Everyday Life.

Weather Map of Feeling

        To gather data for my Weather Map of Feelings, I looked at various blog entries containing the words “happy” and “sad” in the morning and the evening every day for two weeks. I also looked at headlines from the New York Times and other news sources, checked the weather, watched the news, and evaluated my own feelings. I choose to focus on the news stories that were either “e-mailed the most, blogged about the most, or read the most,” according to the statistics on the websites.

        John Donne once said, “No man is an island,” and while gathering data for my Weather Map of Feelings I found this to be the case. I noticed that when I read many of the blog entries with the words “happy” or “sad” in them people were either, happy for someone, or happy because of someone, sad for someone, or sad because of someone. I found that this occurred much more often than people being happy or sad because of something. I found this observation to be very interesting for a few reasons. Firstly, I find that most people keeping blogs are in there mid-to-late teenage years or in their early-to-mid 20s. I think at these particular ages people are the most concerned about their place in the world, where they fit in relation to others, and feel perhaps more closely connected to the people around them. I noticed that the headlines of the day did not necessarily have any correlation to the feelings in blogs. If there was a particular day with more positive headlines it didn’t mean that there were more people writing happy thoughts in their blogs. I think this is because people are most highly affected by the things that are closest to them, while many of the sad headlines focused on the tragic wildfires in California, the blogs that I read happened to be from various other parts of the United States. The events that were happening in California probably did not carry enough wait with them to affect their overall state of emotion being through the day. However if something unpleasant happened to them or near them then they would mention that it, in fact, did have some sort of effect on their level of happiness.

        When taking note of the news stories that were, read most, blogged about most often, and e-mailed to others most, I found them to be stories that were either, most alarming, most scandalous, or most tragic. For the most part, stories that were “pleasant,” did not seem to interest the general public as much as other these other types of news stories. I feel that since Americans seem to focus on these news stories they have become increasingly anxious. In the past few years America has experienced great tragedy, a terrorist attack, natural disasters such as hurricanes, flooding, and fires, and war. We are also beginning to fear many problems such as global warming, an energy crisis, and obesity. When reading blogs dealing with “happiness,” I found quite a few posts where people feel anxiety while happy. They felt that something bad was bound to happy. I think these events have caused an overall anxious and foreboding attitude in Americans that maybe didn’t exist a little over a decade ago.

        I found it much easier to gather data in the evening than in the morning. People tend to write in the blogs in the evening more often and report on how their day turned out. I think this is because people wake up in the morning ready to start the day fresh. Perhaps they wake up in a certain mood, but throughout their day their mood changed, most were inclined to write about what during the day affected their mood rather than how they felt when they woke up in the morning, possibly because they could not explain why they were feeling this way. However I also noticed that in the morning the weather has more of an impact on peoples’ feelings than it does later on in the day. This is probably because when waking up in the morning, the first thing people notice is the lighting in their room and perhaps the weather. I know that on days when I woke up to clouds and rain, I felt less happy than on days when I woke up to sunshine.

        After comparing my data with Melissa G, Jennifer, and Krystina, I found that we each had similar news headlines, and similar images gathered from news stories and in some cases we even had the exact same ones. Many of the news stories focused on the World Series, the California wild fires, the writer’s strike, and ways to be “green.” I think this shows what Americans are mainly concerned about and connected by. Americans will always be connected by sports especially baseball and football, we will always come together in times of disaster, and we are a democracy and will always discuss ideas and opinions on how to make the world better.

        Melissa and I also discussed our theory that people who write blogs aren’t necessarily the same people who follow the news. For instance, many young people are not as active in following the news, while many older people do not keep blogs. Perhaps if the same people were reading the news and writing the blogs there would be more of a correlation between the overall emotions in news stories and the emotions in the blogs. We agreed that for some reason it seemed that people were generally more sad than happy, or at least seemed to vocalize their sadness more often.

        After completing my observations I began to think of ways this project could have been more successful. I think it would be very interesting to create a weather map of feeling for Marist College. Instead of just reading blogs we could actually speak to other students on campus about their feelings and what caused these feelings on any given day. This would be helpful because then we could connect these feelings to actual events that happened around campus and in the surrounding areas. Of course these people on campus will ultimately be affected by other things, such as situations going on at home, personal experiences, and other things, but I think localizing the project and making it more concentrated would improve the accuracy of the results and give the results more value.

