Concepts (finished)

Time is difficult to understand but easy to accept. That’s my conclusion. Digging deep into the far corners of the cerebellum can result in a sleepless night or two, or three, or more. It is 5:21. Cerebellum… crumble eel, celeb lemur… That one’s too hard. Everyone’s been here I think. I can’t be the only one at Clear Ridge still up thinking about why we have thoughts, dreaming about sleeping and waiting for morning to come. It always boils down to concepts that I don’t think I’ll grasp.

It makes a smooth transition from staying up mindlessly watching Bill Nye re-runs until roughly two, to settling down and thinking about some philosopher. I play this game where I try to debate them on their own philosophies, I usually end up winning, but I am both sides of the argument. That’s when the anxiety hits. What if both my parents have died in their sleep? I get up, go check. I’m always surprised that I’m surprised that they were alive. Repeat these thoughts for the next hour or so. Then the depression nestles its way into bed with me like a blanket of black sludge. I feel trapped. My friends could all have died tonight. What would I do? What if Russia just bombed an innocent town? I role-play the tragic thoughts that those fictitious families feel for fake freedom from the thoughts the feed on my mind. But it doesn’t help.
 It’s 5:58. Morning.

I never found my place, at least that’s what they are telling me I’m supposed to find. Basketball didn’t go well. Neither did ceramics. That was freshman year and I was off to a poor start at Clear Ridge One could say I never recovered. I shouldn’t even been at Clear Ridge, this breeding ground of human filth. The people that pass me in masses and pretend like I’m a ghost are just genuinely bad people. Maybe I’m the bad one, and maybe these are what people are supposed to be like and maybe I should adapt like Darwin told me, but I wouldn’t “be myself”.

I’ve been in and out of therapy for a while, and I can’t remember when I start. I don’t really sleep that much anymore. It’s all her fault.

The day is hazy in my memory, but I remember her crying. She didn’t try to hide them as them streaked down her cheek. They fell like boulders. There are times when you shed tears with strength, with perseverance, with courage. This wasn’t one of those times. She sat on the hazel couch in our small apartment six years, four months and seventeen days ago and wept like a weak animal while I looked on in disgust. I was too young to attack the man that eerily crept out of the backdoor as she spouted excuses, but I couldn’t. Her lies were white noise. It wasn’t his fault, he probably didn’t know she was married. It was all her fault.

I was feeling sick and since I lived so close to Clear Ridge, I chose to walk home in pain rather than call her, that way she wouldn’t yell at me. It was roughly one in the afternoon, so the walk was comforting even in pain due to the welcoming spring of Phoenix. My father was working while I had walked in on my mother, and I immediately told him. He wasn’t surprised, maybe he expected it. My mom and this man were right on the couch and I opened the door not expecting it, as if anyone could. I was old enough to know what was going on. He jumped up and left as soon as his empty eyes hit me. She was screaming. I think that’s when I found out I wasn’t a normal kid. I didn’t cry, I didn’t yell, I just knew that I would never look at my mother the same. My parents divorced four months later. I’m with my dad now. I don’t trust women anymore. I don’t trust anyone anymore.

But then I met her. I know you are sighing as another troubled teen finds his true love, but I swear this one is different. Maybe I’m biased.

Middle School was a strange time for me. They gave me a lot of tests with really nice ladies and I usually didn’t have to do much of the work that was assigned to my friends. I was given the work for a couple grades ahead of me. It didn’t matter, it was still incredibly easy. Around 6^th grade is when I realized this was becoming a social issue for me, not that I didn’t have enough of those problems. I couldn’t make friends in either grades. I was trapped in a nether of too smart for my classmates, but too young for the older kids. I hated it, I just wanted to live a normal life at the time. I still do. I started failing the tests to get moved back down. I hated being smart, and knowing all the answers means it’s easy to get them wrong. My parents couldn’t afford for me to get to a snobby, “everyone is special in their own way” high school. My parents didn’t seem to care that I was so smart, but I cared even less. I got a 162 out of 200 on the Phoenix Public School Entrance Exam on purpose. An 81%. That’s a C. I was finally average.

And about three weeks into high school I had realized what an awful, immature mistake I had made. On the third day of my freshman year, Brizzy Kleins asked if Oregon was one of the original thirteen colonies, justifying it with her in-depth expertise at “Oregon Trail”. I watched Renata Williams try to multiply eight times four, turns out the answer is not twelve. This continued every day for the first year of my Clear Ridge experience. I sat in the back of class rooms calculating how long a “bathroom break” could be without it getting unreasonable. Through trial and error in all of my classes, I came to the conclusion of about nine minutes. Nine minutes so I could get away from all the other insignificant kids that I shouldn’t be around. Nine minutes so I could replay the day I watched my mom cry over and over again. Nine minutes so I could reason with Nietzsche, Foucault, and Zeno. The other forty-four minutes of my class were spent spinning pens and drowning out teachers. I still aced the tests.

