Best of Miami Portfolios 2001 - Units.muohio.edu

would remain viable in the new millennium. Most of the students were overly excited because
these papers would be submitted to a contest and the prize was an all-expenses-paid, week-long trip
to Washington D.C. where you would sit in on Congressional meetings to get an inside look on how
our government worked. I wrote my paper with no real expectations of winning. After all, look at
my competition. I thought my piece turned out well because it displayed my point of view, no
interruptions, no one questioning my thoughts, no one eager to get in the last word. This paper
“Will the Constitution Remain Viable in the New Millennium?” restored my confidence. I won the
trip to Washington - - the runner up will be attending Harvard in the fall.
The Romantic poets have always caught my attention. I am not interested so much because
of my love of their poetry, but rather because I envy the total bliss shown in their work. Always
talking about the sunrise, the nightingale, and the daffodil makes me think that they lived in some
sort of a Utopia. I appreciate the innocence and gentility that the Romantic poets exhibited in their
work even if it isn’t at all “realistic.” My essay, “Characteristics Used in Romantic Poetry,” takes
a look into the world of William Blake, John Keats, and Percy Shelley, fantasy and all. I can relate
to this because, in a sense, I also live in a fantasy world. I would much rather watch “Full House,”
where people think morally, than “Melrose Place,” where people think sexually. I still think that
men should stand when a woman leaves the table to use the restroom and that they should always
offer their seat to a woman without one, even though my father and grandfather are the only people
I know who still do this. I guess that I want it all; the romanticism, the intellectual challenge and
the traditions — these are the things that I write about. I hope that when you read the three works
that I have sent you that you can glimpse a little of the person I am and envision the person
I am becoming.
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