        Overall, I think this was my favorite project because it was one where I could actually try to make connections between the data.

I really don’t like creating things at random. When doing all of the projects we have done so far, I really just want to put thought into them, make connections, make them have meaning. I like stuff better that way. I feel like I am creating nothing if I don’t do it intentionally.

Downtown Poughkeepsie.

September 24th:

I often witness every day life in downtown Poughkeepsie. I commute to school and it just happens to be part of my route. Twice a day, at different times each day, while stopped at red lights and going through traffic I have grown accustomed to what my senses experience while driving through downtown for a few minutes. In doing this assignment I was able to pick up little things that I may have not noticed before.

I chose to do this assignment on Baker Street, since it is the street I travel on most often. It is 4:05pm when I get out of my car, which I was quite nervous to parallel park (I had to park my car on a side street). An older man with long grey hair, deep wrinkles, rotted out teeth and a sunken in face wearing a “too-big-for-him” navy adjustable “trucker” style hat and a plaid button down shirt, riding passenger in an old beat up ford pick up truck, bitterly shouted something at me as I struggled to remember just the right way to parallel park (I hadn’t attempted to park like this since my road test, almost three years ago). Now, I was already nervous about doing this assignment, but that grew after the incident with the old man. After somewhat successfully parking, I headed towards Baker Street. Baker Street is a three lane, one way street, which at most times during the day is packed with cars. This time was no exception. The roar of cars serves are a background noise for the rest of my observations.

The street seems to be mainly residential. The homes are “row” style homes, all with similar styles. They seem to be multifamily homes, typical of a city area. There are not many people walking around at this time, not as many as there are around 3:00pm when school is getting out. However, the warm weather seems to have lured a few people out onto the street. Across the road from me I make out three Hispanic boys about my age (maybe a year or two younger) traveling in my direction. One is on a bike, the other two walk on either side of him. I hear them talking in Spanish, barely making out what they are saying, though they are speaking quite loudly, quickly, and enthusiastically, the noise of the cars drowns them out. I understand some of the words they are saying, which causes me to think that maybe those seven years of Spanish classes paid off. All the boys are dressed in the same style and are wearing backpacks. Two of them wear “wife-beater” tank tops, one in a yellow color and one in white, they all have their hair gelled up. The boys pass, and this assignment, makes me wonder where they are going, what there doing, where they came from, and what their day is going to be like.

It seems like a full minute has gone by before I see more people in the distance. As they get close (oh my side of the street) I make out a man pushing a carriage with a small child, about a year old riding in it. Along side the navy stroller is a boy about four years old. As they get closer I hear leaves crunching underneath the wheels of the stroller, reminding me that despite the unusually warm weather we are having today. A breeze blows and I am cooled off a bit and hear even more leaves brush across the cement. I wonder where the leaves come from since I do not actually see any tress from where I am standing. I get more uncomfortable as the people come closer because I am now aware of how awkward I must looking standing, observing, and writing into a pink and yellow notebook. As the group, which appears to be the men members of a family, walks past, I notice that the children seem especially happy, and the father, content himself. I walk to the curb so they have room to pass, and I try not to stare even though I am tempted to observe more. As they walk past I hear the little boy speaking to his father in Spanish, and it always amazes me when little children are speaking a different language. I know it is their language and they grew up speaking it, but I still can’t help be imagine him as a happy little genius.

After the family walks by it’s quiet, with the exception of the roaring of the cars. There is not much to observe, and I suddenly feel lonely. I am not sure why. I am beginning to pay more attention to the cars driving by. It’s 4:11 now, a little early for rush hour, but everyone does seem to be in quite a rush. I contemplate writing down a few names of the cars driving by, but there are so many I can’t choose one. I hear music now coming out of one of them, I am not sure which one. It’s getting louder. I see an older tan colored car, it appears to be some sort of a station wagon, maybe an old Volvo, driven by an African American man, about in his 30s. He has thick dreads and very dark skin. As his car speeds past me, around the traffic, I struggle to make out exactly the type of music he is listening to. It sounds like it has an “island” flair to it.

