I'm not complaining, I'm just saying- think about it.

So a very positive event in my life happened today after I got back from the gym. I got an email saying i was a recipient of a one thousand dollar scholarship I applied for a while ago. That's a really positive thing and I'm not trying to downplay it at all, becuase I know how beneficial this will be toward paying my tuition and it's a nice confidence booster as well in a sense. I just have this frustration on why I think I won. The scholarship application was fairly simple, I gave them my general information, and then I wrote an essay on the prompt given to me which was basically just a "tell us why you deserve this and why you are student we can believe will do well and be successful". Probably one of the hardest essays to write becuase you don't want to come off so into yourself (especially if you don't really have deep reasons for being in school), but you also don't want to downplay all the great things about you and throughout it you have to make sure you are tailoring the whole thing to the reader. Anyway, with the mind set I was in and the low i was feeling at the time I can honestly say I wrote a terrible essay in the sense of well written literature, and essentially listed the great person i used to be, the depressed person I am today, almost dropping out of school on the first day because of the trauma of the loss of a close friend the week prior, and the frank thought that I just have to keep moving and I shouldn't drop out of college. It was the truth, but it was a sob story plus last years resume. With that mediocre essay, I won.

This time last year I wrote a personal best essay for my college applications about how I planned, executed, and learned A LOT from a volunteer trip to Belize where I worked at an orphanage for a week with the kids, day and night. I've never been so proud of anything in my life. I also applied for several scholarships with that essay. Not only did I not win any scholarships, I also did not get into the schools I wanted too.

The whole thing frustrates me because the sob story won. We should celebrate the positive accomplishments in life. I don't want money given to me out of pity. I didn't do anything to deserve it. A tragic thing happened to me and I wrote a two page essay on it. When you compare it to the months i spent planning and fundraising for my volunteer trip, it's seems like there isn't any set moral guidelines to giving out these scholarships. I hate the idea of being rewarded for the life I'm living right now, because I don't put any effort into it. Being a logical and straight forward thinker, I want reward for accomplishment, not for just participating. Isn't that everyone's problem with millenials anyway? We get a trophy for suiting up and showing up and that some how makes us entitled.

I guess most of all I don't like the idea that striving for success could ever lead me to failure. I don't ever want to live in the mindset that doing something big to affect people will never be rewarded, and i definetly dont mean this monetarily. I just feel like these scholarships promote the negative, and reward the negative. I'm just so tired of the negative.

Good Friends

It's a lonely world, but it would help to have a good friend to brave it with. 

Unfortunately I have underestimated the importance having a great friend in my life, someone to truly be the rock in my storm-especially now of all times in my life when I am submersed in strangers. 

Unfortunately I have a strong set of expectations as to what a great friend should enbody. 

Unfortunately, I am unused to being alone. 

Unfortunately, I am lonely. 

And unfortunately, the only conclusion I've come up with concerning my current life dilemma is that I will be alone for a while, and I will have to make this customary to my new life. 

And somehow, I'll have to find light in this dark cave. 

PHR (Post High School Realizations)

PHR #1

One of the biggest differences between high school and college is the amount of time you are actually in class and "school". In high school you take a math class five times a week for fifty minutes and the equivalent to that in college is 2 times a week for seventy-five minutes. Let's also factor in that in college you will only take this class for a semester (give or take your college) while in high school it took you an entire academic year. If I graphed that for you, you'd clearly see the difference. Okay, so why is this important? Of course high school and college are going to have different systems, the brain is more developed when youre in college, blah blah blah, etc etc etc. The single most constant and non debatable truth we have in the world is time and if I understand the American culture like I think I do, money is time and time is money; and i'm not just talking about dolla bills. Life is all about spending time doing things that you think are valuable, right? So it seems to me like in high school I really didn't get any bang for my buck. And if you want to think about this in terms of how well a high school student could do under the 'rigorous' class load of a college student lets think about time allocation in high school vs college. The way i see it, the time you spend actually learning material is about the same. Think about all the half days in high school when "there wasnt enough time to do anything productive" so you sat there talking to friends or went over homework. Think about the days you had a subsitute teacher, and allllll of the work you did then. Think about how much time you actually spent learning material rather than listening to someone try to debate the proofs of Calculus with their teacher. In college, you come in, you sit down, you listen, you take notes, you leave. (more or less). If I put color to the graphs of how long youre in class in high school vs college the college column would be a rich dark blue, and the high school column would be a faint baby blue- so you can see how ones a littel murky dare I even say shady! Anyway. Again. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT? Here's the big idea. We are the millenia generation. We are the generation of baby geniuses, teenage entreprenaures, social activists, and open minded wizards. We are a generation thats all about being out of the box, different, unique, etc and embracing it, and living it up, and making a living from it becuase we own it so much. So by sticking with these out dated ways of education we are only shooting ourselves in the foot, becuase if you spent half the time doing things you had to do effienctly you would have way more time to do other things you don't have to do and thats when our generation gets that little sparkle in our eye. We have so many more resources (technology wise, the earth really is dying shoutout to past generations for that,but we still respect you) that there isn't a sensible math equation to proove why we continue to educate our young the old way we were taught? In a society that is constantly looking for ways to do everything more efficiently so that we have more 'time' to 'do' things with, it's seems like we are over looking one of the biggest vacuums for time for adolecensts.

