Macon Dead, Jr.  “Solid, rumbling, likely to erupt without prior notice, Macon kept each member of his family awkward with fear” (Morrison 10).This quote is expressing the aggression and anger Macon Dead, Jr. has towards his family. He keeps them “awkward with fear”, meaning that his fear makes them all so uncomfortable that they are afraid of him, just the way he likes it. He is unpredictable with his anger, but his family knows he will “erupt” someone or another. “His hatred of his wife glittered and sparked in every word he spoke to her. The disappointment he felt in his daughters sifted down on them like ash, dulling their buttery complexions and choking the lilt out of what should have been girlish voices” (Morrison 10).Macon Dead, Jr. makes his hatred of his wife and disappointment in his daughters seem like something he is proud of. He also seems to enjoy putting them down and “dulling their buttery complexions”. Macon Dead, Jr. seems to have the mindset of a psychological pedophile. These actions make him feel better about himself and make him stand above others, something that he needs in life. “The way he mangled their grace, wit, and self-esteem was the single excitement of their days. Without the tension and drama he ignited, they might not have known what to do with themselves” (Morrison 11).Macon Dead, Jr.’s daughters have lived their lives around their father’s demands, and if those demands, one day, are absent, his daughters would not know “what to do with themselves”. It seems as though Macon Dead, Jr. has brainwashed them into having their lives revolve around him. He is the center of their lives, but not in the positive way most may think. By impressing their father, they gain “grace, with, and self-esteem”, the key factors of personal acceptance. They are used to their father’s abuse, and without it, his daughters are not who they have grown up to be.

Sometimes there are times when one has to cry. The stress of school, friends, pressure, life, builds up and one day you must release it. I feel like my bottle of stress is overflowing and I am going to go home after school today and just cry. Not only is it just a good way to release emotion, but it makes you feel better immediately afterwards. No one can cry on command but one may keep it all inside. It’s kind of weird that I have been planning the day that I am going to cry. I mean, when am I supposed to have time? There are so many other responsibilities that I have that take up my “me time”. Never again will I wait so long to let it all out. I have great friends who will always be there for me but this is the time when they cannot be there. It’s up to me to solve myself and let off some steam. I hope I can do this in a smart way. There is so much that goes on behind a mere smile.

Music is the entertainment for the inspirational. It contains vocal and instrumental sounds to produce beauty, form, harmony, and expression of emotion. There are the devoted and there are the skeptical. There are many different genres: alternative, blues, classic rock, comedy, electronic, folk, gospel, hard rock, hip hop, indie, jazz, latin, mash-ups, new age, oldies, pop, r&b, rap, soul, reggaeton, rock, soundtrack, techno, and world. At least these are the only kinds that are in my iTunes. Music is a way of resolution and a place of wallowing yet it can also inaugurate dancing, a form a movement used to express emotion. At least that is how I describe dance. Dancing is a rhythmic transition of body parts, moving to the beat of the music. It makes me feel happy when I’m sad and it makes me have fun when I’m down. Music is my release. It’s what I do. What’s yours?

In The Great Gatsby, Nick, the main character and narrator, writes about Gatsby, the one person Nick completely idealizes. Gatsby is all that Nick wants to be: rich, handsome, social, etc. My question is: Why is Gatsby the only person that Nick aspires to be? Is it because Gatsby is accessible? Gatsby IS, in fact, Nick’s neighbor, therefore, right in front of Nick. If Jim were in a different location, would Nick have similar idealizations and aspirations? Yes, I believe those would be the same but he would find someone else to idealize. Maybe even a similar person, a neighbor. Neighbors are very accessible and one may always have an excuse to talk to them. Although I have only read one chapter of this book, I am excited to learn more about Nick’s life and admiration for Gatsby. 

A daily experience of nature. A new start. A song by John Legend.

The sun rises every morning as the beginning of a fresh new day. A new day to achieve. A new day to screw up. A new day to forget about the past. This new day is up to each individual and I personally like to watch the sun rising. I love staying up all night and sitting outside very early in the morning and watching the sunrise and the area get brighter by the moment. It is one of the all natural things that happens in our man made modern society of technology. It is also one of the only things that will never change and never become “modernized”.

Movies and parties can be classified as common types of entertainment, but the most exhilarating one, to me, is experiencing the thrill of nature’s actions. Although it is mildly intimidating, the excitement of sitting and watching the sun rising under nature’s commands makes me want to experience it more often. Although I have not been out to watch the sun rise recently, it is one of the top things on my to do list.

