Squirrel Baggers United

Stress Sickness

2011-02-22T21:16:00.001-08:00

I may literally be making myself sick with stress. Every time I start thinking about all the stuff I have to do and have to think about, my stomach gets all crazy-bad-feeling. This is the Least Fun Thing. On top of it, I'm doing that teenage-meta-angst thing where I feel even worse about acknowledging that I feel bad. GO AWAY, FIFTEEN-YEAR-OLD SELF.

I'll avoid making a list of all of the things I've done wrong or forgotten in the past 24 hours, but let's say it's a bit daunting, and this is probably the worst I've felt about something that is entirely my fault in years. I post this on a somewhat public (although probably pretty unread) blog because somehow, at some level, it feels good to admit this. SHIT FUCKING SUCKS RIGHT NOW. AND THAT IS OKAY. It WILL get better. I will make it get better. I will drag myself by my teeth through this mess and come out on the other side. It won't be perfect. Fuck, it might not even be good. But at least it will be over.

Fortunately, this isn't the way I do everything in life. I'm usually okay. I'm just in a bad spot for awhile. And mentally, emotionally, physically, I can't give 100% to everything that I need to do. I don't know why. Some people can. Do I have ADD or some other crazy shit? Probably. But I'm not going to get treatment for it anytime soon, so I have to do the best with what I have. And for some people, that won't be good enough. Sorry.

I've gone too long beating myself up and being beat up (figuratively, not literally) for not being good enough, and I'm not going to take it anymore. So yeah, I'm wasting time right now. But doing shit like this helps my mind make sense of it all. Although at some point I do need to stop babbling. Let's make that point now.

--Jon

Sometimes Awesome Things Happen

2011-01-16T01:13:00.001-08:00

Tonight was one of those nights when awesome things happened.

At Amy's Place, wonderful church youth groups and other fabulous church-going people make and serve meals to Amy's Place on a regular basis. For many months, I thought, "Why can't a Jewish organization do the same? That would be so cool!" By chance, the campus Chabad organization wanted to get involved. Tonight, they made and served a great dinner to the homeless and street-involved youth at Amy's Place.

This night was awesome for several reasons.

1. There has never been a Jewish organization at Amy's Place. The kids know that they're supported by various churches, but showing them that they have the respect of [part of] the Jewish community hopefully meant a lot to them.

2. The kids at Amy's Place were interested. The rabbi, his wife, and the Chabad volunteers talked with the youth (which is more than most volunteers do) about Judaism. This was a huge step, because I don't think many of them understand what it means to be Jewish. Occasionally, I hear anti-Semitic comments from some of the youth, but seeing and talking with real, live Jews really opened their eyes. I hope.

3. Even the most unruly youth were intrigued and polite. I was unsure about how they would react with a bunch of orthodox Jews speaking in Hebrew and serving Jewish food, but there was more respect than I have seen in a long time.

Seeing the youth at Amy's Place and the Chabad members interacting was an amazing spectacle. In a way, it was just people hanging out, playing pool, and chatting. But on the other hand, these are two very different groups of people, groups that rarely interact. Tonight, we all took a step in repairing the world, tikkun olam.

--Elie

A Dream Come True?

2011-01-14T14:00:00.000-08:00

OH MY GAWD I AM WRITING A BLOG.

I realized the other day that I may be fulfilling one of my greatest dreams. It's also the most selfish dream I have.

See, in high school band, I wasn't exactly treated fairly. I was told that I had "potential" but rarely got to work on that potential because I wasn't a favorite student of a certain band director (not mentioning names here). I would often leave band upset and frustrated, knowing that I wasn't being treated well. I didn't want all the solos I wasn't getting, but I wanted to prove I could play them. And I COULD play them. But over and over the solos were taken from me and my wonderful stand partner and given to a less-than-deserving clarinetist.

Now, I have a chance to show my band director how far I have come and how successful at the clarinet I really am. What a slap in the face it will be for him when he hears me playing a beautiful clarinet solo in Western's best band. Sure, the solo belonged to the other clarinetist sharing my part, but she is no longer in band. By default, the solo is in my hands (unless she randomly shows up again).

Call me vengeful, but I truly want to show my band director how incorrect he was about me. I want him to feel terrible about not giving me the chance to grow and show my true potential. I want him to regret treating me and so many other talented students so unfairly. The only way this will happen is if/when he sees me playing at the WMEA conference concert thing in February. Yep, WMEA conference concert thing. :|

--Elie

THE DISMEMBERMENT PLAN IS COMING TO SEATTLE

2010-12-06T12:20:00.000-08:00

You won't see me get this excited about any band coming to Seattle very often. But let me tell you a little story.

Way back when, in my early high school days, I frequented a message board called "All Things Not Weezer." This message board had originally been one of many on Weezer's own website, before their fifth album Make Believe was released (the album that truly displayed their hatred of their fans and of good music). After the album was released, the message boards were reformatted on the website to a nigh-unusable state, and so the boards migrated to a Weezer fanpage. Eventually this board shut down, and the boards migrated to what I believe is their current location on some hidden ProBoard, lurking in the depths of a forgotten time...

Regardless, though, this message board was a happenin' place. It was full of often ruthless Weezer fans who no longer listened to Weezer, had grown up, some had kids and gotten married, most gone on to college and careers and the like. I, among others, was late to the game and was still in high school. Interesting topics were discussed. Music was, of course, among them.

At one point, I decided that I was tired of the bands that I knew of and was aware of, tired of the same old bands I was fed by Fuse (maybe even back when it was Much Music USA), MTV, and the radio. I decided to see what these old, cynical Weezer fans had to offer me with all their elitism and such. I don't remember what my specific questions were, but essentially I asked for new music, for entrance into the fold of the world that we often refer to as... INDIE.

Although they probably gave me more suggestions (some that I looked into and didn't like), two of their suggestions have stuck with me to this day: The Shins and The Dismemberment Plan. The former wasn't anything too terribly groundbreaking; it was more or less folk-rock-pop without the need to appeal to tweens and corporate execs. Still fantastic, though. The Dismemberment Plan, though... something struck a nerve with me. It was exciting, unheard-of, confusing, mind-boggling, and above all, AWESOME. Every band member was insanely talented, but they weren't just a bunch of show-offs. They had fun with their music. They usually had their tongues firmly planted in their cheeks, and when they didn't, they just vomited beauty in a way that I'd never heard before. I had to have more of them, and I had to see them live!

Unfortunately, they no longer existed. They had broken up just a couple of years before I discovered them, after touring the US. Band members went on to less successful acts (and less exciting acts), and then eventually fell into peaceful domestic lives as college professors, math teachers, Boeing employees... something along those lines.

A couple of years ago they reunited for a benefit concert for a friend. I was hoping they'd love it so much that they'd get back together for a longer period of time... but it was not to be. It was a one-off thing that their native fans of Washington, DC enjoyed immensely, and the rest of the world could not see.

Then, recently, they reissued their seminal 1999 album Emergency & I, and behind it decided to go on tour! ...Only around the east coast. Again, I was disappointed to find out I would probably never see one of my favorite bands live.

This morning I checked Facebook. I scrolled down the long list of posts that had happened since I checked it last night. I came across one by the Dismemberment Plan. On March 12th, 2011, they will be playing one show on the west coast before they return to their long slumber. This one show will be in Seattle, at the Showbox Sodo.

I literally started jumping up and down in my seat when I read this. FINALLY, after all these years, I would experience the dancing, the jumping, the grooving, the freak-outs, the insane fun that is said to occur at The Dismemberment's Plan's live shows. I would see them IN THE FLESH playing some of my favorite songs of the past 6 years. Happy birthday to me!!!

If I can get my hands on tickets before they sell out, that is...

--Jon

p.s. from several days later... I GOT MY HANDS ON TICKETS.

Songs to Cover

2010-11-16T00:26:00.000-08:00

"Flying Dreams" from The Secret of NIMH
"Empty" by Metric
"Impossible Soul" by Sufjan Stevens [yeah... quite the project...] [maybe something else from Age of Adz]

"Daily Routine" by Animal Collective
everything from Pinkerton by Weezer

something by Broken Social Scene

something by Menomena

something by Grizzly Bear

more stuff probably

--Jon

P.S., Elie, I've written the past ten posts! I think it's your turn.

Songs of Which I Will Never, Ever Play Covers

2010-11-14T18:45:00.000-08:00

"Hallelujah" by Leonard Cohen (usually played as it was by Jeff Buckley)
"Such Great Heights" by The Postal Service (usually played as it was by Iron and Wine)

any other song played 439857349085734098573948 times by some guy with an acoustic guitar at an open mic.

--Jon

Forgetful Me

2010-10-22T22:51:00.001-07:00

Perhaps as a direct result of what was discussed in my previous post, I have become more forgetful than ever. It seems the more things I take on at once, the more my brain is filled with things to think about, the more I forget stuff. I've gotten so forgetful I can't even remember all the things I've forgotten at various points thus far this quarter. They include but are not limited to: important papers for clubs, important details in club emails, baton, sheet music, studying for a test, assignments, wallet, cookies, lunch, doing laundry, showering, the fact that I need to wake up and not fall back asleep, backpack, why I'm holding Elie's water-bottle, watch, phone, dishes, eating dinner, that giving blood means lifting is harder, ensemble rehearsal, telling someone about ensemble rehearsal... I'll just stop there. I have too much shit to keep track of. For some people it may not be too much. For me it is.

And so I'd like to say, to all of you who have been affected by my inability to handle the workload I've taken on... I am sorry. It may continue for the rest of this quarter, maybe even the rest of this year, but next year I will handle myself better, because I will not do as many things. And my brain will not explode.

--Jon

P.S., on a totally unrelated note, I love Western. Just saying.

Finally In Over My Head

2010-10-16T13:38:00.000-07:00

Well, well, well. It has been a while (but it's been even longer for Elie).

So it's my third year of college. My second year in the music program. It is kicking my ass. But it's not just the classes; I made the very unintelligent decision of committing to all of the following things, none of which I want to give up, very few of which I CAN give up any time soon:

-17 credits of classes (all music) (=8 classes total)
-Also playing on one piece in WWU Symphony Orchestra (not for credit)
-Secretary of WWU chaper of SWEA
-Vice-President of WWU chapter of CMENC
-Active member of SEE
-Volunteer DJ at KUGS 89.3 FM
-Percussionist in Whatcom Wind Ensemble
-Drummer in Viking Band/Drumline
-Hopefully playing in percussion ensemble
-Volunteer at Amy's Place for Youth
-Half of VR Trainers
-Soon to be employed by CFPA as stage tech
-Having a girlfriend that I want to see and hang out with sometimes
-Keeping my sanity

That last one is looking to be the one that will most likely be dropped in the coming months. In all seriousness, next quarter I will have to drop something. It will probably be Whatcom Wind Ensemble and KUGS. Possibly also SEE. Having a girlfriend isn't going to be dropped in the foreseeable future.

Anyways, I'm losing my mind. I can't concentrate, I'm sleeping less, I'm forgetting shit everywhere I go, I'm not putting as much time into a lot of things as I should... which is why I'm ending this blog now, doing laundry, cleaning my room, going to campus to practice, coming back and assembling a newsletter, renewing my subscriptions to MENC and SWEA, practicing conducting, eating something... I need to do that now.

--Jon

PERSONAL: An Album by VR Trainers

2010-09-20T21:40:00.000-07:00

<a href="http://vrtrainers.bandcamp.com/album/personal">Personal by VR Trainers</a>

This is the latest from John von Volkli and I. Please enjoy carefully.

--Jon

5-10-15-20... Ripping off a Feature by Pitchfork

2010-08-30T09:52:00.000-07:00

So here's music I liked at five year intervals (ala Pitchfork's feature where they interview people and ask them this) in my life because I can't sleep anymore but I don't want to "get up" yet.

AGE 5
Green Day -- Insomniac
I grew up on music my dad listened to, more or less. My mom listened to a lot of bad modern country in addition to what my dad's Beatles and Rolling Stones and Steve Miller and Allman Brothers and Fleetwood Mac. Lots of 70s rock. So when my brother brought home a cassette of this band called Green Day and started playing it on his shitty little tape player speakers, I was a bit excited. I'd never heard anything quite like it. When I tried singing along, my siblings encouraged me not to, because there were bad words! People in the songs weren't happy! My parents didn't like it! On top of it all, it was catchy. It was exciting. This was my introduction to modern alternative rock.

AGE 10
Weezer -- Weezer [The Blue Album]
"In the Garage" was the song that defined me pre-teen puberty years. I was nerdy, anti-social, "misunderstood," etc. This entire album felt like it could have been sung by me (at least that's what I felt like when I listened to it back then). Somehow it gave me strength to be like "YEAH, fuck everyone, I can be myself! ...By sitting alone in my bedroom and listening to Weezer and playing video games." Again, I discovered this album through my brother. While he was also getting into Sublime and various hip-hop and bad rap-metal... Weezer was the one band that sung to me. Even though Weezer was geeky and totally uncool... they were, paradoxically, the coolest band ever to me. In reality, I wasn't all that disillusioned or sad. I was just a little bit weird for a ten-year-old. Still, nothing made that weirdness feel as okay as Weezer. Several years later, their later albums would find their way into my hands, followed by their 1996 masterpiece sophomore effort, Pinkerton, which would firmly entrench their place in my musical heart.

AGE 15

Radiohead -- OK Computer

Winter/Spring 2005 was a rough time in adolescence. MySpace was the name of the game. Sad sad sad depressed depressed depressed, hoping someone would come save me from my own misery. Luckily, instead of dressing like a dark anime character and listening to bad, depressed pop-punk-emo, I got into Radiohead, which has since become my favorite band. Before this, all I had heard from them was a few songs from 2003's Hail to the Thief and all of 1995's The Bends. OK Computer (1997) turned out to be perfectly ironic for the me that wanted nothing more than to hide behind a computer screen and feel my social skills further devolve while listening to Thom Yorke wail about paranoia and the devolution of Western civilization in the face of technological evolution. And that was 8 years before I heard it all. At 15 years old I couldn't quite comprehend the scale of what Radiohead was getting at, but the music pretty much blew my mind. I didn't know guitars could make those noises! I didn't know those chord progressions were ALLOWED. I didn't know songs could be so crazy yet so amazing. Radiohead was my gateway drug to even crazier music... but they're still my favorite today.

AGE 20

Igor Stravinsky -- The Rite of Spring

I don't know if I will ever love a classical piece of music as much as this. If you've called my phone in the past year, you'd know that one of its memorable sections is my ringback tone (well, was... I didn't feel like paying $2 to renew it, and a lot of people hated it anyways). The Rite of Spring caused RIOTS when it was premiered. Many (such as myself) remember being terrified by it and the accompanying earth-birth/dinosaur scene from Disney's Fantasia. The piece was first accompanied by a ballet, the original choreography of which has been lost, but modern choreographers still manage to make incredibly horrifying and primal dances to go along with it today. Nothing has ever been able to achieve quite what Igor Stravinsky's ridiculous piece has. After going years having forgotten it, my Art of Listening to Music class reminded me of its fantastic horrors. I haven't looked back since. I can only dream of writing music so seemingly paradoxically visceral and intellectually challenging.

--Jon

Five (5) (V) Albums to Which I Have Been Listening Lately

2010-08-28T23:03:00.000-07:00

In no particular order (except for when I think of them):

Sufjan Stevens -- All Delighted People EP

Until Friday, when my favorite project/genre/state-hopping singer/songwriter/storyteller/composer announced that he would be releasing a brand new full length album entitled The Age of Adz in October, I was confused as to why Stevens referred to this completely-out-of-nowhere album as an EP; it's 60 minutes long (most EPs are less than 30 minutes) and it's pretty dense (and excellent, I might add). Then, upon the aforementioned full-length announcement, I realized that this is more of a prelude to that full-length. Regardless, upon first excitedly listening to this album all the way through, sitting on my bed under the covers, laptop fulfilling its namesake (by sitting on my lap), Sennheiser headphones covering my ears... I was totally blown away. Fans of his hadn't had new recorded SONGS from him since 2006, when he released Illinois outtakes and a Christmas boxset. This was much-needed. Sufjan's voice is braver, but also more panicked. His orchestrations are more erratic and adventurous. His palette has expanded, now encompassing 70s prog, blues and psychedelia (although he had hinted at these colors previously, here they form the primary bases at several points). Of course, he also plays his old low-key-acoustic-whisper and haunting-piano-ballad cards, but this time around the cards are new and improved, breaking out in subtle but noticeable ways (whether using strange chord progressions, strange melodies, or even just drenching his vocals in reverb/delay). Throughout the entire "EP," powerful but ambiguous emotions take root and threaten to explode (at some times doing so with the energy of an atomic bomb, and with far more frequency than ever in his previous work), from the nails-on-chalkboard Psycho-esque ending of the title track to the several chanted climaxes of set-closer "Djohariah," which seems to be a heartfelt ode to his little sister and her troubles in life... in the form of an 18-minute Pink Floyd-inspired jam, choirs and brass invited. Perhaps my opinion of this album can be best represented by telling you what I did right after finishing listening to it for the first time: I went back to the beginning and listened to again, all the way through. Considering this is probably just a hint of what's to come, maybe even the leftovers to hold us over... I'm ecstatic for what's to come. Album of the year? I'm betting on it.

Okay, I can't talk that much about the rest of these albums...

The Knife -- Silent Shout

2006 was the year I started paying attention to indie music (ie, reading Pitchfork). At that point, evilly-catchy/catchily-evil electro-pop didn't sound appealing to me. Now it's my the perfect antiodte for summer boredom. So yes, I'm a little bit late to the game of realizing how awesome The Knife's 2006 LP is (especially this song; I cannot help but dance a little when I hear it). I don't really dance. When I do, it's more just bobbing around at the concerts of bands I really like, or bobbing around in front of my computer or while I'm driving or playing an instrument or something. I'm always really excited when I find dance music this inventive that actually makes me want to bob around unashamedly.

The Arcade Fire -- The Suburbs

My putting this album on this list might be a little bit misleading. Although I've been a pretty big fan of The Arcade Fire for several years... this is definitely my least favorite album by them. While most critics and fans have been adoring it, I find the great majority of it to be incredibly boring. Maybe it's the several songs that can be described as "moderate tempo, folky, major-key, four-chord shuffles," or the fact that the instrumentation this time around is profoundly unadventurous and low-key, or how Win Butler keeps repeating the same little slogans (ie, "the kids"), or just how incredibly PRETENTIOUS the whole thing is, from the album title to the tracklisting (ah yes, two-part songs (actually just two different songs that happen to have the same name). Regardless of my criticism for it, The Suburbs does have its high points. "The Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)" is a fun song, and I thoroughly enjoy "Ready to Start," "Empty Room," and "Month of May." Beyond that... most of it is just pretty damn mediocre to my ears; not enough over-the-top bombast for my Arcade Fire taste. And while they've tended to take themselves a bit too seriously for awhile now, at least on Funeral they sounded like they had fun writing the songs.

Yeasayer -- Odd Blood

Okay, I've only really been listening to a handful of songs from this album ("Madder Red" is my current favorite)... but I have a feeling the rest of it is about to grow on me. And that handful of songs is really interesting. The production on it reminds me a bit of Paul Simon's Graceland without just doing the whole indie-hipster-world-music-crossover thing (*coughvampireweekendcough*). They write fun pop-rock songs, and then make them really cool. The whole thing is very 80s-esque somehow. It's hard to explain. Again, haven't listened too much, need to listen more. Just take my word for it and listen yourself.

Broken Social Scene -- Forgiveness Rock Record

Broken Social Scene has been one of those bands for me where I remember a couple of songs, and I know the rest are good... they just don't stick in my head. They're always pleasant to listen, but I don't go to them very often. They're like that guy/girl you're not really friends with, but you have friends that know them pretty well, and they're always fun to hang out with, but you know you just don't care enough to actually "become friends" with them (On second thought... I don't think I actually know anyone like that. Maybe I do. I don't know. I'm too sleepy to think about this.). With this album, Broken Social Scene got rid of the excess members and sonic space-hoarders, slimming down to the core members and streamlining their sound. The result speaks for itself. This was a triumph. I'm making a note here: huge success. It's hard to overstate my satisfaction. Aperture Scie--er, the album is really good. I remember more songs. The album is easier to listen to all the way through without forgetting that you're listening to an album. You're no longer wincing trying to figure what instruments are playing where/when in that mess of musicians fighting for breathing room in the mix. It's more song-based rather than sonic-journey-through-a-low-budget-museum based. Take a listen for yourself. "Forced to Love" is my favorite track.

