categories, the Volksgenossen (German comrades) and the Gemeinschaftsfremde (Community Foreigners.)
Hitler was open about his hatred toward the Jews. In his book Mein Kampf, he gave warnings of his intention to drive the Jews out of Germany’s political and cultural life. He did not write that he would attempt to exterminate them, but he was reported to have been more explicit in private. Hitler had told a journalist;
“Once I really am in power, my first and foremost task will be the annihilation of the Jews. As soon as I have the power to do so, I will have gallows built in rows at the Marienplatz in Munich, for examples many as traffic allows. Then the Jews will be hanged indiscriminately, and they will remain hanging until they stink; they will hang there as long as the principles of hygiene permit. As soon as they have been untied, the next batch will be strung up, and so on down the line, until the last Jew in Munich has been exterminated. Other cities will follow suit, precisely in this fashion, until all Germany has been completely cleansed of Jews.” (–Hitler 1940)
A concentration camp is a place where large numbers of political prisoners or members of persecuted minorities are imprisoned. After the Jews were taken out of the Ghettos, the Jews were put onto trains and shipped off to one of several concentration camps. But the most known and the worst concentration camp during World War II was the Auschwitz extermination camp.
The camp was a place where the Jews were sent to die. Right as soon as the gates were opened from the trains, people were thrown left to right deciding on who would be sent to labor, or who was sent to the gas chambers were the Jews were told they were going to take a shower. Once they entered the gas chambers, the toxic chemical “Zyklon B” was released into the chamber, killing everyone in the room within 20 minutes.
The Holocaust killed over 6 million people. After the Holocaust, the United Nations was established to prevent such horrific events from happening ever again. The United Nations decided to create a term that specifies a massacre which is when they came up with the term genocide which means the intent to destroy a targeted group. Imagine having everything taken away from you, being treated like animals and losing everyone you love. The holocaust affected millions of people for the rest of their lives.
“The Holocaust is not only a tragedy of the Jewish people; it is a failure of humanity as a whole.”
-Moshe Katsay, Israeli President
Truth of War
It was a cold winter day as I walked my dogs through the woods to give them some exercise. It was 12:05 when I looked along the long road. Out in the distance, I could see a house that was as white as the snow that was on the bottom of my shoes. As I approached the house I could see what looked to be a ditch in the snow, and right then my mind when blank. It was like a white flash that seemed to last forever. The vision started to become a little clearer. I could see two bodies .One was facing backwards to me and the other crept up in front of the other body’s shoulder. It kept getting clearer and clearer until it felt like I had been there before. Right then I knew what I was seeing. It was the 16th of December in 1944, and the bodies that I had been looking over had turned into the bodies of my 25 year old self and the body of my best friend, Ted.
As I continued to watch the scene, I started to remember everything that had happened in those three days of that battle that I had to endure. As I kept watching, and started to see, and hear, what was happening? I was looking through the eyes of my 25 year old body and everything started to fit together.
“Hey Ted!” I shouted with so much enthusiasm. I felt like I hadn’t been that happy in an eternity. My staff and I had just advanced to the borders of the Third Reich. The resiliency of the Wahrmacht and the beginning of the bad weather had immobilized us in the mud, snow, and the harsh terrain of the outer Ruhr and in the Ardennes Forest. Ted had been over on the Outer Ruhr while I was just on the outside of the Ardennes Forest. We hadn’t seen each other since the end of the October. Ted had been chosen to be part of a scouting group that was going to advance their way through the Ardennes Forest. It was a simple assignment that shouldn’t have taken more than 24 hours. He ran over to me with a smile on his face that was as large as the M-80 gun that was slung around the backside of his neck and shoulders. As he walked closer he extended his hand up towards his head to salute me, giving me the respect that I deserved as a staff sergeant and he was an enlisted man. But he was one of my best friends and he didn’t need to give me that respect because of my position, so I saluted him back. Ted was not a day older than 19 and he still acted like a boy. As I saluted him he started to blush like a school girl, then with a sarcastic remark I said, “What the hell is wrong with you. You’re a man so act like it.” He said “sorry” right away. Then I laughed and asked him, “How has it been over on the Ruhr?” His facial expression changed from a smile to a look of sadness.
He then explained to me about how many men were lost as they kept advancing towards Germany. He said the weather conditions had been so miserable, soldiers would get hypothermia, would start to lose their minds from all the death or the miserable conditions that they had to live through day after day. It seemed like a total hell, but he changed the subject to ask me how I had been. In reality I had been completely fine, but I just said things had been hard on the forest floor as well. We heard the drill sergeant who had been sitting in the back of a jeep yelling out, “last call for scouting drill, last call…” Ted turned to me and said, “I’ll be back in a couple of hours,” as he started rushing in the direction that the jeep had gone. I smiled and yelled back to him, “don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.” He started to fade into the distance. I sat down and started to daydream which led me to a deep sleep.
