MERCUTIO: THE PETER PAN OF VERONA

Throughout life in Verona, we grow up and change. Some of us spend our entire life waiting for the day we become an adult – praying for independence, separation, and responsibility. While others cling desperately onto their childhood, wishing upon every star that Santa is real and responsibility is a myth. Sure we all wish we could become an immortal hero like Robin Hood or Peter Pan. Most of us just realize the impracticality of this.

                  Mercutio was a person who never stopped wanting to be Peter Pan. He pitied people who grew up. He snapped at adults and wanted no bed time and to stay up and party. He believed Romeo to be his wingman, sidekick, partner in crime, and best friend. He was a man who viewed love and commitment as terrifying expectations for adults. Mercutio wanted to live free of responsibility and consequences. But everybody wakes up at one point, and realizes that Neverland is only in dreams and only Peter Pan can stay young forever.

                  During an interview with Romeo we learned that this was Mercutio’s initial response to Romeos tragic break up. “Why is it not this better now than groaning for love? Now art thou sociable, now art thou Romeo, now art thou what thou art, by art well as by nature. For this diveling love is like a great natural that runs lolling up and down to hide his babble.”  - (Act 2 Scene 9 Lines 90-95)

                  Mercutio was trying to say that being in love changed Romeo and his lifestyle and his priorities. Mercutio wanted to know where Romeos socialite attitude went. Where the old Romeo went. Romeos fun, carefree personality went missing and in its place was a crumbing, disaster, of Mercutio’s best friend. This is one of the reasons Mercutio viewed falling in love equal to accepting death because he watched as Romeo gave himself away to another person and lost himself there. The Romeo he knew “died” and mourned over not just the girl he lost (Rosaline) but the person he was before the Rosaline. Mercutio was scared of any real commitment because he thought that any time he opened himself up or committed to a relationship he would end up just like Romeo – a shell of a man.

                  Mercutio fought to keep himself away from falling in love or growing up by partying every night and hanging around with many different girls – and he tried to save his friends from that dreaded fate by convincing them to do the same. From an exclusive interview with Benvolio, Romeos cousin and one of Mercutio’s comrades, it was said that Mercutio was very protective of Romeo and tried unsuccessfully and kind of ironically, to make Romeo view love the same way. Mercutio put his friendship with Romeo before anything else, while Romeo put his relationship with girls before anything else. I mean Mercutio died fighting the Capulets for Romeo, and Romeo died for a girl he couldn’t be with. So at times Mercutio felt he needed to remind Romeo of all the fun they have together. Mercutio convinces a sulking Romeo to break into a Capulet party to take his mind off the hardships and consequences of love. Mercutio wants to convince Romeo that he doesn’t need “one true love” when he can have 30 different girls and be just as happy.

                  What happens at this party? Romeo meets Juliet. The girl he ends up dying for.

                  At the end of the interview with Romeo he says Mercutio gave his this advice after his first heart break, “If love be rough with you, be rough with love. Prick love for pricking and you beat love down. (Act 1 Scene 4 lines 27-28)

                 

                  As if he was an eight-year-old, Mercutio felt the need to argue everything and always win, even if that was just by making the other person mad enough to resign. Mercutio was spotted with Benvolio and Romeo when he began to banter with Romeo without provocation. Then Juliet’s nurse arrives, a woman who is noticeably older than the boys, and without any indication Mercutio begins to taunt the adult. It was said that Mercutio’s wit consisted of “Good Peter, to hide her face, for her fan’s the fairer face” and “Farwell ancient lady. Farewell lady, lady, lady.” And even singing about meat pies and rabbit meat. As everyone at the scene could tell, Mercutio’s humor was equal to that of a teenage boy.

                  Mercutio was known as a free spirit and wanted to experience everything in life instead of living entirely for one goal. Before we lost him, he told us, “We waste our lights in vain, lights by day.” (Act 1 Scene 4 Line 48)

                  This showed that there was a kind of morbid, sad twist to Mercutio’s light, hopeful, childish behavior. Mercutio had eyes for death, he saw his future and he saw himself losing his lust for life and need for adventure, just like what he watched happen to Romeo after losing Rosaline. What Mercutio never saw and never experienced and never understood was how on top of the world Romeo felt while in love. That Romeos need for adventure was quenched when with Juliet or Rosaline. Mercutio couldn’t wrap his head around the idea that growing up might bring new escapades that childhood could never give him. He stayed where he felt safe, where he could continue his immature, dream filled life - Verona.

