Once upon a time, the people of North America all experienced the most peculiar July afternoon. It had started off a normal enough day: with wives drinking coffee and husbands reading newspapers; young children eating cereal and watching morning cartoons, while teenagers still sleeping in warm beds, with the stale smells of the previous night's party hanging in the air. All was normal and in order and as was to be expected. In the Midwest a farmer looked across his fields, with delight and anticipation. It hadn't rained in a day over a week and he thought to himself, they were due for a storm or at least a small cloud of liquid gold. In the Southwest, the city streets were all covered in a thin layer of dirty sand. The windows of buildings went unwashed throughout the dry summer months. The mayors of the towns long ago deciding not to waste the energy or time to clean off the dirt and sand which returned overnight, settling in the same cracks and surfaces as the previous day. In the larger cities along the Western seaboard smog hung heavy in the air filling the lungs of residence like a cigarette fills a smoker. Entering and assaulting their bodies without hesitation, never fully leaving with each exhalation. The smog hung thick over tall skyscraped cities, moping around like the cars that drug men and women to work in the early morning. The East coast, though, could not gloat about any happier a circumstance as the green hilled states were covered in shades of olive and jade and golden rays of sun met the faces of morning dog walkers.
That day in July, as is came to be known, when the West woke up a rain cloud was already forming in the distance. It started over the ocean powdering the velvet of the sky, first in long whips ...
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...nging to taste the breath and feel the smooth lips of the other. It made another old women, sitting on her front porch knitting, pause in her stitch and remember a time when she stood in the rain as a little girl unafraid of it running over her and chilling her skin. Mostly, the rain that summer day reminded people of an enchantment they could touch or understand. Meteorologist couldn't explain the phenomena of a cross continental rain storm that was so quick moving and unexpected. Most people though, didn't want or need an explanation. For hours after the climax and thunder had ender, when all the streets and houses were clean and the deserts refreshed the rain remained as a thin mist all the way across the plains, fields, mountains, hills, deserts and coasts, catching each bit of light skewing the air into magnificent colors, no matter where the people looked.
Didion paints uneasy and somber images when describing the Santa Ana winds. “There is something uneasy in the Los Angeles air… some unnatural stillness, some tension,” starts the essay off with the image of Los Angeles people in a sense of stillness or tense. She further adds, “Blowing up sandstorms out along Route 66… we will see smoke back in the canyons, and hear sirens in the night,” propagating the uneasy and stark image of Los Angeles. “The baby frets. The maid sulks,” she adds, giving a depressing view into the effects of the Santa Ana winds on people. Didion, in an attempt to show the craziness associated with the Santa Ana winds, points out the Indians who throw themselves into the sea when bad winds came. At any rate, Didion attempts to show the negative effects of the Santa Ana winds through images of stillness, uneasiness, and sobriety.
image of the city after the rainstorm but upon closer look , it actually revels much more about the
Before you know it is all over and it is quiet again only the calm down remains. I believe Magdalena Fernandez took inspiration from nature and geometric forms that are all tied together in this beautiful piece of work. She used the work of an artist’s song which is actually made by moving around hands and stomping rather than actual rain. It is artificial rain she states in an interview.
...een and heard for miles. Sheets of rain pour down outside. Bobinot and his son Bibi is stuck at the store as the storm flows. Alcee, Calixta’s old lover, just so happens to be near Calixta’s home as the storm approaches. As everyone is forced to ride out the storm in their current location, Alcee spends the storm with Calixta. It became a slippery slope, as the two former lovers created sparks between each other. The climax of the story lead to them having sexual intercourse; just as the storm outside reached its peak in symbolic fashion. This then builds suspense for the reader trying to figure out whether or not the husband will discover his wife cheating on him. Ultimately, Alcee leaves before Bobinot comes home, therefore no one figures out what happens during the storm. There is situational irony that goes along with the story really enhances the suspense.
'The Storm' begins on a stormy spring day, with the protagonist Calixta at her sewing machine. She is alone, her husband Bobinot and son Bibi have gone to the store. Calixta seems to be a bored woman, confined to her duties as a housewife and mother. As the distant storm approaches she is unaware of what the storm brings, her former lover Alcee. Calixta allows Alcee into her home and opens her whole world to him. There is a connection between the storm that is going on outside and the storm of emotions going on in Calixta and Alcee. The weather sends Calixta into Alcee?s arms, he wraps his arms around her, and they can no longer hide their feelings for one another. They gave into their raging emotions and made love. Outside the weather was subsiding and Calixta and Alcee?s bodies felt relaxed and calmed. ?The rain was over; and the sun was turning the glistening green world into a palace of gems.? (1614) His face beamed with light like the sun. The storm inside of her was satisfied and for a brief instant Calixta felt liberated from her ordinary dull life.