~ * ~

Okay, I need to go to sleep. I woke up at 5:50 this morning about, and it was about 2:00am before I finally got to sleep before that I think. So I'm a bit sleep deprived. BUT I'M IN BELLINGHAM. Today is a good day, because I am no longer in the old-people-colony that is Sequim.

--Jon

What Makes a Good Video Game [for Me]

2010-08-10T12:26:00.000-07:00

I'm rather picky when it comes to video games. I generally don't enjoy first-person shooters, MMORPGs, or sports games. I've come to realize that there are a few important things I look for in a game that many other people probably don't really care about.

MUSIC
In order for me to fully enjoy a video game, it should have an appropriate soundtrack that goes far beyond background music and actually contributes to the mood of the game. Be this mood horror, sorrow, thrilling suspense, or pure unadulterated epicness, a game's soundtrack should fully complement the action that's taking place. My favorite movies tend to have excellent soundtracks as well. I guess being that music tends to consume my life (in a good way!), it's not surprising that video game music, of all things, would be so important to me.

GAMEPLAY
Probably a big ol' DUH. At least it should be. But people tend to buy those stupid Madden games every year. When it's essentially the same game. With slightly different teams. And nowadays not even slightly improved graphics. EA Sports has suckered in so many stupid, rich bros into buying sports games every year, so good for them, I guess? In any case, the game just needs to be FUN to play. It shouldn't be too much of a labor, or merely addicting, or anything like that. That's why I can't get into as many Western RPGs and MMOs; once you get down to it, the gameplay is really boring. You press attack, and then stand there. Sometimes you cast a spell. Then you run to the next guy, hoping to get a good random drop from each fight. Booooring. At least in something like Shadow of the Colossus, where you're running from fight to fight, the way to the fight is actually REALLY PRETTY and interesting, and then the fights themselves are epic as all hell. I'm also a big fan of interesting and inventive gameplay, ala Heavy Rain, Katamari, and Flower. A game should, in some way, entertain me.

STORYLINE
Sometimes this isn't so important, but games with interesting, emotional storylines tend to be my favorites. I'll often play video games for the same reason that people read and watch Harry Potter. I want to be sucked into a world with real characters making real decisions, having real effects on the world around them. This is why I love Final Fantasy. On top of the fantastic music that I already showcased, Final Fantasy has great storylines. It's not Shakespeare; there are sometimes gaping plot holes and completely undeveloped characters and shoddy writing in general, but the game is big enough that you can ignore the little things and focus on the big, epic picture. Even if the storyline is only implied through visuals, like in Flower, it can make or break a game. On the other hand, I can forgive games like Katamari, Fat Princess, and LittleBigPlanet for having outright stupid storylines, because those light-hearted games would suffer if they had some kind of immense story with heavy character development and such. But even games like Silent Hill or Metal Gear Solid need good stories to push them from "decent game" into "great game" territory.

~ * ~

That's, uh... that's it.

--Jon

Sequim: Land of Death

2010-08-09T11:43:00.000-07:00

I have a friend named Joey who I met in high school and lived in Sequim for a long time before moving to Bellingham awhile after he graduated. I was talking to him about Sequim one time, and why we both didn't like it. He said one reason, maybe even the main reason, is because Sequim is a place where people go to die.

He was, of course, referring to Sequim's status as a huge retirement town. I think some magazine rated it one of the top retirement communities in the country (http://www.ehow.com/list_6018059_retirement-places-west-coast.html). Old people are the majority in Sequim. The median age is 59. The newspaper obituary is never empty. The overall mood of the town is affected by this, I think. Working at Radioshack, I see a lot of people at the ends of their lives, some holding on by a few threads. I'm always half-expecting someone to fall down dead in front of me. It's unnerving and depressing. I don't particularly enjoy thinking about or being around death. Maybe it's some supernatural thing where all the death in the town just gives off weird vibes. Or maybe it's just my dad being an asshole giving off weird vibes.

For whatever reason, I'm never as happy in Sequim. I never feel as good. I'm never as inspired to do anything. I don't enjoy life as much. I always just want to leave as soon as possible, or at least forget that I'm here by distracting myself with video games, friends (when they feel like calling me back), books, music, the internet via coffee shops and work, and anything else that can make me forget how miserable this town seems to make me. I've tried to tell myself it's all in my head, that I can be happy here. I'm beginning to think that I can't.

When I moved to Bellingham, my average happiness level went through the roof. Elie definitely had at least some sort of impact on this. But it was also being away from the old people of Sequim, the death, the warped and tired perspectives, finally being outside of the social/political/general-worldview bubble that is the northern Olympic Peninsula (I've lost count of the number of times people have come into Radioshack talking about TV or radio, in the process revealing that they basically just like to watch Fox News or listen to Rush Limbaugh/Glenn Beck). I enjoy being around people that at least try to know what they're talking about, people who want to be where they are... I don't know, I'm about to start babbling, so I'm just going to stop while I'm ahead. I need to stop writing depressing blogs; I swear I'm not as depressed as this makes me seem, I just can't stand being in Sequim and cannot wait to get back to Bellingham.

--Jon

Those Evil "Illegals"***

2010-08-03T14:21:00.000-07:00

I don't know if you were all aware, but those Mexicans are all out to get us. Yep, it's true. They're invading from their foreign country specifically to take away our way of life from us those of us who work so hard to keep it. Those liberal hodge-podgers may tell you that they're just looking for an escape from the ridiculous hardships of their own country to find a better way of life, and anyone in their right mind would do the same, because what other reasons would they risk death from dehydration by crossing hundreds of miles across the Arizona desert for days... BUT THEY LIE.

No, those gorsh-durned "illegals" are out to get us. They want to be forced into jobs where they're underpaid (but still paid more than they would ever be in Mexico) under the table by the completely righteous and proud and Jesus-blessed American industrial farms, and then take advantage of the gaping holes in our welfare system, so that they can take away food stamps from the people that really deserve it, like my pregnant teenage daughter that I and my underfunded overly Conservative school district failed to teach proper sex education to!

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not racist, no sir. I have one friend whose great great grandmother was a Mexican! That right there proves I'm not racist. In addition, I thoroughly respect any Mexican who was born fortunate enough to come from a family that was able to get him the training to be considered "highly qualified" by our standards, then is able to jump through the endless hoops to be able to even be in the USA legally, let alone live here [see here for a detailed flowchart]. Yep, those people and no others deserve to be here. Undocumented workers from Canada and Europe are okay, though, because they're wh--er, uh... WELL THEY JUST ARE. THOSE MEXICANS ARE STEALING FROM US I TELL YOU. YEAH.

--Jon's Ignorant Evil Twin***

***The character portrayed by this post is fictional. Undocumented workers are human. They deserve our sympathy. If you were in their shoes, and you had the opportunity to risk your life for the possibility of a better one, would you not do it simply because it's against the principles of "AMURRICUH!!!11!"? Remember, these are the people that make those cheap TV dinners at Wal-Mart possible. They essentially run the farms and factories where your food comes from. Open your eyes.

Just Another Way McCleary Screwed Me Up

2010-07-14T23:22:00.000-07:00

Western Washington University has this nifty program called Blackboard through which students can have access to documents used in class and such. Some teachers post grades on this program. Until recently, it used to show your grade for individual assignments as well as a comparison to the average score. This comparison to the average was helpful in showing me if I did well or poorly. For example, if I got a B- on a test, I didn't feel so badly if the average was a C, but if the average was a B+, I would not feel so great.

Within the last few months, Blackboard has changed dramatically, and I was surprised and rather upset to find that our grades are no loner compared to the class average. How am I supposed to know if I did well or not?! Then I thought, wait. My best should be compared to ME, not other people. And then I wondered where this obsession with comparing myself to other people came from.

I thought back to my previous schooling and found the answer. When I was in late elementary school and all throughout middle school, students would pass their papers to a fellow classmate to grade. The teacher would read off the answers out of the grade book while someone else was responsible for grading someone else's assignment. Then, to save time, no doubt, the teacher would move to his/her computer. One by one, he/she would call out students' names. Whoever graded that person's paper would call out that person's grade in front of the class.

The issue was first created by having our answers seen by another person. What if you messed up and looked like a fool? Well, being obsessive about grades, I often did very well on my assignments, so I usually didn't have much to fear. But because I was known as the smart person of the class, it was always a huge deal when someone else got a better grade. Of course everybody knew if they got a better grade than me because our grades were shouted across the classroom daily. Even from my friends, I would receive a slap in the face if I did worse than anybody. Doing better than me was a huge accomplishment for other people, and they made sure they let me know how pleased they were to be better than the smart girl. The situation worsened in 8th grade when my friend from Alabama moved to McCleary and joined my class. He was clearly smarter than me (than I?), but I worked much harder, and I spent my 8th grade year trying to be better than him, and everybody knew the competition I had. My bad grades were always rubbed in my face.

Due to those experiences in my early schooling, I have continued to compare myself to other people constantly. So perhaps this lack of class average on Blackboard is a step in the right direction. But darn it, McCleary, you really screwed me up.

Love,

Elie

Various Babblings That Deserve Far Better Articulation

2010-07-02T09:57:00.001-07:00

I don’t talk about my brother very much, mostly because we don’t have very much in common. In short:

My brother is a Marine, currently stationed in Afghanistan, with a home, wife, and dogs (I think three) in Arizona. I’m a comparatively yuppie college kid studying music in the Pacific Northwest.

He likes music that a lot of normal people his age like, ie Sublime, mainstream rock, country, hip-hop, etc. I think. I haven’t talked to him about music in awhile. I like music that’s often bizarre for the sake of being bizarre.

My brother likes big trucks driving around in the mud and going really fast. I like wimpy little hybrid cars that can do little more than get around town (if any I have to like any cars at all).

My brother’s in the military. I’m essentially a pacifist.

Even on the psychological level, I’m really introverted and passive, while my brother is definitely extroverted and active.

Other than the fact that we are brothers, we look like brothers, and our voices sound the same over the phone (which my grandma never fails to mention when I talk to her), it’s hard to find anything in common between my brother and me. But our parents are the same, we grew up together; we are family. Still, I rarely talk to him anymore, not because I don’t care about him, but because I’m caught up in my own little world, and I figure he’s caught up in his own little world, and I figure we won’t have much to talk about anyways, and we won’t really see eye-to-eye on much.

I don’t really know where I’m going with this. Maybe I don’t appreciate my family enough. Maybe I don’t really “get” family. Probably both. But no, I do appreciate my family; I’m just very bad at showing my appreciation. Whenever anyone else talks about their family and how close they are, my mind is boggled a little bit. I can’t imagine actually being “close” to my family, mostly because my dad is so alienating and my extended family is even more different than the way I even think.

Family in general is just something of an anomaly to me, which is probably one of the many reasons I have absolutely no desire to have one. Why don’t I understand it? How did I end up this way, when my dad often expresses how family is “numero uno”? My dad is such a strange person, and I doubt I’ll ever actually understand him. Likewise, I doubt he’ll ever actually understand me.

Ugh. Life. I can’t wrap my mind around it. Hence, I throw these thoughts out the window and just try to make the most of it on my own.

Anyways, back to my original purpose for writing this, I think: my brother, Carl, is in Afghanistan, where people kill one another over religious and nationalist and tribal bullshit. I can’t imagine what it’s like knowing that a group of people outside my bed want to kill me and everyone around me. He chose this life, yes, but no one should have to experience that. War is absolute crap. Yes, I “support our troops,” because I want them to come home where they belong, my brother included. You don’t have to support “missions” and wars to be patriotic.

I love America. There are many worse places. But I’ll be damned if this place couldn’t be better, starting with our leaders’ general gung-ho attitude about our place in this world.

Is war ever truly necessary? Of course. That’s the one thing I can’t stand about it. World War II. How many more lives would have ended if we didn’t fight back? How many lives ended because we fought back? What if we’d never needed to fight back? What if we’d fought back earlier? Would our view of the war be different? I don’t know. It scares me that we have the capability now to end all life on this planet in an instance, and I really, really hope we, as a species, don’t put that capability to use.

In other words: cherish your life, cherish your loved ones, cherish the people that you don’t really like at all. You never know when they’ll be gone. Be thankful for what you have. Happy early Independence Day.

--Jon

Vegetarian Criticism

2010-06-28T14:24:00.001-07:00

I kind of hate that this is my third post about this, and my second in the past few days, but I feel the need to address it.

For a few reasons, I've been pretty adamant about not pushing my new-found vegetarian views onto my friends and others. One reason is because it's such a recent thing, and although I definitely plan on doing this for the rest of my life, at this point I understand that it would be hard for most to believe this given the number of people that try vegetarianism or veganism for a short period of time and then decide to go back to eating meat. The second reason I've been relatively quiet about this recent lifestyle-choice-change is because I know there are some vegetarians that are very pretentious, elitist, forceful, and just plain mean to meat-eaters about their diet and such. I don't want to be one of those people. What I choose to consume is my own choice, and what someone else chooses to consume is theirs.

The third reason I don't like talking about becoming/being a vegetarian has become more apparent since becoming one. People will criticize me for it every chance they get. Often time, they will criticize me based on common misconceptions, assumptions, stereotypes, and misunderstandings. I've been accused of being a vegetarian simply because Elie did, and I'm just following her because I want her to like me more or something. As a matter of fact, if you read my last posts, you'll find this is false; Elie decided to follow my choice (although it was probably less hard for her, as she already ate far less meat than me). I became a vegetarian by my own accord, although it was largely influenced by arguments presented in videos by YouTube's popular vegetarian/other-stuff guy Onision, as well as by things I've learned in environmental studies and environmental science. Even in those classes, though, I tried to play devil's advocate and imagine that they were presenting the extremest side of things. This was a hard position to defend. All things considered, vegetarianism is the most rational choice to make from what I can see.

People tell me that humans evolved to eat meat, that the reason our brains became such enhanced specimens is because of the nutrients we got from eating meats, and the reason we were able to eat it is the incisors in our teeth. This may be true, but it's also true that we can now obtain these nutrients without eating meat. We now have the choice to eat meat or not to. Most people choose to eat meat because it is socially accepted and because it's traditionally what is available to those that need the nutrients found in them. Because alternatives are available, I'd rather not directly create demand for the killing of animals, simply because I cherish their lives too much.

I watched videos of animals being brutally and cruelly killed (although the videos were assembled by PETA, who I admit has rather questionable tactics; regardless, animals are slaughtered, and I can barely watch), and I told myself that if I wanted to keep eating meat, I should be able to watch it without feeling remorse. I failed my own test. Honestly, I thought I would pass. At the time, I enjoyed a nice, juicy double bacon cheeseburger as much as the next guy. Now, after watching a cow's or a pig's throat get slit while it's still conscious and screaming in agony, that cheeseburger doesn't seem so appealing.

When considering all environmental factors and everything, vegetarianism does less total harm to the planet, too. This is a very important factor. I've been trying to be environmentally conscious for the past several years, and this is the next step in that growth process for me. Helping keep this miracle of a planet as habitable as possible for future generations of all living things is important to me.

If you're reading this and you're a meat-eater who would criticize me, I challenge you to test yourself the same way that I did. Watch some videos of farm animals being slaughtered. Then cook yourself a cheeseburger or your meat of choice while watching it. Do you still feel like you're making the right choice?

In short, stop criticizing me. I'm not judging you, so stop judging me. I'm not going to force my beliefs on you. If you don't bring it up, I won't. If you offer me meat, I'll simply say, "No thanks, I don't eat meat," and it can end there if you want it. I'd like it to. Just leave me and my choices alone, because even after only a couple of these kinds of conversations, I'm already sick of answering the same aggressive questioning and rebutting the same inane accusations.

--Jon

It's Summer and I'm Sitting in a Classroom

2010-06-23T22:41:00.001-07:00

As I was reading through some of the older blog posts from Squirrel Baggers United, I came across a few posts I had written about stress. And yes, this is yet another blog post about stress. You may skip if you wish.

My summer classes started this week, and my stress level has hit the roof. My brain is like, "Reading? Aaaah! Projects? Aaaah! Lesson plan? Aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!" It's like my brain has forgotten that I've done all this before (maybe minus these in-depth lesson plans). So brain, please just calm the heck down.

While I've been stressing, I've been thinking. The issue is that I'm now learning how to teach and being graded on it. I'm terrified that I'll not like what I'm learning, which means I won't like the content I'll be teaching as a professional, and/or that I'll get a bad grade which means I am not a good teacher now. I'd like to think I'll LOVE what I teach (even if it's grammar) and that I'm already a pretty decent teacher, although I know I have a lot to learn. I just can't stand the idea of getting a B on a lesson I've taught. So now my brain is freaking out in anticipation of any of these things happening.

I keep telling myself that once I receive a grade on my first lesson plan and lesson I actually carry out, I'll feel better. But what if I do horribly? Shut up, brain. Just shut up.

Oh, I also realized that today is the 23rd of June. Where did the month go? It's almost July. That means summer is like half over. Then it dawned on me that I'll be a teacher before long, especially if time keeps moving at such a ridiculous speed (it didn't used to go this fast, I swear). So now I'm like "I need to become a great teacher NOW. There's not much time left!"

The more I write this down, the more ridiculous I feel. Okay, so getting a B on a lesson plan isn't going to kill me. It may not even mean I'll be the world's worst teacher.

Just calm down. Sheesh.

Happy summer, everyone.

--Elie

I M 4 Rlz

2010-06-23T18:31:00.000-07:00

^^^translation: I am for reals.

With that out of the way, in the last post I made about vegetarianism, it was more of a "I'll try," "hopefully" kind of thing. Well, in the words of Yoda, "Do or do not; there is no try." And I am doing. Meaning, I am now "officially" (whatever that means) a vegetarian. Eating meat is a no-no for me nowadays. But I'm not going to eat that stupid imitation meat crap; most of the ones I've tried taste like crap. And that's just lame. Tofu, beans, etc is where it's at.

Today I was riding my bike from my house to Port Angeles, and I passed a field of cows. I stopped by one that was near the fence; its eyes were absurdly pretty. I couldn't eat that! Meat doesn't look appealing to me anymore, especially the more it looks like part of an animal's body. That was part of what made meat okay to eat before; often it didn't look like a creature's flesh. But now I'm forcing myself to think about the fact that it IS a creature's flesh, and I shouldn't be eating it. Or at least, I don't think I should be. I have too many other options, to the point that I do not feel comfortable eating an animal.

As a disclaimer... if some sort of apocalypse or complete societal breakdown were to happen, and my options became more limited... I would likely eat meat. But I don't think that's going to happen any time soon.

--Jon

My Place and Amy's Place

2010-06-18T23:38:00.000-07:00

Hello world! It is summer!

With my roommate gone, the apartment is empty and incredibly quiet (not like she was loud anyway), and Jon is at his home. Well shoot, there went 97% of the people I interacted with.

At first, right as classes were ending, I was like, this is going to be great. I can stay up late reading books and watching movies and not have to get up early and go to class. I can cook real food (more real than throwing some vegetables and cheese onto a tortilla, adding heat, and calling it a quesadilla), read a million great books, hang out downtown Bellingham, go the the park...

And all that was working out fabulously. But then Jon left and I thought, oh my goodness. I'm on my own now. Nobody's here to take care of me or take the bus with me to fun places. Feeling sorry for myself, I tried to keep myself busy. Then I thought, I'm doing this wrong. Normal people are working. At jobs. Real people have jobs. And they talk to people (and drink...mostly drink). I'm not a normal person. Why aren't I normal? Why am I doing this wrong?

I tried to remind myself that finding a part-time job in Bellingham would probably be nearly impossible...and I don't really want a job. I'm happy getting paid here and there from Fair Portia...which is sort of a job.

As I continued to feel sorry for myself, I finally got in touch with this guy running this organization-type-thing which brings college students to a local teen shelter called Amy's Place (google "Amy's Place Bellingham" - I dunno how to put a link into this blog). I got to the shelter at 6:00 pm and stayed until closing at 11:00 pm.

While I was there, I sorted and organized clothes and chatted with some of the people, both volunteers and local homeless and/or battered peopled aged 18 to 25. I was nervous before going there tonight, as I hadn't been there before. Although I want to teach inner-city youth, I was afraid that my first interaction with these people at the shelter wouldn't go well. I thought that I wouldn't be able to converse with them and would be too busy thinking, oh my god. They're homeless and on drugs. I have my own apartment and go to college and have nice shoes. They'll hate me.

