Pain

Pain. 

There are different kinds of pain.

The physical pain that you feel when you fall down. 

The emotional pain you feel right after a break up. 

The mental pain you feel while you're taking your finals. 

Like I said, there are many kinds of pain that a human has to deal with. I think that the most painful is emotional. Emotional pain affects how you function day to day, what your mood is like, and how personable you will be with other people for that day or week. 

Emotional pain hits me the hardest. I used to be a very emotional child when I was growing up. I would cry about everything, no matter how big or small they were. It was not my finest moment. Now I'm not very emotional, I hardly ever cry. I tend to just get very frustrated now. I get frustrated very easily and that's annoying. When I can't figure something out, then I just kind of shut down. When I need help and no one offers to help, I get angry.

Now, I am thinking about how ridiculous this all sounds. I sound like a child that when they don't get there way just throws a tantrum. That's not me.... Well this was an affective blog. Excuse me for my embarrassing blog. 

Frankenstein

      As Frankenstein is coming to an end, I can say that I thoroughly enjoyed Frankestein far more then I enjoyed Hamlet. Frankenstein has more character interaction. It is more enticing to the audience. The story line actually makes sense to me and I can follow it. 

   Mary Shelley's goal was to make a romantic era horror story, and instead to me it's a story about a creature that just wants to be excepted and loved. He wants to be able to live in society with humans and be able to interact with and fall in love with someone. Having a companion to be able to be with and relate to. He just wants to be loved since his creator doesn't want him it anything to do with him.  

  

  Acceptance is an important part of life. And that's all that the creature wants. I look forward to seeing how this story ends. Hoping the odds are forever in their favor. 

Animals

This sounds like a cliché, but ever since I was a little kid I have wanted to be a veterinarian. I have had a passion for learning about animals and being there for them to make them feel better since I was little. I’ve always been an animal person. In the summer of 2012 I was able to have the opportunity to shadow a local veterinarian for the summer to see if I really wanted to pursue a career in veterinary sciences.

In those few short months I had learned quite a bit about animals, one aspect I learned is that I love animals even if they aren’t my own. Secondly, I would never be cut out to be a veterinarian. While shadowing the doctors that summer when they performed surgeries, sewed up sutures, saved lives, and ended lives, I knew that I would never be cut out to be a vet. I knew that I loved animals and still wanted to pursue a career that involved animals in one way or another. That’s how I came to the conclusion of wanting to open my own animal rescue center one day. I’ve seen multiple TV shows that have inspired me to pursue this career choice. It’s not an easy job I know that, but I am a very hands on person. I enjoy working with animals and knowing that I can help them stay off the streets and continue to stay healthy ignites a spark in me that I can’t seem to extinguish.

I am a motivated person, with very strong leadership capabilities and qualifications. I enjoy talking to people which would allow me to help adopt out the animals in my rescue center. My love for animals is what drives me, what better way to show that love, then by establishing my own rescue center.

Relationships

   Relationships are tricky things, being that they don't last forever. Or they most likely won't last forever and that's the most  frustrating  part about them. When you put all of your effort and heart into a relationship and it doesn't work out, it sucks. 

   Yes, relationships have there ups and downs, but in the end if you truly love that person, then all the ups and downs don't really effect you. They make the relationship grow stronger and it makes your heart grow fonder for your significant other. 

  Unfortunately that's not always the case though, and I can be the one to attest to that... I was in a relationship for the past year and a half. I had known him since 6th grade and had liked him ever since then. He wasn't allowed to have a girlfriend then, so we had waited until middle school and then we started dating. It didn't really work out, so we ended it and I went to another high school so I never really thought of him again... 

  

  My best friend goes to school with him and is asked about him sometimes to her and she would te me who he was dating or anything she knew. Sophomore year, I went to a football game with her to my zoned high school and low and behold he was there. I hadn't seen him in about two years, so when I did I was really excited. He looked so attractive and I just couldn't believe how much he had changed... I started to have a crush on him.. We were able to hangout after that with our mutual friends and it just started from there. 

   I have to say, that dating him was one of the best things that has happened to me. He taught me a lot about myself, he taught me who I wanted to be and who I wanted to be with. He was my first love, and he always will be. But I think it's time to move on. Move on away from the heartache and start focusing on myself again.

The Beginning of Frankenstein

I wasn't very excited to say the least to have to start reading a new book in AP. That class is already stressful enough, and adding another thing that is required for us to do does not help my situation out at all. AP this year is not as fun this year as I had thought it would be. 