Year two was better. Two years, nine months and four days ago Mr. Schelmer marked me off a point on an essay for using the word “better”. I still spite him for it, I never missed points, and he didn’t ever tell me that I wasn’t allowed to use it. It was November and rather than lethargically droning through each class period like freshman year I decided to challenge myself. I was reading more novels, I was doing extra homework problems, I had put down my controllers for the first semester and picked up a trigonometry calculator. I still had no concept of a social life or relationships; I grew up sheltered and my parent’s relationship made me feel like the answer would always be “Google it”. My first semester of year two came to a close, my only lost point being from Mr. Schelmer. What an ass. I hate this school. The second semester, my teachers noticed I was doing so well that they wanted me to take junior classes. I had been down this road before, and I promptly declined. My mother was indifferent, as usual. She never cared about anything. My dad was insistent that this was “my one-way ticket to Harvard”. I didn’t need a ticket, I argued. He signed me up behind my back after a day of discussion. I called upon my early grade school days, saying how it messed my life up forever. High school is different, high school is different, high school is different. No it’s not. These kids are just blow up dolls of the lifeless creatures of 3^rd grade. They have no humility, empathy, or grace. They are dumb, evil and will do whatever they can to hurt me for no other reason than entertainment.

He signed me up the following day for 2^nd semester junior year classes. I hated him. Not nearly as much as my mom, but I hated him.

Until the next day when I met Lloris. French, and she looked the part. I know, I get it. What kind of name is “Lloris”?! Is he buying a croissant? No, no I’m not. But she was sweet, golden brown, and different on the outside than the inside. Long brown hair, shorter than me, sky blue eyes. She was wearing a faded pink crop top with a leather skirt. Her face was slightly disfigured due to acne, but you could look past it. Her teeth were white and shiny but about as straight as Freddie Mercury. She came with a hard copy of Harry Potter on the first day I met her, I can’t remember which one. She sat next to me, unheard of.

“Hey.” she mumbled, it was a morning class. She couldn’t be talking to me, maybe through her headphones?

“Hey man are you like taking a test for another class? Sorry to bug you.” She was talking to me. What. How. I had only seen this in the movies.

“No, I’m transferred in. Sorry I was just tired.” I played it passive. Conversation is a chess match and I had been practicing like Bobby Fisher.

“Oh, no! You are tired? Let’s run you to the nearest cot and get you a little nappy time! I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were tired.” I was used to bullying, but I knew from her sweet tone that she was just witty. A smart, witty girl. We ended the conversation there, but it was a win, I promise. I went four days without saying a word to her, I didn’t know what to say. Friday approaches, she walks in, I’m always first to class, yet she still sits next to me with all of her options.

“Hey.” She was stern this time.

“I know I’m supposed to talk to you. I’ve seen the movies. We talk before class for like a week, then I start walking you to your next class. As a “joke” you steal my phone and throw your number in it. We text and text and text and then call and call and call until suddenly we are a couple.” I was praying that I was right. Because if I was wrong Lloris would tear me to shreds with her charm and wits, a more gaping blow than just the usual insults.

“Good morning.” Passive. She copied me.

“Am I right?” This had to be the worst way to ask this I’m positive, but I got to the point.

“Yeah. I’m tired. Yeah.”

Checkmate.

It’s my second semester of junior year. I woke up this morning in the middle of the night. It was the day my mother cried. I don’t feel bad anymore. I still don’t trust anyone. Except Lloris. She’s kind of amazing. We’ve been together for 1 year, 7 months, 14 days, 12 hours and about 4 minutes, and I’ve loved her every step of the way. She taught me to trust. The relationship is typical of high school so I didn’t want to bore you with mundane descriptions of dates and conversations that end with hearts and hugs. Lloris got me past what I thought I never could get past. I still argue with philosophers, I still watch Bill Nye. I still anagram, and I still have anxiety and depression. But I love my mother. I don’t like her, but I love her. That’s a concept that I think I’ve grasped.

Concepts (First Half)

Time is difficult to understand but easy to accept. That’s my conclusion. Digging deep into the far corners of the cerebellum can result in a sleepless night or two, or three, or more. It is 5:21. Cerebellum… crumble eel, celeb lemur… That one’s too hard. Everyone’s been here I think. I can’t be the only one at Clear Ridge still up thinking about why we have thoughts, dreaming about sleeping and waiting for morning to come. It always boils down to concepts that I don’t think I’ll grasp.