The Capitial-T Truth about the Tattoos

It occurred to me the other day, actually the day after I got my tattoos, that not everyone would understand why I got the tattoos in the first place nor would they understand what they meant. For some reason this hit hard, and probably because it was something I should have thought of before I got the tattoos. But i didn't. I was in such a one track mind. I wanted the ink. I wanted the permanence on my body. I wanted the art.

 The first tattoo I got was a simple wave on my wrist. I knew getting it on my wrist would mean that many more people saw it, it's the easier of the tattoos to explain, because in passing conversation the wave represents my love for the ocean, my love for water. But in a deeper and more authentic conversation, the wave itself is a symbol for the ocean which in turn is a symbol for the metaphor of comparing people on earth to the drops of water that make up the ocean. Philisophically there seems to be an infinite number of drops of the ocean with one of the biggest factors differentiating them is each one's salty-ness (haha). And really, the same goes for people in the world. At times it feels like you make little difference in the world becuase there are just so many other drops of water, but every single drop of water creates a ripple effect in the ocean. Every drop of water is part of the eb and flow of the ocean. All drops, no matter how salty, really do matter. And if the only reason they matter is just to be apart of the ocean, than that should be enough because the ocean is a pretty majestic thing to be apart of. Overall, its just a reminder that being part of this really majestic thing called life is always worth it when I start to get too exsestential with myself. Putting it on my wrist wasn't just because I could take cool pictures with it.






 The second tattoo I got was a quote from the commmencmence speech written by the late David Foster Wallace, it reads "This is water". Even in the time I could take to describe exactly what it means to me, it still wouldn't compare to the person I was explaining it to actually reading the speech and then talking to me about it. So honestly, I'm not even going to begin to say what this tattoo is all about.
"This is water" - David Foster Wallace
Mostly what I can say about this tattoo is that I got this for myself. For now, this tattoo means what the speech means to me. The timing at which I got the tattoo is coiencidental with the passing of a dear friend of mine. This brings me back to the beginning of this post. What I didn't know, but now do, is that a lot of people think I got this tattoo to commemorate my friend. This, for some reason, dumb founded me. I guess it was just one of those things that was so obvious to me that I didn't even think about the different interpretations it could have. I think its sweet others would think I got this in memory of my friend, but I also think others don't know the pain the passing of my friend has caused me.

In any case, and any interpretation others may have, it won't bother me and I think it will provide for interesting conversation in the least.
To quote another friend who quoted this to me from a stranger "People get tattoos for one of two reasons: 1. To make a statement to others. 2. To make a statement to themselves."

Blue, Blue, Blue, and You.

I once wrote a poem in my english class on the color blue. I said: Blue smelled like the ocean, it was a breathe of fresh air. It sounded like music, a piano solo, calm and steady. And blue made me feel overall positive- contrary to popular songs. The touch of blue was soft and silky, but sometimes a little chilly. And blue looked like the big empty sky in the middle of a warm summer day It tasted like ice cream, sweet and refreshing Then a year passed, and winter turned to spring and I added to the poem: But now when I think of the color blue all I can think about is how blue smells like your conditioner at the nape of your neck And it sounds like your sleepy voice in the morning And blue feels like you eyes looking into the depths of my soul Now blue isn't an empty, its the limitless possibilities when I'm with you And the taste of blue, too good to be true, your soft "I love you,too" kiss. But a long ways from an 'unphotgraphable beach' and there is only one thing I can add to the poem: Blue, makes me miss you.