   

   Starting Frankenstein was interesting to say the least. It had started out with these letters sent from some guy to his sister maybe? And then the main character of the novel and his story begins right after. It was all very confusing to me. After I had finished reading the part required, I thought that I had understood what was going on. Then we came into class and took the quiz that our teacher had made for us and I was so lost.... I had no idea what was going on. 

   Who writes a book with letters at the beginning that aren't even from main characters in the book? It doesn't make sense and I'm sure my grade showed that..     

"Not the Right Class"

      I worry a lot. Ask anyone that knows me well enough and they will tell you that I worry a lot and about the most unnecessary things that someone could worry about over 90% of the time. I have always been a worry wart and especially with having OCD it is more prevalent then it would be in a “normal” person. .

            Senior year isn’t helping me with trying to cut down on my worrying and that’s even more frustrating than anything else is right now…  I have a lot of large worries right now that I am not sure which one I need to deal with first to start to ease my mind.

            Yesterday in AP our teacher was talking about college and scholarships, so like  I said in my other blog post, I began to have a mini panic attack about all that I still need to do and then I began to zone out.  As I began to zone back in, I heard him talking about if we couldn’t handle what we were doing right now, that maybe we needed to not be in AP anymore and needed to find a way to get into a regular English class.

                Um, well that was annoying to me. Just because I was getting a little bit behind with turning in a few assignments that he had assigned us but never told us when they were due, does not mean I belong in regular English. I have never been in a regular English class and plan on never being in a regular English class. I’m sorry, but I respectfully disagree with your opinion. I am a smart individual and will always be smart. Quite frankly, if I'm not good enough to be in that class, I don't know how half of the people in my class are meant to be there either....

Ap Woes

            When I chose my classes last year for my last year of high school, I thought to myself, pick classes that are easy enough to pass but are still challenging enough that I don’t get bored with them. As well as having a schedule that I would enjoy and have classes that I actually wanted to have. So that’s what I did, I built my schedule for myself this year, not for college or for the counselors or my teachers, or my parents. I built it for how I wanted MY school year to go.

            I was almost 100% positive that my schedule would be manageable this year and it would be easy enough that I would be able to have free time and be able to prepare myself for college. I thought wrong I guess you could say. Very wrong…

            Yesterday while I was in my AP English class, our teacher was talking to us about scholarships and applying for schools. Whenever he talks about those things I have a mini panic attack because I think about all the things that I have to do and have done and by what dates they need to be done by. It’s overwhelming to me and I can tell it’s starting to take a toll on me because I’m getting stress sick. For me, that’s when I have too many things on my plate and I begin to have a messed up body. My stomach is the main contributor to that.

            Next, he started talking about the novel that we have begun reading in class and taking it home as well. We had to take a quiz on the chapters that we had previously read and I read the book and I had felt pretty confident in myself that I would do well on the quiz. I was wrong for that as well…. I was at a loss for words yesterday after I had finished taking the quiz. I knew I had failed the quiz, which had angered me even more than I already was and the day had just begun. I read the book, so how could I have failed the test? It was extremely disappointing that the test had gone the way it had. It makes me wonder if I had made the wrong choice in picking AP literature as my English class, maybe I should have done regular English and just been able to get an easy A and been done with this year.

205 Days to Go...

This past weekend when I was at Skills, I received an email to tell me of what score I got on my ACT. I was just a little disappointed when I looked online to see the score that I had gotten, I had wanted to get at least 5 more points, but that’s okay. The score that I received was pretty average, but I know I could have done better. I suppose the most disappointing thing about my score was that I had actually taken the time to study and to do well on this test and it didn’t really help me out in the end. I just hope that my SAT score is better than my ACT score was.    

The countdown has begun for the class of 2014 to graduate. It’s pretty surreal to think that this is my last year in high school, the last year that I will maybe ever be able to see most of my friends again. 205 days is all the time left we have until we graduate. It’s scary. I start to dream of all the possibilities that I will have in my life and it really scares me.

No more high school. No more seeing all of my friends every day and being able to confide in them about the things that we are all going through. It scares me; it truly and honestly scares me. I can honestly say that high school has been one of the best experiences that I have been able to be a part of the last 18 years of my life.

I can’t even fathom words to put into how I feel. That’s pathetic… I still feel like 1996 was only ten years ago, when in reality it was 17. How has the time passed me by so quickly? My best friend turns 18 tomorrow and that freaks me out. I don’t know why, it just does. 205 days left of my childhood and being with my mom and dad 24/7, but it’s time for me to go and spread my wings. See where life will take me. I’m afraid to jump, because I don’t know where I will land. I will just have to trust that what happens will be what was meant to be. That’s all I can hope for.