It makes a smooth transition from staying up mindlessly watching Bill Nye re-runs until roughly two, to settling down and thinking about some philosopher. I play this game where I try to debate them on their own philosophies, I usually end up winning, but I am both sides of the argument. That’s when the anxiety hits. What if both my parents have died in their sleep? I get up, go check. I’m always surprised that I’m surprised that they were alive. Repeat these thoughts for the next hour or so. Then the depression nestles its way into bed with me like a blanket of black sludge. I feel trapped. My friends could all have died tonight. What would I do? What if Russia just bombed an innocent town? I role-play the tragic thoughts that those fictitious families feel for fake freedom from the thoughts the feed on my mind. But it doesn’t help.
 It’s 5:58. Morning.

I never found my place, at least that’s what they are telling me I’m supposed to find. Basketball didn’t go well. Neither did ceramics. That was freshman year and I was off to a poor start at Clear Ridge One could say I never recovered. I shouldn’t even been at Clear Ridge, this breeding ground of human filth. The people that pass me in masses and pretend like I’m a ghost are just genuinely bad people. Maybe I’m the bad one, and maybe these are what people are supposed to be like and maybe I should adapt like Darwin told me, but I wouldn’t “be myself”.

I’ve been in and out of therapy for a while, and I can’t remember when I start. I don’t really sleep that much anymore. It’s all her fault.

The day is hazy in my memory, but I remember her crying. She didn’t try to hide them as them streaked down her cheek. They fell like boulders. There are times when you shed tears with strength, with perseverance, with courage. This wasn’t one of those times. She sat on the hazel couch in our small apartment six years, four months and seventeen days ago and wept like a weak animal while I looked on in disgust. I was too young to attack the man that eerily crept out of the backdoor as she spouted excuses, but I couldn’t. Her lies were white noise. It wasn’t his fault, he probably didn’t know she was married. It was all her fault.

I was feeling sick and since I lived so close to Clear Ridge, I chose to walk home in pain rather than call her, that way she wouldn’t yell at me. It was roughly one in the afternoon, so the walk was comforting even in pain due to the welcoming spring of Phoenix. My father was working while I had walked in on my mother, and I immediately told him. He wasn’t surprised, maybe he expected it. My mom and this man were right on the couch and I opened the door not expecting it, as if anyone could. I was old enough to know what was going on. He jumped up and left as soon as his empty eyes hit me. She was screaming. I think that’s when I found out I wasn’t a normal kid. I didn’t cry, I didn’t yell, I just knew that I would never look at my mother the same. My parents divorced four months later. I’m with my dad now. I don’t trust women anymore. I don’t trust anyone anymore.

But then I met her. I know you are sighing as another troubled teen finds his true love, but I swear this one is different. Maybe I’m biased.

Middle School was a strange time for me. They gave me a lot of tests with really nice ladies and I usually didn’t have to do much of the work that was assigned to my friends. I was given the work for a couple grades ahead of me. It didn’t matter, it was still incredibly easy. Around 6^th grade is when I realized this was becoming a social issue for me, not that I didn’t have enough of those problems. I couldn’t make friends in either grades. I was trapped in a nether of too smart for my classmates, but too young for the older kids. I hated it, I just wanted to live a normal life at the time. I still do. I started failing the tests to get moved back down. I hated being smart, and knowing all the answers means it’s easy to get them wrong. My parents couldn’t afford for me to get to a snobby, “everyone is special in their own way” high school. My parents didn’t seem to care that I was so smart, but I cared even less. I got a 162 out of 200 on the Phoenix Public School Entrance Exam on purpose. An 81%. That’s a C. I was finally average.

And about three weeks into high school I had realized what an awful, immature mistake I had made. On the third day of my freshman year, Brizzy Kleins asked if Oregon was one of the original thirteen colonies, justifying it with her in-depth expertise at “Oregon Trail”. I watched Renata Williams try to multiply eight times four, turns out the answer is not twelve. This continued every day for the first year of my Clear Ridge experience. I sat in the back of class rooms calculating how long a “bathroom break” could be without it getting unreasonable. Through trial and error in all of my classes, I came to the conclusion of about nine minutes. Nine minutes so I could get away from all the other insignificant specters of kids that I should be around. Nine minutes so I could replay the day I watched my mom cry over and over again. Nine minutes so I could reason with Nietzsche, Foucault, and Zeno. The other forty-four minutes of my class were spent spinning pens and drowning out teachers. I still aced the tests.

Year two was better. Two years, nine months and four days ago Mr. Schelmer marked me off a point on an essay for using the word “better”. I still spite him for it.

