Essay #4 Revision

Pre Writing Statement

            For Essay #4, I plan to write about my sense of touch.  I have chosen to write this essay in a personal descriptive format.  I hope to be able to describe to my readers that the sense of touch is one of the most important senses, I feel, we as humans obtain.  I plan to accomplish this by citing sources from various readings, as well as personal experiences.  My audience is my classmate(s).  I hope by the end of the reading my audience will feel differently about the sense of touch than they possibly did before reading this essay.

 

 

Do You Feel Me?

No matter in what context we use our sense of touch, it is necessary in our daily lives.  The most obvious need for touch is the romantic/sexual touch.  Out of all of the other “options” for touch, this is the one we recognize the most.  Whether it is a simple hug from a friend, or a special touch from a loved one, we notice this touch is much more pronounced than the feeling we may get from picking up sand, and feeling the grain-like texture on our skin.  Touch we receive from another person is a completely different feeling.  “Physical closeness and touching stimulates the continued growth of your loving relationships.” (Mauchline)

            Try to think about how life would be, if we (as humans) never had the sense of touch.  Touch is the sense I take for granted the most.  It seems that almost every moment of my life I am using my sense of touch, although I never realize it.  Even right now, as I type the keys on my laptop, I am not directly thinking about my sense of touch.  The sense of touch is one of the senses that we would notice if we lost it very quickly, but don’t appreciate while we have it.

            The sense of touch is one of the most important senses I possess.  This is very evident when I was a young child.  I remember when I would get hurt how a loved one would “fix” my wound, and then give me a hug and a kiss, and almost instantly everything would seem to be better.  This feeling still applies to me today.  When I am having a bad day, and a loved one gives me a hug, I feel better.  I think of touch as the most common way of showing love.  No matter if the touch is meant to be caring, healing, or sexual.; each form is a sign of love.  The sense of touch surrounds our lives, even from the very beginning.  Infants require someone to touch them.  In Diane Ackerman’s book “History of the Senses”; she describes how the University of Illinois did experiments on primates to see what effect could happen when refused the sense of touch for an extended period of time. She stated”that this lack of touch produced brain damage.”   (Ackerman)

            Touch in my opinion, has a lot to do with our feelings; more specifically, love. “Everyone needs love. Every action, ranging from the most cynical to the most selfless, can be traced back to love or a lack of it.  Everything is based around giving love, receiving love, a lack of love or a search of love.” (Urban Monk)  The most obvious “back-up” I have for this thought is just the reason Diane Ackerman wrote about.  After reading that, I tried to imagine my life without touch.  I tried to imagine my life without being able to feel someone giving me a hug, holding my hand, or being able to feel a kiss.  It’s hard to even comprehend because I have always had my sense of touch.  I would feel completely lost without it.

            As I try to think about how I would react if I ever lost my sense of touch, I realize that I’ve already had the experience.  Every time my arms or legs “fall asleep”; I have the answer to how I would react.  I feel disproportioned, and disconnected.  Without that feeling, I always have to keep looking to make sure that everything is ok, and it’s just my arm or leg that “fell asleep.”  Without the feeling, I almost immediately become paranoid about my body.

            One of the most interesting things about my sense of touch is that it can relate with other senses as well.  If I were to be blindfolded, and had to feel a random object, I can use my sense of touch to try and come up with a mental picture or image in my mind of what the object I am feeling may be.  This, of course, is relating to my sense of sight, and relying on images that I’ve seen before in the past compared to what I am feeling with my sense of touch to combine that two thoughts, and figure out if they match in any way.  This is another reason why the sense of touch is so important, but the sense of touch is far more important in other aspects as well.

            There is no better way to demonstrate the importance of touch than by examining what happens when we are deprived of it. Most of us have experienced the sensation of touch deprivation at some point – the need to feel the benefits of touch.   But touch deprivation can also have more serious consequences. In the 19th century, infants in their first year of life commonly died from a disease called Marasmus, a Greek word for “wasting away”. Doctors later discovered that this disease was caused by a lack of touch: babies not touched on a regular basis would literally starve themselves to death.  An amazing study completed in the 20th century by touch researcher Ashley Montagu found that children deprived of loving touch suffer the consequences in their bones – small lines of retarded growth, known as Harris lines, appear at the ends of the tibia and the radius. And the need for touch doesn’t diminish as we age. In fact, research on adults has proven that touch is essential for physical and emotional well-being: regular touch can lengthen life and cut down on doctor’s visits. Touch provides solace, safety, tenderness and soothing. (Unilever)

There is no doubt that the sense of touch is highly important.  “Our skin is what stands between us and the world.” (Ackerman 68).  This quote is implying to me, that our sense of touch is a gateway between the “I” inside of me, and the world that is outside of me.   Touch influences every part of our lives.  Touch is a sense known by all living creatures.  “Touch is a powerfully important sense among animals, for which the slightest touch of an object or another animal triggers responses” (Ackerman 98).

Touch to me can’t be summed up in just one meaning.  The sense of touch in my opinion is a mixture of all different meanings.  It could mean something as simple as touching an object with your skin, or it could mean how someone or something touched you emotionally.  The sense of touch is so complex, but yet the most fascinating, and important sense I obtain.  The sense of touch completes the missing piece of the puzzle that is “I”.

           

 

           

Works Cited

Mauchline, Paul. “The Art of Touching.” ENotAlone. 2009. 25 Feb 2009 <http://www.enotalone.com/article/1091.html>.

 

Ackerman, Diane.  A Natural History of the Senses. New York: Vintage Books. 1990.

 

Monk, Urban. “The Lost Art of Touching.” Urbanmonk.net. 03 Mar 2007. 25 Feb 2009 http://www.urbanmonk.net/78/the-lost-art-of-touching-part-1-caring-healing-and-sexual/.

 

Unilever, Canada. “Consequences of Touch Deprivation.” Unilever Inc.. Unilever. 16 Mar 2009 <http://www.unilever.ca/ourbrands/beautyandstyle/Morearticles/Science_of_touch.asp>

 

Post Writing Statement

            I feel that I succeeded in writing a persuasive essay on the selected topic.  I used various examples, ideas, and cited information from various sources to back-up my argument.  I feel that I stayed true to the personal descriptive format.  Although parts of this essay seemed to be a lot of opinion, I feel that the use of descriptions and opinions both helped to have my readers relate to the topic.  I hope that this encouraged my readers to think a different way in relation to the topic.