In my dream I had seen a small group of soldiers who were walking along a long road that was in the forest, when they came to a white house. I woke up to my dogs’ wet, cold nose sniffing my face. As a scrambled to my feet, I noticed that I had just fallen down into the snow. Then I looked at my watch and it said 12:05. Not a single minute had passed by when it felt like I had been knocked out for hours. I stood up and started to walk, still a little confused because I had never had a vision that felt so real. It felt like I was back in 1944 on that cold December day. I was having trouble connecting the past with the present because it all felt so real.
As I started to approach the white house I slowed down and got a glimpse of a bomb going off. I ducked and yelled out, “get Cover!” Then I noticed that I hadn’t been talking to anyone but my dogs, who sat there with a clueless looks in their eyes. I felt foolish and stood back up and acted like nothing had happened. Then I looked through the window and passed out again.
I again envisioned myself as the 25 year old man sitting on the edge of the forest. I had been reading a newspaper saying that Hitler was trying to split our allies in two so that our drive towards Germany would destroy our ability to supply ourselves. Right as soon as I read that I heard someone cry out that the scouting group that had gone through the woods had been ambushed and that the Nazis plan to split us in two had already started. My first thought was if Ted had been killed, captured, or somewhere hiding in the woods. I needed to know. I was about to have a mental breakdown with all of the commotion. I ran up to my commanding officer and asked him to put me in the first wave of troops to go through the forest to take out the Nazis. His expression gave me the feeling that he thought that I had gone mad, considering the fact that I had just requested to pretty much get myself killed. He had no hesitation; I bet he was thinking better me than him. I started to pack up ammo for my Mp-40. It was originally a German gun but I had taken the gun from one of the German soldiers that I killed along with his two knives. A standard issue pocket knife and a Hitler youth knife. I put on my helmet and headed for the front lines.
As I reached the front, I looked around at the men next to me. They were either crying, knowing that they were probably going to die, or had an insane look in their eyes that said all they wanted to do was kill a couple Nazi bastards for the last action of their life to avenge their lost friend or family member. I wasn’t feeling like that in any way. I wasn’t scared. I didn’t want to avenge my lost friends .All I wanted to do was find my friend and get him out alive. We started to march our way through the Ardennes Forrest where the attack had begun.
Since I was in the very front of the line I could see German soldiers scramble into their positions to take us out. Their goal looked like they were trying to draw us into a clearing so that our troops would be spread out in the open so they could just pick us off one by one. Luckily, I was able to draw most of the troops to the edge of the clearing. There were at least some trees to take cover behind. I heard the Germans start to open fire on us. I positioned myself behind a tree so that I could get a glimpse of the German perimeter. As I continued to scan, troops would start to charge forward but fall down like lifeless toys. And then at the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of the German’s ammo dump. It had been positioned in what looked like a German farm house; it was a simple white house. I looked at the house thinking that Ted might have been in there held as a prisoner of war. I started to make my way towards the white house. A grenade went off beside me and I was thrown to the left like a ragdoll being thrown from a child’s hands. My arms and legs flailed about as if independent from my body but my expression stayed the same. Once I hit the soft pillow ground I scrambled back to my feet and continued my way towards the house. My fellow soldiers had been running beside me but each one would either get shot and fall to the ground or step on a land mine and get blown to bits. As my comrades started to deplete I knew that it wouldn’t be long before I would be taken out. I was right. As soon as I thought that, I was shot right in the ankle. I fell flat on my face. The pain was unbearable. The bullet had gone through the skin, muscle and bone leaving me with a gaping hole on both sides.
I thought about standing up but I knew that if I tried I would definitely die. I laid there in defeat and started to call for a medic. I couldn’t have been yelling for more than 3 minutes when two medical officers showed up with a stretcher, ready to get me to cover. They laid me out on the stretcher and started to run to the forest when suddenly, BOOOMMM!!!! The first medic had stepped on a land mine. He was automatically blown to bits, while the other medic had been pierced through the heart with some shrapnel. I was flung from the stretcher. Dirt, blood, metal, and body parts were flying all around me. I hit the ground and went into shock. I couldn’t hear or feel anything. I was kneeling in this field with my mouth wide open with drool falling out both sides of my lips. I tried to stand up but then I noticed that my entire leg had been blown off. I started to scream as two more medics started to pull me back into the forest. I was crying, yelling out, “my leg, my leg!” When the pain hit an all time high, I blacked out. The next thing I remembered was waking up in a daze. I looked around for a second, not knowing where I was. I felt pain in the bottom of my thigh. I let out a groan as I reached down to feel my leg. I swept my hand down where my leg should have been and noticed that there wasn’t anything there. I scrambled about trying to find my leg.