Actually, it all went well. Some of the youths talked about being beaten by their parents and others talked about taking drugs, but I surprised myself by not being judgmental. I knew these people were good-hearted, even if they took drugs, and I didn't pity them to the extent where I wasn't comfortable talking to them. It just made me want to help them.

Once again, I found myself wondering if I should be a teacher. I looked around at the building and saw all the wonderful clothes, food, furniture, and friendship Amy's Place has created, and I had a desire to devote my life to this. But my place is in the classroom, and I do believe I can help students to succeed at and say in school. Shelters and schools are both vitally important, and I choose school as my area of focus.

Maybe I'm still not feeling like a normal person who should be working and not living off her grandmother's money, but at least I did something worthwhile today.

--Elie

There Will Be Blood

2010-06-03T16:25:00.000-07:00

I haven't been following the Gulf of Mexico oil crisis very carefully, but I've read enough (see: 'very little') to know that this is turning out to be a serious tragedy. Over twenty years ago, we experienced a similar environmental disaster. In 1989, 11 million gallons of oil spilled into Alaskan waters and killed thousands of animals, in the worst oil spill the country had ever seen. This spill has almost definitely already surpassed that one in amounts of oil; best estimates were at 30 million gallons as of May 27, and that was a week ago. Species are likely to go extinct because of our carelessness. We're destroying our planet. You'd think we'd have learned after twenty years, but it's obvious we haven't. We're madly in love with our oil, and we'll go through any means to obtain it, even turning a blind eye to meth-use/porn-watching on government computers/cronyism amongst government overseers and BP staffpeople. This is absurd. We can't do this anymore. None of us are innocent. I don't know what we can do to fix it, but we need to right now before we kill ourselves and everything else off.

~ * ~

“All our lauded technological progress -- our very civilization -- is
like the axe in the hand of the pathological criminal.” -Albert Einstein

~ * ~

--Jon

p.s., the title of this blog is a reference to the movie of the same name.

[edit (6/12/10): I find it funny that people are most worried about the oil hitting the coast, as if there is just empty water between the coast and the rig. THE MARINE HABITATS are what we should be worried about, not our precious goddamn coasts.]

An Ongoing List of Things That, Contrary to Popular Belief, Are Not Cool [updated]

2010-05-29T11:57:00.000-07:00

-drawing a mustache on your finger and holding it to your face
-drawing a mustache on your face
-"shutter shade"/"Kanye West" sunglasses
-Sublime
-singing Sublime songs really loudly on the balcony of the apartment above me
-Bob Marley
-celebrating every cultural or pseudo-cultural holiday by getting hammered
-pretending to be ironically faux-sexist/racist/homophobic when really you're just trying to hide the fact that you're ACTUALLY sexist/racist/homophobic
-doing anything stupid/ridiculous/etc "ironically"
-slack-lining
-saying that you're engaged, pregnant, or broken up on April Fool's Day
-taking photographs of people jumping mid-air
-taking photographs of yourself
-uggs
-crocs
-high heels
-wearing so much makeup your face looks like it's made of wax
-...actually, wearing makeup, period
-fulfilling stereotypes
-smoking hookah

I shall think of more...

Bad People

2010-05-26T22:14:00.000-07:00

Over spring break, Jon and I took the greyhound from Olympia to Bellingham. Good idea, right? Nope. While we were at the Olympia station, one woman was yelling (yes, really yelling) at the woman who worked at the ticket booth place, because her daughter (I think) wasn't allowed to bring an extra piece of luggage on the bus. Her rationale was that the girl has a service dog, and that dog was allowed to "have" one piece of luggage. This was a rational argument, but the woman was being totally unreasonable. She was being very mean to the employee, and her behavior was absolutely unacceptable.

But then I thought what makes people "bad." Here are a few reasons why someone would be a "bad" person:

-They were born with a mental illness that makes them angry and irrational.
-They were raised by parents who were angry, abusive, etc.
-They encountered a life-changing event that caused them to hate life and everything about it.

Why else would someone be like this nasty woman?

Furthermore, if she was subject to one of these reasons, it's not HER fault that she's a "bad" person. I'm convinced that behind everyone's terrible actions, there is a reason that is beyond their control. Okay, maybe not totally beyond their control, but enough to pre-dispose them to to have such behavior.

Just a thought.

--Elie

An Open Letter to Everyone

2010-05-25T18:26:00.000-07:00

Dear World,

Every time you put an 'h' in my first name, God kills seven kittens. Please, think of the kittens.

Love,

--Jon

I Have a Surprise for You

2010-05-24T21:16:00.000-07:00

I'm Jewish! SURPRISE!

I was working with a student (who is Asian; I won't specify his ethnicity) at the high school today, and I was reading with him about the Israel/Palestine conflict. We got to a part about the day Israel gained independence. I said something about how "we celebrate that day as a holiday" and had to explain that I was Jewish myself. The student's reaction was a lot like the reaction from the other student who found out I was Jewish. He was so amazed. Again, I couldn't really find out why he was so surprised. I'm guessing that he had never met a Jew before. Maybe it was like meeting a celebrity. No, really. Maybe he has only read about Jews is books and seen them on TV. Maybe meeting one was a big deal.

Reflecting on these two Surprise-I'm-a-Jew events, I wonder if I shouldn't be telling students I'm Jewish. It's not like I'm skipping around shouting "Hey, everyone! I'm Jewish!" I mention it when students are learning about Israel or Hebrew or something related to Judaism. That way, I can help their learning experience.

Okay, but religion should stay out of the classroom, right? The way I see it, I don't mention the religious part of Judaism if I can get around it. I'm culturally Jewish rather that religiously (interpret that how you wish), and I believe that students must learn about other cultures. What better to learn about a foreign culture than to meet someone who identifies with that culture? But something tells me that I should keep my mouth shut, because one of these days, it might cause a problem...

--Elie

Imagine Shakespeare Got Drunk...

2010-05-17T00:55:00.001-07:00

Think about what would happen if Shakespeare got completely wasted. I mean like his friends are considering taking him to the hospital for alcohol poisoning. But right before his liver just about exploded, he wrote the worst piece of shit script his inebriated brain could possibly concoct. Now imagine Uwe Boll found this script and translate it into modern (awful) English and set it in modern-day San Francisco. While also drunk. And then decided to produce a movie using said script. Now imagine a freshman at a rather unprestigious film school was ordered to direct this movie (also while drunk), and given a cast of actors who had only acted one time each, all in either soap operas or WE/Hallmark/Lifetime movies. Except the lead role, which was given to a French homeless guy.

This is what the movie The Room is like. It's magnificent. You must watch it.

--Jon

Take the Good and Bad and Make the Best of It

2010-05-10T19:51:00.001-07:00

Title courtesy of The Republic Tigers.

I had a really good morning! Then I had sort of a lousy afternoon. But it's okay! It's funny how life plays out. But lemme start from the beginning.

I volunteered for 2 hours at the high school today, and I worked with one girl who usually doesn't want help from anybody. We worked pretty well together, and she wasn't rejecting my being there at all. Next I worked with a boy who really doesn't like reading, and his assignment was to read to me. Long story short, we got to talking about my bio-anth class, and he said that evolution isn't real. Then he asked if I was Christian. I told him I was Jewish, and he was really surprised! He started asking me questions about my family and if both my parents were Jewish. At one point he asked why I was Jewish in the first place. It was a little awkward because I could hardly understand him, and it was a bit concerning because I wasn't sure if he started to hate me because I'm taking a class about evolution and I'm Jewish. But we talked. We actually had a conversation, and that was impressive. He might hate me now, but, heck, it was worth it. While he was reading to me, the girl I worked with first came over and asked for help. She actually ASKED for help. This is the girl who doesn't ask for help. And if she does, she'll ask the teacher. This was probably the most impressive part of the day.

Then I went to my clarinet lesson and couldn't play a simple to scale to save my life. I kept thinking, "I just want to be done with this." I didn't hate myself for not being able to play well like usual. I knew that I'm pretty mediocre at the clarinet, and that's fine, because I'm going to be a good (hopefully better than good) teacher, and I'm making impressive strides with the students I'm working with now.

Reflecting on my previous blog, I think another reason why I'm not as stressed is that I've stopped caring so much about being great at things I know I'm not good at, and I'm concentrating on what I AM good at, and I'm doing well.

--Elie

Your Probably Thought I Was Dead

2010-05-08T22:08:00.000-07:00

Right? You all totally thought I'd died of stress and from taking 22 credits. It would have been a good, logical guess, though. But you'd have been wrong! Delightfully, wonderfully wrong!

You see, the stress gods took pity on me. My stress level is a fraction of what it used to be, and it is miraculous. It's not like I don't feel any anxiety, but it's not nearly as bad as before. And it happened all by itself! Or did it...?

I think this is the first few months in my entire life (well, since like 3rd grade) that I haven't been banging my head against the wall because of my classes. Yes, I am taking 22 credits. Yes, it's a lot. Yes, it's too much and I maaaybe shouldn't have done it. But I have and I am happy.

Yep. Happy. Happy because I'm working with wonderful 5th graders. Happy because I met wonderful high school English language learners. Happy because I'm excelling in my classes. Happy because bio-anth isn't destroying me, and even when I have an issue, my professor is quite attractive and kind, so it's sort of a win-win. Happy because, for once, I'm defeating my mountain of homework rather than it defeating me. Happy because I am often surrounded by peers and teachers who believe in educational equity for all. Happy because I don't have to deal with the drama of student-run clubs. Happy because I have the best boyfriend and fellow squirrel-bagger ever.

But you know what I'm dreading? I'm dreading having to leave my 5th graders in a few weeks. They make me so frustrated and exhausted, and they make me so happy. I've made fabulous connections to some students, and it's hard for me to take in that I probably won't see them after my next few visits. I'm in the process of writing them all cards about how much they've achieved this year. I'm also dreading leaving my ELLs at the local high school. I've only spent about 10 hours there, but I adore them. I'm pretty sure most of them can't stand me, but I've learned so much for them, I'm having dreams in Spanish, and I'm beginning to see how brilliant they are. Last week, they threw a surprise party for the teacher, and I felt like I was in the middle of Erin Gruwell's classroom (you know, from the book/movie The Freedom Writers). There I was, witnessing Latino, Chinese, Ethiopian, and Punjabi students tell the teacher how much they love her and how she has inspired them.

Maybe I should stop being selfish and treasure all the amazing memories I have from this year. Was it only a year? It seems like far more than that. And to think I get to spend the rest of my life doing this!

These students sustain me.

--Elie

I'm Going to Try to Become a Vegetarian

2010-05-06T11:00:00.000-07:00

...After I eat all the meat that I've already bought and is in my house, so it (and the animal's death for it) doesn't go to waste. And because it's still delicious.

I've come to the conclusion that since human's don't have to eat meat, since we can get our nutrients from other places, since we can make that choice, since the raising of animals for meat is a huge contributor to environmental problems, since animals raised for meat eat a shit ton of food, and a tiny fraction of that actually gets converted into what we eat, since the industrial meat industry is totally fucked up and abuses the shit out of animals in countless ways, and since it causes the (usually unnecessarily brutal) death of an animal that has complex thoughts and feelings... being a vegetarian just seems the logical thing to do. This is going to be hard for me, since I've been an avid meat-lover my entire life. It's an integral part of my diet. Pepperoni pizza, cheeseburgers, hot dogs, BACON, ham, steak, ribs, chicken in its various forms... I love them all. But other than my own selfish desires and their wide availability, there just isn't a logical reason to continue eating them.

What spurred this? Well, a little YouTube dude named Onision. He's kind of a jackass sometimes, but the big thing that made me think was when he said something along the lines of, "Yes, humans have been eating meat since the beginning of time... but we aren't eating meat because we're fighting for our lives. We have the choice. I hope you make the right one." He's right. We need to recognize that.

I know it's hypocritical of me to get preachy this early on, but... me becoming a vegetarian is kind of a miracle. If you think you're a huge meat-eater, think about the points I've made and consider it yourself. I may not last. I wish I could be vegan, but it's next-to-impossible as a poor college student. This alone is going to be hard for me, too. Wish me luck. Thanks.

--Jon

Composin' Me Some Music

2010-05-03T22:00:00.000-07:00

So, as I probably mentioned at some point, I'm in the Music Composition program now, in lessons with Dear Friend Isaac and Guy I Don't Really Know But Seems Pretty Cool Brendan. I'm essentially bottom-of-the-barrel since this is my first quarter and I'm not a compositional genius, so I don't get my own hour-long lesson. Hopefully next year that will change since I'm such an amazing composer (and since Bruce Hamilton will be back).

These are the pieces I have written thus far:

A Twig for a Nest [for solo flute] (being performed by Ashlyn Stoddard at the Composers of Western concert on... May 27th? Ish?)

Spellbound [for flute and Bb clarinet] (super short, lame, and probably will never ever be performed)

Calamity Dance [for woodwind quartet [bassoon, Bb clarinet, oboe, flute]] (short, written as the performance piece this quarter (for a quartet to sight-read); is going to be expanded into a multi-movement work)

I feel like I should also include one that I composed before I got into the program...

River Tam Beats Up Everyone [for percussion quartet] (I hope to also expand this into a multi-movement work...)

~ * ~

So here's some ideas I have for the future.

River Tam Beats Up Everyone [for reference, see this film and read this comic]

I. Opening/Henchmen

II. Gunslingers

III. Cyborg Ninjas

IV. Evil Clone on Mountaintop

So those probably won't be the final titles (I just came up with those on the spot), but that's the general idea. I'm thinking what I have now will be the "Opening/Henchmen."

Three Dances for Woodwind Quartet

I. Calamity Dance

II. Slow Dance

III. Nu Dance

Essentially it'll be a basic Fast-Slow-Fast suite. "Calamity Dance" I have, obviously. "Slow Dance" I can salvage out of my first attempt at a woodwind quartet piece. The "Nu Dance" I'm thinking will use a driving quarter-note rhythm ala techno/disco/etc for most of it, and will probably morph into something else by the end (based on a discussion Isaac and I had today; people used to actually dance to classic music, like at parties and such, but modern classical pieces called "dances" aren't usually danced to by people unless it's going to be "modern dance"; ergo, I intend for the third movement to be able, at least, to be danced to by the layperson).

Post-Apocalyptic Jam for Percussion

Scenario: the world has essentially ended. Civilization is literally in rubble. A small village of people eventually assembles out of the rubble. They get to the point where they need entertainment, ala music. Here's where this piece comes in. What kind of music would be made after the end of the world? What kinds of instruments would be used? Obviously primarily percussion, mostly found-sounds kind of stuff (brake drum, spring, [this would be the perfect opportunity to use the broken autoharp we have in the percussion room], log drum, maybe a hand drum of some sort, other pieces of metal, etc...). I also want to use a radio tuned to a static channel, using volume swells and maybe some slight modulation of the frequency. It'd be fun and interesting.

House of Leaves

I. Zampanò/Johnny Truant

II. 5 1/2 Minute Hallway

III. "In my father's house are many rooms"

IV. The Spiral Staircase

V. Exploration #5

VI. "The child is gone."/Yggradasil

I'll just copy and paste the notes I made as I was coming up with this...

i. Introduction of *Zampano’s theme*, introduction of *Johnny’s theme*, interplay between the two

a. Slightly ominous, but not scary

b. Still mostly clear, but with some mystery (strange and sudden key change[s])

ii. Prominent use of echoes (statement; statementàecho; statementàechoàfurther obscured echo; etc)

a. Quiet and distant growl(s)

b. Lots of mystery and obscurity, but still grounded in reality

c. Introduction of *the house’s theme*

iii. More disorienting and scary, sudden tempo and dynamic changes

a. More growling (not full volume yet)

b. Hints of reality come through now and then (hints of Johnny’s theme)

c. Have each section be a “room,” but always black, ashen walls (ie, monotonous)

d. End with an organ transition into the next section (The Grand Hall)

iv. Really disorienting

a. Organ intro, get quiet, then quickly (though not suddenly) crescendo and SCREAM the growl

b. Utter chaos, ala Stravinsky (not Schoenberg), occasionally SCREAM

c. Loud but thickly veiled echoes of Zampano’s theme

d. House’s theme = central point, though

v. Quiet intro; entire movement is gradual increase in tempo and dynamics, representing going down the hill

a. The end suddenly gets to loud and screeching halt, with a quieter sustained note, and then a loud fanfare like chorale, and then quiet

b. Slightly veiled restatements of all themes

c. Resolution of house’s theme

vi. Resolution of Johnny’s theme; then resolution of Zampano’s theme

a. Quiet, slow, sad, contemplative movement

b. End on a final tonic major chord

If you haven't read House of Leaves, I still highly suggest it to anyone who won't be offended by frequent "sinning" and the like. It's incredible. I'm not sure yet of the instrumentation, yet, but I'm pretty sure I want organ (probably doubling on piano), some strings, some winds, two percussionists, at least two vocalists... yeah.

Some lonely composition titles I've come up with:

Definitely Beautiful

Suburban Waves

I Wanna Know You

Yep. One composer in the program got, from what I understood, a full-ride scholarship to a doctoral music program somewhere. Made me think that I could do the same. Do I want to do that? Maybe. That's the distant future. For now I'll focus on smaller goals.

--Jon

[UPDATE 5/18/10]: Okay, so after watching a Randall Monroe talk, I realized that one of the "River Tam" movements has to be about dinosaurs.

I Finished the Book in 9 Days

2010-04-10T20:01:00.001-07:00

I finished House of Leaves. Jesus. The book was amazing. The ending was perfect. Wow.

Need I say any more?

My First Time Buying an ACTUAL Book In a Long Time... And I'm Thinking of Returning It

2010-04-02T04:18:00.000-07:00

Right now, it is 4:18 AM. I haven't slept at all. Perhaps I should start with my trip to the bookstore.

I wanted to get the WWU Bookstore's quarterly coupon book. I rarely use many of the coupons, but I usually use a few. However, I needed to buy something. Rather than just get a pencil, I instead browsed the books. I considered getting Fight Club or 1984 or Stephen Colbert's I Am America, and So Can You! I started reading a book called (quite ironically, looking back now) The Boy Who Couldn't Sleep and Never Had To, but it failed to retain my interest. Then I remembered a book I had been considering reading for awhile now... Mark Z. Danielewski's House of Leaves.

I had heard about the book via an xkcd strip that parodied the book. I read the product descriptions and review on the Amazon page that followed and was very intrigued. I think I read the book in a chair in the bookstore for about half an hour, maybe more, before deciding to buy it. I bought some MSG-ified lunch, ate it, and continued reading for another hour. I went to class earlier. Read some more. Took notes in class. Walked to band. Read more. Played percussion in band. Read more. Came home. Read a LOT more. For those of you that don't know me... this isn't something I usually do.

Or maybe it is, and maybe this book is constructed specifically for people like me, who can't pay attention to one thing for too long? I was thinking about this today; I tend to get very caught up in stories (more on that later...), but if a story stays stagnant too long, I lose interest (I probably have undiagnosed ADD of some sort). It's the same reason [good] video games appeal to me I think; the gameplay gives my ADD a break from the storyline and vice versa; the way it's constructed allows my brain to follow it more easily. Maybe that's [part of] why I was so initially enraptured by the book.

I stopped reading at about 11 o'clock, I think. I won't get into the book's subject at all, but it didn't settle well with me. The supernatural and the unknown tend not to. There was definitely something not natural about the book's subject and contents, even though I suspect that even the book's characters are fabricating the events that they're relating to me, the reader. After avoiding sleepiness for a long time, I finally caved in and decided it was time to hit the sack.

Kind of.

Only I kept stalling. As a rare occurrence, I had my desk light on. It made me feel a little more comfortable. I didn't want to turn it off. I haven't turned any lights off yet since the sun's gone down. I was afraid to turn the light off. I AM afraid to turn the light off. I keep thinking of a few key passages in the book about how the characters' perceptions of darkness started changing, and how something was in it, something never seen, but always lurking, always just beyond their field of vision (I just heard a sound outside [wind against a flagpole] and just about pissed myself). It's not that I think that something actually exists, but... I'm afraid that when I turn the lights off and get lost within my thoughts, I will think that.

I actually did manage to get into bed (though I kept my [very bright] desk lamp on). I tried listening to music. But I had a hard time even closing my eyes. The wind outside hasn't been helping. I'm very anxious. And this is why I'm considering returning the book. But how embarrassing would that be? Returning a recreational book? Because it scared me?!