The Eras

  While in AP literature, we are learning the different styles of writing of the English language from all eras right now. Our class has made I through the Anglo-Saxons era, the Middle ages era and now we are on to the Middle ages era. Our class has finally finished reading Hamlet and we are now moving on. We have moved on to a few different stories the first new story that we have read is the fall of Satan from Paradise Lost. To be quite honest, I skimmed through the story to find the answers to the questions that I needed. But the parts of the exert that I read were pretty interesting for the most part.

I’m not a religious person, so anything that has to do with religion is kind of annoying to me. But reading about the fall of Satan, it had some interesting parts and aspects to it. From a nonbiased point of view, what is being said makes sense to me. If I was a religious person and believed in God, I would say that I don’t like the devil for going against “God” in anyway, but I’m not so I won’t.

There were a few different quotes from Paradise Lost that had really resonated with me. Of course when I want to, I can’t find them, but I like how Satan described his rebellion against what God had wanted. The imagery of Hell and how it feels was immensely powerful and it was a bit frightening to be exact.

SkillsUSA

This past week I went to our SkillsUSA fall leadership conference, the last of my high school career. It was bittersweet in a way, because for the past four years Skills has been my life, my own sport that I am able to participate in. It has allowed me to grow as a person, as a leader, and just as an all-around person. It has allowed me to meet and make many new friends. It has allowed me to be more social able and has taught me how to be able to speak in front of a larger group of people.

I am very blessed to have been a part of leadership for four years consecutively. It’s an experience that I would have never expected in my life time. Before I had left for our trip, I had promised myself that I would make the trip the best that I could, meaning that I wouldn’t have any drama or if there was, I would stray from that. For the most part, I did just that. That was, up until the people from other schools on our bus started to say that our school sucked and theirs was so much better. I got angry that those morons had even said that to us. So I asked them why our school had won so many more gold medals then they had, that shut them up real fast.

All four of my best friends as well as myself had shared a hotel room when we were in Elk town, and boy was it crowded. Five girls with one bathroom and two beds, needless to say it was interesting, especially because we were all in such close quarters. We had drama as well, but we are a team and we always get through it somehow.

It was a great trip all in all and I’m glad that I was able to be a part of the trip.

Hamlet is OVER

  I can happily say that Hamlet is now O-V-E-R over and I couldn't be ore excited that after this week I wont have to worry about Hamlet until we take the AP test in May. It's not that I wasn't able to understand what was going on in Hamlet, because I was able to understand about 80% of the text. It was the fact that William Shakespeare is possibly the must dull author that I have read material from. All of his stories have almost the exact same plot and its boring to me. In almost all his plays, everyone dies. I'm sorry but his history seems to repeat itself. Excuse me if I see that as boring material.

  Yes, Mr.Burge I did understand the dense text of Hamlet and would be able to use it if and when need be. I had asked around to my friends in that class last week to see how they felt on the subject matter of how exciting Hamlet made them and I got about the same response from them that I thought I would. Conclusion, I wasn't the only one that didn't like Hamlet, I was just the only one that ever said anything about it. Everyone else would just sit there and take it, or there was that select few in class that actually enjoyed it. (Weirdo's! ;)) Just kidding!

  It is my job as an active member of my class to have an opinion that matters and I wanted to share it when we were asked how we felt. Sorry Mr.Burge that it wasn't what you wanted to hear. Hopefully as the year progresses it will all get better and you wont have to worry about my controversial-ness. Until then, good luck!

Novembers prediction

    This last week I have been sick and quite frankly it sucks. I hate being sick and having that nasty sore throat and than the cough and bleh. It is just gross. Due to me being sick, I missed school on Monday. Which added more work to my already jam packed full plate. When I went to class on Wednesday and stayed after to ask my English Lit teacher what I had missed, he replied with not very much, watching hamlet scenes from different movies, reading hamlet and telling everyone that they are going to cry by the end of this month because of how stressed they are. When he told me that, I had to laugh. We were all going to cry? Really Burge, I hardly cry anymore. I figured that most people would cry, but I thought I wouldn't. I'm the type of person that needs lots of things going on in my life to function properly. And that's just what I had, lots of things going on in my life this past week. Not to mention quite a bit of homework. 
   
