Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Individuality

"The apparition of these faces in the crowd,
Petals on a wet, black bough."
~Ezra Pound (In a Station of the Metro)

I just read a piece in A Thousand Splendid Sons by Hosseini, and was completely inspired to do my term paper on individuality and the importance of having that feeling of bringing a useful trait to the table of the world.
"She (Laila) would never leave her mark on Mammy's heart the way her brothers had, because Mammy's heart was like a pallid beach where Laila's footprints would forever wash away beneath the waves of sorrow that swelled and crashed, swelled and crashed." (pg 130)

This segment made me think about the struggle I live with all the time of comparing myself and trying to be good at something that I could bring to the table. I think many, if not all of us struggle with this sometimes. I know last summer I had the hardest time with this, and feeling like I was a worthless ailment to the staff I worked with and as. I saw how well someone could dance or how amazingly someone played basketball and I crashed. Everyone would find those people cool and want to hang out with them, and I felt like I had nothing to offer. I faded out behind all the shining faces.
Of course, I realized that these comparisons were ridiculous and that it was nothing but the enemy trying to bring me down for an entire summer, but I still find myself pondering what I can really bring to the table. I still tend to blend in most of the time.
I feel that this whole issue of individuality and uniqueness is universal. It's a common theme across cultures, and this is why I believe it would make a great paper topic for my comparison of A Thousand Splendid Sons and other American Literature that share this theme. Pin It

1 comment:

ambersun said...

Hi from Australia

What a lovely, honest post.

I struggle to bring anything to the table, not through lack of talent or motivation but through a terrible lot of illness.

Hope your term paper goes well.

God Bless

Amber