Class in Session: Money's Victim

Money finds itself to be the center of Chicago and in general, runs a lot of urban areas. Money since its first print in Philly back in the early 1700's has been shaping and molding the future of children. Young kids at good schools, and young kids at bad schools are changing their eye colors to green as they learn how the world works. Money runs society. Just ask Devin. Yeah, I'm calling Devin out in my blog. Partially because, I mean, it's Devin, but I also think he is an interesting, and maybe frightening example of money's effect on children. Devin has announced a few times about his "dreams" of being a psychiatrist. I air quote dreams because I'm not convinced that Devin has thought of what he really wants to do. He has set his goals to solve the equation (Fun*Salary)/Effort to the best of his abilities. I'd say that psychiatrist is a pretty good option, but Devin has attacked his dream job from a monetary viewpoint way too early in his life. Even people with a lesser chance of education and success are drifting towards money and not happiness. Society and class has become increasingly money driven and is influencing where children go, and they are going toward money. The solution? Focus on increasing the "Fun", not the "Money".

Thanks

I try to make classrooms interesting. I hear way too often "I hate school." That statement is ridiculous. You should love school, school is a place to go and have the best times so that 20 years from now you can hit up a friend and say, "Remember that time...". I try to participate, I try to understand and learn. 7th period class is a time when I can actually do that. Express and opinion, have an argument, hear something for the first time. That's something I miss in other classes. But a discussion, a class setting and a good lesson needs more people to participate. That's where Devin (David) comes in.

Thanks Devin for making 7th not a one way discussion for me, you have interesting opinions, some of which we have agreed and others where we haven't and that makes a good friend. When the class is silent, you can say something, a trait that surprisingly few others have, especially in this class. You are insightful and funny in and out of the class. That I can respect. Thanks.

A Celebration

Often we celebrate on account of the things we avoid. As a species we avoid self-indulgence, it is treated as an evil, a sin. Every one has at one point completed something "amazing" on the spectrum of what we can achieve, small or large. A kid isn't taught to gloat, he's taught to respect his humility. But it is never appropriate to celebrate. I celebrate, I honor, I remember the accomplishments I have done, not those I haven't. I celebrate the individual and the whole, the community that I'm apart of. I celebrate that that I can look back upon and tell to all I know, that was me, that was what I was. And what I will remember myself as is what I am currently. I celebrate all I am, not what I'm not.

The Poe-t.

Edgar Allen Poe is a staple in American Gothic writing, specifically in the masterful art of his poetry. After reading in class two excerpts and analyzing many more, you get to see the deeper meanings of Poe and his writings. Darkness. Despair. The poems of Edgar are a giant part of opening the eyes of his readers. He uses every single sense and more to get across the true themes of his writing. Loneliness is hell. Love is materialistic. Passion is savior to lost souls. Without Poe's poetry, American writing would be at a loss, and his readers would not have the outlook on life they have today.

Poe had loss in his family early on, and throughout life took all twelve rounds battering him into a metaphorical lump of loneliness. Many readers may attribute this to his "dark" sense of writing. Never does Poe set his stories in the dandelion fields or the children's playground. But this is not the reason. Poe used previous styles, long forgotten, and resurrected them to give readers a new type of story. No longer were the good guys beating the bad guys. No longer was the "happily ever after" tales of which we've learned to hate. It was a new sense of writing that did its job better than ever before; teach a lesson, get a metaphor across while keeping the reader entertained and on the edge of their seat.

This is Poe's greatest talent. The Raven, for example, classified as the greatest poem of all time, was a roller coaster ride that not only was the horror, but was also able to throw in the intricacies of a true story within every line. Poe was able to transform the face of poetry from happy meadows to dark castles, while keeping the influential principles within his story the same. That is the true beauty of the poet.

An American

An American isn’t defined as someone who can live in the Great United States. It’s more than that. An American has character, a definition embedded within all of us because of what our country is made of. We can be farmers, using the fertile lands that we are established on to embrace an opportunity. We can build the highest of towers and claim the skies our own. An American can be free, and American can be brave, but an American has to call the country where they have lived all their life “home”. An American should be “home”. As the dilemma is presented, we introduce ourselves from other nationalities. “I’m Italian”. No you aren’t, you’re an American, as a real Italian would say. We aren’t ever aware of this flaw because of the perpetuation of the idea that we are a melting pot; that we come from another land. We never have had the chance to call ourselves what we actually are because we are masked by our ancestor’s ambitions. We hide behind the houses that we built long ago in foreign lands, when we need to embrace the actuality of where we are from. The foundations of my home, literal and physical, reside in the United States of America. Someone who comes from another, but acknowledges the present is an American. Americans are here, we are where we call home.