current goals

Reading over my whole blog, I can come to one conclusion: my goals have changed as my writing has matured.

By that I mean, quite simply, the blog has given me what I consider to be a much more sophisticated and well-rounded writing style (though still opinionated.) The greatest thing that I can honor the blog with is that it opened my eyes to a myriad of ideas and thoughts that I alone wouldn't have been able to conceive. I continue to be surprised and intrigued by my classmates' writing, and I am so grateful to be able to nurse this opportunity. In fact, it's not just in blogs, but in our class discussions. I find that when the class stops and thinks about something together, we reach a level of greatness that none of us could have assumed on our own.

At first, I thought I'd talk about 'topics,' like things I like or have been doing recently, since that's what I'd seen in other blogs, and it pretty much seemed like the only option in something like that. But since then, I have broadened my horizons and learned that there are so many other things you can do with a blog, especially with a connected group of students like ourselves. I made a lot of progress in how to express my opinions and reasoning properly, which I find to be very valuable both in a blog and elsewhere.

Reading blogs on the internet has been a very joyful experience for me, even when it's not someone I know. I feel like I can have debates and conversations with anyone, anywhere who decides to share their thoughts and ideas, and I can! Admittedly I haven't made many comments, but the ones I have made I tried to put a lot of thought into. This new quarter, the last quarter, I'll bite the bullet and make lots of comments.

Oh, and I'd also like to start posting more art. I'm in bed right now with mono and pink eye (oh gods!) so I'm totally not about to go get up and scan this but here's a webcam photo.

It was my first time attempting a comic-book style. I drew it with fine/regular point Sharpie on notebook paper, but I had to up the contrast so it wasn't as blurry, which means you can't see the detail. so later I'm going to scan it. I'm proud of this because I drew it without sketching anything in pencil! Some of the proportions are off, and the rifle could be drawn better, but I never know how to draw guns anyway. I learned a lot about drawing in this style by doing this, and it was really fun but my Sharpie ran out of ink so it'll be a few days before I do something like this again. It looks so badass. I should draw more badass things. Would it be a bad idea to post an art dump with like 5 pictures? I'll do it anyway, since this is my blog.

One thing I'd like to get out of my blog is critique, but I don't think this will happen. It's a dream though. I guess if I asked for it it would be more likely so I'll start asking for it.

Time Traveler's Wife III

Dear wives,

I don't really know what to talk about/I kinda feel like shit right now so I'm just going to go to the ol' open-ended character analysis.

Henry. Oh, Henry, so strong and manly you are. So stunning, handsome, smart, etc, and I know that makes everyone swoon, but I can't help but be... bored. Of course, Henry isn't without his flaws, which are... being temperamental and time traveling I guess. Then again, this is coming from a man who can't even appreciate his own ability to time travel, which of course the author makes an attempt to justify. Yet, Henry seems too perfect. That, and the whole relationship he shares with Clare is a little creepy.

I'm not just pulling it out of my ass, I mean it's seriously cause for concern. He forces child Clare to house him and get him clothes and food, and spends much time "playing" with her... teaching her French? Alone, in an isolated field. At like, age 30+. I don't care if the man claimed he was my future wife, if I was six years old and I kept seeing a naked man who knew my name and everything about me, I would be out of there. I guess the book just kind of expects you not to notice the ridiculous age difference between the two. And Clare keeps this man in her mind for practically her whole life.

Now now, not as if true love isn't possible, but people change. I find it hard to believe that Henry would happen upon a beautiful, brilliant redhead at age six and woo her for the rest of her life. Because Clare literally stays totally faithful in waiting for like eighty years. I suppose this guy is just too good to be true, except, you know, he harasses your childhood memories and is gone for large amounts of time without warning. I really don't care what anyone says. No five year old can read college textbooks and contemplate the theory of evolution... not even Gary Stu here.

