Post 3:

Hello True Believers!!!!

     Ok, so here's where I compare my life to the stores we've read.  I'll take "A Rose for Emily"  simply because I was raised by my grandparents. I'll not get into the details because honestly those details are still being worked through by me and my family.  That being said.  I respect the way that the past can be held onto by some simply because that is all they know.
     While going through elementary school I always felt apart from my classmates but on par with my teachers.  I'm not talking about the lessons they taught.  They were as hard for me as the rest of my classmates. But the way that everything was delivered.  When the teacher cracked a joke or made a side comment about something I identified with them way more than my fellow classmates.  In that respect I felt like and I recognized that I saw things from a different time.  It was hard for a while.  My freshman and sophomore years were a struggle. My juniour and seniour years were better as I learned to acclimate.

     After high school the temptation to hold onto the past plagued me yet again.  Once I joined the Air force I met each new person with the same perspective that I learned from my grandparents and was not challenged while in school.  This resulted in a racist, narrow minded outlook on the world.  What I quickly discovered was that you are surrounded by people that at the end of the day have the same needs, wants, dreams, emotions as you. This is where I and the story divert. I saw men and women from far differing cultures and upbringings than me work with me towards a common goal.  The first was graduation from basic training but that was really a shallow taste of what I saw for the next twenty years.   I learned that no matter what I brought with me in the way of history or "culture" the world is always changing and if you don't recognize what really matters in life then you will get left behind just like Emily did.  Sleeping with the dead remnants of a past reality.

Post 2: My favorite Movie

     "What is your favorite movie?"  That has to be one of my least favorite questions.  I have a very hard time trying to nail it down to one genre let alone one movie.  My usual answer is whatever movie I've seen recently that actually left an impression of some kind.  For the purposes of this post however, I'll nail it down to one movie in particular.  Serenity is my movie of choice.  So far as the literal meaning of the movie.  That is pretty basic.  There are bad guys chasing the good guys across the galaxy.  Backstory being the good guys are just trying to survive.  They do so in ways that might conflict with a set of values that are based upon a different perspective.  To fly and keep on flying as long as you can is the captains mantra.

The literal interpretation of the movie is a pirate crew flying smuggling missions in the face of the federation.  The easy motivation is money.  Obviously when you rely on fuel to live in deep space jobs that bring in credits become very important.  However, the rebellious spirit of the captain and the loyal crew quickly conflict with the nature of federation rule.  The struggle of man vs. monetary requirement quickly turns into man vs. system.  The fight against poverty coincides with the fight against the powerful central government.

     The literal fight that the crew of the Serenity has is man vs. environment.  As they are fighting against dying from the dangers of space travel and the pursuit of the federation.  The figurative interpretation is the crew against the oppression of a higher power that threatens not only their literal survival but the bonds that have been made between them.  It becomes a fight against "The Man" and "The Ship"  The fight against the man embodies all that we strike out against when it comes to equality and how we see ourselves rightly coinciding with our fellow man.  The captain who has already fought on the opposite side of the federation has to balance the needs of the crew with his own values.  He has to walk the line between figurative and literal interpretation of his own reality. 

     Captain Reynolds has to constantly make the choice between figurative and literal realities. It makes him seem uncaring in the short term but once you watch the entire (series and movie) you realize that he has balanced as best he can the two.  I think that once all is said and done.  The best story, character, motive you can have is split between the literal and figurative. 

Post 1: Greetings and Salutations

Hello,

     My name is Gary Pergande.  I'm originally from Lebanon, Missouri.  I joined the Air Force in June of 1997 and just finished out twenty years.  While in I had a couple different jobs.  I started out as a avionics maintainer repairing navigation and targeting systems.  Fourteen years in I retrained and got a cool job flying on the E-8C JSTARS that fly over the campus on an almost daily basis.  I operated and maintained the communications systems in flight.  That was a fun job but retirement is a much better job ;-). 

     My current goal is to finish my bachelor's degree in English and marry that with my twenty years of technical experience to become a technical writer.  I have always loved reading and write short stories from time to time.  It was a huge decision changing my degree plan from one more in line with my experience to an English degree but I feel like I'm doing what I want to do instead of what I have to do for once.  (That's a good feeling after leaving the military) 

     I live in Byron on a mini farm.  We have goats, chickens, ducks, geese, and five dogs roaming around.  Two of which are Great Danes so couch space is at a premium.  Some of my favorite authors are Stephen King, Brian Lumley, Kevin Hearne, and my absolute favorite is Jim Butcher.  If you don't recognize all of those names I'll just tell you that I'm a huge fantasy fiction geek.  I got my start on comics when I was a kid and my mom had a ready supply of King and Lumley once the Hardy Boys books didn't cut it anymore. 

     I'll wrap this up for now.  Have a good weekend and I'll see you all on Tuesday!!