    On Thursday after work, I had signed up to go to a informative meeting on a college that I have been considering. That meeting started at 6:30, so my mom told me to be home by 6 so we could leave by 6:15 and get there on time. I said no problem, I should be out of work by 5:45. I jinxed myself when I told my mom that, because I wasn't able to leave work at the time I needed to. We had an emergency cat that came in and it's owner didn't leave until after we had been closed. Which messed up my shutting down routine for the night. Strike one. So I just started closing down what I could. Strike two. I have OCD so I always close down everything the same way every night and I couldn't do that on Thursday and it bothered me, a lot. Final straw, I asked my coworker if it was okay if I did all the cleaning every where but in the back and if she could do that so I could leave and get home to go to my meeting. She angrily said I guess to me. Strike three. The tears started to build in my eyes and I just thought to myself how angry I was that no one would help me. I hurry to finish the rest of my job so I could leave and go home before I had a melt down. I worked quietly so that I wouldn't be bothered. My other coworker asked me to show her how to shut something down, so I showed her. She asked me what was wrong and I replied nothing. Hoping she wouldn't keep asking, I contined to show her the steps to shutting down the machine. She said I know something's going on, what's up? I began to explain to her what was going on, and didn't get very far before I had started to let the tears fall. I was embarrassed. Work is a place of work, not tears and whining. I felt bad, I'm not a complainer. I'm a hard worker and always get my work done. 

    So I finished the closing for the night and asked if I could leave. I saw my coworker telling our superior what had gone on and I was even more embarrassed. So I left and went home to get ready in two minutes to go to my meeting with my parents. Luckily I made it to the meeting and all was good. My homework for this last week is a whole other story, for another time. 

Hamlet is almost over

    Reading Hamlet to me is like a never ending tilt-a-whirl. You just keep getting flung back and forth and you don’t understand why, and you just want to get off this stupid ride and put your feet on the ground for once and take a breath.   Oh how I wish that right now I could take a breather from having to read Hamlet. It sucks, royally. It’s such a pain in my butt. Not only do we have to read and annotate, one of my least favorite things to do, but we have to write chapter analysis’s and then write a one page analysis of a soliloquy in each Act. Very tedious and very frustrating.

   We just got done reading Scene 1 in Act 5, and it all made sense to me. There was not one part if that Scene that did not make sense to me. I was so very proud of myself. This last scene was in the graveyard as the grave diggers are getting Ophelia’s grave site ready for her burial. Hamlet and Horatio then come in and Hamlet is disgusted with how the grave diggers are treating Ophelia’s death, as if it’s a joke.

   Laertes and the rest of the people then come in and mourn over the loss of Ophelia. Hamlet and Laertes argue with each other about who loved Ophelia more as well as who should be buried alive with her. Laertes jumps into the grave and holds his dear sister one last time before her body is gone forever. It was sad to read and yet I was able to feel their pain.

  I am so very ready for Hamlet to be over and for us as a class to be able to move on to bigger and better subjects.

Fake, An Ode To You

Fake, fake, fake,

Those are the only words that are replaying in my brain right now.

You don’t know me then, that’s all I think.

How can someone be fake,

When they were friends with someone like you for so long?

How am I fake, if I was your only friend?

If I was so fake, isn’t that a lapse on your judgment then?

How could you be friends with someone as “fake” as me?

I pity the ignorance that this world has succumb to.

Your judgment clouded by lust and hate.

Sexual poses, made up all in your mind.

We never had a chance.

You knew that.

You pushed my boundaries for so long,

I had tried to stick up for you when people said not to get to close.

I disregarded them, because you were my best friend.

WERE as in past tense.

Not fake friends, or whatever else you may call it.

As days went by, I began to notice everyone was RIGHT.

It was my fault that our relationship got to where it is now.

It wasn’t a friendship, it was too much more than that.

I’d hope that you would change and begin  to realize that our friendship was too intense.

You wanted more.

I wanted less.

Our friendship was never to evolve into more.

I had thought that it was mutual,

That you had not wanted anymore.

If anything, you are fake.

Telling me that you didn’t like me anymore.

Don’t point fingers at me and tell me to apologize.

With you, my anger was always prominent.

IT wasn’t just “my time of the month”

It was you being in my life and acting the way that you did, that always made me angry.

You took advantage of my friendship.

Don’t you dare, blame your anger on me.

Our friendship used to mean the world to me.

USED TO.

You knew from the moment that you met me,

That I was as real as they come.

It’s time to move on and move forward.