It’s now 4:13, I really want to get in my car and go home. I’ve had a long day, I now feel oddly lonely, and really hungry. As I begin to walk back to my car I see a group of African American girls walking towards me. I count them. There’s five. They are all different ages, and I think maybe they are cousins, probably not sisters because they don’t look very much a like. I am not sure though, obviously. The two youngest girls have braided hair, one is chubby and wearing a bright yellow shirt and has yellow clips in her hair. The other girl is very thin and wearing a dark pink outfit. They seem to be excited. I think maybe it’s because they are hanging out with their older cousins, or sisters, or neighbors, whatever they are. One of the older one’s (about 13 years old) links hands with the younger child (about 6 years old), she seems to be teasing her. As they get closer I can hear their conversation. One of them says “Awe, no girrrrl.” Pretty loudly, and the tone of her voice makes me giggle a bit. I wonder what the girls are thinking as they walk past me giving me strange looks (Hey, I don’t blame them, I am writing in a notebook, looking up, and appearing to be very nosey). I feel like Harried the Spy, the main character of a movie I used to like when I was younger.

I check the time on my cell phone once more, it’s 4:14pm only. I’d say this is one of those moments when time seems to be moving really slowly. I am walking slowly back to my car. I see a boy about 8 years old, a little over weight, with a round, nearly bald (buzzed short) head, bend down to tie his black basketball sneakers. I wonder why he is alone. He almost trips as he gets up, and he looks at me a little embarrassed, probably also a little creeped out that I had been looking at him. He starts to jog off, it actually almost looks like he is partially skipping, and I sort of laugh, because he seems so happy.

There is still not much happening.

I am now sitting in my car. It’s 4:16.  Since I technically still have 4 minutes of observation left to do, and am nervous about pulling away from the curb (there are cars parked close in front of and behind me), I decide to call my mom and tell her I am alive (she was worried about me being outside my car and “vulnerable” in the city of Poughkeepsie). She told me to be careful. So I am going to try to do just that as I pull out of my spot, and head home to Mahopac, where the everyday is completely different.

4:18pm.

Phantasmagoria

The following 3 pictures were taken at 5:30am-ish. Yes, 5:30am.. I do have to get up that early when I commute to my 8ams. :[

My desk, with my notebook for this class on top. I was reading the assignment again.

Fridge.

My shower stuff.

These pictures were taken at 6pm on September 21st.

My desk, and a lot of books everywhere. AND batman=).

FRIDGE. yuck.

Shower stuff.

The following were taken around 11:30pm on September 21nd.
My desk, unusually neat.

Fridge. Note: this picture grosses me out. and if i wasn’t so lazy i would probably clean the fridge.

My shower “supplies.”

With the exception of my refrigerator, my stuff didn’t seem to change much over the course of one day, which is somewhat boring to take notice of, haha.

Interests

Music - I love listening to live music. I also really like country music, and I don’t care if no one else does, haha!!

Children - I love children under the age of three, especially. I was a nanny over the summer and now I babysit. I love how the smallest things can make a child happy, because the littlest things make me happy as well.

Traveling - I am interested in visiting and experiencing as many different places as possible. This summer I plan on going on a road trip cross country (I have already been as far west as Idaho, where I used to live). My goal is to visit all 50 states (not all at once!). I eventually hope to travel to another country; I’ve been to Puerto Rico, but I don’t think that counts.

Communications - This is my major. :) I think it’s very important to have good communication skills in general. I also just love to talk! Having random light hearted or deep meaningful conversation is always fun for me. I’m not usually shy about saying what’s on my mind. I like meeting new people, and learning about them. I especially like learning little details about people that normally aren’t paid attention to. I love making people laugh. I love laughing in general. Laughing is one of the best releases in life. :)

Football - I like football season and I like playing Madden even though I am bad at it, haha. I don’t even really have a favorite team, but I play the Panthers in Madden, usually. Haha. And I also like Tom Brady.