On to Clare... Hm. Is it just me or is the whole sexism thing totally coming into play in modern literature nowadays? I can't even begin to describe how much Clare irks me. She is the stereotypical faithful wife, waiting forever, never losing faith in her husband although he's been known to play quite a few shenanigans. She's also beautiful and pale with long, pretty hair and a sweet face. She's also an ~*~*artist~*~* which means she's in touch with her emotions, apparently. And her emotions are boring, really, really boring. I saw no multi-facetedness to this character whatsoever, and it continued to make me angry through the duration of the book.

I'm no feminist, but I do like my characters to be interesting.

It seems like you guys found these characters interesting. Why? Please describe to be what you thought about them was so intriguing, because I don't get it.

-Irene

P.S. Please ignore the snark in this letter. I'm kind of pissed off.

case against conception

As many of you know, the Earth is grossly overpopulated with all the wrong things. Not only massive energy and resource consumers such as ourselves and the animals and crops we cultivate, but our carbon footprints... the pollutants that we "require" to lead a normal life in our current society.

We are very conceited beings. We value our individual lives above all else, even our entire race. This is because we do not like to think of ourselves as members of a collective, rather, individuals, which personally I find to be laughable. Our "superior intelligence" does not divide us so from the rest of the animal kingdom, and it especially does not divide us from ourselves. This is not arguable. This is a matter of complete truth which we once understood, and hopefully, in time, we will understand again.

Nearly every person I talk to, young or old, wants to be a parent at some point. Who wouldn't? Not only are our major role models parental figures and parents themselves, it's our instinct to want to conceive, and throughout human history it has served our species well. It continues to serve us well, from a certain perspective, but now that we have begun to forcibly tip the natural balance in our favor, the consequences are visible and drastic.

So, what is our solution? There are many obvious solutions, one being something we encourage in the unmarried masses yet scandalize amoung the married couples- remaining without children. By scandalize I refer of course to the "terrible and cruel" method the People's Republic of China uses to regulate its' population, which still bursts at the seams. Of course, a nation like ours would never hold such a blatant noose; not at all, we prefer to encrypt ours into the fabric of our financial scheme.

We are not rabbits. We are intellectually and physically capable of refusing to have children. But we live in a society that permits and helps its' residents to help only themselves, and lead only the most comfortable lifestyle in parenting. The average age of mothers is creeping up. Women do not want to waste their youth with babies, because our medicine allows them to wait two, even three decades past biological adulthood to conceive. We want to have children, we think our knowledge and DNA is unique and precious and our legacy simply must carry on. We wish and aim to be better parents than our own, and we find the miracle of birth magical and special enough to be a necessity in our timelines.

Continuing from just the age at which women give birth and the selfish comfort associated with it, it is ever so evident that we are becoming lazier and lazier parents. Look back to the obese family of the mother who was never taught to cook. She will not teach her children to cook, and she will probably never wean herself from fast food entirely. Her parents were much too lazy to spend their time building their daughter an ideal lifestyle. The cheapest and fastest was enough, which is a grotesque warping of priorites if you ask me. Did she have a choice? No, she was not aware of her choices, if they were hers to make. It's likely that her parents in their negligence stripped her of many choices as well.

It's no sort of complex problem to me. It is very simple... When people decide to have many children for their own enjoyment and satisfaction, even if they are not financially able to provide for their children the oppertunities that they should want, it is clearly a selfish endeavor. Did the parents ever stop to think..? It is one thing to want children, yes, perhaps we all truly wish to raise a child of our own. Adoption would definitely solve this simple wish. It is another when in our overpopulated society people value their own DNA above the wellbeing of the entire human species, which is in fact jeopardized in lifestyle and health by this overpopulation.

The problem immediately segways into the environment, even ignoring the situations of those who are incapable of becoming employed due to unfortunate circumstances. Where will our food come from when our population doubles? In America alone, the majority of citizens not only lead sedentary lifestyles but also are completely dependent upon major corporations for our food, these corporations which then must destroy grassland, forest, and other environments to make way for our crops, our chicken, our cattle. Americans do not want to return to the farming regime most of their ancestors relied on for centuries, they would prefer to fuel this destruction. Americans indirectly and intentionally destroy these environments for their own personal comfort, never looking back, and they are not alone.