Good luck in life, and may everything that you deserve in life,

Come your way.

The Soliloquy Begins

Last week before we left for the weekend, Mr.Burge asked us to figure out which of the character speeches in the paly that we wanted to memorize for reciting in front of the class. I have been dreading him asking us what soliloquy that we wanted to do. I have been in our school plays for three years now, and have always had to memorize lines to read. It’s not the easiest thing for me to do. It takes time and it doesn’t just come to you all of a sudden. It’s a lot of practicing and word reciting. Which if I do say so myself is very time consuming. Unfortunately this year I don’t really have any extra time in my schedule due to the extra-curricular activities that I do as well as an Elementary School internship and my job on top of that.

   Mr. Burge hasn’t given us our time frame of exactly how many days we have to memorize these soliloquys, but I’m hoping that it’s not going to be any time soon.  These past weekend as well as this upcoming weekend are booked solid because I took the ACT and then I am taking the SAT this weekend. Needless to say, I am already all tested out.

  I’m hoping that this memorization will come easily to me, especially since I have so much going on right now, academically and “friendship” wise, it would be nice to just cease all the chaos and be able to just sit down and have no worries.

   This is going to get interesting.

Anxious and Disappointed

        Going into break, I was really excited to be able to have a week-long vacation from having to endure the worries of school and balancing my life for a bit. I was excited to get to just relax and then go to work and come home again. It was a well needed break that I wanted to use to my advantage. There was nothing really that I needed to catch up on per say, but I had wanted to get into studying for my ACT and SAT since I would have time to do that and I didn’t have any other homework really.

        To my disappointment, none of that had happened like I had promised that it would. I knew I had to work all last week from 1:30 until close, and knowing that I didn’t have any homework made that easier on me. So I figured that I would be able to accomplish all that I had wanted to and still have a relaxing break if I managed my time correctly.

        I was just reading one of my friends blogs that he had wrote yesterday, and what really stuck out to me was how he had said that he did what this last week was called. He took a break. He took a break from all the stress to re-collect himself and be ready to continue once we had to return back to school. He didn’t do homework or college stuff, or apply for scholarships. He relaxed and did what he wanted to. I did that too. Or what I could do for the most part, but I had work and my mother breathing down my neck about studying for the ACT which is this weekend L and the SAT which is next weekend.

        Thinking about having to take those tests just adds about fifty pounds to my already slumped shoulders. Once the stress of those tests is off my back and I can successfully say that I am satisfied with the score that I got, then I can begin to relax a bit before I have to begin to apply for colleges and then wait until winter break hits me in the face and begin that quick journey down the mountain of school to graduation. I have waited six years for this moment in time and feel like I’d like to now wait a whole other life time for my next chapter in life to begin.

        Will I be ready to experience that part of life? I am afraid for what’s to come next. I wish I had a choice to pause what I want to, but life doesn’t work that way.  I have to put trust into myself and know that what is meant to happen will happen and that these decisions that I make along the way are what make me, me. I’m anxious for what’s to come.

Hamlet, the never ending journey

  The Friday before we went on break, we had a sub in all of our classes. In Mr. Burges class, we were continuing to read Hamlet; the problem was it wasn’t with Mr. Burge; instead it was by ourselves with the sub just listening to us read our lines. The most frustrating part of reading Hamlet has to be needing a “translator” to interpret all that we are reading.

            Coming back after break to class I felt pretty good. I felt as if I have been able to understand very well what has been going on in Hamlet. It began to feel easier to interpret the text. All until yesterday during class when Mr. Burge had started to talk to us about how important it was that we understand the text. How he is putting in more effort to explain to us then the regular senior class. It was impertinent that we were able to interpret the text and understand it, and if we didn’t then we need to pay attention during class and really try hard. If we don’t understand it now, how are we going to grasp it when we are taking the test 7 months from now to test what we have learned this year?

            I worry about how well Ill actually do on this test. I had confidence in myself that I would be able to do all that was required of me on the test and being able to fend for myself when I didn’t understand something well enough.  Now I’m second guessing myself and wonder if I will be able to pass it this year? I worry about failing because I “didn’t try hard enough”. I care about not letting myself down, especially when I know that I am able to persevere in what I do.

            I wonder how well this soliloquy is going tot go.

Preparing for Break

    Unfortunately for me, I had written this blog post in class on Friday and thought that I had posted it. I then go on my blog this morning and see that I hadn't even posted anything. My disappointment was immense. I'll try to remember what I wrote, so bear with me. 