                  Verona was some what like Neverland for our beloved Mercutio in the sense that it was his comfort zone. it was where Mercutio could be a child and no one would judge him or tell him he couldn’t. In Verona, Mercutio was allowed to party every night. In Verona, Mercutio didn’t have a single responsibility. In Verona, Mercutio felt free. It especially symbolizes Neverland because the minute Romeo was banished and left Verona he was smacked in the face with reality. With struggles he couldn’t even imagine existing in the bubble of Verona. Mercutio stayed where he was comfortable and never got the chance to discover himself outside that comfort.

                  In the long run Mercutio was terrified of dying old and what he saw as unhappy. So he practically killed himself to remain in everyone’s eyes as young, strong, daring, and in the middle of a story book. It was public when Mercutio challenged Tybalt to a duel and fought for Romeo, for the Montagues, for his pride. He fought knowing that he would most likely die, kind of wanting to die. Wanting to die a hero, to leave the world before he had to face reality.

                  Mercutio finally realized he could never be Robin Hood or Peter Pan, but Mercutio was a man full of pride and stubbornness and he wouldn’t allow his reputation go down in flames when he turned sixty. So he froze his childish, innocent, fun-loving, image into time. Citizens of Verona, must honor Mercutio’s spirit and wish and make Verona a little more like Neverland.

                  Mercutio should forever be known as the Peter Pan of Verona.

BREATHE ROMEO

Dear Romeo,

I am writing to send you my best wishes, because boy do you need them.

I am more than sorry to have heard about Mercutio's death, I can't begin to imagine losing your best friend. I know you are angry; angry at Tybalt, angry at the Capulet's and even the Montague's for having this rivalry in the first place, and you are definitely mad at the world. That's how I would feel, I think, if I ever lost anyone. I would act out in rage before I even gave myself the chance to mourn or deny the loss. In fact the idea is not only terrifying but maddening to lose someone who means more to you than yourself - but what I want to tell you is yes, the world is incredibly unfair and you should be mad. But you cannot allow that anger and resentment to blind you.

You have a track record for making hasty decisions and allowing your emotions to take over your thoughts, actions, and basically entire life. This is not solely a bad trait, it means that while you might hate with every ounce of your being you also care and love with everything you have. Your "undying" rage against Tybalt will cloud your judgment, therefore I am warning you to breathe before anything else. Allow your body to break down and weep for your friend and process what his death really means to you. Because what you will find is that your hate isn't only for Tybalt, you are mad at yourself. You are angry that you didn't fight beside Mercutio, you are mad you couldn't stop the fighting before his life was taken, you are mad that it isn't you who died. Now that you have realized this, hopefully soon enough, take another breath.

This was not your fault. This is not the end of the world for you. The solution is not to make another rash decision and shed more blood. You lost your best friend and while you are feeling the burning pain that is described as grief, understand that is how Juliet will feel if you kill Tybalt. That's how Tybalt's best friend will feel and that might just cause him to kill you. It is an endless cycle and if your really mean it when you say you love Juliet, you love Tybalt like a cousin, you want peace in your lives, breath, Romeo. For once, think outside of the immediate situation and your immediate feelings.

Breathe.

Sincerely, 
Louise

POWER DRIVES US MAD YET KEEPS US SANE

          Power is the thing people start wars over and although everyone wants it is only given to those who fight their way to the top – or earn it. Power can be looked at as many different things, especially in this world. Money, ownership, decision, need. In The Shining by Steven King there are multiple occurrences of power and they all show up as who is “winning”. While there is always power there is also resistance to that power and that’s where looking at how both people are using power and how or when people are resisting power becomes interesting. The Shining tells the story of an old hotel called The Overlook and two families who lived in it alone for five months taking the position of ‘winter care taker’. The old family was called The Grady’s and it was Mr. Grady, his wife, and his twin daughters. The isolation and pure alones led Grady to what the police report defined as ‘cabin fever’ where being alone in a snowed in building for five months drove him to madness and led him to chop up his daughters and wife with an axe and shoot himself in the head. While reading the book and following the family taking the position of winter care taker the year after you find it is much, much more than cabin fever that takes control of these poor men’s minds. Many awful, terrifying, and deadly things happen at The Overlook during the Torrance’s stay and a powerful change happens to everyone; Jack and Wendy Torrance and their son Danny. To have power means to have purpose and the will to fight, and in situations where it is life or death, power becomes a pawn in a much more complicated game – with one looser.

            Jack, Wendy, and Danny Torrance have a very complicated and unhealthy family dynamic. 

