Civic Engagement Project

Conclusion

 So in Conclusion......

The year has come to an End. Homecoming was last years dream, Prom even was just a moments thought, Trip week just remains in photographs, the Christmas paper covering the LC has been cleaned up, Spring break is only a story now, the APs have all been taken, Spring Carnival has sailed away, Elections burnt up a week, Seniors up and left, Lit mags and yearbooks have been handed out and signed, and the American Character paper has been handed in.

Now we are Seniors. Supposedly I'm a Senior. Ehjh, I choose not to. Peter Pan and I are hooking up this summer and we are going to have some beautiful babies...;P I hate this growing up BS. I'd rather swing on a swing. Screw responsibility. Who ever thought we were ready for that anyway. Who would actually expect anyone to want to be obligated. I want grass stains. I want lemonade, mud, and sprinklers. 

You see you get into high school all scared and maybe you don't, but I remember very clearly saying to myself, "wow I bet these years are going to go fast. One day soon, just around the corner really, a time-blip second away, I'm going to be a Senior." I got an A+ on that one.

I am a Senior now and you know it doesn't matter if you're a party animal and your grades suck because you smoke and drink and do all crap other than study, and it doesn't matter if your a prude bookworm whose friends consist of fridge condiments and an occasional pen pal, who reads for survival and has all assignments done a week in advance. Most likely you are somewhere inbetween these two and maybe balance average grades with an average social life, or lean more towards one side or the other. Who really cares though because it doesn't matter who you are or what you did; its the fact that whoever you are and whatever you did at EA is pretty darn dear near its end. And doesn't that make you sad? the death of a quat-ans. These years which are supposed to be the best years of our life, they are and were precious... its a sad thing to realize we let it all slip through our fingers. If in fact you did. Sad for anyone, the Jock, Emo, Punk all kinds. Because no kind escapes time.

     Maybe the fun is already over and tomorrow when the, "good luck at finals!" "see you next year" 's are said, it will just be the end of it. Because next year will be a bunch of, "guys this is our last______ever..." Followed by silence, a few "thank gods" and general depressant sadness. I suppose Junior year was really IT. The IT year and if we didn't notice it, well too bad. Remind the Sophomores of the world not to be as careless. Because growing up is a horror. Its my horror. If ever I have a phobia this is it. For Life has opened a whole slew of possibilities to me and really I am truly very happy, but if given the choice, I would go back to 4th grade. I'm pretty darn sure of that.

My reflections on the year are rather personal and as I can't imagine you all agree with me, most likely a waste of your time. I will not bore you no longer. But take a look around at at least learn for yourself what you feel, thats far better than anything I can comment on. 

I hope you have a good summer dearies, See you guys next year!

:( vs. :)

Grrr well I will be the first to tell you that I am slightly more than displeased with my last blog "Qismah" because in my head I had such a interesting and in-depth argument going on between those three concepts/elements and I failed to put them on paper. Time was a little straining that day I will admit, and sleep was controlling my cognition, but still, I had so much more that I could have improved upon... :(

Maybe I'll fix it here soon. :)

Qismah

Fate is destiny, an inevitable course of events.

Destiny refers to a predetermined course of events. It may be conceived as a predetermined future, whether in general or of an individual. It is a concept based on the belief that there is a fixed natural order to the universe.

Destiny may be seen either as a fixed sequence of events that is inevitable and unchangeable, or that individuals choose their own destiny by choosing different paths throughout their life.

Destiny versus Fate

Although the words are used interchangeably in many cases, fate and destiny can be distinguished. Modern usage defines fate as a power or agency that predetermines and orders the course of events. Fate defines events as ordered or "inevitable". Fate is used in regard to the finality of events as they have worked themselves out; and that same sense of finality, projected into the future to become the inevitability of events as they will work themselves out, is Destiny.

One word derivative of "fate" is "fatality", another "fatalism". Fate implies no choice, and ends fatally, with a death. Fate is an outcome determined by an outside agency acting upon a person or entity; but with destiny the entity is participating in achieving an outcome that is directly related to itself. Participation happens willfully.

Used in the past tense, "destiny" and "fate" are both more interchangeable, both imply "one's lot" or fortunes, and include the sum of events leading up to a currently achieved outcome (e.g. "it was her destiny to be leader" and "it was her fate to be leader").