     This week long break this month is a blessing. I'm not a religious person what so ever, but it was definitely a blessing to have this break, because it was well needed. Mr. Burge had asked us to write a blog on Friday for how we were going to stay on track or ahead over our week long break.  

    For me that was an easy question because I had an easy answer. Since I have luckily not missed any classes this quarter, I have no assignments that I need to catch-up on. Which means, that this break is geared towards me finishing the little homework that I got on Friday, as well as studying for taking my SAT again and my ACT for the very first time. I was able to get two study books for each test and it is my goal to begin doing the ACT prep book. I'm not a very good test taker, so I hope that with this help, that I am able to accomplish my goal of getting a good score. 

      Along with studying, I need to continue with my search of scholarships that I am eligible for. I have a lot to do this break that will keep me on track. But all I really want to do this break is sleep and relax by doing nothing. 

Hamlet Act 1

Although families are meant to stay together, familial problems can lead to an individual’s internal conflict.  When Hamlet learns from his father’s ghost that his uncle/ “current father” had murdered his biological father, it gave Hamlet an even larger reason not to like his uncle. After the Queen married Hamlets’ uncle, Hamlet began to greatly dislike his uncle. His attitude towards his uncle showed his resentment towards his mother’s new marriage. This sudden marriage caused Hamlet to second guess as to whether or not his mother actually loved his father, as well as if how she had acted towards his father was all a lie as well.

    Hamlet begins to show loathsome qualities towards his mother as time progresses. He can’t believe that his mother could love his father so much and then move on from that past love and begin a new relationship, let alone an incestual relationship, so quickly. Hamlet had such a high admiration for his parents and their relationship.  He loved both of his parents with such passion and power, that when his mother married his uncle, it seemed as if she had betrayed Hamlet along with his father. This feeling of total betrayal causing him to act inappropriately towards his mother while in the public eye, and reveals his disapproval to all others around them.

   When Hamlet finally talks to his father’s ghost and hears from him what actually had happened, he begins to feel torn about the revenge for his father on his mother. Hamlet feels such sorrow for his father’s death, that he would do anything to avenge it. His father had told him that his mother would get her revenge at a later time, and that it was Hamlet’s duty to revenge his death against his uncle. His father’s request then pushes Hamlet to the breaking point of “sanity” and crazed revenge against those that acted against his beloved father.

    Throughout the next two scenes, Hamlets inner conflict begins to rise to the surface. He begins to act strangely, differently than his old self, focused on his father

Balancing this year

  I know that this blog today will seem very cliché and for that I’m sorry, but for my free write blogs I enjoy talking about my life because it’s my story to tell. So again, bear with me for the moment.

   This year, I have a lot of balancing that I have to do within my life and my school life as well. I was told at the end of my junior year, by my senior friends that this year was going to be my toughest year to balance. School work would be on the easier side if I knew how to do my work on time and not procrastinate. I told her that I would be fine, and that I would be able to balance my life well enough that I would get by just fine.

  I was lucky enough to be able to get a job this year to earn myself money before I go off to college next fall. I was pretty excited about it, because it’s not just your average teenager’s first time job at a fast food restaurant, it’s at a veterinarian hospital, and that will actually benefit me later on in life.

   On top of that, I was lucky enough to be able to be elected as the president of my academy as well. I was very excited to be able to have the opportunity to have a larger leadership role in my academy and actually be able to do the things I want to in my academy. It’s just a little tough to have to balance when I am able to have meetings with the other officers and then making sure that I am able to get to work on time. It’s frustrating being a student that is so involved in my school and its leadership and then having to be able to make time for myself to get to work on time. There are times when I just want to quit being so involved. When I don’t want to do anything at all after school is the worst time for me.

  On top if all of that, I have a boyfriend who works as well as I do. This makes it difficult for us to spend time together and work our different schedules together to be able to make time for each other. It makes it hard on me when we don’t go to the same school either. There are a lot of days, when I wish that I could just have him with me all day at school to keep me grounded and focused. I miss him and wish that there wasn’t so much in my life right now that I have to balance.

   My life is just one large weight that I have to balance on my shoulders and it’s starting to make me sway back and with all the added pressure on my shoulders from everyone around me.

The Cycle of Hamlet

    Mr. Burge had told us that as we continued to read Hamlet that we would begin to understand it more and that it would become easier for us to get the first time around. For most people it was becoming easier to grasp all the different meanings that Shakespeare had put into his writing. As Burge continuously tells us, Shakespeare doesn’t have just one meaning for anything that he writes.