When I pulled off the covers, I remembered everything that had happened. I remembered the bullet in my ankle, the medics, the explosions, the blood flying through the air, the dirt on my face. It was like I had just relived the entire moment. I noticed that my right ankle was in a cast. I was concerned that I was completely handicapped for the moment. I had the feeling my life was over, like I would never be able to do anything.
I woke up. I was back to reality and had been holding on to my wooden leg as my body laid flat on the ground. I then let go of my leg and rose to my feet and looked at the white house. I spoke to my dogs and said, “you know, they never found Ted after he left that day. I wonder if he had actually been in the white house.” I looked again and then said, “but some things are meant not to be known. “
I could have kept walking towards the house and I wondered if Ted had escaped and lived in that house. But I decided to just take my dogs and walk back the way that I had come from in the first place.
Truth of War Project Reflection
During the course of this project, I have changed my perspective on war. Before starting the project, I had never really thought about war. I had never really noticed what war was about until we had started to read “All Quiet on the Western Front.” After reading that book and studying the cause of WW1, it had really opened my eyes. The part of the Project that I had had connected with the most was the cause of WW1. I thought that this was most interesting because it really shows how stupid war really is. WW1 was started when the Serbs had assonated the Arch Duke of Austria Hungry. That was one man who got killed. But because of all the countries saying they would back each other up if anything like this had ever happened. Which led to the Germans declaring war on the Serbians, then that led to Russia to declare war on Germany and so on. This really showed me how childish war really is because one man got killed; millions of innocent lives were lost.
I think that my truth of war after doing this project was that War is a childish game, because these leaders can have a compromise, they have to take what they want. They tell the soldiers that you are making a stand for your country, but in reality, the country is like a master, and the solders are just puppets that dangle down from strings, not having a choice what to do. I think that this is important to learn because it’s a very interesting topic, along with the fact that it can show students how war really is, rather than letting them believe in the propaganda that the government puts out. Because after doing this project, I would never want to go through something like that. This is why I think that it is important to teach students about what war is really like, so that they don’t get manipulated to go fight for their lives.
I feel that during the course of this project, me as a student, has improves as a writer along with having more of a creative atmosphere. Because before the course of this project, as far as short stories go, I was never really offered the chance to be as creative in my stories before doing this project. I felt like I could really let my ideas out, which I feel is good for me, rather than having a guided plan so I’m doing this thing at that time, which I don’t like to do. I like to be able to write freely, and put m thoughts out on paper. So I feel that I have taken something away from the writing part of the project, is that I do much better when it is not guided, I am better with just writing freely, and expressing my thoughts.
I felt that my project could really reflect off of my story, because the character relates to PTSD, which reflects my painting and quote. My quote Sais, “All moments, past, present, and future, always have existed, always will exist.” This then reflects back to PTSD, these soldiers witness such unspeakable horrors that had affected them when they saw it, and will continue to see it as they live on. And I feel that this reflects back to the truth of war from another perspective. All of the soldiers are changed for the rest of their lives because of what they saw, and that is truly awful. I think project defiantly let me show a visual example of the truth of war.
I feel that the class has been just fine. I think that the work load is plentiful, and the projects are great. The only thing that I would change would be to have a little more options. Like I would have liked to have the choice to write an essay rather than a short story, but besides that, everything in class has been fine.
As I continued to watch the scene, I started to remember everything that had happened in those three days of that battle that I had to endure. As I kept watching, and started to see, and hear, what was happening? I was looking through the eyes of my 25 year old body and everything started to fit together.
“Hey Ted!” I shouted with so much enthusiasm. I felt like I hadn’t been that happy in an eternity. My staff and I had just advanced to the borders of the Third Reich. The resiliency of the Wahrmacht and the beginning of the bad weather had immobilized us in the mud, snow, and the harsh terrain of the outer Ruhr and in the Ardennes Forest. Ted had been over on the Outer Ruhr while I was just on the outside of the Ardennes Forest. We hadn’t seen each other since the end of the October. Ted had been chosen to be part of a scouting group that was going to advance their way through the Ardennes Forest. It was a simple assignment that shouldn’t have taken more than 24 hours. He ran over to me with a smile on his face that was as large as the M-80 gun that was slung around the backside of his neck and shoulders. As he walked closer he extended his hand up towards his head to salute me, giving me the respect that I deserved as a staff sergeant and he was an enlisted man. But he was one of my best friends and he didn’t need to give me that respect because of my position, so I saluted him back. Ted was not a day older than 19 and he still acted like a boy. As I saluted him he started to blush like a school girl, then with a sarcastic remark I said, “What the hell is wrong with you. You’re a man so act like it.” He said “sorry” right away. Then I laughed and asked him, “How has it been over on the Ruhr?” His facial expression changed from a smile to a look of sadness.