Fate can involve things which are bound within and subject to larger networks. A set of mathematical functions arranged in a grid and interacting in defined ways is Fate-like. Likewise the individual statues in a larger work of counterpoint art are aesthetically Fated within the work. In each case Fate is external to every individual component, but integral to the network. Every component acts as Fate for every other component. The entire world can be seen as existing within such a network, a kind of mythical spiderweb controlled by unseen forces.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thank you to Wikipedia.....(see above)

Okay so I wanted to describe the difference between fate and destiny, but Wikipedia described it far better than I could have so please read the above. What I want to discuss now is The Law of Attraction.The Law of Attraction states that "thoughts become things" and that "whatever you can conceive you can achieve." In other words, just by simply believing that I am a millionaire or that I will be invited to Daniel Radcliffe's birthday party, I will be. Sounds like the dumbest concept or idea ever because it would be impossible, but generally I think it is not. The Law of Attraction says that your thoughts can move people, places, and things, and I would agree with moving places and things, but not people. The idea that I am subject to the every whim and will of someone else's thoughts and vice versa that I control the goings and comings of people is to me null and void. Conceivably it could work when two people have a similar idea that cooperates and completes the other's, but rarely does that happen. However thoughts can bring you just about anything else you could possibly desire if you think it and believe it.

This being the case, I would then like to know who is stronger. Fate, Destiny, or Thought? Fate and Destiny do alright together but once you put Thought power in the mix a sort of paradox is created. Could I conceivably believe myself into be a wealthy landlord but then due to my predetermined destiny, be fated to remain a cobbler? Could I pray and pray and pray and believe and believe and dream of and believe that I would one day find true love, but just as Fate would have it never do? Or could I take my Fate and overcome it (usually by definition of the concept that is impossible) by the power and conscious decision of my own thought and carve out my own destiny (as in destiny being an unfinished process, a blank sheet of paper if you will, only a destiny once it is full, filled, and complete)?

I do not know.

But I would like to know, as my past, present, and future tips on the summit of Fate, Destiny, and Thought.

hell exists because. and you just don't know

Its hard to be angry at a sick man

Its the worst when you realize you were pitying yourself

Its terrible when you can't speak to anyone;                                                                                     even your friends

Lies are lies

Hatred and madness

Love is a virus

The cancer, the cancer

Don't you ever put down the woman

Don't you ever touch what is mine

When you think you have lost it you are the closest you'll ever be? Liar. You may never get there. Somethings aren't meant to be. Will is will, but fate is stronger. Do you believe it? Well that makes all the difference doesn't it.

B*stard

You have no right.

Who decides where you are born

Don't touch me, don't talk to me

I hate feeling crazy

The mind is sick, sickness is hell.

Hell is so strong.

Hell is so strong.

How close have you got?

Mine kampf

Can't make yourself sleep can make yourself move

Slam

Screech

You won't believe me

Screaming doesn't work, people are always there

Gone in my most dire; twice

Learn it!

Can the old dog learn right?

No tricks, I'm sick of tricks

Sick of it all

Hate, odio, deteste, hasse, haat, odeio, hater, Ayoko, utálom, hatur, nefret, contemno, μισώ, nenavydzhu, casâ, Nienawidze, benci, nanka, nenavizhu, vihaan, kan ikke lide its Hate

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anger lasts longer than sadness

notice

I've watched you feed

devil see me through, guard me angel where are you on my shoulder where you should be are you i bet you are but i can't feel it never stops why can't you stop it are you making me feel for a reason so i know what life feels like                           ?

how the f*ck do you know

oh f*cking hell this is what its all not ever going to be about so why put it there

I'm not ready to talk

back away

don't you

every anger you cause pink warped killer devil hang you by the neck you ever cause this to another god damn you people i hate the way you think you rule

f*cking dictator

the ground offers no comfort

the sanctuary has no peace that soothes

it serves to scare you more did you realize you had lost it this bad?

did you know all this time she had a point?

The same same same same same

worse each time you can't change mother f*cker

twist, the pounding block of terrible metal in your head, my head my head it never stops, please let me sleep

no thinking,

always angry

Go to sleep you mother f*cker why can't you sleep

come take me come take me

Have you ever been so angry and so angry at the anger?

That it folds over unto itself and you cease but the anger

Thrash

Covers overhead

Gasp

Laughter in the evil of sarcasm

at the pointless

pointless

What the fuck you mother fucker god dam you ever set foot on this earth

What's the Deal Here?

     Guam, the United States Virgin Islands, American Samoa, and the Commonwealths of Puerto Rico and the Northern Mariana Islands are all U.S. territories that they all have a say, to some extent, as to who the U.S. president will be. For this blog I am going to focus in on Puerto Rico, but the situation relates to all.

     Puerto Rico is a self governing commonwealth in accociation with the United States and their chief of State is the president of the United States. Now Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens but cannot vote for the president, and their representation in Congress is restricted to a single nonvoting member. Puerto Rico is allowed 20 delegates and each delegate gets one vote in the primaries. Presently all twenty have gone to McCain and he is the Republican nominee as we know. According to "welcome.topuertorico.org," a website dedicated to explaning Puerto Rican government, the major differences between Puerto Rico and the 50 states are exemption from some aspects of the Internal Revenue Code, its lack of voting represenation in either house of US congress, its ineligibility to vote in presidential elections, and its lack of assignment of some revenues reserved for the states.