    The double meaning to his work is something that’s hard for me to grasp a lot of the time. Reading Shakespeare confuses me greatly because I second guess myself on what I think something could possibly mean. I feel like if I begin to understand what is being said in the play that there is something that I am missing. As if I’m not fully understanding anything that’s going on, maybe I’m just thinking that I do.

   In all honesty, Shakespeare frustrates me. How could one person write so many successful plays in such a short period of time? Each being as successful as the last one that was written. How does someone come up with so many different play ideas, plots, characters and settings, while still being able to not repeat anything ever? It doesn’t make sense. Frankly, Shakespeare makes me feel inferior which makes me even angrier.

   Who would have known that one play like Hamlet could make me feel as though I was back in freshman year Algebra all over again? It’s ridiculous. I try to participate more during our class readings to have a better understanding, but I’ve been picked twice and not with as much willingness that I would have hoped or thought there would be.

   I don’t like this Hamlet cycle, I would like to stop the on going process.

Leadership is my life

   I've always been a strong child, ever since the day that I was born. With my strong headedness or as some would like to call it "stubbornness" comes leadership. One of my favorite things to be a part of. I've always been a leader, and have surrounded myself by those that follow, ever since I could remember having friends. Being a leader is in my blood I guess you could say.
   I enjoy the feeling of the authority that you gain when in a leadership role. Its a thrill that I get when I am able to head something important. For the past 6 years now, I have been involved in leadership and couldn't have asked to be a part of something better then it. I couldn't imagine being involved in anything else. As the years progress, so do my leadership skills. Going to my high school has really benefited me even more so, because it has given me many more opportunities to better and add on to those skills.
  I've grown and moved up on the totem pole these past 4 years in leadership positions. I went from being a freshmen representative to being secretary, to vice president and this year, I can happily announce that I am president. President of my academy I mean. Being a part of something where you know that you try your hardest and it prevails you, is a great feeling.
  Being a leader is what I have a passion for. When people judge me and use it against me as a leader it makes me upset. There's nothing I dislike more then negative people. Especially those that doubt me. When that happens there is no greater feeling, then metaphorically sticking up your middle finger and saying "What have you done, to have someone consider you as a leader? Not to mention, who are you to judge me?" I am not the person most people perceive me to be. I am me, and that person is a great leader that hopes to change the world, or at least make it an enjoyable place to be for others.
   As a leader, that's all that you can ask for. That at least some people benefit and appreciate all that you did.  Maybe one day they will. I'm not the most popular or the prettiest, but I care, and I hope those that have doubted me, will soon realize that I am human just like they are. We all have faults, but I ask as a leader that you don't just pick out the wrongs. find some good.

Hamlet Hath Ugh

   As Burge begins to tell us that we have to start reading Hamlet this weekend on our own, I proceed to groan inside of my head. This has to be the one of the worst plays by Shakespeare that I have read in all of high school. It's boring, and has to do with a lot of sex. I'm sorry, but that does not sound fun to me. 

    Tonight as I began to read the first scene in Act I my mind began to wander to other aspects of my life. Anything that could and would distract me sufficed. Those 18 pages were filled with pure jubberish to me. I mean don't get me wrong, I understand what was going on, but it was just so uninteresting and disappointing. I had high hopes for this play and am greatly disappointed. 

  To make matters worse, we have to actually do work for this play. We have summaries and titles to make for each scene. Even better, I'll have to memorize a speech that is over 25 lines long, along with all the rest that is going on with my life...  

   Let the count down begin for this play to end now. T-minus however many days we have left of it and 4 more acts. Wish me luck my friends, as I do the same for those of you that are in the same boat as I am! 

My best friends

Throughout my life, I have had many best friends in my life. My friends are my whole world to me. They are there for me when I'm down, they have my back when I need them the most. They are my rock and my whole world. Without them in my life I would be lost, I wouldn't be where I am today. 
    They brighten my day with our inside jokes and their big smiles! I can honestly say that coming to this school allowed me to gain friendships that I will have for a life time. 
    The people at this school are different, we aren't just regular high school students, we are kids that have a drive in life to follow the path that we want to in life. My friends and I have ambitions. They place a drive in me that pushes me to be better. 
   Without them in my life, I would be lost. I love them and am so grateful to have had them allow me into their life. 

The poetry in our Music

     While reading some of the headings on some of my fellow classmates blog, I begin to develop my own idea for my blog entry tonight.