Horror stories have fascinated me for years, somehow. And yet every time I come to them, they incapacitate me with unnatural and irrational fear. I think it revolves around how I just get sucked into stories; I find myself really relating to characters in stories as if they were nearly-real (never actually real; never real enough to be seen with my eyes, standing in front of me). I find myself anxious to see or hear what happens next in a story, almost as anxious as I am to see or hear what happens next in my life. I spend a lot of time daydreaming in my head, just "spacing out." This, too, likely has a connection to the experiences I have with stories of all kinds. It's not like I think the stories are real... but often in my daydreaming I will quickly alternate between thoughts of actual events, hypothetical events, and fictional events; that is to say, things that have happened already or are happening, things that might happen in the future or that I wish would happen or wouldn't happen etc, and the made-up stories I read, hear, and see. Sometimes they interplay with each other more than they should I think. Again, I'm not a schizophrenic; I never believe that untrue events become true. Sometimes I just get lost in my thoughts.

And this is probably why scary stories so truly scare me, especially at night, when I have nothing but my own thoughts and darkness (or even with the lights on, my small room and the endless darkness outside). When my daydreams are all I have, they get that much closer to reality, becoming the dreams and nightmares that I have when I sleep, which, often when I am having them, are very real to my perceptions.

Does this mean that something is wrong with me? Wrong is probably the wrong word. Not usual might be more appropriate. Thought it could become wrong if more nights come without sleep. It's not like this is a developing case; this is how I've been for some time. I remember how deeply terrified I was after watching The Ring for the first time, or when I played Silent Hill, or when I was a child, watched Child's Play, Halloween... I'm sure there were others. They scared me, but I was somehow intrigued by them. Now, these movies and games seem mostly silly, especially when real life constitutes my day.

If I avoid the stories that stir such fear in me, as I have been for the past couple of years, does that make me a coward? Maybe I have too much downtime, too much time to sit and think. But surely, people read, people watch movies. People read scary books and watch scary movies. It's not as simple as just staying busy and ignoring the things that scare me. Perhaps just this once, I'll confront my fears and read this book in its entirety. Perhaps afterwards, I'll give the book to someone else, purge it from my life, and henceforth go on with my life without wandering into the distractions of these fear-inducing tales.

We'll see how I hold up. I don't think I'd mind being a coward.

--Jon

p.s., I am confident that when they day begins, I will feel fine again (aside from the sleep deprivation, of course). If I leave the book, things will get back into the same regular flow they were in. Maybe my life needs some interruption? Maybe not. In my current very-very-tired state, everything get jumbled, especially when I'm alone. The daylight will shine more than a little light on everything.

Final Fantasy XIII: Awesome, but... (a game review)

2010-03-25T17:28:00.000-07:00

Boy oh boy, was I excited for this game. This summer I played through Final Fantasy X, and it was an amazing experience. I attempted to play through XII, and was extremely disappointed. But after years of footage and images and news stories piling up and showing that this game might be a new favorite, I started getting more than a little STOKED. Overall, I'd definitely have to say that excitement paid off, but not without a few cringes and eye-rolls.

I'll start off with the things that I loved about this game. First of all and easiest to agree on and talk about, the graphics. Wow. The transition between CG and in-game graphics is getting close to being seamless, and the world presented is totally gorgeous. Look here for an example (just skip to about 4 minutes in; that would be the opening of the game, which throws you right into the action).

The gameplay is rather awesome; arguably one of the best battle systems that the series has seen, aside from Final Fantasy X. I'm quite glad they did away with the boring MMORPG-like shittiness of XII and decided to bake up a fresh take on the ATB system that's both exciting and strategic. The crystarium system, the new vehicle of character growth, is also great; it's a bit similar to the sphere grid of Final Fantasy X, but a little easier to work with. Many people have expressed strong dislike of the linearity of the game, but I didn't mind so much; I'd say it's largely a reflection of the nature of the storyline (being fugitives constantly on the run doesn't give you much time to wander around cities where everyone wants you dead). I think people have just been spoiled by Western RPGs like Fallout, Elder Scrolls, and Dragon Age, which I would argue lack any kind of focus. Personally, I enjoyed the streamlined gameplay; it makes the storyline, IMO the most important part of the game, more up-front, and makes it all make sense.

Now, what I really want to talk about: the plot [SPOILER ALERT]. The plot started out being among my favorites in the series. The game's primary setting is Cocoon, an enormous Death Star-like world (but even BIGGER) that floats above Pulse, a more naturey world seen by Cocoon citizens as Hellish; anyone that comes into contact with anything from Pulse is seen as a virus and immediate threat to society that needs to be wiped out on the spot. Both worlds are run by gods known as fal'Cie that tend to the humans like pets. Long ago, Pulse and Cocoon warred, with no particular winner.

After the game's opening, six characters are thrown together via some sort of chance happenings and bound to the same fates; they have been marked by Pulse fal'Cie and made into tools of their home's destruction (l'Cie). Now all of them are on the run, trying to figure out how to get loved ones back, avoid their pursuers, stay alive, and figure out how to get rid of their marks, lest time runs out and their turn into monstrous, mindless, zombie-like beings (Cie'th). In their journey across their home of Cocoon, we are shown flashbacks of the thirteen days before the game's opening, which shed light on present events. Namely, two of the six characters are revealed to be from the lower-world of Pulse, having awoken from a several-hundred-year-crystal-sleep and caused the characters to be in the bind they're now all in. It's a very emotional journey, with some pretty prominent and tough themes (destiny, loyalty, government/religion-led fear-mongering, forgiveness). The pacing of it is just right, and kept me on the edge of my seat, even if we were just wandering through a junk-heap or a manufactured forest/bioweapon-production lab.

However, about halfway through the game, everything is shattered by a crazy plot-twist: the characters were being guided and kept alive by a rogue Cocoon fal'Cie that wants to destroy its world as a sacrifice to bring back its super-God Maker, which created the world and left it in disarray. This is all revealed right after he kills the only primary villain up to that point. At this point, despite some of the most epic boss battle music ever, the game really loses some of its focus. The characters end up on Pulse (which is a bit less hellish than the government would have liked its citizens to know) and wander around aimlessly for awhile (ironically, this is when most people seem to think the game gets better). Eventually they end up at two of the characters' former homes, now overrun by monsters, Cie'th, and a mysterious, light crystal snow (which, unfortunately never is explained). This part is probably the best since that goofy plot twist. After another encounter with the aforementioned rogue fal'Cie, Barthandalus, the characters go back up to Cocoon to stop its destruction.

The invasion scene that accompanies this is completely ridiculous and anime-like, having probably been done by the same people that made the similarly ridiculous Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children. Anyways, the characters make it through the city, all epic-like, and the game picks up and starts being good again. Then, suddenly, it seems like the writers of the game got to crunch time and started running out of ideas, so they killed off a really awesome character without even a shred of emotion, and then threw everyone into a tedious labyrinth to the final boss. Amidst that fight, things get REALLY ridiculous and confusing... and then they get even MORE ridiculous and confusing... until the ending movie of the game, which made me throw my palm to into my face. Suddenly, boom, EVERYTHING IS HAPPY. Even though the characters kind of fucked up by almost fulfilling their literally-god-given-duty of destroying their home-world... they and their world is saved by what they call a "miracle," and what I call "bad writing," and/or "bad planning." That super-God "Maker" guy I talked about? Never even shows up. They could have really done something with that if he had, and accentuated some of the themes of the game. They could have done a lot of stuff that would have made the game more awesome than it was. Instead, it's just kind of awesome. Fortunately, they're thinking of doing a direct sequel to this game, which hopefully will be better than Final Fantasy X-2, and could tie up some very, very loose ends.

Another complaint I have about this plot is the lack of depth at some points. How did Lightning and Serah's parents die? How did that affect them? How did Snow meet Serah? How did Sazh's wife die? How did that affect them? What happened to Vanille and Fang's hometown? Does the Maker actually exist, or is it just some myth that the fal'Cie made up? Or is that question meant to go unanswered? Whatever happened to Hope's father? Where WERE Serah and Dajh when they were in crystal suspension? What happened to the rest of NORA (I did like that they at least appeared in the final chapters of the game, but...)? It's these sorts of unanswered questions that frustrated me the most. [SPOILER ALERT OVER]

Despite all the negative stuff about the plot, I still loved most of it. My eyes almost got watery at a couple of points, and I found my heart beating fast and my hands clenched at the controller at some of the more poignant points in the story. The game was incredibly fun to play. The soundtrack was AMAZING. I wouldn't have wanted anyone other than Masashi Hamauzu to take over the series' music (except maybe Yasunori Mitsuda); I really admired his work on Final Fantasy X. He does even better on this soundtrack. His adaptations of the chocobo theme are ingenious, and unlike the music to XII (man, it really seems like I'm hating on that game... probably rightfully so), he manages to make epic, blood-pumping music that is really enjoyable to listen to. He also did a phenomenal job with his usage of leitmotifs throughout the game.

I think I've talked enough about the game. It was good! Go play it!

FINAL SCORE: +3.7 (on a scale of -5 to +5)

--Jon

Custodians

2010-03-17T13:11:00.000-07:00

There's this one custodian who cleans a certain building at Western who is always there mopping the floor when I go to my meetings. The custodian, a small, old man, stops his cleaning to let me walk past. He's usually unsmiling and rather unhappy looking (I'm not too sure what reason he'd have to smile, as cleaning the floor is really not that fun), but lately I've smiled at him and said "hello" or "excuse me" or something, and he always cheers up and says something kind in response.

The other day, I was in the performing arts building, and there were two custodians hauling a large cart of clearing supplies down the hall. I needed to go down the same hall they were about to go down, and one of the custodians respectfully opened the door for me and let me go first, and I thanked him. I came to another door in the hallway (come to think of it, those doors are completely pointless), and I performed the polite and normal act of holding the door so they could push the large cart through. Rather than just saying "thanks," one of them said, "Thank you! Not many students would do that for us." I talked with them a little bit about doors, and although it wasn't the most interesting conversation, I realized that few people realize what custodians do for us. If we encountered a professor in the hall, even if we didn't know that professor, we'd at least simile and acknowledge their existence. I feel as though we almost always ignore custodians and pretend they aren't there.

I bet custodians realize that they're under-appreciated, and we, as students, can make a huge difference in their lives by at least smiling at them and telling them "good morning." But I'm not saying that we should feel sorry for or suck up to them; I'm simply stating what I have observed and concluded. I encourage everyone to befriend a custodian, because they are some of the nicest people I've ever met.

--Elie

Craziest Week Ever!

2010-03-10T22:44:00.001-08:00

It's not even Finals Week yet, and I have a final every day this week except Monday. On top of THOSE finals, I have to finish two 800 word lecture reviews that I procrastinate on, prepare for finals and juries next week, prepare a radio show for this weekend, prepare for practically-sight-reading with the orchestra this weekend, entertain my parents when they visit me this weekend, band concert this weekend, band concert I just finished, attend the last club meetings of the quarter, and on top of that all I figured out the next four years of my life last night, and it looks like I'll be in college for a total of 5.6 years. And beside all of this, I bought Final Fantasy XIII. It's fantastic. But I have no time to play it because of all of this stuff going on! BLAARGH! This is madness!

...Madness...?

THIS.

IS.

COLLEGE.

--Jon

p.s., on a side-note, I'm in the Wind Symphony next quarter, we're playing an awesome epic piece, and the composer will be in residence! Huzzah! AND. Bianco will have the biggest Mahler hammer ever. :D

I'm Wasting My Time at College

2010-03-07T15:45:00.000-08:00

Man, I really need to post an up-beat blog. Maybe someday...

Anyway, as winter quarter ends and registration for spring quarter begins, I'm realizing more and more that I'm waiting my time at college. It's not like I have nothing to do or that I hate what I'm doing, 'cause I'm doing a lot of stuff that I really love. But I'm only taking 3 classes that count towards my major each quarter. What a waste of time! My credits are fluffed with a mentoring class (which is great for practical experience, but doesn't count towards my education major, ironically), and band/lessons. Together, that's 4-6 credits that aren't going towards a degree. And I'll already be in college for an abnormally long period of time due to my large major and endorsements.

For a few days, I was convinced I was going to take four classes towards my major next quarter, and volunteer for the mentoring program and band, so I would be taking an equivalent of 22 or 23 credits. It didn't sound that scary because band, lessons, and the mentoring program don't give out homework. Basically, I'd only have to do homework for four classes. But then I realized I would have NO time to do homework or do my practicum work. So I cannot take four classes for my major/endorsement; I can only take three. So now I'm back to shuffling my feet through college, only taking a few classes at a time. This cannot be a good way to spend my time, but there's no way I can NOT see my 5th graders or participate in the music program or in my clubs. Ug. I'm so conflicted!

Blog gods, please guide me in the right direction. Amen.

~Elie

"Advice, Like Youth, Probably Just Wasted On the Young"

2010-02-09T20:37:00.000-08:00

"Wear sunscreen.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now.

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth. Oh, never mind. You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they've faded. But trust me, in 20 years, you'll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can't grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked. You are not as fat as you imagine.

Don't worry about the future. Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 p.m. on some idle Tuesday.

Do one thing every day that scares you.

Sing.

Don't be reckless with other people's hearts. Don't put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Floss.

Don't waste your time on jealousy. Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind. The race is long and, in the end, it's only with yourself.

Remember compliments you receive. Forget the insults. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old love letters. Throw away your old bank statements.

Stretch.

Don't feel guilty if you don't know what you want to do with your life. The most interesting people I know didn't know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives. Some of the most interesting 40-year-olds I know still don't.

Get plenty of calcium. Be kind to your knees. You'll miss them when they're gone.

Maybe you'll marry, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll have children, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll divorce at 40, maybe you'll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary. Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either. Your choices are half chance. So are everybody else's.

Enjoy your body. Use it every way you can. Don't be afraid of it or of what other people think of it. It's the greatest instrument you'll ever own.

Dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but your living room.

Read the directions, even if you don't follow them.

Do not read beauty magazines. They will only make you feel ugly.

Get to know your parents. You never know when they'll be gone for good. Be nice to your siblings. They're your best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.

Understand that friends come and go, but with a precious few you should hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle, because the older you get, the more you need the people who knew you when you were young.

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard. Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.

Travel.

Accept certain inalienable truths: Prices will rise. Politicians will philander. You, too, will get old. And when you do, you'll fantasize that when you were young, prices were reasonable, politicians were noble and children respected their elders.

Respect your elders.

Don't expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund. Maybe you'll have a wealthy spouse. But you never know when either one might run out.

Don't mess too much with your hair or by the time you're 40 it will look 85.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia. Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it's worth.

But trust me on the sunscreen."

--by Mary Schmich
Chicago Tribune Columnist

It's Been Awhile [What's Up! Pre-Awards Show 2010 review]

2010-01-30T01:36:00.000-08:00

It's been awhile since I was unable to sleep due to ear-ringing and adrenaline-rush. That's right--tonight I attended my first show in quite some time, and it was quite enjoyable. First of all, the lighting was excellent. Unfortunately, my spot at the very front had some downsides; namely being in between speakers prevented me from hearing some stuff, particularly during Idiot Pilot's set.

Sugar Sugar Sugar was the opening band, and at the first few chords and drum-hits, I wasn't very impressed; sounded like a typical pseudo-"classic-rock" band. Then the vocals came in... and it was not at all what I expected. No Brian Johnson or Bon Scott or Robert Plant or Mick Jagger impressions; more of a Prince impression than anything. As the set went on, I took them for what they were; a pretty damn entertaining local rock band. Good set.

Next was Rooftops. The first time I saw them, they were "the Acoustops" opening for Pan Pan (or was it the other way around? Can't remember) in the Underground Coffeehouse. Electric instruments definitely suit them better. Super-mathy virtuosic guitar pop is the best way to describe them. Sarah Jerns of Pan Pan joined them on flugelhorn/trumpet on a couple tunes, which was quite the nice addition. IMO, they're just a taaaad too noodly, but overall I enjoyed it.

Next was Yogoman Burning Band, the very fun ska/reggae/dub/whatever band that tried to make me dance when I wanted to stand and enjoy the music. I don't have anything against people who want to dance (until they started dry-humping in front of me, or when bro Sublime-fans start ramming into me), but it irritates me when a band says (this is almost actually a direct quote) "If you're not dancing, you should be." NOPE. Regardless, their music was very nice, tight, fun, and groovy. I liked it.

Next up was Idiot Pilot. Fortunately for people like me but unfortunately for the ego of the closing band, a bunch of people left before they went on. They totally rocked it, though. Only three songs from their [superior, IMO] debut album, "Strange We Should Meet Here," but they were good ones ("A Day in the Life of a Poolshark," eponymous track, and set-closer "To Buy a Gun"). Lots of jumping, thrashing, screaming, belting, electro clicks, and just energy in general. Very glad I finally got to see them live.

On the way home, the bus was totally full of possibly drunk college students doing their Friday night thing, and then on Ferry Ave I saw a couple of deer. I'm going to bed now. Good night!

--Jon

The Teen Pregnancy Welfare Dilemma

2010-01-26T23:02:00.000-08:00

Some quick and probably rather uneducated thoughts about welfare:

I understand where angry conservatives are coming from when they bash on welfare. They don't want their tax dollars going to someone who doesn't learn from their mistakes, who takes it, makes more mistakes, and then takes more money. It's understandable. They don't want their money going to teenagers who were "stupid" enough to have sex unprotected, and then got pregnant.

Okay, fair enough. Teens shouldn't be monetarily rewarded for getting pregnant in high school. It's their own fault, etc. What these people never seem to think about, however, are the children of these kids. We focus so much on "teen moms" (hell, apparently there's a reality show called "Teen Moms") that we forget about the ones that matter and that suffer the most; their children. These kids will quite often grow up in an incredibly negative environment, with parents that don't know how to be parents, that don't have enough money to buy them the essentials, that use the money they do have irresponsibly [I know, this isn't how every teen parent does things]. As a result, by the time they get into school, they haven't developed adequately to the point that they are ready to learn, and then they get held back, and then they don't get enough help with homework, and then they end up just like their parents did. And then, lo and behold, 16 years later, they get pregnant. Just like their parents.

Does welfare help this problem? Sometimes, probably. But also often not, I'm guessing. I don't have the statistics. Maybe Elie will? In any case, here's my question: how do we protect and make a better life for these kids before it's too late for them?

--Jon

I Think Life is Trying to Tell me Something

2010-01-19T23:16:00.000-08:00

The blog I wrote a few weeks ago, right as school was about to start, was all about how I was stressed. Let's see. I was stressed about being too busy, stressed about getting to see my 5th graders, stressed about getting good band music and not being demoted, stressed about my sink breaking, etc.

I wasn't too busy. In fact, I'm not nearly as panicked as I was last quarter. The irony is that I'm taking 20 credits now whereas, last quarter, I only took 13 credits without being in Whatcom Wind Ensemble.

I got to see my 5th graders. For about 3 days I was nearly in tears all day because I thought I wouldn't get to go back to see them and I was incredibly frustrated because of that. But it all worked out.

I got fabulous pieces in band. In fact, I got solo clarinet on the best piece we're playing. So not only was I not demoted, but I was promoted to basically being the number one clarinetist for at least that one song. My ego grew like 15 times what it was before...

And then I started to stress about whether I could actually play my solos, either because I suck at reading music or because I would get nervous and mess up - or both. But, the one time I got the opportunity to play the solos, I did it well, and now I'm more excited than nervous. Again, worried for nothing. And I'm practically the solo clarinetist on half the music we're playing in Whatcom Wind Ensemble simply because I'm on the of the only clarinetists period, and it's not freaking me out!

Before all this stuff happened, my sink leaked a whole bunch on my birthday. I thought I would have to move to another apartment, would be fined for water damage, have horrible mold everywhere, have the landlord mad at me, and have my roommate mad at me. But everything was fixed and nothing was pinned on me.

For everything that I've been really stressed about, I've realized that I stressed for nothing. This happens over and over. I think that fate is creating these stressful situation to prove to me that there is nothing to worry about. But does this help my stress level? No. I keep thinking that luck has been on my side all these times that it's going to work against me soon. But that's illogical. I even considered going to the WWU counseling center for free counseling for this lovely stress and anxiety of mine, but I just want to be able to pop a few pills (this coming from someone who hates taking drugs of all kinds, be it vitamins or advil) to make me calm. But then that would cost money and would probably be the less-healthy route. Something needs to change, though, and I don't know how to make it happen. *sigh*

-Elie

Of Fish and Men

2010-01-19T23:06:00.000-08:00

As I've been telling everybody who comes within earshot of me, I recently bought a Betta fish. Since I've always grown up with animals (cats, dogs, fish, a parakeet), I felt a void in my life when I moved away from my home in McCleary because I didn't have any pets besides spider plants.