Even food is not the beginning of the end of this problem, which, like so much else, is coated in hidden costs. Energy is a large one, our main supply being coal. Recently, we decided to build several nuclear powerplants to supply us with our growing need. I was shocked and appalled upon mentioning this to adults I trust and getting a supportive response. My own father praised Obama's decision for it's "clean energy." But radioactivity is never clean, once we strip the material of its' energy, they must be placed somewhere, and they are highly toxic. We cannot bury them, for they will enter our water supply eventually. There is no way to relieve ourselves of this poisonous material and we are resorting to it because we refuse to stop. We refuse, amoung all the consequences, to sacrifice our lifestyle for our future as a race, which we continually jeopardize with every selfish move we make.

I'll end this by bringing it back home. My father had four children with two wives. Each of his wives would not have married him if he were not willing to father their children, because children are apparantly the most important thing. I loved my mother, and I do not need to ask her why she did this, even if that was possible. I don't care if this whole opinionated shitstorm of an essay is biased and rude and cruel, I think it is the truth. Most girls I talk to want children.

You know what, girls? You may have your babies, but I beg you, please, do not concieve them. There is so much that we can already do to help this situation, this dire trend, and that is just one thing. An adopted child will be as much your own as one with your DNA, and guess what, we all share the same DNA, so it's not like your gene pool is going to end with you.

For all I can say about this topic, it's essentially that I've made the desicion never to give birth until this overpopulation is corrected.

Time Traveler's Wife II

Dear wife people,

I made more progress on this book. I thought about the concept of time travel, narrarative style, which is the style that Ms. Niffenegger as well as many other authors have used to make sense of the incomprehensible time travel. Narrarative style is the simplest and also the most confusing of ways to tell about time travel in a story or a movie. It happens like this, when a character realizes something in the present and then goes back in time to fix this something, or just realizes something that he would later change at all. But it really doesn't make sense! There's no way his future self would be unaware of it to begin with if he changed his past self. He'd know exactly what was happening all the time, don't you think?

Another perplexing thing about time travel is the duplication of matter and energy in the vessel (in this case, the vessel is our hero.) Isn't it more of a paradox than time travel to think that a person could go back in time and encounter themselves? Yes, I think so, because that would mean our traveler duplicated himself. Think about it. There is only a certain amount of matter in the world. This amount of matter can only exist in one place at one time, i.e. our hero's body. Though we've studied particles traveling close to light speed and discovered that they experience time faster, or manipulate the time around them by traveling so fast. And ok, so they can do this. Perhaps I will jump into a wormhole and emerge 2 years earlier. Would the wormhole, in the process of transporting me through the fabric of spacetime, duplicate my matter (the matter in my body)? No.

Time travel, to me, would have to have a way of redistributing the matter. Perhaps sucking the matter of the past into oblivion with the addition of the traveling matter? There are many mysteries of space that we can only guess at.

This is not off topic! It's just on the topic of time travel itself rather than the mundane and sluggish romance part of the novel.

I ask you fellow readers! What is your time travel philosophy? Do you agree with Ms. Niffenegger's theory?

consumerist landslide

As we know, no trend can continue forever. We are constantly changing, our trends rising and falling at constant and inconstant rates. Our lives are measured by these perfect and imperfect numbers.

This is no new thought, though it is as frequently ignored nowadays as it was in the distant past. What is the philosophy behind immediate gain? What can our disregard for the far-off future tell us about ourselves?

I am in the middle of a consumerist catastrophe, a blatant ignorance towards that shared future. Perhaps this is an overstatement, but it's something that I think is true.

This landslide, this perplexing strategy that warps the most basic of priorities, has come upon us, and we have let it. We have let it because those of us that benefit from it would benefit less from supporting the future-friendly alternative, and those of us that do not benefit as much do not have the means or the say to change anything.

So some people suffer. OK, they'll suffer, but it is for the greater good. But what greater good is that? The good of who, and what? Certainly not the good of our mother, our one and only, our almighty home. Definitely not the good of the majority, the sweating and cursing masses, the unfaithful.