He then explained to me about how many men were lost as they kept advancing towards Germany. He said the weather conditions had been so miserable, soldiers would get hypothermia, would start to lose their minds from all the death or the miserable conditions that they had to live through day after day. It seemed like a total hell, but he changed the subject to ask me how I had been. In reality I had been completely fine, but I just said things had been hard on the forest floor as well. We heard the drill sergeant who had been sitting in the back of a jeep yelling out, “last call for scouting drill, last call…” Ted turned to me and said, “I’ll be back in a couple of hours,” as he started rushing in the direction that the jeep had gone. I smiled and yelled back to him, “don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.” He started to fade into the distance. I sat down and started to daydream which led me to a deep sleep.
In my dream I had seen a small group of soldiers who were walking along a long road that was in the forest, when they came to a white house. I woke up to my dogs’ wet, cold nose sniffing my face. As a scrambled to my feet, I noticed that I had just fallen down into the snow. Then I looked at my watch and it said 12:05. Not a single minute had passed by when it felt like I had been knocked out for hours. I stood up and started to walk, still a little confused because I had never had a vision that felt so real. It felt like I was back in 1944 on that cold December day. I was having trouble connecting the past with the present because it all felt so real.
As I started to approach the white house I slowed down and got a glimpse of a bomb going off. I ducked and yelled out, “get Cover!” Then I noticed that I hadn’t been talking to anyone but my dogs, who sat there with a clueless looks in their eyes. I felt foolish and stood back up and acted like nothing had happened. Then I looked through the window and passed out again.
I again envisioned myself as the 25 year old man sitting on the edge of the forest. I had been reading a newspaper saying that Hitler was trying to split our allies in two so that our drive towards Germany would destroy our ability to supply ourselves. Right as soon as I read that I heard someone cry out that the scouting group that had gone through the woods had been ambushed and that the Nazis plan to split us in two had already started. My first thought was if Ted had been killed, captured, or somewhere hiding in the woods. I needed to know. I was about to have a mental breakdown with all of the commotion. I ran up to my commanding officer and asked him to put me in the first wave of troops to go through the forest to take out the Nazis. His expression gave me the feeling that he thought that I had gone mad, considering the fact that I had just requested to pretty much get myself killed. He had no hesitation; I bet he was thinking better me than him. I started to pack up ammo for my Mp-40. It was originally a German gun but I had taken the gun from one of the German soldiers that I killed along with his two knives. A standard issue pocket knife and a Hitler youth knife. I put on my helmet and headed for the front lines.
As I reached the front, I looked around at the men next to me. They were either crying, knowing that they were probably going to die, or had an insane look in their eyes that said all they wanted to do was kill a couple Nazi bastards for the last action of their life to avenge their lost friend or family member. I wasn’t feeling like that in any way. I wasn’t scared. I didn’t want to avenge my lost friends .All I wanted to do was find my friend and get him out alive. We started to march our way through the Ardennes Forrest where the attack had begun.
Since I was in the very front of the line I could see German soldiers scramble into their positions to take us out. Their goal looked like they were trying to draw us into a clearing so that our troops would be spread out in the open so they could just pick us off one by one. Luckily, I was able to draw most of the troops to the edge of the clearing. There were at least some trees to take cover behind. I heard the Germans start to open fire on us. I positioned myself behind a tree so that I could get a glimpse of the German perimeter. As I continued to scan, troops would start to charge forward but fall down like lifeless toys. And then at the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of the German’s ammo dump. It had been positioned in what looked like a German farm house; it was a simple white house. I looked at the house thinking that Ted might have been in there held as a prisoner of war. I started to make my way towards the white house. A grenade went off beside me and I was thrown to the left like a ragdoll being thrown from a child’s hands. My arms and legs flailed about as if independent from my body but my expression stayed the same. Once I hit the soft pillow ground I scrambled back to my feet and continued my way towards the house. My fellow soldiers had been running beside me but each one would either get shot and fall to the ground or step on a land mine and get blown to bits. As my comrades started to deplete I knew that it wouldn’t be long before I would be taken out. I was right. As soon as I thought that, I was shot right in the ankle. I fell flat on my face. The pain was unbearable. The bullet had gone through the skin, muscle and bone leaving me with a gaping hole on both sides.