So I finally went out and bought a fish. I know that he's just a fish, but I love Frederick (my fish). Having a living, moving creature changes the whole mood of my room. Even though he's terribly distracting, watching him makes me calmer, aside from the fact that I'm terrified that he'll suddenly die out of nowhere. That fear was caused by my killing my roommate's fish - on accident!

As I watch Frederick, I wonder about the ethics of keeping fish. Wouldn't all fish be happier living in the ocean or lakes or whatever they're from? Do they mind being kept in small bowls? I'd imagine that they'd prefer larger spaces in which to swim, which is why I bought a fairly large, half-gallon bowl. But is he happy? Is it cruel to keep fish as pets? It's not like we provide joy for them as humans can for cats and dogs. Or are fishes' brains too minute to comprehend happiness?

-Elie

Here's a quote that I don't like

2010-01-17T00:31:00.000-08:00

"Alcohol is the anesthesia by which we endure the operation of life."

-G. Bernard Shaw

This is contrary to all the arguments FOR alcohol that I've heard. It basically reinforces my main criticism of it; people drink because they don't appreciate life just for what it is substance-free. I'd love to be convinced otherwise. But my experiences around people drinking have been less than fantastic thus far in my life.

Maybe I should put it this way; if you're drinking for reasons that align you with this quote, then you are drinking for the wrong reasons.

--Jon

Musically Disadvantaged

2010-01-10T20:53:00.000-08:00

Be warned; this is going to be rather stream-of-conscious-esque.

I didn't grow up in a wealthy family. We were the epitome of "lower middle class." My dad jumped from job to job with his worker's union, and my mom worked at a local grocery store. We lived comfortably, but I didn't have a lot of the fancy gadgets that others had. On top of it all, we kind of lived in the middle of nowhere, in a small town with small schools, and hence not a totally prestigious music program (although, I have to say, Mr. Fosket has done wonders with what we did have). The nearest decently-sized city was a good hour away from where we lived. Two-hour round trip. We had a small house; a drum-set would have been out of the question in that place, as there would be nowhere to put it, let alone play it without driving my parents insane. My family wasn't a musical family. My sister, seven grades above me, went through the public music program that started at grade 6. She was the first in our family to play any instrument. We never had private lessons; we couldn't afford it, and there weren't many teachers in our area in the first place. I've seen pictures of now-amazing musicians when they were kids. Some of them, even as toddlers, had a mini drumset they played, or a toy keyboard. They had lessons starting at age 5. I didn't have any of that stuff. I didn't play music, aside from my tinkering on elementary school instruments, until 6th grade.

I remember one time in elementary school, there was some sort of culture assembly where some classical musicians came and played for us and talked to us about music. It totally enthralled me. I wanted to do what they did so badly (although at this point I was also totally enthralled by the motivational yoyoist that talked to us, too). In our music classes, I totally hated singing and dancing... but boy, when we took out this little tinker-toy mallet instruments and toy drums... I was in heaven. In fifth grade, I took a little evaluation to figure out what instrument I should play. I was a master of rhythm with those drumsticks. In sixth grade, I would be a percussionist.

And that happened. But my middle school band teacher wasn't the finest. He wasn't meant for the job he had. And something tells me he didn't give a rat's ass about what was going on way back in the percussion section in the back of the room. I took drums seriously. Very few others in that classroom did. I didn't have any professional lessons. Once or twice the local drum instructor came in and taught us "a thing or two." He wasn't meant for his job either. But he was what the area had. I essentially had to teach myself everything. One big thing did happen in middle school though (or, rather, didn't happen); I never actually really learned to read music. Sure I got the same basic instruction as everyone at the beginning. But as soon as he could, he threw me on timpani. There went my reading skills; right down the tube. To this day, I still have a very hard time reading music. I feel like if I had gotten some more decent training early on in my music career, I wouldn't be so disadvantaged now.

Fast-forward to high school. Bottom of the barrel. I barely knew how to play my instrument. A lot of others didn't, either. But by now those were the ones that were in this class because they knew it was an easy A, not because they wanted their lives enriched by music, or because they wanted to become better musicians, or even better drummers... they just wanted to hit shit and get an A for it. I could read music better than a lot of people there... but that wasn't saying much. To those who wanted to learn and needed to learn, Mr. Fosket taught. And I took in everything I could. But Mr. Fosket wasn't a percussionist, so he couldn't teach private lessons in them. At this point I didn't know what I wanted to do with music, and by this point I had started to play guitar, so that was more of a focus for me; percussion was just what I did with school. I had a solid sense of rhythm, but I never really got the chance to truly show what I was made of. I got a pretty good part in most ensemble pieces, including one of four "lead" parts in a piece that got us 2nd in the state solo/ensemble competition... but any mallet parts I ever had were essentially memorized. Rhythms were fantastic. Anything melodic or harmonic... I could not sight-read. Sophomore year I tried playing a mallet duet... and failed. Badly. Any musical dreams I had at that point were crushed. I figured I might as well do math. I was pretty good at that. While this wasn't really a turning point at all, my self-esteem hadn't really improved much.

Fast-forward to my senior year of high school. I'm more more self-motivated and independent than ever before. I've been on the sidelines in the band for three years, and I'm ready to prove what I'm capable of. I dug through Mr. Fosket's catalogs of percussion solos and found a short and pretty cool and easy one for the regional solo/ensemble competition. I practiced hard during band (and once or twice after school, as well as reading it to myself at home) for a couple of weeks. I won the spot to State, but much to my dismay, I'd need a new (and harder) piece of I really wanted to compete. Mr. Fosket, not always being one for personal motivational speaches, gave me subtle but effective encouragement. As did my mother. I went through some online samples of multi-percussion solos, and one in particular really caught my ear... but it sounded impossibly difficult. How could anyone possibly play that?! Absolutely insane. I'll find something easier. ...But I slowly got to thinking "...No, I can do this. If I put my mind to it, and work really, really hard, I can do it." So I got the score, and slowly picked away at it. I dug through the back of the band room, through piles of old equipment, looking for the right instruments that I would need for the solo, assembling it almost every day and practicing it after school when I didn't work. I played it on my lap for hours at home. I worked very, very hard, and with that piece, I got a $2000 scholarship and 2nd in the state. I finally had something for which to be truly proud of myself.

Fast-forward to college. Bottom of the barrel yet again. I realize that my musical skills are pretty lackluster. I'm worlds behind other entering freshmen. Sure, when it comes down to theory and weird rhythms and subtle things like that, sometimes I've got the edge. But essentially, when playing anything... bottom of the barrel. But I'm working hard on improving. I'm finally getting private lessons, and for one quarter I even got them from a fellow student, since I was so desperate for help, and this was truly what I wanted to do. It took me a year to muster up the courage and skills to actually audition for the band program... and from what it sounds like, I definitely needed that extra year. I almost gave up on music. But now, here I am. I'm finally a bit secure, now that I'm here in the band program.

But now I'm reading a book for my first music education class. It describes five kinds of musicians that become music teachers, and the professor, Stambaugh, added an extra one in class. We're supposed to pick one of these stories with which we most fit into. After listening to all of them, I realized that I didn't fit into any of them, because every single one of them received private lessons at a young age, came from a musical family, lived in a big city with a completely astounding music program, came into college as one of the best in their freshman class... all things that I never had. It's times like these that I realize that, yes, I was musically disadvantaged. But that didn't stop me in middle school. Or early high school. Or my senior year of high school. Or last year. And it won't stop me now.

--Jon

Bellingham is A-Buzzing

2010-01-04T22:10:00.000-08:00

And thus begins a new chapter in our lives. A new year. A new quarter. A new...hair cut?

I actually have a resolution for the new year. Well, I guess it wasn't for the new year, but it began around the new year. I mentioned in my previous blog that my pants fit, which is a bad thing. Since coming back to Bellingham, I've taken up jogging, and I love it. In addition to making my legs really sore, I already feel a difference. And being healthy is good. But no, I refuse to drink milk. Don't even ask.

A while back, right before summer ended, I wrote about not stressing any more. I said something awfully catchy like, "it's time to stop stressing and start living." Well, that didn't work out very well, unfortunately. I considered trying to try that resolution again, but I know I can't do it. It's like quitting smoking cold turkey. I can't quit stressing just like that. But I need to do something. Here I am, one day before school starts, and I've given myself a headache due to stress. And classes haven't even started yet! I keep telling myself that it'll be fine, but it doesn't do a whole lot. I keep thinking, what if I can't handle all my classes? What if I have major time conflicts with my clubs and potentially future job? What if I suck at archaeology or any of my other classes?

My mind goes back to last quarter when I freaked out about my evil, evil history and anthropology classes. But guess what. I got A- in both of those classes. It's like Western is trying to tell me to shut up about stressing because I'll be fine. Why can't I listen to reason?!

Well, reason is also telling me that I may have committed to too much: 20 credits of coursework, 3 clubs, pep band, and 2 jobs. But if I didn't do so much, I'd think I was slacking compared to everybody else, which would also make me stress. I feel like I need to do something extraordinary, so I overwhelm myself with classes and extra-curriculars.

Elie. Shut up and stop worrying. It'll be fine. Sincerely,

Elie

Just For the Record...

2009-12-29T22:51:00.000-08:00

If anyone mentions anything about my hair resembling a bowl, or something similar to that, they will receive a swift punch in the face, followed by a firm kick to the genitals. Thanks.

--Jon, an unhappy Noggins haircut recipient

A Complementary Sample of Inane Winter Break Babbling

2009-12-26T14:23:00.001-08:00

So I’m sitting on my bed in the dark, listening to an “inspiration” playlist I made myself (David Byrne & Brian Eno’s “Strange Overtones” was just on, and now it’s Grizzly Bear’s “Fine For Now”). I was playing Minesweeper, and before that Spider Solitaire, and before that Final Fantasy VI (didn’t know what I had to do, confused, then finally realized after getting really bored and didn’t care enough to prepare well enough to go to a dangerous place, so I gave up). I feel like I should write something, even though I have nothing to write about. Earlier I tried making music, but I felt totally uninspired. And I feel like I SHOULD be inspired. I often think, “Ooh, this would make an interesting song subject/title/theme/feeling/whatever,” but I fail at expressing it. I hope that composition classes will help me with these sorts of issues. And actually progressing in theory, ala NOT taking it from Chuck Israels. I think I made almost this exact same blog post awhile back, buuuuut oh well.

I’m excited to get back up to Bellingham. It’s obnoxiously difficult to hang out with people who are like “Oh, yeah, we should hang out…” and then totally bail or don’t call or don’t call back. At least once I get back to Bellingham, Elie will hang out with me even if she has poop-loads of homework to do (although she might do that homework while hanging out, that’s okay). I realized recently that I get very lonely very easily. Like Elie, I don’t care about “fitting in” as much as I care about being true to myself and what I believe to be right for me. Unfortunately, what I believe is often quite contrary to what others believe, and just the way I am generally isn’t as socially compatible with typical college kids. Or typical people. I’m not sure what it is. Other people are opinionated. Other people are goofy. Other people like weird music. I just feel like there’s other people up there in Bellingham that I could easily be great friends with… but I’m not. Why? We just never find each other? I guess so. Hopefully that will eventually change. I can’t complain too much, though. I still have great friends (that I don’t see enough : /) and the best girlfriend I could ask for. Yep, more sappy Elie/Jon love. That’s more than a lot of people have; I would venture to say more than most people have, even if they think they have it.

So some lighter fare: I got my radio show that I submitted! “All Things Epic” will premier Saturday, January 9, 2010 from 10 AM to noon, and will run every Saturday thereafter for the whole quarter at that time. Classical, metal, post-rock, chamber-pop, and other “epic music” is what it will consist of. Suggestions? I could always use some.

Merry Christmas?

Speaking of Christmas; the holiday means very little to me now. It’s especially confusing in a town like Sequim; nationwide, Christmas has essentially become a secular holiday (as it should be; separation of church and state FTW), with completely non-religious people celebrating it and wishing people “Merry Christmas.” But the fact remains that basically all Christians, the majority of America, take Christmas very seriously. In Sequim, a Christian-right bubble of “Fuck you if you’re not Christian!” attitude if there ever was one, whenever I hear “Merry Christmas!” I think, “What if I don’t celebrate your precious holiday?” Obviously they mean well. But in places like this, people do assume that everyone is a God-fearing Christian, like everyone obviously should be. And it’s a dangerous attitude; these are the kinds of mindsets that spark ethnocentrism, which in turn sparks all sorts of problems.

I probably sound like a Grinchy Scroogey cynic; I really WANT to like the holiday season, but it doesn’t help that my parents have all but completely given up on it except for the whole “Well, might as well gather some family members while everyone else is” part. I kinda want to just spend Christmas with someone else; but I don’t really know anyone whose house I might be invited into [editor-in-Jon’s-head note: how the hell do you write that sentence grammatically correctly?!]; Christmas is a family holiday, and my family has become totally indifferent. I haven’t even gotten anybody gifts yet, because I have no goddamn clue what to get anyone. I’m feeling a total lack of Christmas spirit. Or even a spirit of giving. Most people would probably confront this problem rather easily… but it’s totally rattling my brain and driving me crazy. I can only hope that I’ll find divine inspiration somewhere.

Ironically, the song playing now is Wilco’s “Jesus, Etc.” It’s a very pretty song.

--Jon [written 12/23/09, 1:20 AM]

My Pants Fit

2009-12-21T13:58:00.001-08:00

Yup. My pants stay on my waist without having to use a belt that's too big. In fact, the buckle now fits into one of the actual holes on the belt, not one I had to make myself because I needed a smaller belt. This is not a good sign. This isn't a blog about a crazy teenage girl complaining about how fat she is, but I am gaining weight and I'm not okay with it.

My weight gain is probably due to my lack of exercise. I do absolutely none of it except for walking to classes and to and from my apartment to campus. And stress. Especially this past quarter, I've done so much sitting and reading and writing and stressing. Plus, I hate exercising. Absolutely hate it. Last year I forced myself to sign up for a jogging class at Western, but once I started running, I had shoulder problems. Yup. Shoulder problems from running. Thank you, messed up back. And speaking of my back, the exercises that I can actually do are severely limited, and the only type of exercise I'll actually do, jogging/running, will make me hurt more. Why do the health gods hate me?

At any rate, shoulder problems or no shoulder problems, I'm going to make myself start running when I get to Western. I'd start now, while I'm in the lovely land of Grays Harbor, but I don't have running shoes or sweat pants. But I'll do it. I'm not just sayin'. The fact that my pants actually fit has scared me into realizing that my health is declining quickly (well, more quickly than I thought) and that I need to do something. Of course, running won't solve all my problems, and might make them worse, but it's something. That way I can say I actually tried.

--Elie

Dear Popular Girls of Middle School,

2009-12-18T19:56:00.000-08:00

You all made me feel worthless and unpopular. You made me try to be like you and get into your clique, and I was discouraged each time you pushed me away. You were the cool ones who were going to make it big one day, with your handsome, popular boyfriends, your beautiful skin full of make-up, and your brand-name clothing. You all made me feel so out of the loop that I voluntarily pushed myself as far away from your clique as possible. I tried my best to be a tomboy by not dressing in tight, expensive clothing, by not wearing makeup, by not coloring, straightening, or curling my hair, by not taking dance classes, and by not having all the boyfriends I possibly could.

Well, the years have passed, and I went my own way. While you guys were more involved with cheerleading, boys, and your appearance, I was concentrating on good grades. Popularity was not a concern of mine, although I often wished I had more friends. But I never wanted to be like you. By the time high school rolled around, I knew I would never be that shallow.

Over five years has passed since middle school, and I'm slowly figuring out what you're all doing. While I'm fulfilling my dream of becoming teacher, what are you guys doing? Are you all living in mansions with gorgeous husbands and expensive dogs? Or are you working hard in med school?

Not even close. You all are stuck in the lousy place we grew up, going to community college every once in a while, or going to beauty school to support your children. What good will beauty school get you? What good can you do in the world? Sure, you can make rich, white women feel richer and more beautiful, but what good does that to do anybody else? And you've probably figured out that the beautiful boy you've been dating is actually a loser and cannot support you and your family or family-to-be.

But wait! For once, I'm the one with the handsome boyfriend. And he's actually smart. And guess what? We're going to do something with our lives. And I don't mean having children as soon as possible or styling people's hair. We're going to help people who need it, and we're going to reach people at deeper levels than their skin or hair.

So, you popular girls of middle school, thank you for being so horrible and shallow. Otherwise, I may have been accepted into your clique and ruined my life. I may have suffered in middle school, but, thanks to you, I know I came out on top.

Edit: I discussed this topic with my mom, the idea of very few people from McCleary leaving the area, let alone going to a four-year college where they have to move away from home for a few years. Her hypothesis (with which I agree) is that people from McCleary are used to being a big fish in a little pond. People in McCleary are usually born and raised in the area where they have lots of friends and relatives. By going to a university or just moving out of the area, they're suddenly nobody. I understand that being a little fish in a big pond is scary; I've been there. But the people from McCleary don't have the nerve to be that little fish. They're too scared to move outside of their comfort zone and become nobody and have to actually make a name for themselves.

From the beginning, I was different because I moved to McCleary from Tacoma. I knew nobody and had no relatives within 100 miles. Because I wasn't born with my reputation and family tree stapled to my forehead, I was not accepted in McCleary.

But I've taken risks, beginning with going to high school in Olympia. I was successful in that endeavour, which helped give me courage to move away from my home and again be a little fish in a big pond. I may not be known by everybody at Western, but I like to think that I'm seen as a big fish in the activities I pursue, such as the clubs and bands I'm in. I've gone out in the world and done something, and I'll continue doing this until I'm a successful teacher - and a successful person. Take THAT, popular girls from middle school.

Most sincerely,
Elie

With a Little Help From My Friends

2009-12-16T23:07:00.001-08:00

So here I am, finally willing myself to write a blog only to find that Jon has beaten me to it! And there's no way I can top his blog. God dammit!

That aside, winter break is finally here. Okay, fine. Call it Christmas break. That's what it is: a break for Christmas. Schools have to call it winter break to avoid excluding those non-Christmas-celebrating people. But still, the break is for Christmas. It's not Hanukkah break. It's not Ramadan break. It's a break for Christians. At any rate, I'm finally on a break. As I sit at home trying to enjoy a book or knitting something I'll never finish, let alone wear, sometimes I wonder what else to do. Nothing, I think, and I continue knitting or reading. It usually doesn't occur to me to be with other people. Then I realize that most people are with friends and use this break from school to hang out with others.

And then there's me, sitting at home with my books, glasses, and fuzzy socks. I'm content at home, although I may be a little bored from time to time. But sometimes I wonder why I'm so different and not with friends. Maybe it's growing up in McCleary that has moved me away from being social. Maybe it's my dislike of socializing. Maybe both. Maybe that's why I really don't have many friends. I made friends in elementary school and a few in middle school and then lost them all when I went to high school. And I made friends in high school and lost most of them when I went to college. And I'm making friends now, but nobody who I hang out with or can really talk to. I'm sure I'm not the only one who can be considered a loner, but why me? What makes me so different? In Bellingham, there's plenty of people to hang out with and public transportation to get me around. Yet I hang out alone in the library, a practice room, or my apartment, usually alone. And I'm content. I don't think, "dang, I sure wish I had a friend." I only wish I was with Jon, 'cause I always wish I'm with him when I'm not. But being with other friends rarely crosses my mind, and that's normal to me. But then I realize that my normal isn't normal to everybody else's normal. But I don't want to be normal like everybody else.

Yet, as I look at all the pictures my friends post on facebook of their high school and college adventures, I feel like I'm missing something. Nobody's around to take pictures of me (don't you even think about it, Jon), and my only social activities include going to club meetings. And I put myself in those clubs; it's not like I was invited. And it's times like these that I feel invisible and thank Allah for the one person who I feel can see me: Jon. I feel as though I gush about him a lot, and I probably do. And that's fine with me. :)

On rare occasions when I think about my friend predicament, I become afraid that if I mean little to my peers then I'll mean nothing to my future students. What exactly is it about me that turns people away from me? How can I make myself appealing to my future students who actually matter? Maybe I'll mean something them because they'll mean something to me. Part of my problem in the first place is that I've been slapped in the face by so many people with whom I've wanted to be friends that I really don't care if I'm friends with them or if we were once friends and then became distant. I just don't care. Sometimes I stop and think, "well that's a shame," but I move on. I've learned to do that: forget. I like to picture myself as standing transparent as people I once loved walk through me. Neither of us look back at the other.

