Quote of the Week

So I've decided that I'm going to post one quote a week and see what people think of it. This week's quote is from one of The Killer's songs:

"I got soul but I'm not a soldier."

What does this mean for you?

Quotes-a-lot

Found a nice quote in Constance's blog, and I thought I'd use it because it doesn't just cover one of the topics from the constitution.

"I am the odd girl out.
It begins around third grade, the differentiation between "popular" and "unpopular", "cool" and "uncool". Up until then you're allowed to be whatever you want to be and do whatever you want to do. But in third grade, it starts.
If you're privileged enough to be one of the cool kids, you don't notice the changes because for you there aren't any changes. Suddenly there's someone new to be mean to, maybe, if you're so inclined. That's all. But the outcasts and the oddballs are in a perfect position to observe the social tide. And you'd better believe we notived the difference. All of our friends may have turned against us, unless we had none to begin with.

I was one of the uncool kids, in third grade, and my friends were quite emphatically not. They drifted away slowly, and I don't think I really noticed it until I approached one of them one day, and one of the girls I had always classified as "nasty" asked me smarmily, "Who said you could come here?" And it was all over."

 (I made the lines I really liked bigger and bolder...)
This is very profound and very true. It covers numbers 2, 3, and 4 of the constitution. Number 2, which is "Include, Don't Exclude" works here because the people who became "popular" pushed aside the unpopular people and, well, completely excluded and isolated them. Number 3, "Accept others for who they are" works in basically the same way. Young children don't understand people who aren't like them, so they'll have a harder time with this one, but if they could learn it at a younger age, everything would be so much less chaotic by the time they become real, vicious teenagers. Number 4, "Build Mutual Trust and Respect" doesn't work quite as well as the other two, but it still makes sense. These little kids only trust other people who are popular like themselves, and they sure as hell aren't going to respect some 'freak' who acts differently than themselves. Learning to cooperate with others is the first thing a person needs to accomplish in life- without teamwork, we wouldn't be where we are today. If ancient peoples had worked separately to build their own individual fires, they'd have all died out long ago, because it takes several people to discover something, and back then, they weren't the sharpest tools in the shed.

Dysfunctional.

I like that word. It describes my new ASTI family perfectly. :D

So I'm posting this here so that those of us in the "family" don't get confused and forget whose aunt is who and what not.

Starting off: I'm the transsexual father (gender confusion, anyone?) of Constance Wilde, the brother/sister (brister?) of Cristian Cortez, Mercedes Thorne, and Elizabeth Orsack, the son/daghter of Aakash Sainju, the uncle/aunt of Devin Liu, and the part-time owner of our dog, Fluffy (Elton Ng).

Mercedes is... I think she's the mother of Devin, although I'm not one hundred percent sure because a lot of people were talking at the same time...

Jesse Valdez is "the family friend"...

Aakash is always trying to disown me, and he "favors" Cristian so that complicates things...

Oh yes, and Freddy (Mr. Sutherland ftw) is the great, great aunt (no one knows exactly whose aunt, he's just the aunt), as well as being the family duck.

...our family has issues. Mostly gender issues. And, uh, species issues. But isn't that the best part? :D

A small bit, yes.

-post edited-

Political

Warning: This is a sorta rant-like poem I wrote last year. Thought I'd post it for English class. :)

Faceless heroes discarding bullets like tear drops

Where is the sanity?

To kill is to win,

A sad story passed down through generations

And worshiping the land that they fight on.

But without this contradiction there would be unity

The deathly dream of happiness

A cluster of memories from a long lost childhood…

You would not want this joy,

This relief, this comfort

Because everyone knows that good only comes from power

The power over a mass of living beings

Breathing, eating, sleeping, begging

And not even the miracle man who rose from the dead can save us now

‘Cept for the few who linger at his footsteps

Cherishing the very air he breathes

The rest will have to wait for further guidance from the kings of life

Our empty hollow eyes fixed on a flag

Red for blood, blue for bruises, and white for nothingness

Muttering the words we were taught as a child

No longer thinking

No longer choosing

No longer seeing the truth behind the lies.


© Susan Peevy

I Am

So recently in Writing class we've been making "I Am" poems. I think everyone did really well, although a lot of people showed serious signs of nervousness, including myself. We were focusing on "Golden Lines" (lines of the poem or essay that really struck a chord within you), which I think is a good idea, because it helps people to know where they phrased best, what's the most interesting about themselves, etc. Personally, I think my "Golden Line" was when I managed to pronounce "Ich liebe dich" ('I love you' in German) almost perfectly when I'd been sure I would mess up. Here's the rest:

I am from the old, out of tune piano that sits in my living room, covered in picture frames

and a layer of dust.

I am from “Ich liebe dich,” and “Je t’aime,” and “Vous son mon petit fleur.”

I am from my grandfather’s nature-filled water-color paintings and my mother’s shining thimble

collection, covering the living room walls and lining my memory.

I am from the wide map of Ireland hung on the wall outside my bedroom door that shows the lineage of Ireland and represents the blood of my family.