What can we do? The keyword is not what, but we. We are power in numbers. A common goal can bring us to a power greater than that of any we have ever seen. Numbers is all it is, a less than predictable trend. A wonderful and unlikely odd.

They would like us to think of them as supreme. The best, the richest, the most powerful. The uncommon, the super, the unchanged. The immaculate.

Who are we to argue? They bring us what we need- no, what we think we want. What we need is simple. We want more than we need, always. Such has kept us alive for countless generations.

I've negated the moral complexity of the human race before, and I will elaborate. What supreme race are we who cannot, will not think? Who wastes what we make on the most frivolous and destructive of goals? Who cannot prioritize, who knows no bounds, who believes himself to be separate from a common identity? Who uses his imagination to force injustice?

No, this is not a natural world we live in. We cannot allow ourselves to believe that we are above the past, if we ignore our future and thus create for that future an inferior destiny. Destiny does not exist, however, it is fickle. As fickle as our minds and the decisions we make to shape them.


On another note, the other day I talked to someone in Oakland. They told me they hated East Oakland and though the whole of Oakland was terrible and crime-ridden. Though I don't live there, I can't bring myself to agree. I've seen people shoot at each other in East Oakland, and I still think that Oakland is a beautiful place. Even the slums can be beautiful. I love the architecture and the diversity. Oakland is a great place, full of art and trees. I would like to live there. I think it is more beautiful than here, though it is beautiful here if you look.

Speaking of moving, I made progress on the exhange student program. I plan to go to France, Senegal, Italy, Tibet, or Japan. I have to decide mainly if I want to do language learning or community service, because I would very much like to help people as well as study languages. I think I will probably go for language learning first, though. I am very excited. All of the countries are so beautiful and full of culture, and it will be hard to choose.

I am very scatterbrained today. On the plus side, I think I've done well on the CAHSEE tests. I think they were very easy, but we'll see. I'm going to go and apply for the PSAT soon.

cheaters and thieves

Though March is the longest month of the school year, I think it’s been good so far. Granted, it’s but a third over, still I am optimistic as to what it will bring.

I was thinking more of the perhaps immoral things students do in our school, but are certainly not confined to our school alone, things like stealing and cheating. I have never copied a paper and considered it cheating, though I have copied countless papers. It’s no thing of shame to me! Teachers might have this delusion that homework helps us understand the material better, but it’s really more like a waste of my time. I mean, I don’t want to spend 6 long hours at school only to have extra hours of schoolwork when I get home- I already learned it! I’m just copying information onto a sheet of paper, and all that is… well, it is but a waste of my precious time. Which is precisely why I copy.

I can’t admit to always knowing everything all the time, of course, but homework is usually very basic. And I do my part, I’ve lent probably more than 75% of my assignments to other students, if only because I cannot refuse to help mend a predicament that befalls me so frequently.

So for me, it’s never a conscious decision not to do any homework, but more of a forgotten task. I allow homework to be swept under the rug because I don’t think it’s useful. I hardly ever find myself looking at past assignments to study, in fact…

Well that brings me to an interesting point. I don’t really study, at all. What is studying? Sometimes I’ll discuss a topic with someone, but I can’t say I’m familiar with the hours behind textbooks trying to cram information. For me it’s like, if I know it then that’s because we went over it enough in class or I already knew it. If I don’t, tough luck for me! I’m not about to shove irrelevant information down my own throat on my own time.

Well, enough of that. “Cheating” has been addressed previously by many of my peers.

Which leads me to stealing. Stealing is far worse, a despicable sort of thing far below the “claiming of another’s intellectual property.” I saw someone steal something on Monday, and was nothing short of horrified. So horrified, that, despite myself I could do nothing but witness the act. The sleazy look on the kid’s face as he all-too-skillfully removed a few desired items from an unsuspecting pocket, and placed them in his sleazier inside coat compartment. I glared at this kid, and I sill wonder why I didn’t move to slap him or grab his sticky fingers in my indignant fist and verbally deny him masculinity. Or at least tell the victim that something had been stolen from him.