I thought about standing up but I knew that if I tried I would definitely die. I laid there in defeat and started to call for a medic. I couldn’t have been yelling for more than 3 minutes when two medical officers showed up with a stretcher, ready to get me to cover. They laid me out on the stretcher and started to run to the forest when suddenly, BOOOMMM!!!! The first medic had stepped on a land mine. He was automatically blown to bits, while the other medic had been pierced through the heart with some shrapnel. I was flung from the stretcher. Dirt, blood, metal, and body parts were flying all around me. I hit the ground and went into shock. I couldn’t hear or feel anything. I was kneeling in this field with my mouth wide open with drool falling out both sides of my lips. I tried to stand up but then I noticed that my entire leg had been blown off. I started to scream as two more medics started to pull me back into the forest. I was crying, yelling out, “my leg, my leg!” When the pain hit an all time high, I blacked out. The next thing I remembered was waking up in a daze. I looked around for a second, not knowing where I was. I felt pain in the bottom of my thigh. I let out a groan as I reached down to feel my leg. I swept my hand down where my leg should have been and noticed that there wasn’t anything there. I scrambled about trying to find my leg.
When I pulled off the covers, I remembered everything that had happened. I remembered the bullet in my ankle, the medics, the explosions, the blood flying through the air, the dirt on my face. It was like I had just relived the entire moment. I noticed that my right ankle was in a cast. I was concerned that I was completely handicapped for the moment. I had the feeling my life was over, like I would never be able to do anything.
I woke up. I was back to reality and had been holding on to my wooden leg as my body laid flat on the ground. I then let go of my leg and rose to my feet and looked at the white house. I spoke to my dogs and said, “you know, they never found Ted after he left that day. I wonder if he had actually been in the white house.” I looked again and then said, “but some things are meant not to be known. “
I could have kept walking towards the house and I wondered if Ted had escaped and lived in that house. But I decided to just take my dogs and walk back the way that I had come from in the first place.
Truth of War Project Reflection
During the course of this project, I have changed my perspective on war. Before starting the project, I had never really thought about war. I had never really noticed what war was about until we had started to read “All Quiet on the Western Front.” After reading that book and studying the cause of WW1, it had really opened my eyes. The part of the Project that I had had connected with the most was the cause of WW1. I thought that this was most interesting because it really shows how stupid war really is. WW1 was started when the Serbs had assonated the Arch Duke of Austria Hungry. That was one man who got killed. But because of all the countries saying they would back each other up if anything like this had ever happened. Which led to the Germans declaring war on the Serbians, then that led to Russia to declare war on Germany and so on. This really showed me how childish war really is because one man got killed; millions of innocent lives were lost.
I think that my truth of war after doing this project was that War is a childish game, because these leaders can have a compromise, they have to take what they want. They tell the soldiers that you are making a stand for your country, but in reality, the country is like a master, and the solders are just puppets that dangle down from strings, not having a choice what to do. I think that this is important to learn because it’s a very interesting topic, along with the fact that it can show students how war really is, rather than letting them believe in the propaganda that the government puts out. Because after doing this project, I would never want to go through something like that. This is why I think that it is important to teach students about what war is really like, so that they don’t get manipulated to go fight for their lives.
I feel that during the course of this project, me as a student, has improves as a writer along with having more of a creative atmosphere. Because before the course of this project, as far as short stories go, I was never really offered the chance to be as creative in my stories before doing this project. I felt like I could really let my ideas out, which I feel is good for me, rather than having a guided plan so I’m doing this thing at that time, which I don’t like to do. I like to be able to write freely, and put m thoughts out on paper. So I feel that I have taken something away from the writing part of the project, is that I do much better when it is not guided, I am better with just writing freely, and expressing my thoughts.
I felt that my project could really reflect off of my story, because the character relates to PTSD, which reflects my painting and quote. My quote Sais, “All moments, past, present, and future, always have existed, always will exist.” This then reflects back to PTSD, these soldiers witness such unspeakable horrors that had affected them when they saw it, and will continue to see it as they live on. And I feel that this reflects back to the truth of war from another perspective. All of the soldiers are changed for the rest of their lives because of what they saw, and that is truly awful. I think project defiantly let me show a visual example of the truth of war.
I feel that the class has been just fine. I think that the work load is plentiful, and the projects are great. The only thing that I would change would be to have a little more options. Like I would have liked to have the choice to write an essay rather than a short story, but besides that, everything in class has been fine.