Maybe now I sound like I'm crying to this blog and those few people who read it. I don't want it to be like that. It's not a cry for help. I'm just spilling my thoughts on the Internet for others to read. I'm that nice. :D

--Elie

As a Matter of Fact, MY God's Last Name IS Dammit

2009-12-16T14:34:00.000-08:00

I've heard a number of people say "God's last name isn't 'Dammit'!" after someone says an obligatory "goddammit." Okay, so maybe YOUR god's last name isn't 'Dammit.' But what most people don't know is, many citizens of the world worship a different and less well-known deity that goes by the name of God Dammit. He's a cool dude usually; he likes to induce painful laughter and joy by putting stupid words in someone else's, but he can be pretty apathetic to tragedies in the world, and likes to inflict all kinds of pain (hence people yelling "GOD DAMMIT"). I think he smokes pot or something. I talk to him every day. I also see him all the time. You can't see him because he doesn't think you're cool enough. He has a pretty big family, all of which are near-omnipotent. Mother Fucker, Sonuva Bitch, Jesus Christ (different one than you know; this guy's actually a pretty big bastard), and Shitonmy Balls just to name a few.

So next time someone says "God Dammit," maybe you should be less judgmental and stop disrespecting and blasphemizing my religion!

--Jon

A Little Worse Than Mediocre

2009-11-08T12:50:00.001-08:00

On Friday I was in an elementary school classroom for 3 hours, meaning I've spent at least 6 total hours in that class this quarter. I love those kids, but I had a really hard time connecting to them. And now I'm bummed. :(

Part of the problem was that the class was in absolute chaos for most of the day. The teacher realizes that the class has a variety of students at different reading and math levels, so she divides the class into sections. Thus, a third of the class is working on one thing while the other two thirds are doing something completely different. Then, one part of the class will finish and run around while others are still working. Pretty soon, one group is running around killing time, another is working on spelling, and another group is taking a math test. Let me tell you, those kids do not want to do much of anything quietly. Furthermore, as soon as I figure out how to help a group of kids with a reading assignment, another reading group needs help, but their assignment is totally different, so I have to figure out the answer to a puzzle about a story I never read. Most of the time I feel pretty useless.

When I can't help them with their classwork, I walk around and try to chat with the kids about various things, but they don't seem like they want to talk to me; they want to do their own things with their own friends. How the heck do I reach these kids?

I left the school feeling pretty lousy about how I didn't reach most of them. Then I started thinking about what I would do with them if I was their teacher. I wouldn't allow for such chaos, for one thing. Because I'm the bad guy trying to get the kids to do their work rather than draw pictures and throw markers at each other, they would rather me not be there. Basically, the kids just want to play. And I understand that. School's boring. When I'm a teacher, I'll try to make the kids want to do the work. Easier said than done, though. It just seems like there needs to be more appeal in doing the work than in goofing off whenever possible.

Maybe I'm portraying this classroom incorrectly. These kids are very smart, and many of the students were trying very hard. But because of the chaos and confusion, few students were focused on finishing their work. After 15 minutes of struggling, they were ready to be done.

Okay, so how am I going to reach these kids next week? I definitely won't try to prevent them from being hyper elementary school kids. Last time I tried that, some kids got into a shoving match which I couldn't break up because I couldn't touch them. It was the teacher who yelled at them to get them to stop; that's her job, not mine. When I'm a teacher, I'll be the one in charge of keeping order in the classroom. But now, I'll be there to manage the kids that need help with the school work. Plus, the kids that were goofing off were the ones that had a pretty good grasp on the work they were doing.

I've been thinking about the management and organization of this classroom. There will always be several different groups of kids at varying levels in any classroom. How am I going to challenge the kids that are ahead and help the kids that are behind? Dividing up the work seems like a logical solution, but then the risk is of dividing up the class into "smarter" and "dumber." This is going on in the classroom where I volunteer, and the kids at higher level rub their intelligence in the faces of the kids that are behind. The kids are disrespectful in general. I can talk all I want about how I'll manage kids in my own classroom and how I'll do away with all disrespect and chaos while forming a utopia in the classroom, but I know it probably won't happen. I guess where my skills are lacking is in discipline. Psh, I know I'm lacking in discipline skills. But again, this is not my place to discipline kids.

Okay, my rant is over.

-Elie

Feeling Pretty Mediocre

2009-11-04T20:49:00.000-08:00

One of the first things that happened today was a confrontation with my hopefully-future math professor. He basically told me I'll have to fend for myself in order to get into his popular statistics class. I was hoping he could save me a spot, but I guess not. So I thought "Shoot. This day is going to suck since the first thing that happened was me getting bad news."

So then I successfully snuck up on Jon, got a hug, and had a decent clarinet lesson. Then I thought "this day might not be so bad..."

I managed to stay awake in anthropology and not be too spiteful that I got an B+ on a paper I thought I wrote well. It's kind of funny, because I got an A- on my last anthro paper and I was really upset, but with this B+, I know I wrote a good paper. The professor's prompt just sucked. So I may not be able to write what he wants, but I can write well in general, and I guess that makes me feel better.

Next I got my history paper back and got 17.5 out of 20 - a 0.5 point improvement. I was pretty happy but not ecstatic. As I walked to band I thought "This day is probably going to suck as soon as some more bad news pushes me over the edge."

Band was decent, and so was SWEA later that night. And now I'm sitting in my apartment with not a whole lot of homework and not being horribly stressed. It suddenly dawned on me that this day was neither bad nor good. It was just mediocre. Then I realized that this whole quarter has been mediocre. I'm getting mediocre grades, and my stress level is neither minimal nor incredibly high (sometimes). What can I do to feel great and not mediocre? Being happy would be awesome!

What's getting me through school is mentoring and tutoring kids. I look forward to Tuesdays when I can *try to* read to 1st graders. As that excitement wears off, I become excited to see my 5th graders on Friday. I spend a whole 4 hours with kids each week, and I always wish I had more, so I get a little depressed, especially when I just hung out with kids and then must do homework. It's the ultimate let-down. The good news is that I'm trying to set up a mentoring program with the local high school, so hopefully I'll get to spend even MORE time with kids.

When I catch myself wishing I was tutoring, mentoring, or just hanging out with kids, I make myself more happy by knowing that I have a passion for teaching and learning and just being around those kids. I know for sure that I want to teach, and I can't wait to stop taking history, anthropology, math, English, and any other poorly-taught college course so I can have my own classroom.

Against my better judgement, I recently started reading a book I bought over the summer: Teach With Your Heart by Erin Gruwell. It's so amazing and inspiring, and I find myself reading that book when I should be working on a paper or reading for a class. I mentioned this in a previous blog, but I really look up to Erin. She was a "privileged" white, middle-class girl who didn't know how to help her students. She just knew she wanted to make a difference, and she worked hard in order to help her students in any way she could. She's a lot like me. I know that in a few years I'll be teaching at some inner-city school where kids can't relate to me and don't want to learn what I'm trying to teach, but I know that I'll prevail somehow. Reading this book is my escape from the chaos, stress, frustration, and disappointment that is college.

Okay, so maybe you're thinking: "If you hate college and your classes so much, why do you want to be a teacher?" I can't stand my classes because they're poorly taught. The subject material is fascinating, and I know that I could make this material come alive if I was teaching it. Mind you, I'd need the knowledge first. A good teacher or professor makes all the difference, and I'm confident that I can eventually become a teacher who can make that difference. But I'm not being unrealistic. I'm expecting to make loads of mistakes and fail a lot along the way.

This is what's keeping me from being upset with my mediocre life.

-Elie

Hurricane Ridge is For Sale Online

2009-10-30T20:19:00.000-07:00

My album, HURRICANE RIDGE, released under the same artist name, is now for sale online at Amazon, iTunes, eMusic, Rhapsody, Napster, and other online music retailers. Please buy it! It's excellent.

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?id=335901000&s=143441

http://www.amazon.com/Hurricane-Ridge/dp/B002T9H5TO/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=dmusic&qid=1256425346&sr=8-3-catcorr

http://www.rhapsody.com/hurricane-ridge/hurricane-ridge

http://www.emusic.com/album/Hurricane-Ridge-Hurricane-Ridge-MP3-Download/11673220.html

http://home.napster.com/ns/music/artist_search.html?artist_id=12918412

Check other places too! Everywhere I've looked, the album is less than $10!

--Jon

Me and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

2009-10-20T21:39:00.000-07:00

a. Around midnight, I sent out a mass S.E.E. email and said "color in" twice in the same sentence. I know that doesn't seem really bad, but I felt really stupid.

b. I set my alarm for PM instead of AM, so I missed my first class (aural skills), which I should have gone to because we had a practice midterm and review.

c. We watched a really badly done video in environmental studies. Later I also found out that I got an 85 on my test, which I thought I had done much better on.

d. We were supposed to hand out apples with information about S.E.E. in red square... but there was a miscommunication and it didn't happen. No one is going to come to our event on Thursday.

e. I am am doing worse in my current math class than I've ever done in math.

f. I didn't get a chance to practice any music.

g. I am not good with elementary school kids, and I'm not very good at helping kids learn to read. Thus, I failed at literacy tutoring with first graders.

h. There's a big ol' moderation shit-storm happening on the forums I help moderate. Not really bad, just a lot going on.

i. I forgot to review a couple of CDs for KUGS. I was supposed to have them back today.

j. Glimmer of hope for open mic... but we had to wait in line to get in because of fire marshal maximum capacity issues, and then...

k. Sound issues when we went on stage. The backing tracks sounded like shit. Dead air before we started playing. Not even nervous giggles. I think I heard a piece of dust hit the floor.

In general I'm just very frustrated with life and I am very stressed out. And I keep forgetting stuff. And for some reason I just can't stay organized. BLEHHHHHHHHHHHHH *vomit*.

--Jon

My Life, in List Form

2009-10-13T15:06:00.000-07:00

I am way the heck behind on this blog-writing thing. Now I remember why I was never able to keep a diary for more than a month or so.

So, what's going on with Elie's life? Man, it seems like a lot of really crappy things have happened, actually. Yeah, let's start with the bad.

Bad thing #1: I'm still in symphonic band rather than wind symphony.
Bad thing #2: I dropped out of music theory.
Bad thing #3: My history class is destroying me.
Bad thing #4: I just got an A- on my first anthropology paper. Okay, that doesn't seem so bad. But it is, because I totally missed the point of the question and my thesis was flawed from the beginning. I'm supposed to be good at anthropology because it's my major, and I know I didn't deserve an A-. I didn't answer the question remotely correctly. I should have gotten a B- at best.
Bad thing #5: I'm working so hard, but it's not paying off. Maybe it is a little bit. I mean, I'm not failing, but I spend hours on homework each night and I try to understand everything and I talk to my professors after class and during office hours, but it just doesn't matter. I feel like I was a horrible person in a past life, and now I'm making up for it.
Bad thing #6: I'm so stressed. Therefore, I'm really unhappy.
Bad thing #7: I'm so sick of sitting through lousy college classes. I'm just tired of being in college. I love being in the clubs and with the people, and I especially love volunteering, but the academics are destroying my life.

Good things that have happened to Elie:
Good thing #1: I'm still with Jon and am really thankful for our wonderful relationship.
Good thing #2: I'm on first clarinet in symphonic band and probably should have made it into wind symphony if I had seniority.
Good thing #3: I have a decent shot at graduating in 4 or 5 years rather than 5 or 6 or 7.
Good thing #4: I'll be applying to the college of education a lot earlier than expected.

There. That's my life story. Now it's homework time.

-Elie

Fail

2009-09-27T09:52:00.000-07:00

Yup, we've been in school for just a few days and I've already failed - failed at keeping my resolution. And it isn't just a little fail. This is an epic fail. I'm so incredibly stressed about everything, especially music theory which is kicking my ass. I'm constantly doing homework and studying, yet I feel like it's all coming to nothing. And my god, this stress! Like Jon said in the entry before it, there's so much going on, but it seems like whenever I take a stab at getting something accomplished, I take a step backwards. I just want to be happy, and I honestly don't think it's possible. I don't know how to deal with this.

--Elie

phew The Week in [Brief] Review

2009-09-25T12:17:00.000-07:00

Who ever thought that the first week of school could have lasted what seemed like thousands of years? From the info fair to sunburn to band auditions to getting up early to placement exams to background checks to last-minute-required-book-buyings to email issues to radio shows to a toe injury to keyboard/singing practicing to laundry-doing to apartment-cleaning to multiple other rather stressful situations... Jesus Christ, this has been quite a week. And the craziness isn't all sorted out quite yet. At least not in my mind. But at least I got everything I need for the mentoring "class" in. *le sigh*

This weekend, John von and I are going to do some rehearsing for the open mic we plan on hitting up next week. If you've listened to the songs on our MySpace, you'll recognize what we plan on playing. So be there to listen! It will be great if all goes well.

I'm thinking of just giving away my CDs. Although that would actually cost me money, no one has really displayed any interest in buying it from me. Maybe I'll just nag people some more.

--Jon

An Overview of My Music Stuffs (ALBUM FOR SALE)

2009-09-19T23:02:00.000-07:00

So I finished recording my "solo album." It's called Hurricane Ridge, which is the sort of pseudonym I'm using. The title was kind of inspired by Mount Eerie, another Washington one-man "band," and since the original idea of the project was to reflect upon conflicts between nature and civilization, I thought it was appropriate (for those of you not in the know, Hurricane Ridge really pretty spot in the Olympic Mountains above Port Angeles that a lot of tourists go to). However, there isn't so much an overarching theme anymore to all of the songs. I tried to keep it somewhat in the same range of feelings and emotions though, and I think I did an okay job. I'm really happy with the end result, which is about 40 minutes of music, plenty for a short-ish album. Longer than Weezer's "Green Album."

I'm selling copies of my CD for $5. Talk to me if you want one! If you don't live near me, I can send you a copy in the mail for $6. Email me at jonbashmusic@gmail.com. Also, add me on MySpace! www.myspace.com/jonbash.music. I don't know who would read this that doesn't know me but... whatever! Stuff can happen.

In terms of genre... it jumps around a bit, but it's generally somewhere around gloomy, slightly experimental electronica, folk, and indie rock. I've taken to calling most of the music I make "alternative pop," even though that has potential to sound very 90's. Influences... Radiohead, Sufjan Stevens, Animal Collective, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Fleet Foxes, Arcade Fire, Weezer, Cursive, Dismemberment Plan, Mount Eerie/The Microphones... way too many to name.

So I guess I'm going to go over all of the songs. I know this might make me sound pretentious, but this is also for myself; since my memory is shit, I want to be able to go back and read this some day and be like "Oh, I remember the state of mind I was in when I wrote that!" Here goes:

1. "The Northern Sun"

This is probably the first song I fully conceived in my head when I started pursuing this project, although ironically it was the last one I recorded. I was planning on making it much more grandiose, with violins and cellos and clarinets and flutes and timpani and concert percussion and other stuff, but this would have been terribly difficult to do just right. It came out as more of a minimalist acoustic piece with a nice little buildup at the end. This song has only one "virtual instrument," and it would have been non-virtual if I had access to an acoustic bass guitar, but alas, I just wanted to get this done. I wasn't planning on having a "guitar solo," but I didn't want to have a boring plain ol' instrumental interlude. So that's what happened.

One morning, in the middle of January, it was super cold, and super early, and the sun had barely risen, and I was all wrapped up in scarves and coats and such, and could see my breath, and I was all alone at the bus stop, just thinking, and this song and these lyrics just started playing in my head. I wrote them down later when I get to geology, and started writing the rest of the song. The lyrics have been in my geology notebook unused, until the other day when I finally recorded the song.

The influence of Godspeed You! Black Emperor shows most in this song.

2. "Opening Day at the Mall"

A short instrumental that I made mostly when I first got the program I use to record my music. I was planning on turning it into a full song, but just never got around to it, and couldn't think of anything classy to do with it. I think it's best as it is. All the guitar parts were recorded this summer.

3. "Cabin Fever"

During the winter, when this project was in its infancy, I came up with the idea for this song; drum machines and layered, moaning, choir-like vocals, with some regular (well, distorted) singing over the top of it all. The working title for the idea was "I'm Only Dying," based on some conversation between my fellow Squirrel Bagger and me. During spring break '09, after Elie left, my parents had gone on vacation to California, many of my friends were busy, and I had very little to do except make music. But even that was tough for me. I was just totally dead, suddenly. I tried starting to write another song (what would later become "Post-Apocalyptic Blues"), but it just wasn't coming out right. I had a classic case of writer's block. I tried using an idea of Thom Yorke's; scribbling little bits and pieces of lyrics on small pieces of paper, one-liners, something that sounded good but had nothing to go with it. The lyrics to this song are what eventually came out when I put a lot of those little lines together and changed them up a bit to fit the music. As I've stated on this blog before, the chord progression was lifted from a somber, sad, and mysterious song from one of my favorite video games ever, Final Fantasy VII. I tried to capture a sense of panic and paranoia and insanity that one might get from REALLY intense "cabin fever." I hope I did alright? I'm really proud of the drumbeat in this song; more so than any other song here.

4. "What a Hero"

The music to this was a result of some nice, random inspiration while I was working on another song. I had a lot of fun with this. This was the second time after my previous shortcomings that I tried writing lyrics that didn't necessarily make much sense, but sounded good enough. I'm not sure what I was trying to convey; it's a mix between actually telling someone (not anyone in particular) to stop sitting around and start doing stuff, and sort of poking fun at people that say that kind of stuff. I think moreso the latter. Being a percussion nerd, I really enjoyed the time signature changes. The percussion that begins and ends the song was all software instruments. I wanted to make it sound like some field recording of a drum circle, though; my original plan was to rerecord it, but I would have needed way more drums than I had, it would have taken a lot of time, and since my computer isn't top-of-the-line, the poor guy wouldn't have been able to handle that many tracks. I totally ripped off The Beatles with the backwards guitar solo in the middle. It was fun, though, and sounds neat, which are the most important parts. I always wanted to use a distorted acoustic guitar in a song, and this, I think, was my first opportunity to do that. I will definitely do it again sometime.

5. "Carbophobe"

I found a program online for making and manipulating (in real-time) stupid, awesome, synthesized techno loops. I played with it, and made the music to this. Afterwards, I decided to put some singing to it, but not even in-time with the beat. I programmed the vocals to come in right when the techno loop starts defragmenting itself. I basically wanted it to sound like music for a stupid workout machine commercial from the 90s, or an energy drink, or protein powder; something stupid like that. It, again, doesn't have too much meaning. Take it for what it is.

6. "Henchmen"

The lyrics to this song used to be god-awful (discussed in the aforementioned blog-post). Kind of written to be closure for an old friend that hates me now. I realized that was really pretentious and I didn't quiiiite get the message right, so I decided to change the lyrics around and give them pretty much no meaning whatsoever. I came up with the guitar riff while messing around with a setting with my software that gave it a ridiculous amount of distortion. After contemplating making it a sort of post-metal song, I decided to take a more glitchy electronic direction with it. I like how it came out. The verses take a lot of breath to sing, if you can't tell. I don't know how dudes like Tomas Kalnoky [of Streetlight Manifesto] do it. The song originally faded out during the guitar solo, but it felt half-finished, so I added another section and another chorus. I guess the lyrics do have some sort of vague storyline... about two henchmen arguing or something...? I don't know. A friend told me that this song sounds kinda like Xiu Xiu, who I hadn't heard until he said that. I do agree with him, though, strangely.

7. "Haven"

Another instrumental I wrote testing out my recording software. I also thought of turning this into a full song, but I kinda think it would have tainted it. I think this song was just 3 tracks: a stock drum-loop from the software, super-echoey guitar, and the main "rhythm" guitar. Fun fact: those two guitars are actually acoustic guitars plugged straight into the computer and processed to hell. The distant guitar sounds that open this song are the same ones that open "The Northern Sun" and the album. I thought it added "cohesion" to the album. :)

8. "Ostrich in a Casket"

So during spring break, after I semi-got over my writer's block, I had one more day to record stuff. I was sick of overthinking the songwriting and recording. I talked to Elie the night before, and somehow the phrase "Ostrich in a Casket" came up. She suggested I write a song about it. So I took that, along with a strange dream I had where Justin Timberlake was the leader of a gang I was in, and we had penguin soldiers (like in Batman Returns), wrote the dumbest lyrics I could possibly think of, thrashed around on my guitar with much, much dissonance (kinda poking fun at the Blood Brothers and Dismemberment Plan), played a "rawkin'" [see: shitty and sloppy :D] guitar solo, distorted one vocal track and double-tracked the other one, singin' falsetto, programmed some ridiculous drums for key sections... okay, you get the idea.
You can listen to examples of my influences for this song here (my favorite super-angry thrashy song of all time) and here (my favorite anti-pretentious-hipster song of all time).