While I doubt whatever was stolen was very important, it was someone’s belongings. It feels terrible having something stolen, you feel duped and depraved. So I took it upon myself to promise that next time I saw anything like this happening ever again, I would do something, even if I felt too boiled-over with rage to move. Yes, it is popular philosophy that those who remain idle in the face of injustice are as bad as the wrongdoers themselves… I will not stand for such a title.

Time Traveler's Wife I

Dear wife people,

I must admit that my expectations of The Time Traveler’s Wife were no short of poor. I am not one for romance novels, and this science fiction-y one was no exception. Which isn’t to say that I’m dissatisfied- no, I rather prefer my cruel outlook as it better provides an opportunity to critique. Of the many things for which I can be glad, I am glad that this book at least attempts to interest me, unlike some popular teenage romance novels... Yes, although I rank romance novels below those of almost any other genre, I cannot deny that some are better than others. Volumes better.

So, rather than dwell on my dislike of the matter and my immature prejudice towards it’s genre, I’ll focus more on what you, fellow readers, might like to hear from me. What is your favorite part of the book so far? Is it one of the characters, the writing style, perhaps? Is it the concept and execution of the time traveler alone? I found it interesting the way time traveling was pursued by the author… she tells it through his eyes as a negative experience, something to dread rather than anticipate. But indeed our hero must try to anticipate it at all times, wherever he is, to whenever else he is thrown.

To call time-traveling negative is probably considered by many to be inhuman, indeed, for it is everyone’s dream to travel even a few minutes or seconds back in time. So when we are confronted with time travel as something to dread, it is alien, isn’t it? I couldn’t dream of a more other-worldly prospect. That was interesting for me… an attempt by the author, perhaps, to ground the possibility of time travel.

Finally, the thing I have to say about this book is that the characters left me annoyed. Particularly in the beginning of the book, in Clare’s first entry, how she describes her longing for her husband and confronts him boldly and physically with affection even though she is well aware that he hasn’t met her yet. I can see why this would be relevant, yes, it is definitely an homage to undying love. For anyone who is truly in love would not care if their partner felt similarly, no? But it felt much too soon in the novel to introduce their affair. It was much too prompt. I could not understand why Clare felt the need to bombard her unknowing victim with affection even though she knew it was not mutual. I'd prefer to see the relationship develop before having it shoved in my face. Then again, the book explicitly states even in its’ title that this story is one of love faced with the supernatural.

My negative thoughts could be because I find the whole immortal nature of love concept to be sappy and overplayed, which is at best a shallow opinion. However, I am eager to hear what you all have to say about it, if not solely because I cannot find it in myself to speak well of it.

Sincerely, Irene

no such thing

Ah, so much of what I've learned is false. Today, adolescence.


In class we talked briefly of adolescence, a nonexistent period in the human lifespan that people have built ridiculous ideals around. What am I? Some people will call me a child. Some would call me a teenager still, but none would call me an adult. Is this simply because I am less mature?

Not only am I fully physically mature, but I have worked hard to attain a level of mental maturity. Yet, I've read and heard so much denouncing my maturity levels. My brain isn't fully developed? I still need time to "develop" emotional maturity as well? What kind of bullshit are they throwing at me this time? A woman my age is able to start a family in many cultures. So if theoretically I could do such a thing... that leaves intellect as the remaining factor in maturity.

Hmm, but there are several things wrong there, as well. The test I'll take soon to pass high school is only things I learned before I entered high school. That's some kind of mockery, isn't it? It's like they don't expect people my age to learn anything in this "unstable" time of our lives. Not only that, they expect me to start learning but the bare minimum once I enter high school. Is this getting hard to follow?

I'm constantly subjected because of my age. People my age are supposed to act a certain way, dress a certain way, and even eat a certain way in the media. But once I'm "an adult," these things will appear childish. To me, they already appear childish.

I come to school to learn. I won't accept my time being wasted, though I feel this happens a lot. I want to learn what I want to learn- practical applications of algebra, thought-provoking literature, the origin and structure of life, past and present practical politics, truthful, intensive history if only from the past century, the list can go on.

