The Tree

She walks to the bottom of the tree, stands as straight as she can, tilts her head back and stares up into the swinging branches.  The top seems ages away and nearly unreachable, but she knows that it can be achieved.  After all she watched him do it only a few moments ago.  He had placed first his left hand and then the right upon the trunk.  Stepping on those large roots protruding from the ground.  Quickly he swung his leg around the trunk and scooted up a little ways, careful to reposition his hands.  He continued his assent even with the continual motion of the tree.  Effortlessly he slid the heel of his foot over the branch and pulled with his leg to bring his entire body up, teetering atop the weak unsteady tree limb.  He however was not satisfied yet, he had to stand on that unsteadily limb and spring off with the expectation that same limb would reach out and catch him.  It did, it always has.  For that limb is not really a tree limb at all, but the limb of his and her father.  A man so devoted to his children he allows them to climb him like he is nothing but a tree. 

Before I had children I had one hope for those that I might have someday.  I hoped they would have two very loving and involved parents.  I hoped they would know their grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins and be close with them.  It’s not as if my parents aren’t wonderful parents, they are.  They were just always busy doing something they thought needed to be done for me and my sisters.  Too busy to spend much time just being silly with us. 

My husband is great at just being silly with the children, but me I have forgotten this lesson.  Today I became so upset with my twins for opening all the board games and throwing the pieces all over the house and ruining the majority of the games.  Sitting here tonight after they have all gone to sleep made me start thinking about how the board games were not important.  Rather enjoying doing anything, even destroying board games, with them is what’s important. 

Maybe tomorrow I will be the tree. 

 

Aristotelian Rhetorical Analysis of 5 Ancient Medical Practices -- Thought Glass #6

The video posted below is a very fast paced and exciting one to watch, however I noticed right from the beginning the only thing we know about the guy in the video is that his name is Kevin.  He also says “Vsauce” super-fast at the very beginning.  Being that I have no idea what Vsauce even stands for and it’s not explained in this video, there is very little credibility to the content.  If you wanted to find out more about Kevin himself or Vsauce you would have to go elsewhere on the web and do some research.  I poked around on youtube but there was not really any additional information provided as to where the information came from to start with or what authority Kevin has. 

Based on Kevin’s upbeat and funny way of delivering information I would assume people of the younger generation would enjoy this, while someone my mother’s age may not.   

The content of the video is pretty straight forward.  It explains of lot of historical medical procedures that no longer take place.  This video gets people thinking about history in a fun way, and if you want to take it one step further, perhaps gets us thinking about how grateful we should be that we live in the here and now. 

Kevin delivers the historical information and captures your interest in the form of humor.  An example of this is his facial expressions and also when he talks about Bart Hughes performing self-trepanation and recommending others do it as well, Kevin adds that the scientific world responded with “um, no”.  I laughed out loud during this part of the video, as was his intent.

Kevin picked several subjects that are interesting to people today.  He chose to talk about procedures and possible cures from the past which are things we would find truly outrageous today.  The drastic difference in the beliefs he talks about and those we all know about know, makes the viewer really feel for the people who underwent these horrid medical practices.  This video makes you disgusted, sympathetic, and touches the funny bone a bit too. 

Overall it is a fun video to watch.  You can learn a very small bit of history, and it might encourage you to go out and find more information on the subject.  I wouldn’t use this a scholarly source however since it I lacking any credibility.  Fun, with facts, but no sources to back them up.