Danny Torrance is the six year old son of Wendy and Jack and he has a super natural power called “the Shining” that allows him to read peoples minds and hear their thoughts and communicate with others who have The Shining, but most importantly he has a friend Tony in his mind who tells him things to do and shows him images of the past, present, and future. Danny is their only child but is the one who actually ends up looking out for his parents and working the hardest to keep his parents together. Because Danny can hear their thoughts he knows that both of his parents think of DIVORCE all the time before they moved into The Overlook and Jack thinks of SUICIDE. Danny had plenty of terrifying, concerning things going on in his little life, like a stranger in his mind showing him images of mallets and blood and twin girls all chopped up, and he hearing thoughts of adult he knew he wasn’t suppose to hear and didn’t understand. But with all of this craziness bouncing off Danny’s head and all the constant worry and confusion, he never asks his parents about it or shows any real sign of being upset or scared – because he wants to keep his parents together and happy. This was Danny’s purpose for being at The Overlook. He needed to be there without complaining to allow his parents a chance to be happy together again without bringing his own problems into the mix, which is incredibly strong for a six year old to put his parents before himself. This purpose gave Danny power and was suddenly needed for his family’s happiness.

            Wendy Torrance is a young, beautiful wife and mother who is constantly doubting herself and allowing others to make her decisions for her, because she looks for approval and doesn’t trust herself because her mother didn’t trust her, and honestly is incredibly weak when it comes to standing up for herself. Wendy through out the entire book looks for jacks approval in her actions and scrambles for him to make the decisions. At one point Danny passes out after listening to Tony and Wendy becomes terrified, but is even more terrified to ask her husband to get Danny to a doctor, in fear he will disagree of dismiss her like she constantly dismisses herself. She finally does ask but does so where she asks if he thinks it is a good idea for Danny to see someone giving Jack all the room to shoot her down and take control of the matter which is what he always does, because she always lets him. Until she stabs the man. Yep, she stabs him with a knife right in the back in defense and in fury. After seeing her struggle so much to find her voice and decide what was best for herself and her son, she fights back and it is so powerful and is as though she is stabbing her overpowering husband, her condescending mother, her weakness and her doubt and everything she had ever hid behind. She was finally willing to fight and after that moment she got the upper hand and the power she deserved the entire book.

           

            Jack Torrance is a recovering alcoholic who recently got fired from his job as a teacher after giving a student a concussion on purpose, after that student stabbed holes in Jack’s car. Because of Jacks recent situation the man needed a new job and he found one as the care taker for The Overlook Hotel in the middle of no where for five months – bringing his entire family with him to this isolated, snowed in, empty hotel. Divorce was necessary way before this point but this is a major tipping point for any normal family. Jack had always held the power once he married Wendy and had Danny, but when he was a kid he had nothing. HIS father had all the power and made the decisions and was angry and aggressive all the time – which is exactly who Jack grew up to be. Jack loves having control and when he doesn’t have it he will get it. Once, Danny was only four and he threw Jacks papers all over the floor of his office and when Jack got home, drunk and pissed, he saw his office and didn’t think before he grabbed Danny’s arm and twisted it behind his back ready to spank his son until he bled. But he heard a snap. He broke his four year olds son arm and he might have done worse until he heard the snap and snapped back to reality totally apologetic and concerned and scared. Wendy did nothing but take Danny to the emergency room and protects Jack whenever the incident comes up. Danny either doesn’t remember or knows not to bring it up just like he does with every other problem thrown on the kid’s shoulders. Jack has power over his family before The Overlook but Jack had no power over himself and his drinking. Jack needed control and he usually had it over everyone else but himself. He wasn’t strong enough and deep down saw no reason to fight the bad things happening to him because it gave him something to blame while he hurt everyone around him.

            What I found most interesting is how Jack chose to resist the power struggle in his life, and when he gave into whatever was held over his head. Wendy resisted Jack and her weakness and doubt when she stabbed Jack. Danny resisted all of his fathers cruelty and intentions to make Danny exactly like Jack when he kept his problems to himself and put Jack before him even after everything Jack had done to him. Jack didn’t know how to resist for long enough. One of the two things that had power over Jack is his drinking. Alcohol was used as an escape for Jack and as he was constantly thinking of killing himself he drank, and drank, and drank. He didn’t try to resist it, he didn’t want to stop, until he ran over a child while drunk driving. The child was never found and he was never the same and as he told no one about the incident he promised never to drink again. It took such a drastic measure to finally snap Jack out of a tempting escape. He finally found power over alcohol.