It's not even that I'm being taught the wrong things. I just feel like I'm wasting my time sometimes. Why do I have to waste my time in a pointless physical education class that neglects the purpose within its' title and instead teaches me to dread exercise? Why do I have to fill out worksheets instead of discussing the topic with knowledgeable people in the field? How much of the six hours a day I spend here could be better-spent?

No, I spend plenty of time in my classes... I cannot just wish for something I think is ideal. I am probably wrong according to many people.

What is the greatest level of maturity, then? Is it the firm belief in equality, in the power to shape the future, things time-tested by fathering generations?

I could be patronizing here, but I think I am mature. Prove me wrong.

spring

Walking home from school every day, I've noticed the very first touches of spring- I have watched it gradually and surely grace withered plants with buoyant blooms of new life. Later come the travelling songbirds, beautiful and talented, and the early sun. Spring is my favorite season. It is happy and sweet. It takes the cold, long months of painful winter and churns the lost leaves into beautiful displays of soft color on the streets.

So, what has spring brought me so far? Warm weather, plentiful tangerines, which I love. I've also been feeling the urge to go outside more, as is typical of me when the weather is warm. (I have this circulation issue that turns my skin bluish purple if it isn't warm enough to stimulate proper bloodflow... which I find both unsightly and humiliating.) Spring brings me relief.

Most importantly, however, spring has brought me March 4th.

For those of you who didn't know, March 4th was a fabulous day of protest with a magnificent turnout of students, teachers, and other like-minded citizens. It was a fabulous display of our power in numbers. For even if we are powerless teenagers "doomed" to face and accept the education system because it is the law and it is an ancient and respectable establishment, we still hold a huge power in our hands, but only when we unite.

As students, it is an obligation of ours to research the background of society- the past, how it makes the present, and most importantly, where it might take us in the future. The future, yes! The distant future which we humans cast aside with such reckless abandon. The near future which we just barely aim to please. These are opinions, of course, but opinions that strengthen every day I see decisions made for our futures.

I've talked to my dad about my education before. I've been to private school before where I learned little, definitely less than my friends at public school. I left private school in the seventh grade not knowing algebra or basic geological science, subjects commonplace for my school's public counterparts. So I knew that there was no major plus to going to private schools besides it looking good on your record and placing you in upper-class society (which is only a plus by shallow standards if you ask me.) And while obviously, other private establishments might do a better job, it baffles me that a pathetic place like the one I attended got such acclaim by parents and other airheaded people "trusted" enough to make the reputation of the school.

He told me that I only had two more years of high school, and that any place in the world that we could go wouldn't make much of a difference in just my last two years. This infuriated me, because it was a blatant disregard of my time... and a reflection of what I see many parents thinking.

"It's just school, we all had to do it. Just get through your required years trying to get good grades. Nobody likes it."

This is almost the complete opposite of what I'd like to hear coming from parents. To me, parents should encourage their children- their children to whom they have passed the great burden and power of the future- to make the changes they find necessary. To stress the importance of an education. Not school itself, but an educated mind, which is far more important. People who never completed the school system that America calls essential have grown up to be far greater men and women than the people who just did school since they were told they had to because they valued their own education- not this foggy idea of what all people "should" know.

Are you following me here? I'm trying to say that, apart from the education system reform that needs to take place, what should also take place is the birth of interest in our youth. They, rather we, need to see the importance of a literate and educated mind, the relevance of what we are being taught, and the opportunities and discoveries waiting to be made through our actions.

When I saw all the faces of my peers at March 4th's protest, I was filled with excitement, a flickering and bright pooling of hope which still rests at the center of my mind. I am excited to make this country, this world a better place for us, and our children. Our future, which is of the greatest magnitude of all.

End note: While I attended the protest with great vigor, the following morning proved that I had unfortunately become ill... again. I am sick of this. Luckily, no longer sick (a bit weak) but I hate missing school for these unexpected reasons. I did have time to read my reading group book, though, so I'm excited to talk about it.

I'm sorry this is late, and I have no further excuse.