So this past weekend was semiformal. It was on Saturday night from 7 – 11. My friends and I arrived close to 7:45 pm. We walked in and saw about 50 people standing around. This was quite humorous because the space that was rented was enormous compared to the meager number of people. No one really started dancing until about 8:30. There were a much larger amount of girls than boys, and although the formal part pretty much sucked, my friends and I made it fun by acting crazy. We took a party bus on the way home and everyone was standing up dancing with each other, music blasting on full volume, making the ride home quite enjoyable. My date and I are friendly so it was not that awkward, but some of my friends were set up, which made their night awkward until they got to know their dates. Overall the night went pretty well and beat my expectations for it. I can’t wait until next year’s semiformal.

On iTunes, there is a new release movie called “Purple Violets”. It is the story about this woman named Patti who is an unhappy, married woman in her 30’s. She has a best friend named Kate. They have been best friends since college. When Patti and Kate are out having dinner one night, they run into their boyfriends from college, who were both best friends, Brian and Murph. Brian goes over to say hi to his ex girlfriend, Patti, while Murph stays at their table because he is too scared to talk to Kate after he cheated on her, ten years before. Although the movie is a bit slow, it is a great movie to watch about how old friends and lovers can never lose what they had, even if they did break up or not see each other for more than ten years. Since Kate found out that Murph cheated on her in college, she has never been able to really trust a guy as much as she trusted him. She knew that she could never be with someone who cheated on her, but in her heart, she still loved him. Even when they finally start talking many years after college, Kate can still never forget about Murph’s actions when he was younger, and she doesn’t let him forget it either. Kate’s love for Murph overpowers her hatred for his actions because it is not he who she hates, just his mistake. You have to know when to forgive and forget, and sometimes that is all you can do, even in the worst situations. From seeing this movie, it seems that love is a hard thing to lose. When you are forced to not be with someone, it doesn’t mean that you stop loving them. Ever. When I get into college, I hope that I can have an optimistic outlook on love and relationships because so many people take their friends for granted, therefore resulting in this well known quote “you don’t know what you had until its gone”.

10th grade is the year to start really looking at colleges. This spring break I am going on the college tour. I am very intimidated because college is such a huge jump from high school. It is even bigger than elementary school to high school. College is like a whole new chapter in your life when for the past six years all I have been doing is filling up more pages of the same chapter, teenage years. When I leave high school, I will never be able to go back and that is one of the scariest thoughts that I have ever had. There is such a variety of choices from liberal arts schools, to preppy New England ones, to casual state schools, to single sex religious schools, to party schools. How am I supposed to choose one? The preparation to get into these schools is not only tremendous, but also so intimidating. So many things are taken into consideration for acceptance. There is the SAT, the ACT, the subject tests, GPA, extracirricular activities, recommendations, interviews, essays, and so much more. What if I am not strong in one of these categories? This is what determines the rest of my life. Getting ready for college is a time consuming process. What if your test scores and grades say that you are ready, but what if you are not emotionally ready? I am only 15 years old you know.

On 12/3/2007, a student from Loyola, Roman, was in a major car accident with his two friends. The senior was driving them home from school on the freeway and all of a sudden the back tire blew out. He lost control of the car and hit the middle divider of the freeway. There, a different car hit them and the car was thrown to the middle of the freeway. There, they were hit by another car and swerved back to the middle divider. At the middle divider, a big truck came and smashed the car the three boys were driving in. The senior who was driving was just a little bit bruised up. The sophomore sitting in the front seat had minor cuts, but the sophomore sitting in the back seat was badly hurt. Not only did he get a concussion, but also his face went through the window, damaging it. He broke his jaw and bit off part of his tongue. It is a miracle that they are all alive today. If any one of the cars, or the truck, hit them at a different angle, then they would have all been paralyzed. Why did this particular accident have to happen to him? Why not someone else? This nice, funny, outgoing boy happens to be the victim of a tragedy. A tragedy that could have ended his life. Why? Was it supposed to happen or was it just a coincidence? Why.

10/13

Flashback Day is next week. I am pondering what I should be, but as I was wondering, I questioned whether the people 30 years ago thought that 30 years later, our generation would be flashbacking into their generation. I do not know how time works, but I would really like to find out how. The fact how you can erase something that you write down, but you cannot undo an action that you did is an impossible question to answer. There are so many things that almost everyone in the world would like to undo, fix, alter, take out of their life. Things they never wish happened. But because of how time works, flashing back will never be an action that we can accomplish. Even though scientific technology is very advanced, there is no promising future in the study of time. In the past 10 years, so much has changed with the world including fashions, technology, education, evolution, etc. It makes me wonder how life will be in 10 years.