9. "Livin' It Up"

I'm still very proud of the instrumentals in this song. It was originally meant to be a mostly loud and exciting song, but I was a little suppressed recording the vocals in the new apartment. This is why I autotuned some vocals. It turned out to be a kind of neat touch, with robots singing the chorus and the second half of the first verse. Still kinda funky, though. I don't know. I spent a lot of time on the music for this one, and I had the chorus melody in my head for a long time, but the execution wasn't quite what I originally planned. Again, the lyrics make no sense. Vaguely something about seizing the day. I originally planned on making it an anti-alcohol song. But that could never have ever worked out well. I love the 80s-ish drum sound I managed to get. The echoey harmonized guitar that comes in during the "I've had quite enough" line was inspired by a cover of a Final Fantasy X song called "People of the North Pole." I used to reeeally look down upon anyone lifting a single idea from another song, but after listening to too much Daft Punk, Coldplay, and so many other bands that do that, I've lightened up quite a bit; as long as you don't just straight up rip off an entire song or a significant portion, I think it can be put to fantastic use. Anyways, I think this is the closest this album came to sounding like my "other project," The Situation, in which I write with John von Volkli. This song was definitely influenced by my experience making music with him. Most intentionally lame line I've ever written: "We can start anew if only we could only start... livin' it up."

10. "Post-Apocalyptic Blues"

I put the long instrumental intro before the actual song starts, because I think people didn't have a long enough attention span to listen through it to get to the exciting part. Which I can understand. This was also done over spring break. All of the music from the opening through the verse had been something I'd been working on for about a year (possibly more?), but never turned into a full song. It was nice to finally get it off of my plate. The lyrics were taken from an idea I had for a totally different song, but I soon realized that, with a change of key, they would fit very well within this song, so I melded the two together. This is the only song where I actually plugged my guitar into an amp and set the mic in front of it; I mainly did this so I could get some nice end-song-guitar-feedback (a little trick I think I first learned from Weezer (used most memorably (for me at least) in this song)). Seeing as this was one of the first songs I recorded by myself, the vocals are a bit meh at points *cough*towardstheend*cough*. But it gives it a feeling of really being post-apocalyptic...? Or something...? I had I Am Legend in mind when I wrote the lyrics, but just about anything similar could work. I think the guitar before the track starts is the album's only use of my phase pedal? No wait, I think I used it on the backwards solo on "What a Hero" as well. Damn. Godspeed also influenced the final section of this song, as well as the way this song fades into the next.

11. "The Northern Sun (Reprise)"

Also inserted for record cohesion, and because I wanted "The Northern Sun" to, lyrically, be a kind of focus for the album, even if in a really weird, non-sense-making kind of way. This was recorded when I first conceived of the song so that I wouldn't forget the melody. I recorded it with the mic that comes on the laptop, and it sounded like poop, so I took advantage of that fact, added lots of reverb... there ya go. This "song" is in the same key as the song before it! Except this is minor and the other was major. I like it! Not entirely intentional, but YES, awesome segue!

12. "Prologue/Epilogue"

The song written for my favorite person in the whole wide world and my dear fellow Squirrel Bagger, who arrived in Bellingham today (well, "yesterday" now)! This song had its beginnings possibly 3 years ago. The music during the "All we can do is try" section (and also the "I know we've got all the time" section) is definitely the oldest part; I've been playing that for years, never really able to come up with something good to go with it even though it was so fun and I was so proud of it. Somewhat Fleetwood Mac-inspired? I think so. The next part I wrote was the main riff that plays in the beginning and the end of the song. This was written some time during my senior year in high school, and again, although I loved it, I didn't know what to do with it. Time passed. When college began, I tried using that acoustic riff I wrote my senior year, and added another section, the whole "I never said, I never will" part (don't you love how I label parts of my songs...). I also wrote some lyrics for the song. It was an incomplete mess, as evidenced when I tried performing it at open mic the night after I finished it. Elie and my relationship was just blossoming at the time, so I scavenged the lyrics from this unfinished boggle of a song, added more, added those old sections from so long ago that I had still never used, added even more, and came up with this: "Prologue/Epilogue." The beginning of one thing, the end of another. One problem: performance anxiety. I didn't really have the guts to play her the song. I gave her the lyrics, but kept the song inside for awhile. I wanted to be able to play it well. After recording most of this album, I decided I was experienced enough to try to pull it off. I originally wanted to have all sorts of extravagent acoustic instrumentation, but Elie agrees that it sounds better simpler. I managed to use my mandolin on this song alone! Also, the drumbeat at the beginning was inspired by something similar Christian played when I showed the acoustic "riff" to him and John during a practice once (at the time, we couldn't figure out anything to do with it; looking back, I'm very glad nothing became of it at the time). This and "The Northern Sun" are the two songs I'm most proud of here.

There may or may not be a secret song on the album. It may or may not melt your face and make your ears bleed.

~ * ~

Anyways, *phew*, that's it. I think. I probably forgot stuff. Whoooo cares. Buy my album, please!

--Jon

L'Shana Tova

2009-09-18T23:48:00.001-07:00

Happy (Jewish) new year! And now for a Passover pun: why is this new year different from all other new years? Well, this year, I actually want to make a resolution; I want to make myself and my life better than it ever has. My resolution is to stress and worry less and to just try to be happy.

It's always smart to make some steps of how you're going to accomplish your goal, and I guess I don't really have a list. Thus far, it's helped to tell myself that whatever I'm worrying about, it's not a huge deal. For example, I started to stress about my audition, and then I told myself that it really doesn't impact my life a huge deal if I don't get into wind symphony. I'm concentrating on becoming a teacher, not a professional clarinetist. Whatever happens, I'll deal.

This new year is also different from all other new years because I'm starting off this year with going to Bellingham/my new apartment on the first full day of Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish new year). When spring quarter ended last school year, I was involved in a lot of campus activities, but this year I want to be more involved, and, most importantly, I want to help people - specifically children. I've decided that one day I'll change the world by first helping the education system and the children within, and I'm going to start helping by tutoring and mentoring while learning all I can about educational inequality and educating others about it. In essence, I've found what I love (teaching and learning about teaching) and I plan to do all I possibly can in that field - starting on Sunday with a club meeting.

I start my life anew this year, and it shall be excellent.

-Elie

Every Romantic Comedy Ever

2009-09-18T20:41:00.001-07:00

Part 1: Guy and girl are impressed with each other's good looks, but once they talk they realize that at least one of them can't stand the other.

Part 2: Guy and girl are forced into each other's company and realize they like each other

Part 3: Guy and girl are in love!

Part 4: Guy does something stupid and girl gets pissed.

Part 5: Guy concocts grand and over-the-top scheme to win back girl

Part 6: Guy and girl live happily ever after!

~ * ~

There are even some non-romantic comedies that have a romantic sub-plot that follows this arc pretty much by the book. And who started it?

JANE. AUSTEN. PRIDE AND PREJUDICE. The precursor to all chick flicks.

--Jon

RPGs Need a New Name

2009-09-12T20:29:00.000-07:00

Video games labeled as "role-playing games" aren't usually "role-playing games" in the sense that lots of people tend to think. It's not just pretending you're someone you're not and living a second life. Hell, the games Second Life or The Sims are a lot closer to "role-playing games" than, say, Final Fantasy or Chrono Trigger. The difference is the latter games have their roots in old pencil-and-paper "role-playing games" like Dungeons and Dragons. In these games, you would construct a character that you would play as, "playing" their "role" at all times in the game. This character would grow and gain skills, maybe even a personality, making them more real, and since this character was the player's creation, they would grow very attached to them. This character is essentially an extension of the self. The same goes for Second Life and The Sims and similar games, but these games aren't called RPGs.

In contrast, Final Fantasy and similar games have preset characters, preset abilities, a preset storyline, preset everything. For me, playing Final Fantasy games are more like reading an interactive book, where I can change the events in very slight ways, and, although only virtually, experience the events. While I suppose you still are fulfilling the role of these characters, it's no different from any 1st-person shooter, 3rd-person shooter, side-scrolling, or any other sort of game featuring identifiable characters. It's sort of arbitrary, but I was driving back from Kingston today, and I thought about it... so I decided to post this.

--Jon

Amazing Grace

2009-09-12T17:38:00.001-07:00

Many weeks ago I read the book Amazing Grace - The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation by Jonathan Kozol. I wrote a bit about this book in a previous blog, so I may be repeating myself. But basically the book was about the people living in the Bronx, and the book changed the way I see poverty.

I bookmarked a few places that I wanted to have other people read, although I strongly recommend this book to everyone. If I had my way about it, everybody in the entire world would read every one of Jonathan Kozol's books. One can only dream... :)

--"'Evil exists? Yes, I said that. People who let other people be destroyed do evil. People who know but do not act do evil too. I don't know if I would call them evil but they're certainly not thinking about heaven."' - the son of a woman dying of AIDS, living on welfare

--"Prisons, schools, and churches, many religious leaders have observed, are probably the three most segregated institutions in our nation, although the schools in New York City are quite frequently more segregated even than the prisons."

--"'Hypersegregation' has been introduced to speak of schools like these, where there are simply no white children, or not more than token numbers; and similar schools are to be found, of course, in almost every city of the nation. 'Two thirds of America's black children' notes the Times, 'know few, if any, white people.' The city rights momentum of the 1960s, says Professor Gary Orfield, one of the authors of the Harvard study, 'is dead in the water and the ship is floating backward.'"

--"'A dream,' he [Gary Orfield, I think] says, "does not die on its own. A dream is vanquished by the choices ordinary people make about real things in their own lives. The choices that some of your friends on the West Side have made may seem benign and innocent and, in the short run, even logical. But the net effects are very much the same as those we saw in Alabama and Virginia when white people left the public schools after the first court ordered. The motive may be different, and I'm sure it often is; the consequence is not.'"

--"I ask him why the children in the Nazi camps came to his mind when we were speaking of this neighborhood. He answers with a caution I have heard from others, when a reference to the Holocaust was made. 'It is not the same,' he says, 'But there are some similarities. There is the feeling of eclipse. There is the likelihood of death for many. There is the sense of people watching from the outside but seeming paralyzed and doing nothing. And there are the miracles.'"

--"I [Mr. Kozol] think that Mrs. Washington [the woman with AIDS, on welfare in the Bronx] is right to view the years before us as foreboding. I have never lived through a time as cold as this in the United States. Many men and women in the Bronx believe that it is going to get worse. I don't know what can change this." - This is the paragraph before the epilogue and Jonathan Kozol admits that he doesn't know what to do. His editors were not happy with him.

I'm fascinated and horrified that schools are such dismal places with such segregation where dreams are destroyed. I think that these sections stood out to me because it was a call to action. I agree that people who know of an injustice but do nothing to stop it are "evil" in a sense. There's no way that I can't not go into the world wanting to make a difference. I don't know how I'll do it, but I'll start by teaching these kinds of kids that need their dreams nurtured.

I guess it's hypocritical that I read these kinds of books and am inspired, and I'm covered in peace signs, yet I have done nothing. At least I'm planning to do something. I'm definitely going to be helping the community more this year at Western by being a part of Compass 2 Campus and being part of Students for Educational Equality and such. What makes me annoyed is that the peace sign has become so popular yet most people who sport the symbol don't understand what it means.

To me, peace means unconditional respect, a desire to understand, and a hope for equality for all people. Peace means dreaming of something bigger than yourself while being part of the movement. I want to be part of the movement. As I look at the words of peace on many of my shirts and the peace signs on my ring, earring, and necklace, I'm reminded that wearing the peace sign is not enough. I must act and make a difference somehow. And I will. It's just a matter of how.

--Elie

P.S. I was listening to "Revolution" by the Beatles as I finished writing this. :D

"Smile Time!" - a math professor at Western

2009-09-11T23:19:00.000-07:00

I'm fallin' behind on this whole blogging thing. But let's start with a significant life-changing event I recently had. Hooray!

Well, one night I was particularly frustrated and tired of being unhappy and stressed, and I was frustrated in general with myself for my inability to be happy. Just as I thought my life couldn't get any worse, I got a call from my roommate the next morning saying our apartment was full of mold and water damage, and her parents weren't letting her live there, and when my mom found out about the condition of our apartment (which we hadn't seen), she wouldn't let me live there either.

So I had two problems: finding another apartment 3 weeks before school started and getting out of a lease both my roommate and I had signed. We had also paid the landlady about $700 for the security deposit and for rent. After contemplating my problems and realizing it was mostly my fault for never looking at the apartment and for pushing my roommate to sign the lease, I broke down completely. I was depressed and miserable and sick for 2 and a half days. During that time, and before, Jon was always a great help and I owe him my sanity. He always tried to calm me down, and he never freaked out when I was crying while I tried to talk to him over the phone. I realized then that although I had made one of the biggest mistakes in my life by getting myself and my roommate into this apartment mess, at least I had made the right decision, roughly 11 months ago, to hook up with Jon.

And THEN, that same night that I had a bit of a nervous break-down, I over-heard my parents arguing and discovered a bit of information that I could have done without which further pushed me over the edge.

I eventually went to Bellingham and found another apartment, and it looks like we'll get out of the lease and get most of our money back. As I looked back on the days previous, I realized that I had been so upset and stressed for nothing because everything turned out alright. Then I realized that most of my worrying is for nothing. Ironically, a friend had just pointed that out and I brushed it off.

When the weight of this whole apartment problem was lifted from my shoulders, I realized how relieved and happy I felt, and I decided that it's so much better to be happy and not depressed/stressed all the time. That's not the life I want to lead. As the Jewish new year (Rosh Hashanah) approaches, I'm promising myself that I'm going to change. I'll do my best to not be a stressed, worried, depressed mess all the time. It's just not worth it. I want to live life instead of worrying about it. It's time to be happy.

--Elie

Brand New – DAISY [an album review]

2009-09-02T22:36:00.001-07:00

I recently obtained Brand New’s brand new album, entitled Daisy, and boy is it heavy (in many ways). Their fourth full-length outing and the first in almost three years, this is definitely the sound of a band that has doing its thing for over a decade. It opens with an odd 50s-ish sample of religious hymn of some sort, which is shortly interrupted by the short and vengeful “Vices,” definitely the heaviest (aurally, at least) song of the album and definitely the heaviest song Brand New has ever written. They scream. They rail on their respective instruments. It rips open your throat and pours itself in, melting your innards. It ends before it grows old, and travels to the polar opposite of the Brand New sound-catalog, a slower and gloomier song that sounds more like the material of their last album. Although now they're not as afraid to let their love of straightforward rock-and-roll show as much, much of the album shares its general vibe and influence with 2006’s The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me, but this run-around cuts out the filler and the more boring moments, keeping the dark hooks and often-Modest Mouse-ish guitar/vocal work melded with some newfound near-metal-ish tendenacies. The album's first single, “At the Bottom,” fairly well represents the album, with a delicate and moody guitar opening, chanty verse, loud and catchy chorus, and hard-hitting breakdown. I find myself jealous of Jesse Lacey’s emotive voice, which has never sounded more angry and yet more mature. In an interview, he's stated that they wrote the album with a live setting in mind, and this definitely comes through on record. Lyrically, much of the subject matter is similar to the last album, revolving around existentialism, life, death, and God. The band has definitely come a long way from their debut album Your Favorite Weapon, which was pretty much straight-up pop-punk-emo; this is precisely the album that I wanted them to make when I heard their second album, Deja Entendu, which was a step towards their current darker sound. While The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me sounded rather hopeless, this latest outing takes hold of this gloom and doom and forms it into wonderful, melancholy bliss.

FINAL SCORE: +3 [on a scale of –5 to +5 (positive numbers = like; negative numbers = dislike)

--Jon

All About Love for a Child...

2009-08-31T12:42:00.000-07:00

(Blog title stolen from Jason Mraz)

Contrary to what I was expecting , I fell back into depression during my trip to Lincolnwood, Illinois.

I hadn’t been to Illinois since my grandfather’s funeral in 2007, and I hadn’t seen my grandmother since my brother’s bar mitzvah that summer. Since then, my grandmother sold her beautiful house that she raised three daughters in, including my mother. An apartment in a Jewish retirement community replaced that beautiful house in Evanston. That fact alone was saddening. The apartment felt and smelled like the house, but it wasn’t. I desperately miss that silly house. Never have I been so attached to a building. Being in that apartment was like being home but knowing it really wasn’t; it was a mirage.

Since I hadn’t seen my grandmother in two years, seeing her getting older was depressing in itself. I fought back silent tears for the first day that I arrived at her apartment. She’s unable to do every-day things that most people take for granted. She struggles to walk around and stand up, and she gets confused and disoriented easily. She even tried to knit with one needle and couldn’t figure out why it wasn’t working until I told her she had forgotten the second needle. We both laughed about it, and she’s been a great sport, but I think that her struggle with old age is taking a toll on her, as it is with me. Just watching her struggle is difficult.

I’ve never had to see this before, which is probably why it’s so difficult now. My paternal grandfather died when I was young and I never knew him much. I only have one memory of him and it’s just a fleeting glimpse of his figure standing in his living room saying “Hi, Timmy!” when my dad walked in the door. My paternal grandmother died when I was a senior in high school but no tears were shed because she is the exception to my claim that all people are truly good. My half-grandfather, my mom’s stepdad, was unable to get around by himself for almost as long as I knew him. I have very vague memories of him coming home from work in a suit and tie, but soon after, he had surgery on his knees and wasn’t able to walk well since. Old age had already taken a toll on him, and I simply grew up knowing that my grandfather was old and unable to do basic things like everybody else. But now I’m seeing this once fully-functioning person, my grandmother, deteriorate before my eyes. As harsh as it seems, I couldn't wait to get away from Lincolnwood and Illinois because it’s so difficult and frustrating to watch this, not only because I love my grandma but because I know this will happen to me. I, too, will grow old and become unable to walk and think. It’s even scarier because I have a hard time walking and sitting because of my bad back, and I’m not even 20.

A less drastic contributor to my depression has been watching my family moving further and further apart. My mom’s two older sisters are being less than kind to my mom, and I’m quickly growing apart from my older cousin with whom I used to be fairly close. We used to be friends, and I looked up to her. Now, we talk to each other because it’s the right thing to do and because we’re related, not because we have things to say to one another. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to have a supportive family with aunts and cousins and uncles and the like. My only uncles I know fairly well haven’t spoken to me in nearly a decade. One of them hasn’t spoken a word to me since I was five or six. I guess I grew up not expecting to have a supportive extended family, and that’s just what I got. I never really understood how friends talk about spending time with their cousins or visiting their aunt and uncle, or visiting their grandparents that live just down the road. It doesn’t necessarily upset me that I’m lacking this sort of family, but it’s difficult to see that small extended family that consists of my mom, her sisters, and my grandmother and half grandfather deteriorate. When my grandma passes away, there will be absolutely no reason for my mom or myself to correspond with any part of my family. Once the will is dealt with, communication will essentially cease just like what happened to my dad’s family. Déjà vu?

The main contributor to my depression and what pushed me over the edge in the end was stress and anxiety brought on by school, my future teaching career, and all the stress and anxiety I know I’ll face in the process of getting to where I want to end up. It’s hard to explain. All of a sudden I became sick and tired of being so stressed about every little part of my life. I know it’s a problem and probably some sort of mental illness, but I can’t help it. I want to be happy but I can’t be. I worry about getting my apartment furnishings to Bellingham and I worry about where to park and when. I worry about ordering clarinet reeds and what kind to order, and I get a sinking feeling in my stomach every time I think about picking up the clarinet even though I can’t stop playing it. I’m more than anxious to meet and hang out with a boy who has more feelings for me than I have for him (not Jon!), and I worry about how, when, and where I’ll meet up with my roommate to buy stuff for our apartment. I worry about getting lost on my way to my dermatologist appointment and I stress about what I’ll say to him and what he’ll say to me. I’m terrified of being a bad teacher and deciding that I spent 5 or 6 years preparing for a career that isn’t right for me. This isn’t the life I want to live, and sometimes I wonder if it’s worth it. What keeps me going is the hope that I can change the lives of children and help them have better lives than what I’m having.