    This past week has got to be one of the most stressful weeks of this year by far. I was in a horrible argument with one of my best friends and had our academy's elections on my mind. Its fair to say that my mind was else where for our classes last week.
 
   It was hard for me to concentrate knowing what was going on and that no matter what I tried to do, to stop it, that nothing would make it better. That all my attempts made it worse. I tried so hard to focus on school last week. I was so frustrated at my feeble attempts to finish my work last week. So, at the end of last week on Friday when Burge had told us that he was going to give us a break this weekend and give us an easy assignment, I sighed with great relief to know that my teachers still understood that we needed breaks.

  Our assignment was to find a song that we found to have deeper meaning and that held some sort of meaningful poetic value. Don't use Miley Cyrus' song, was all I heard replaying in my mind as I tried to find a song that would do this assignment justice. Especially now, that we are in our final year of high school, I would like to go out with a bang, and say that I actually tried this year. Being in Burge's class and always trying so hard to be in the head of the class and have him think that I am as smart as people like Parker and Delana who always seem to understand what's going on. I feel unskilled when I am around people like them.

  I hope that the song that I chose has meaning and could actually have a purpose tomorrow. I enjoy both poetry and music, so hopefully blending the two together tomorrow will resonant with me. Both poetry and music allow self expression, independence and authority over your own material. Its all up to the one that is behind that keyboard or pen writing and typing away.

English

   Yesterday in class we had the opportunity to take a part of a practice test for our AP exam that we take in May. It was a bit challenging to say the least. Usually in class when we are assigned a poem, we read it by ourselves for homework and then are able to discuss it when we get back to class. For our AP test we aren’t allowed to do discuss anything with anyone. Those tests require complete silence. So, you can imagine the difficulty that the practice test posed for me when I wasn’t able to discuss with my friends what they thought about a part of the poem or what they thought that the poem meant.

    The poem was a poem by Emily Dickinson, one of the most confusing poets that I have ever heard of. All of her poems always have more than one meaning or have a hidden meaning. It’s hard to understand for me what she is saying most of the time. Don’t get me wrong, she has great poems, with abstract thoughts and thought provoking words, but why couldn’t she have just made it a little easier to understand.

   Needless to say, when I took the practice part of the test in my AP English class yesterday in Burge’s cold room in a hard cold chair, I didn’t understand what was going on. I didn’t do so well on that test. I have confidence though, that with Mr. Burges help, that I will be able to pass the AP exam with great understanding and ease. I look forward to all that is to come this year and all the knowledge that I will gain in this class to use to further my future college career. I just hope that as our text gets closer I will still feel the same.

Senior Year (an Original Poem)

Senior year has begun, and boy is it overwhelming.

No matter how much someone warns you that life comes at you full speed when you reach senior year, you are never quite ready for it.

Senioritis starts to come into play,

the school work, the boring days at school,

wishing that you could be anywhere else but in that hard cold desk staring at the clock on the wall.

 

Hitting me like a ton of bricks, I begin to imagine my life after high school,

a life without my parent’s right by my side anymore, it’s scary.

I have to provide for myself, I need to pay my own way,

through school and the rest of my life.

 

Scholarships, grants, essays, tests and quizzes, SAT’s and ACT’s, when does it all stop.

Senior events, dances, football games, Prom, and graduation.

My last year of high school.

I want to keep all the friends that I have right now, for the rest of my life,

but who am I kidding; I know that will never happen.

 

It’s the beginning of September, the countdown begins,

276 days left until it’s all over.

Not knowing whether all this stress will be needed or worth it in the end.

Graduation day is surreal,

I just hope that I will remember it all and take it all in with my eyes wide open.

The day that I have to say goodbye to those that I have built my life with.

Please don’t forget me,

I won’t forget you.

 

College decisions are beginning to be made.

I don’t want to make the wrong decision.

How will I know when I made the right one?

Uncertainty kills me.

College scares me.

I’m still a kid, where’s my mom, where’s my dad?

                                                                  

Don’t forget to look for scholarships, my counselor advises me,

apply for them all she said.

Fear fills my body as I think of what I’ll have to do by myself.

Will I make it in college?

I’m afraid to put myself out there anymore then I have to.

I need to begin my life I think to myself.

I’m ready for what the world has to bring

New adventures await us, just past the doors of our oh too familiar high school.

Life awaits us.

 

Senior year, don’t fail me now is all I can think of.

Our lives have just begun.

I prepare myself by looking ahead.

I will not look back, I promise myself.