            The one other thing that held power over Jack was The Overlook Hotel. The Overlook seemed to taunt Jack since the second he walked in and Jack saw the challenge and fought it. He fought the madness and he resisted the urge to murder his family and drink again and do all of the terrible things he promised he would stop. But this situation happened to be the opposite from his drinking. As the drinking got worse he found the motivation to stop, but as The Overlook got worse and his thoughts got darker he got weaker and he sunk into it and allowed himself to loose his mind entirely. His last escape. Jack needs control in his life, but when it comes to dealing with himself and his feelings and his thoughts he blocks them off and runs away. He runs all the way to The Overlook.

            Power is found in many different places, in many different people, and in many different forms. Power is what drives us and how we set our goals and why we strive to achieve more. Power is dangerous and will usually end in hurt – if not death. But power is needed because it separates the losers from the winners, the Jack Torrance from the Overlook. Power is what drives us mad and keeps u

I DON'T STOP WHEN I'M TIRED I STOP WHEN I'M DONE.

“You can always keep going.” (SEAL)

The books Living With a SEAL by Jesse Itzler and City Of Glass by Cassandra Clare are very different when first looked at. Living With a SEAL is about a 45-year-old man asking a navy SEAL to live with him and train him for a month. This memoir tells not only real events, but events that are impossible to imagine. City Of Glass is the third book in the Mortal Instruments sci-fi series. This fiction based story is about a world where vampires, werewolves, and demons all exist, and star the people who fight them. This book takes you on a serious adventure through all different kind of dimensions following a girl shadow hunter and a boy shadow hunter who fall in love in a very complicated situation. City Of Glass is 100% crazy, imaginative, unreal, drama where the main character’s mother is kidnapped and put under a sleep-spell by the first chapter. Living With a SEAL follows SEAL who doesn’t believe in messing with unnecessary drama and yet spend his time challenging himself and working out and surpassing ridiculous expectations. Although these books are very different and talk about many very different issues through four very different main characters, the same theme can be applied to both books. Through character motivations and actions, these books teach a very similar, and simple, lesson. If you want something, don’t give up until you can give yourself exactly that - work.

“If you can see yourself doing something, you can do it. If you can’t see yourself doing something, usually you can’t achieve it.” (SEAL)

ALWAYS believe in yourself and create your own outcome. If you want to achieve something, it is really difficult to be successful if you doubt your every move. “Believing in yourself” not only sounds incredibly cliche but is surprisingly difficult, yet SEAL never stops doing it. When circumstances are rough and it seems almost impossible for him to do something - like run in pitch black at 2am on the side of an iced over mountain in shorts - he tells himself it is “70 degrees and sunny” and he runs six miles on the side of an iced over mountain in the dark. He tells himself what his limits are and he believes himself, he believes in himself. SEAL goes to incredibly lengths to push his body, mind and limits and once he has conquered one obstacle he moves to fight the next, and he never stops telling himself he can do it. In City Of Glass, Alec has a boyfriend and there is kind of an unspoken rule against being a gay shadow hunter. He really wants to tell his parents but he doesn’t know how to bring himself to do until the very end of the third book. Alec questions everything he believes about himself and about his community and he second guesses every move he makes because he isn’t confident and he doesn’t feel supported by anyone, including himself. He wants to be open about who he is, but with all the doubt and negative thoughts and fears he can’t bring himself to actually tell his parents. In result he almost loses his boyfriend and feels constant depression and self-doubt and even at one point tries to convince himself he is not gay at all. It is so important to believe in yourself and create your own limits, your own fate. because without your own support and belief, it is almost impossible to get anyone else's.

 “Know what’s important to you and protect it at all costs.” (SEAL)

NEVER give up on yourself, or the people you love. I know this is beginning to sound like a Hallmark card, but sometimes the easiest way to process and accept important lessons are through mushy-gushy simple words. City Of Glass tells the story of Clary and her mother who are shadowhunters, yet Clary was raised in the human world without being told any truth of her history or family. Clary finds out practically her entire backstory while her mother is kind of in a coma and yet, she doesn’t react the way a normal teenage girl would. Clary immediately looks into ways to save her mother and people who could help her find her mother, rescue her mother, and wake her mother out of the spell. Clary fights on her mother's behalf while her mother can’t. Clary does everything in her power, breaking laws, fighting very powerful demons, befriending vampires and werewolves, all to get her mother back to her instead of resenting her mother and her decision to keep everything about who Clary is from her. Clary’s one objective is to save her mother - so she works and works until finally she wakes her mother up. Clary never throws away the idea of her mother being ok because she knows she is working as hard as she can to ensure it. Clary never gives up on her mother, just like Jace never gives up on Clary while she drags him through hell and high water trying to find her mother, and Alec never gives up on Jace who drags him around looking for a girl’s mother he never even cared about. Each of them care for the other and they will do anything for them, no matter what, because they love them and have vowed to themselves as long as that connection is alive to never give up or doubt the other. Clary and SEAL are very similar in this way that they will do anything and everything to accomplish what they want to be done. Yet Jesse and Jace tend to give up easier, which is why the relationships between these characters are so similar.  