     Here I am most confused hence, "What's the Deal Here?" If Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens why are they "Puerto Ricans" and not "Americans"? If Puerto Rico uses our chief of state, The President, as their cheif of state, then why do they not have more than one nonevoting member as representation in congress? If "Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens, why are they allowed only a 20 delegate say in the primaries and not allowed to vote or allowed access to some U.S. revenues? And if Puerto Ricans are "Puerto Ricans" and not "Americans," and Puerto Rico is really only that of a commonwealth, not bound or run much by our government, then why on earth do they have a say in who will win the Presidential election!?!

     Guam is in roughly the same situation as Puerto Rico, while both American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands each have 9 delegates, (all of which were awarded to McCain as he vowed to help resolve Washington’s complicated relationship with the U.S. Caribbean territory).

     I am not trying to be exclusitory or all encompasing and I recognize that I still may be missing some facts, but I do no understand why we allow these territories to have a say in who runs America if they are not Americans and will not be run (in majority) by America, or why we do not let these territories vote in congress and for the president if in fact they are U.S. citizens and use our president as their cheif of state. Is voting not a right of all legal (18 or older) U.S. citizens?

     So what is going on U.S.A.? Whats the Deal Here???

Demasiado

This post is short because I have little time to write due to AP prep, projects, homework, and other class work.
And this is the point of the blog.
Demasiado.
Trabajo.
Too, too much work.
"Youth is wasted on the young" Or so they say. It is meant to mean, I believe, that the young don't know what they have until it is taken away. They live childhood as if it is immortal, and everlasting. They do not take it for what it is worth. But give an adult youth and they would know what to do with it, they would not waste it.
Maybe this is true, but my argument for today is perhaps that we as youths do not waste our youth by simple choice, but because we are forced to.
Right now, the weather is wonderful. I would rather be outside lying in the grass, dreaming of lazy days, and frolicking in the flowers. Instead I have to be in school, studying, loosing sleep, isolating myself in piles of paper wasted on prepping for tests that may determine my future, but loose me my present.
Maybe this is how we loose our youth.
Not by careless choice, but by force.

There is so much more I could say, but the overbearing work of my present calls.
See you around...
youth.

Pennsylvania, Clinton

And on a side note, Hilary took Pennsylvania today!

After this happened the first thing I heard Barak Obama say in his following speach was a congradulations toward Hilary and her fight in the race and that is really nice to hear. If there is anything I am supportive of in this election it is the clean way these two canidates have been running against eachother. True there have been some minor sqirmishes, but really these two have been very good about keeping a clean and positive race. Etremely impressive in a race so close and with their opinions so similar that it would seem more likely that the canidates would be at their height of nastyness to prove their differences and highlight the ways in which they are better.  Not so for thus far. I applaud the both of them. :)

Earth Day

This blog is intended as a project for school and is meant to talk about the importance of staying involved with civic, local, and governmental life, and the ways in which to do so. Today was Earth Day and I guess this topic may not seem to have a direct correlation with a civic engagement project but I'd like to try and tie it into that. Beginning with, my initial dissapointment on how perhaps 1% of my school knew that it was Earth Day, and how once others found out, they could have cared less. Maybe it was just the educational Barney I watched, and maybe it had something to do with the peace-loving, Earth-loving, elementary Montessori school I grew up in, but Earth Day seemed like such a big event when I was younger. Everyone knew it was Earth Day, and everyone wanted to do something to show how he/she cared about the Earth. If people don't care anymore then that is their own problem, but if the community doesn't care, then I think something is wrong. The streets are littered with trash and 5 out of the say 7 or 8 cars I drove directly behind threw cigarettes or some type of trash out of their cars as I drove home today. Is that not sad? If our local governments or city councils could just get it together to do a two hour clean up of the highways, or set up a billboard about littering I would be there in a jiffy to help. But as of lately I feel as if no one cares. Not my classmates, and not the community. Wasn't everyone all hyped up about the global warming scare? Well it hasn't gone away my friends, it won't just vanish into thin air. Something has to be done! Take some action!

Be the change you with you see in this world.

Maktub. Shalom. Peace.

EA Civic Engagment Project

A Civic Engagement activity from Elgin Academy. Open for comments, open for ideas. :)

The idea here being that by writing in a blog I am engaging myself in civic life. My blog could be about presidents, hair dressers, liquid eyeliner, the Kentucky Derby, the unrest in Tibet, the sexual tensions of Catullus, matheleats, or anthing else I could concieve to write about. It does not matter because it is not what I write about, but the fact that I am writing and engaging myself in the public/civic sphere.Therefore in this blog you my find a mesh of ideas, concepts, topics, writing styles, and opinions, but thats what you are supposed to find so please enjoy!