I am from the worn, rusted wind chimes placed randomly throughout my house.

I am from my mom’s fanciful pincushions and my dad’s vast Star Trek collection.

I am from the towering, wild rose bush out front and the jar of old collars our cats have worn

out over the years.

I am from my mom’s tuna and macaroni ‘n cheese casserole to my sister’s flavorsome salmon and rice dish.

I am from the French couple living across the street that just had a baby to the Japanese restaurant that never fails to make or stomachs grumble with hunger in the evening.

I am from our dark red front door with the finger mark I accidentally formed in the paint

when it had been drying.

I am from the Irish family that always speaks their minds.

I am from the tan and red house that is set back a little behind the others.

I am Susan Peevy.

It's not the best poem I've ever written, that's for sure. I mean, I think I got a little lazy when I was piecing it together because I followed the basic outline of "I am, I am, I am..." that we were told to do. There were a couple people who broke out of that. I am proud and amazed by them. :)

Odd Girl Out

Odd Girl Out - Reflection

-

I’ve been ‘unpopular’ and ‘weird’ ever since third grade. In fact, people used to think I was mentally disabled. Halfway through my third grade year I moved and had to go to a brand new school with faces I’d never seen before. I was basically a loner for the entire year except for brief interactions with my classmates, and there was one girl whose name I don’t remember. She had short red hair and lots of freckles, and she was a very confused girl. There was another girl who had short brown hair who was tall and was constantly getting into fights with the girl with red hair. Whenever they fought the red-head would consult me and we would be like best friends until she made up with the brunette- then I was the enemy. They would joke and make fun of me, along with a large group of other girls at the school. It was at those times that I would feel the most isolated, cut-off from my peers.

I didn’t actually have a real group of my own until middle school. In seventh grade I had a small but close group of friends consisting of about six or seven people. I was unbothered for most of seventh grade, and the first couple months of the next year, my last year, my eighth grade year. I had developed a new friend, closer than any of the others, but along with her came the burden of bullies- and lots of them. People I had dealt with but ignored before who had mostly ignored me in return were now attacking me and my friend.

For most of eighth grade I chose to laugh at these people. My friend and I made ourselves feel better by poking fun at them, telling ourselves that they were all idiots and that we were the ‘cool’ ones. But there was one boy that really got to my nerves, really made my teeth grind. At one point it became physical, and after that he left me alone for quite a while. But then he started bothering my friend and me again, talking to us when he knew we didn’t like him.

There was also a small group of seventh graders that harassed us for most of the year; three of them. It started when I rescued a worm from murder and they called me a freak. What I didn’t know at the time was that they walked home the same way I did with my friend… They constantly shouted things at us as they rode past on their bikes, and sometimes they would stop in the middle of the sidewalk, forcing us to walk into the street to get around. At one point they followed us, running into the backs of our legs with their tires.

The worst part about it is that they only did these things for the same reason that my friend and I would poke fun at the bullies in our own grade- to make themselves feel better. They wanted security, a higher status, and we were just perfect targets to get what they wanted. It was almost as if we just stepped up to be their enemies.

Bullying has been part of history since apes first stood on two feet. It used to consist of one ape shoving another, one ape throwing rocks at another, or a group of apes shunning another ape. Bullying has stayed with us, complicating itself and twisting itself to turn into things like blackmail, torture, murder, rape, and others. Bullying has always been a way of making oneself feel better. By bringing others down your position in life increases. In fact, politics have a lot of bullying in them if you think about it. Spreading rumors as a way to make the other candidate look bad, using secrets against them. Bullying is almost a necessary part of human existence. War, religion, and politics are heavily discussed every day on the media, a weapon used to backstab others.

Modern day bullying in school seems to have flourished. Instead of just stealing money and lunches and beating scrawnier kids into the dust, people have developed more… refined ways of doing things. There’s always the classic whispering to each other and continuously glancing at the target then laughing as they walk past. There’s posting cruel and (hopefully) untrue things about the target online (Facebook, anyone?). But these things aren’t the worst of it. Some are clever enough to set up humiliating stages- like telling someone their crush likes them back and that the person wants to talk to them. The target, who is too blind to wonder why this particular person that they don’t know much about other than the fact that they’re not always very nice, goes after their crush. Then, in the middle of a large crowd, the target will say his or her feelings out loud… And their crush will reject them.

With boys it isn’t as bad. Teenage boys are still in a time of “I don’t like you so I’m going to shove you and steal your money”. It’s the teenage girls that must be kept an eye on. Gossip, rumors and lies are possibly the worst part of middle school- especially when a rumor was started that’s true and you find out that it was started by someone you trust. That’s when it really stings. Sure you begin to feel desperate when everyone is being mean, but when you thought you knew someone, thought they were your friend, thought they were someone you could rely on, that’s when it aches.

In my years of high school I look forward to being able to relax from bullying for a while. I’m hoping that, at least for a time, people my age can be kind and considering to each other and that people don’t gang up on others. In the next four years I will remember to be kind to everyone, especially the people who don’t really have anyone else. Everyone deserves to have at least someone on their side.