”If you want to be pushed by your limits, you have to train to your limits.” (SEAL)

ALWAYS work and fight for what you want and believe you deserve. Believing in yourself and never giving up on the people around you are two very important aspects to life, but when you want something it is a fact that you can believe and stay loyal as much as you want but you are not going to actually achieve anything by doing nothing. SEAL and Clary know this and they teach Jesse and Jace to think like this as well. Clary’s best friend is taken by vampires and she sets out to get him back. With no training or knowledge of real vampires, she risks her life as she marches head first into a vampire's lair. Jace immediately tries to stop her because it is a ridiculous plan, and he suggests they give the challenge to the Clave (their government and leaders) and forget about it. Clary flips. She trots right into the lair anyway and brings Jace with her to show him that it may be difficult and it may be an inconvenience, but she is going to get her friend back right that very second and it honestly changes his view on his job and his life. SEAL is training Jesse and he believes that you get to decide your own limits and you work, and work, and work until you can meet them. Then you create new limits. Jesse gives up before he has even starts his run because his shorts are making it slightly uncomfortable - SEAL adds an extra three miles. Jesse wants to watch TV all night because he had a long run that morning and believes he deserves a break, but SEAL knows Jesse asked SEAL all the way out to Manhattan for a month to train him and he makes Jesse do a 6-mile run in central park at 3a.m. SEAL takes a challenge and rips it apart, Jesse finds one and digs a hole to avoid having to confront it. Yet after a month of living with SEAL, Jesse runs 12-miles every day and he wants to work harder for the approval of SEAL.. That is another place Jesse goes wrong, he works hard for others approval.

“I don’t do sh*t for applauses. I don’t do sh*t for fanfare. I do sh*t for me.” (SEAL)

NEVER let other people be the reason you push yourself and never let other people tell you what you can and can’t do. SEAL knows what he wants and knows what he likes and if someone tells him he is crazy or that he can’t do it, it will just push him to work even harder until he gets what he wants and can prove the others wrong. Jesse is instructed to do 1,000 push ups in one day and he does it. He works and pushed himself and he does 1,000 push ups in one day. But he does it so that he can make SEAL proud and so that he might not have to try again the next day. SEAL does 1,000 push ups and maybe even more because he likes a challenge and invited effort and sweat and he does it because he wants to impress himself, and he doesn’t care if anyone else even notices. Clary and Jace are hopelessly in love and yet refuse to admit to each other or anyone else. There is a huge barrier blocking them from being with one another and they thought there always would be. So, because people thought it was unnatural and strange they let that get in the way of feeling happy and being together. They put the opinions and requests of others to make everyone else feel comfortable before their own needs and wants, and not only is that unhealthy, but it is demeaning and wrong. Jace and Clary eventually found a way to be together but only because what they thought was holding them apart turned out to be a lie. So sure they eventually got what they had wanted after three books, but only because people decided it was okay for them to be together and they needed the approval so bad they were willing to be in pain and put the other in pain for it.

“I don’t think about yesterday. I think about today and getting better.” (SEAL)

Believe, stay loyal, work hard, and do it for you and no one else. Wanting something that seems impossible is such an easy moment for people to give up right then and there. And without someone encouraging you or maybe having someone doubt you, makes it even harder to imagine being able to accomplish what you want or even need. But SEAL and Clary are loyal as hell and they never ever think for a second that something can’t be done if they really want it to get done, and they work so furiously that it makes others believe that SEAL and Clary really can do anything. These two characters, one fake and one real, are inspirations. They inspired Jesse and Jace to start pushing themselves and trying to solve seriously challenging situations. Although these two books are written about incredibly unrealistic and not every-day incidents, this can be applied to everyone’s everyday life. If you have an essay due for school and you really don’t want to write it or you want to do something else, instead of avoiding it or walking away and complaining, you just have to sit down and write until you are finished. Then you can do whatever else needs to be done. If you want to run a marathon, you can’t do it by just getting on the track and running, you have to practice and work and tell yourself all the time that it is possible. If you are trying to do anything, and someone stops you because they think it isn’t best for you, or they think you can’t handle the challenge, you tell them to get out of your way and you do what you believe is best for you. You can’t give up on something you want and something you love, or else you really won’t achieve a thing to make you happy.

“I don’t stop when I’m tired. I stop when I'm done.” (SEAL)