Growing Up

It's come time for the quite expected and quite hackneyed post about growing up. Such a cliche topic for every young adult my age requires a bit of patience from the audience who has been through it, and a little empathy from the audience who is currently going through it. I thought to myself some time before I graduated that this post would come far sooner than it actually has. One month and two days after graduation it finally feels like time to make it internet official. I the heavy hearted, insomniac, and naive junior who started this blog is now a clear headed, slightly broken hearted, maturer college freshman who will hopefully display more discipline in keeping up my writing. It feels good to have graduated and to move on, from school that is. One of the things that feels the best actually is this innate amount of respect that is immediately added to your self worth by other people just because you have graduated from high school. It truly feels like I have just been welcomed into a secret society of the world; sure, I'm still going through a bit of a hazing stage and not fully accepted, but getting in is half the battle right? Part of me likes to wonder what secret rules, come with this secret society. Just the other day I sent a text to a friend that started out "haha, ..." I might as well have dropped the phone and shuddered. How junior high! Surely I was more mature and could hold better conversation than that that constituted me in all seriousness using "haha" to get through the conversation. (And to those who have long been a member of this secret society there is a distant difference between "lol" and "haha" and there is a distinct difference to someone my age using either with someone your age than with someone our own age). Along with making me shudder, this whole event made me come out of auto-pilot for a minute and realize how detached I was being. Halfway through a car ride home from anywhere, the grocery store, L.A., Uganda, there will be a moment when I realize I've been on auto-pilot and I suddenly tune back into my life and think "wow, that went by faster than I thought it would." It's like I went through some type of time warp in these moments, and these past couple of days I've realized that my whole life feels like a car ride halfway home and now I'm lucid for the rest of the drive. So, I finally have to grab hold of the steering wheel and pay attention. I can't say in truth that I am thoroughly thrilled about this. I do fear the monotony that life can bring and my love for routines- together a deadly combination. This all makes me think back to another post on this blog. After I got back from volunteering in Belize I had felt as though I peaked and was hesitant to go back down the mountain. I'm not sure what I've done this whole year. Its a bigger mountain than I previously imagined, that I know for sure. College admissions and rejections, getting out of this bubble town, and thinking an bit more outside myself has knocked me off my high horse and back on to the ground. I think it was a bit arrogant of me to even think I had peaked in any part of my life. The "high school was the best part of my life" mantra is not one for me. There is much to learn, much of the world to explore, and many, many more people to talk to. In a compact thought, I know I am finite in an infinite world, and I feel comfort in knowing that. With nearly a month of summer left I am beginning to hear the clock tic-tock in the back of my head. It's starting to drive me a little crazy. I'm finding it hard to decide whether the future is near, or the future is now.

This Blog

I haven't had a lot to write and post on this blog because lately I have been internalizing and attempting to redirect the energy elsewhere. In the past few weeks, things have dangerously resembled the events of last year. The largest difference this year is the way I've reacted this time around, and thank god I'm not a slow learner. As many things come to a close this year the term senioritis has become more clear to me. Senior year is not the the year everything ends, if it was there would be a lot of people working furiously to finish- it would be crunch time. Senior year is a year of waiting for what you've been looking forward to and actually want to do, to begin. That's why a lot of  people just sort of don't do much senior year academically wise, time spent with friends and family seems much more valuable. Doing things that go against the norm and the expected seems much more exciting. And, I lost my train of thought.

Every time I sit down to write down some thoughts for this blog it always ends up as half an idea. My head feels scattered an unfocused because I don't care about high school anymore. After my last AP test this friday I'll be worry free with only movies, a few finals, and a project here and there to occupy my school day.

Up until today I haven't really been looking forward to graduation. I mean, I haven't not been looking forward to it, but it just didn't seem all that important. Up until now, when I just watched a scene of seniors graduating on a TV show did I suddenly become really, really excited. I feel like graduating is going to be the opposite of death. Everything is will be a fresh start. Right now, i'm slowly coming back to life. My mind is clearing up and the things that I thought mattered, really don't and I don't think I've ever felt a better feeling.

The only thing I find to be scary at the moment, is how willing I feel to cut all ties with this town. In the past couple of months its brought me a lot of grief and I'm ready to be over the grief, anger, and overall bad feelings.