“…it broke into hundreds of pieces so that the rain fell here and there from high clouds in long, curving gray plumes.” The hyperbole about the storm produces a wild sense of the surroundings. Kingsolver uses the onomatopoeia and simile to describe appearance and the sound of the storm. The first-person point of view also assists on expressing Taylor’s senses and emotions. In describing Taylor’s feelings for Estevan, Kingsolver combines them into a one complex sentence, which displays the exhilaration that Taylor feels. Most of all the paragraphs’ structure is similar, adding consistency to the passage. The consistency makes it easier for the readers to follow and understand the message and concepts that the author conveys in the novel. Additionally, Kingsolver uses contrast to bring out the mood among Taylor’s group. In the beginning, she makes a deadly ambience with the storm and lightning, yet the characters are very high in spirit and energy to a point in which they dance under the storm. It enhances the characters’ emotion to attract the attention of the readers, which makes it more noticeable just like light being brighter in the dark. Kingsolver also uses this passage as a chance to build up for a shocking event unexpected by
The water was calm, like the morning; both were starting to get ready for the day ahead. The silent water signals that although rough times occurred previously, the new day was a new start for the world. As I went closer to the water, I heard the subtle lapping of the water against the small rocks on the shore. Every sign of nature signals a change in life; no matter how slight, a change is significant. We can learn a lot from nature: whatever happens in the natural world, change comes and starts a new occurrence. I gazed over the water to where the sky met the sea. The body of water seemed to be endless under the clear blue sky. The scope of nature shows endless possibilities. Nature impresses us with the brilliant colors of the sky, the leaves, the water. She keeps us all in our places and warns us when we are careless with her. After all the leaves have fallen from the trees, she will offer us the first snows of the year to coat the earth with a tranquil covering. That will only be after we have recognized the lessons of autumn, the gradual change from warm to cold, rain to snow, summer to winter.
Rays of golden sunlight were piercing the blue sky. Today was a hot day. There had been no rain in the last month. A young child was playing in the field while his father was harvesting the crops. The boy was playing among the newly harvested golden vegetables. There were a lot more vegetables than he remembered from years past. The boy knew they were going to sell most of this harvest. Where are the other plants that he remembered? Why was corn the only thing growing? Why is it in straight lines instead of winding around the property like it normally did? He pondered these questions on the way to school. Today, unlike normal, his teacher let him out of school early. Though he thought nothing of it at the time the sky was turning dark. It was almost like a monster ate the sun. Not only was it getting dark the wind started to blow. The wind sound like a wolf howling at a full moon. When he reached his house, his father rushed him inside. The first of many dust storms hit and the period known as the Dust Bowl began.
Right after the line, “final uneasiness.” (16) the poem’s intended audience changes. The audience shifts from lovers and their experience with love to a more specific person/intended individual love to him. This is important to understand because it further demonstrates the emotions the speaker has. After the shift, the speaker says “Love, if you love me,/….Be for me, like rain,” (17-19). In this he is demanding that if someone wants to love him or be with him they need to be like rain. The image of rain falling outside is something simple and beautiful. Rain, to some people can be a calming sensation to feel on their cheeks. It is interesting how rain is used in a positive light to describe love because rain is not something one would typically assimilate to love. Rain is beautiful, like love, but to compare the two to illustrate a meaning is thought-provoking. Why would the speaker use rain to describe love? Possibly because it is beautiful like love and has characteristics one may desire in love? This may be true, but conversely it can be assumed that love is difficult to comprehend and that through the use of something out of the ordinary maybe some understanding of the abstract emotion can be facilitated. At the end of the poem the speaker leaves his intended audience with the final phrase of “Be wet/ with a decent happiness.” (23-24). This final phrase is significant because it tells the audience and those who desire
The “Dust Bowl Odyssey” presented an initial perspective of why families migrated from drought-ridden, Dust Bowl, areas to California. Edward Carr cautions, “Interpretation plays a necessary part in establishing the facts of history, and because no existing interpretation is wholly objective, on interpretation is a good as another, and the facts of history are in principle not amendable to objective interpretation” (Carr, 1961, p. 31). Historians had to separate the prejudices, assumptions, and beliefs of the times in order to have a more objective reasoning of the migration. The migration had valid evidence that supported against the theory of the Dust Bowl being the only contributor. Rather there were other historical contributions to
The Dust Bowl existed, in its full quintessence, concurrently with the Great Depression during the 1930's. Worster sets out in an attempt to show that these two cataclysms existed simultaneously not by coincidence, but by the same culture, which brought them about from similar events. "Both events revealed fundamental weaknesses in the traditional culture of America, the one in ecological terms, the other in economic." (pg. 5) Worster proposes that in American society, as in all others, there are certain accepted ways of using the land. He sums up the "capital ethos" of ecology into three simply stated maxims: nature must be seen as capital, man has a right/obligation to use this capital for constant self-advancement, and the social order should permit and encourage this continual increase of personal wealth (pg. 6) It is through these basic beliefs that Worster claims the plainsmen ignored all environmental limits, much ...
Tranquility fills the dull atmosphere. Not knowing how much water the clouds contain before the downpour starts, we innocently set ourselves up for an endless journey; a journey to find the purpose in life. A droplet of rain trickles down onto the top of your head, following a shower of many more droplets. Lightning flashes and booms of thunder take over the sky. Many are hesitant of whether to continue their journey or hide from this storm; an umbrella can only give so much protection against the rapid winds and stinging raindrops. Many describe thunderstorms in a frightening way, but the strong willed individuals who embrace the storm think with positivity - rain is changing the environment and bringing life to the world. Once the rain subsides, the atmosphere, exhausted and worn out, settles down back into the calm tranquil environment that it once was. The sky, once filled with dark and murky clouds, is filled with blue. One may either face the challenge they have been approached with to move on, or decline and stay caught in a storm. An individual’s view of the world has immense power of whether one’s obstacles will result in failure or achievement. It is the mentality that we approach life’s challenges that determine the positive or negative outcomes in our lives.
I was surprised when I was in the cafe, and suddenly the weather changed from a sunny afternoon to a stormy dark afternoon. I had seen many rain showers, but this one seemed different. This seemed different, because I had a different view and perspective of the storm. A storm like this had never left an impact on me.
The clouds were dull and grey and the light pitter patter of the rain could just be heard above everyone’s voices. My head was still spinning, not knowing wher...