I'm excited to leave high school and all the things I find immensely annoying and all the people that are immensely ignorant. I'm excited to be an engineer. I'm excited, and it feels great.

Coins

In extremes simplification, the world works like this: what you put in, you get out. To me anyway. But sometimes we get impatient and it feels like we aren't getting out all that we've put in. Then we are at a crossroad. Do you continue to put in and have that blind faith, or do we change something, start all over again.  It's kind of like those machines at casinos or chuck-e-cheese were you put your money in the slot of the machine and they roll down on to the the moving table, and you sit there and keep putting in your coin hoping that that coin will be the coin that pushes the mountain of coins over the edge. But it's not that coin. That coin slides down, rolls a little, does a little bounce, and then it wobbles a little and falls right on top of another coin rendering it useless. So you sigh, watch the moving table go back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, all the while you hold a coin in your hand, turning it over until your palm starts to get a little sweaty. So, finally you hold the coin at the slot, focus on the moving table, and then you push in the coin and watch it slide down and fall. 

Eventually, you'll get what you put in the world, in one way or another, I'm sure of it. Sometimes, I just wish you would know when to stop putting in your coins. 

Our Little Needles

Today in my TA class for a freshman honors English class we continued watching the movie "I am" a sort of documentary on the ongoing research to prove just how connected, and we are in fact connected, to everything in the world, human or not. 

The movie got to a scene where a leading scientist was showing us how our emotions affect some yogurt in a cup. They almost lost me. And had it been any other day, they would have lost me. But they put some sensor things into the yogurt, turned on the little machine and they asked the director if he was married to which he answered "next question... Not anymore.. Jeez" and lord behold the little needle on the little machine twitched. 

I'm not sure how much I believe I'm connected to some yogurt in a cup but I get the idea, and on a more practical level-it makes sense. 

This past weekend, I lost a classmate to a car accident. She sat next to me in my government class and was the literally the best seat partner you could ask for. I wasn't close to her like a lot of my classmates were, but I still feel the loss. 

In this situation, in today especially, I feel like the yogurt, and when someone cries, sniffles, has an expression of grief on their face.. My little needle twitches, and then I balance back at rest and then another person crosses me and I twitch again, and so on and so on. The pain could not go unfelt, and it seems like when it is all too much for one person we beckon another to us to help share the heavy load. And to this we do unyielding. To help seems like a reflex. 

But now I've just been through my first two periods of the day and I'm not the only yogurt cup anymore. My classmates left and right have their little needle twitching over and over again. 

And now I lay in bed, thinking on the day. Thinking of our little needles twitching at each sniffle, until suddenly our needles are drops of water and we are all an ocean. An ocean so irrefutably one and a million things at the same time. And in silence we are calm, in laughter we are a gentle roar, and in everything else we are a storm. 

Reaching the Peak.

I think in sixth grade I read this book called "Peak". It was the typical book to capture a sixth graders attention. The main character had an odd name, Peak, his parents were divorced, he climbed buildings and marked them with his on logo, and never really got into any real trouble.

 But he did vandalize buildings right? Right. So something had to be done. Instead of him going to Juve or anything like that his mom and the police sent him to live with his Dad who was, of course, climbing Mount Everest. So naturally Peak climbed it with his dad and a Tibetan kid his age. He would be the youngest person ever to reach the top. So long story short, without spoiling the entire book, he reached the top. But then what? Well he climbed back down the mountain because you can't breathe at the top of Mount Everest for very long. 

I feel like I've peaked. Earlier this year, I went to Belize to complete my Gold Award for Girl Scouts. I volunteered at an orphanage. I developed an after school soccer program. I helped the orphanage begin fish farming. I learned so, so much. It was an amazing project. I know this, but I don't feel this. 

 I ask myself, where am I now? At my high school droning through my classes. But I want to aspire to rise and do great things! But I feel as though I have no aspiration left. I'm not jaded, I'm not busy, I'm just not anything- and that's the problem. 

I'll admit I've had a difficult time climbing back down, more than I did climbing up I would say. I'm trying to be patient, and to wait, but what and I  waiting for?  There's only the bottom of the mountain so that I can start climbing up again, but I'm not entirely sure that's how life is supposed to be..Climbing up and down mountains- how could someone be stretched so far? Because I feel like I left a piece of me in Belize at the top of the mountain. 

I'm at a standstill right now, I'm not climbing all the way down. I think I may go around the mountain instead.