-Elie

I Don't KNOW

2009-08-31T12:32:00.000-07:00

When anybody asks what I’ve been doing this summer, I say I’ve been reading. I’ve done little more than work with kids and read books about kids. I feel like I’ve finally found my calling, what I want to do with my life. I’ve decided I want to teach “disadvantaged” kids in segregated schools where good teachers are needed the most.

As I read another book by Jonathan Kozol, Amazing Grace, my heart beat faster than normal because I felt for the people about whom Mr. Kozol wrote. Although this book was written 14 years ago and primarily focused on poverty in America rather than the flawed education system, I wanted, more than ever, to become a teacher of these kids so that I can give them an education and empower them to leave their dangerous neighborhoods and seek a new life for themselves. When I finished the book, I had that great feeling of “I’m going to change the world!”

After allowing for about seven hours of sleep, I started another book. It’s written by a rookie teacher in the Bronx, the setting of Amazing Grace. The Bronx is on the outskirts of New York City and is among the poorest city in the United States and even in the world. Hopefully it’s improved since Jonathan Kozol published his book in 1995. This new book is making me think that I might not be cut out to be a teacher. It takes certain kinds of people to succeed at different professions, and I may not have the “teaching gene” as the author, Dan Brown (NOT the guy who wrote The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons and whatnot) called it.I began to picture myself as a first-year, young, inexperienced, nervous teacher in front of a group of rowdy minority students who don’t identify well with a white, middle-class woman. Just as Mr. Brown (then twenty-two years old when he first began teaching) struggled to earn respect from his students and also struggled to control them, I see myself having the same problem.

The book I recently finished by Rafe Esquith was about teaching with respect and trust rather than fear, but it appears that the best way to gain respect from these irresponsible and less-than-respectful students is to show them that they can’t act poorly without expecting punishment. Essentially, it appears to be best to scare them so the teacher has a chance to get their attention so that he or she can actually gain their trust. But can you gain their respect after instilling fear into them first?A difference between Dan Brown and myself is that I will spend many years preparing to be a teacher. Mr. Brown was actually a film major at NYU who was drafted by a program intended to bring college students into much-needed schools while giving them a crash-course in teaching. The program was a lot like Teach for America…but not.

Basically, he didn’t have much preparation or guidance, but how much will I be able to learn from college where most of the professors and students are white and middle class? I don’t want to teach middle class white kids. I just don’t want to. I can and I might have to, but that’s not where I’m needed. I guess if feels like I’m setting myself for a fall by wanting to teach the “unteachable” kids – and not the young, innocent ones, either. I’m passionate about these kids who I want to teach, but I just don’t know if I’ll be good at it. I’m investing so much time and energy into learning about teaching that it would be terribly sad if I quit teaching within a few years. I’ve never felt so passionate about anything in my life. I want to be a teacher and sometimes I feel like it’s the one place where I belong, but as I’m thinking more and more about what kind of person I am while I read books about failure and success, I wonder if I’m right. Can I succeed? WILL I succeed?

As I read books about educational inequality, I feel a burning desire to be in those schools that need good teachers. Then, as I read books about being in the classroom and about the wonderful things that teachers do with their children and how they manage it, I become scared that I won’t be able to succeed, and I want to succeed more than anything.

Part of me thinks, “I’ve been reading so much about teaching inner-city kids. I should know what I’m up against and whether or not I can handle it.” But I DON’T know. Argh. Sometimes I feel like I can – I feel like I can be Superwoman. Then when I put down my book and picture myself along with several dozen middle or high school kids, I doubt myself. Okay, so how can I convince myself that I’m fit for this job? Experience. Okay, well, I’ve had experience. Sort of. I enjoyed my time in Elma Middle School, but I wasn’t in charge and I didn’t feel comfortable taking control of discipline issues because I wasn’t the teacher. The same happened at camp. I didn’t feel like I had the authority to sit a kid down and talk to them about their actions. Given the opportunity, I think I could have done more than I wound up doing, but I have a habit of handing over the problems to someone more qualified.

I actually didn’t enjoy Dan Brown’s book much because he basically got scared out of teaching in the inner city. The administration was out to get him, and they refused to let him have his own classroom for his second year so he was pretty much put on probation. He then resigned and picked up a teaching job at a rich private school. He admitted that it was more rewarding teaching in the Bronx than in a rich area with privileged kids, but he still didn’t return there. He might have gone back eventually after finishing the book, though. It scared me because the book didn’t have a happy ending. He didn’t win over the kids in the end. And in the end, it was the administration that did him in, but the kids never gave him much respect.

It’s just so frustrating being so far from the students I’m so interested in, and I can only read books about people doing the job I want to have. Sometimes I wish I went to college in New York or California so could spend some time in inner-city schools so I can gage how badly I’ll fail. Time will tell, I guess. I just hope Time has the answers I want to hear.

-Elie

Somewhat of a Failure

2009-08-27T00:14:00.000-07:00

So recently, I attempted to write a song. Nothing really new. But after writing the music, which I was happy with, and it was time to write lyrics, I, as usual, hit a bit of a rut. So I came up with what I could, which in my mind was going to be hard-hitting and poignant and personal lyrics. Turns out they kinda sucked, and I realized this pretty quickly after I finished the song and put it up and tried to give it a title ("The Bewildered Bully"? Really, Jon?). So, after talking with John von about my writer's block, I realized that I need to stop trying so hard. This won't apply just to the lyrics I try to write, but probably also to the music, because it's really hard to write simple lyrics for overly complicated music. Now, I really like the music I've been making, so I'm hoping I can find a way to reconcile and write some decent lyrics to fit the music and vice versa, and come to some kind of compromise, but I'm kinda thinking that collaborating is going to be the way I have to be. That or just straight-up musical composition without lyrics. When I write music, I try to empower myself and make these grand schemes and best myself and everything and everyone. I keep thinking, "I can make this better." And I get so caught up in making everything better, and going over it again and again, I don't take a step back and just make music. I get caught up in "production." In making it more complex and interesting. When it's actually just getting pretentious and boring. I don't know how it's happening, but what I'm TRYING to say is uhhh... I'm trying too hard. And I might be done making "solo music." I don't know. We'll see where my musical adventure with John von take me. But right now, I'm much more satisfied with the music we've been making together than anything I've made by myself.

--Jon

Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word

2009-08-15T17:27:00.001-07:00

A few weeks ago, I had a dream or two about meeting my ex-best friend and us apologizing to each other and becoming friends again after having not spoken for at least 7 years after a mysterious break-up. All of this happened in real life, except for us meeting -- in person. After that dream, I managed to track her down via myspace. I considered writing to her, then I decided not to, then I thought about writing again, and then I finally did. After a few days, she responded. She apologized for breaking off our friendship and explained what was happening in her life at the time we stopped being friends. She also said that she thought about me and our friendship a lot and she had even tried writing letters but she could never say what she wanted to say. I completely understand and I forgive her and, honestly, I feel so much better.

This is a huge step for both of us. I can't quite comprehend that I just got in touch with her after being so hurt. But now we're communicating and making up. It's really a beautiful thing. I'm not expecting or hoping that we'll become "best friends forever" again, but maybe we'll get to a point where we'll stay in contact and essentially become penpals now that she lives so far away.

As if this wasn't enough, I met up with a friend who I used to very good friends with for many years. We hadn't talked for a year and then we went to dinner together for about one and a half hours yesterday. She was recently in a car accident and was drugged with various pain medications so she wasn't herself, but she hasn't been herself since taking drugs in high school. I was a little disappointed because I wanted us to become friends again when we met up yesterday, but I felt very little connection between us. She's moved in one direction and I've moved in another, and I felt no desire to rekindle a relationship.

Life is funny sometimes.

--Elie

Ruach Shoveva!

2009-08-15T16:45:00.000-07:00

Camp has ended. And I am sad. Yes, I am indeed sad that camp is over, even though I complained at first. Well, things have changed.

Somehow, that "elitist group" sort of disbanded at the end of the first week, probably because we all got separated during the day and were forced to work with people who we weren't initially friends with.

All counselors had a difficult time controlling the students not because of our lack of ability but because the kids were just crazy this year. Even so, we continue to love them, and I miss those kids dearly. Our difficulty brought the counselors closer together, and I wouldn't have enjoyed camp much if it weren't for them. I became incredibly close with some of them, and I even made friends with a girl I with whom I wasn't getting along.

My experiences at camp flashed before my eyes at the Shabbat service where the campers and counselors performed for the families and congregation. As we all stood on stage and sang various camp songs, I laughed with some counselors as we forgot the words and I realized how close I had gotten to them. I've gotten to the point with some counselors that we can talk about every-day life, not just what happens at camp. Even though I knew all of them from previous years, it was like I made a bunch of new friends.

As we performed skits for the parents, I realized how much I'll miss the kids. It's been a struggle and a learning experience, and I'll miss those kids dearly. Before the service started, some kids actually asked to be closed in a closet, so Jesse did it with a smug look on his face. It was our dream to lock those kids in a closet! Not really. But it was pretty funny.

When (almost) all was said and done, the oldest counselor, my friend Sam, gave a short speech about the camp director who moved to Philadelphia, returned to camp a few weeks ago, and will not be returning to camp in the years to come. At that time, all the counselors were standing in front of the parents because we had just been thanked and applauded for our efforts. Sam began her speech to thank Ariel and she began to cry. It was difficult to witness because Sam is a role model to me and she's such a strong woman. As she broke down, Jesse tried to comfort her and the rest of us cried. We all love the camp director and we'll miss her. I'm afraid of what will happen to camp next year, but Sam might take over. Either way, it'll continue but it won't be the same. However, all the counselors have vowed to come back. We all made sure of that. We're a family that only gets together for 2 weeks during the summer, but we've gotten really close.

I had a sort of mental crisis throughout camp. The counselor who I grew closest to was Jesse, mostly because he and I were in a lot of the same groups together and wound up just spending a lot of time together. He's just a great, nice person and we get along well. I felt guilty because I was making such good friends with a boy that wasn't Jon. I like him (Jesse, not Jon) strictly as a friend, but I still felt a little weird. As I thought about it, I realized I feel that way when I hang out with other guy friends I met at Western. It's not a huge deal, but I always felt a little bad for being drawn to Jesse.

I just realized how amazing it is that we're all so close, because there is a huge range of ages in our little family. The youngest is 14 or 15 and the oldest is 21, yet we all treat each other with the same respect. At first, that wasn't the case, of course. The youngest girl is actually amazing with kids and she's quite grown up for her age. I respect her greatly because she's so eccentric and openly lesbian. I keep forgetting that she's 5 years younger than me.

Overall, I can't wait for camp next year, but I'm afraid of what the future holds. Even though the counselors will still be there, we'll have a new director or maybe several directors. Knowing that I'll return next year made me sure that I won't be spending a whole lot of time in Bellingham over the summer. I'll probably move home like I did this year so I can volunteer at the middle school, work at Fair Portia, and work at summer camp.

This was one boring blog. Oops...

--Elie

Carpe diem quam minimum credula postero

2009-08-10T23:56:00.000-07:00

I know made a post about religion yesterday, but I thought I would talk a little more on the subject, since in the past couple of days I've been browsing YouTube and its plethora of atheist material. With each video I watch, I am less and less convinced by the idea of a God, especially the Christian God. One thought in particular I've been coming back to again and again in my mind: what kind of all-powerful and perfect being (who I'm assuming has perfect logic) would damn so many of his creations to eternal torture simply for not believing in him, when so few logical signs point to his existence? Sounds like a malevolent sadist to me. No, these are not new ideas, and I didn't begin this blog to try to debunk the existence of God.

There ARE some atheists that irk me a little bit. Some simply say, "God does not exist." "I can prove that God does not exist." Simply put, no, you can't prove that. Just as theists can't prove that God(s) DO(ES) exist, atheists cannot prove that God(s) do(es) NOT exist. There's no way to know either way. But let's think through a few scenarios.

1. An individual believes in God and there is a God. He devotes his life to God. He dies and goes to heaven and lives an eternal afterlife of happiness.
END RESULT: A life devoted to an invisible being and a fulfilled afterlife

2. An individual does not believe in God and there is a God. He tries to live life to the fullest. He dies and goes to Hell for no good reason (unless the God is not the Christian one and isn't a total jerk-face).
END RESULT: A life devoted to whatever he wants and eternal damnation

3. An individual believes in God and there is no God. He devotes his life to God. He dies and becomes dust.
END RESULT: A life devoted to an invisible being and then nothing

4. An individual does not believe in God and there is no God. He tries to live life to the fullest. He dies and becomes dust.
END RESULT: A life devoted to whatever he wants and then nothing

Obviously, this list is a little biased to my own beliefs, and it's definitely oversimplified. But to recap... If one believes in God, either eternal happiness or wasted time (not necesarily, but... mission trips (the non-humanitarian ones) and any time spent worshipping). If one does not believe in God, either eternal damnation from a total asshole of a God who doesn't deserve worshipping, or a life well spent (again, not necesarily, but I'm not totally finished). On second thought, there are so many possibilities out there... perhaps a God would reward atheism because of the signs that point to it? Kind of weird, but again, possible. This whole idea is getting ridiculous so I'm just going to move on from it.

Perhaps a little of my religious history is in order. From late elementary school to early high school, I considered myself a Christian, attending the church of a friend of mine as regularly as I could. I can't remember the first time I was invited, but I remember I believed in some sort of God before I first went to church. I don't think my parents explicitly taught me that God existed, but they definitely alluded to it. That church just told me all the specifics about that God. Throughout the years, I convinced myself that they were right, and they convinced me that they were right... but looking back now, I know there was always this nagging feeling that there was just something inherently wrong with some of the stuff they were saying. In the back of my mind, I thought then what I did now: what if I just hadn't discovered Christianity? I was condemned to Satan's hellfire? Makes no sense. So over the years, especially after I stopped attending church, I began to see that Christianity just couldn't be right due to all of its self-contradictions. It's like saying "I love chocolate" and "I hate chocolate." Only one of those can be true. But Christians twist that to mean "I have a love-hate relationship with chocolate," which almost makes sense... but that's not what they said!

So anyways, more time passed, and although I now had no reason to believe in Christianity, I still admired Jesus and some teachings of the Bible, and still believed in some sort of God. I thought, if there is nothing after life, what's the point? Isn't that just so depressing? I went on convincing myself there HAD to be a God for life to matter. Whenever I thought about the possibility of there being nothing after this life, I wanted to curl up in a ball and lie in bed. Only within the past year have I realized the fallacies of this thought-process.

A few friends of mine have become increasingly open about their own atheism. I think there was one thing I read about atheism that compared this sort of event to a homosexual's coming-out, and although I know they have their major differences, they are, in some ways, quite comparable. Anyways, at first I didn't understand why they would choose to just NOT believe in God. In the past, whenever I saw someone "lose faith" or declare their disbelief, it was often out of sadness. I wasn't about to pull some "God works in mysterious ways" bullshit, but my rationalization was, "Maybe God stopped paying attention, maybe he made the universe and now is just letting it do its own thing, like a scientist with a petri dish."Something like that. The possibilities were endless. The point is, I didn't want to just stop believing in God because something bad happened. But I realized that this isn't what happened. They just had no reason to believe. The evidence is not there. On top of this, life didn't have less meaning without God... it had more meaning.

It took awhile for this thought-process to evolve in my own mind, but now, when I think about life and death... I think about how my time in this world is finite, fragile, and precious. I can interact with my surroundings. I can experience an incredible array of emotions. I can change things. I can affect other people and living things. By the miracles of science, the molecules in my body have coalesced to form me for a brief instant in the history of this universe, after being around for billions, perhaps trillions, probably even more years. I won't be here for much longer. I need to get up out of this seat, I need to see what this life has to offer. I want to see the world. I want to help everyone I can. I want to learn everything there is to know. I want to get out of Sequim! I want to spend as much time with my girlfriend and other friends as possible. I want to make MORE friends. I want to meet everyone, nasty and nice. I want to teach music to kids that have nothing. I want to become a better musician. I want to write beautiful music. I want to live life. I may not follow this motto all the time, but now, when I think about the possibility that there is no God, there is no afterlife... that's when I'm at my happiest.

"Carpe diem quam minimum credula postero." "Seize the day, and place no trust in tomorrow."

--Jon

Rise Up! Rise Up!

2009-08-09T21:43:00.001-07:00

I'll be frank: I'm not religious. Religion works for some people, but in most cases I've experienced, I'm not fond of it. This particularly applies to Christianity, but this may be because that's the only religion I've had much of any experience with. However, I do have to say I had no problems when I went with Elie to the Chabad House and experienced brief glimpses of Judaism; I've never felt more comfortable in a religious environment than I did there.

In any case, I was thinking recently about how awesome this song and its lyrics are, so I'm going to share them with you lucky readers. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you "Rise Up! Rise Up!" by Cursive.

~ * ~

Dear preacher, thanks for making time for me today
Hope you don't mind if I hide behind the curtain
It's been fifteen years since my last confession
By your good book's standards, I've sinned like a champion
But that book seems a tad bit out-dated

Please forgive me, for questioning divinity
It's an ugly job, but I think I'm up for it
I'm not saying who's right
I'm just saying there's more than one way
To skin a religion
There's more than one way
To explain our existence

Reverend, sir, I don't want to seem malevolent
My teenage angst is far behind me
But father, certainly it's troubling to see
All these people kneeling, instead of dealing
With the fact that we are all we have

So, rise up! rise up!
There's no one to worship!
But plenty of life to lose!
I'm not saying "Let's burn down the church"
But do you want to hear my confession?
It's my greatest sin...

Okay, here it is:
I wasted half my life on the thought that I'd live forever!
I wasn't raised to seize the day, but to work and worship
'Cause "He that liveth and believeth" supposedly never dies

Rise up! rise up!
Live a full life!
'cause when it's over, it's done
So rise up! Rise up!
Dance and scream and love!

~ * ~

--Jon

We Now Pass the Baton to You

2009-08-08T17:52:00.000-07:00

Another blog = Elie finished a new book. And the book I finished was The Freedom Writers Diary - How a Teacher and 150 Teens Used Writing to Change Themselves and the World Around Them.

Reading this book aroused several seemingly-disjointed ideas and questions:

-How likely is it that Erin Gruwell's (the teacher) methods are repeatable? What she did was amazing, especially as a first-year teacher. She stayed with her class (well, several classes for a total of 150 students) for all four years of high school. After her first batch of kids graduated, she stopped teaching at Wilson High School and taught at a university. She continues to be an inspiration to her past students and to future teachers, but the point is that she stopped teaching high school. In the movie based on this book, some faculty members asked Erin if she could repeat what she had done with other kids in years to come. Her answer was, "I don't know." She put an incredible amount of time, energy, and money into those first four years, and it's incredibly daunting to live up to her standards or to even make a fraction of a difference as she made.

-The good news is that there is another book (and a new one coming out in a few weeks) that is all about Erin Gruwell's methods of teaching. What she does now is teach her methods to other teachers so that her accomplishments with the Freedom Writers isn't particularly outstanding in comparison to other classes. Her efforts are currently concentrated to reproducing her method of teaching, and I really want to learn what she has to say. She even has an institute for current teachers, so I know that repeating what she did is possible.

-Erin Gruwell spent a great deal of money to take her kids on field trips to New York and Europe. She also brought people from all over the world to meet her students. She worked a second job with a famous hotel company to support her and her students' endeavours. I've heard that a lot of the "best" teachers must take on second or third jobs in order to raise enough money to take their kids to museums and on field trips outside of their dismal neighborhoods. I don't mind working hard, but it's exhausting just thinking about planning lessons, working a second job, and having a life. I know it's possible and that it's all the more rewarding, but it's still daunting.

-In the movie The Freedom Writers, Erin and her husband got divorced because Erin was spending so much time with her students and working her second job. Plus, her husband seemed to be kind of an unsupportive jerk. I'm not even sure if Erin did divorce her husband because it wasn't mentioned in the book, but it makes me worry. Will Jon and I continue to have a stable relationship when one or both of us will be occupied by teaching? I have no desire to be a stereotypical teacher who spends the minimal amount of time with the students and at school, and I hope my goal of being a super fantabulous teacher won't affect my relationship with Jon. And I know this is far in the future...but it's kind of not. In 4 or 5 ... or 6 years we'll be looking for teaching jobs, and we'll be put to the test.

-There were several paragraphs I highlighted simply because of the inspiration the words provided. It wasn't just that the words were beautiful but that they came from troubled high school students who were transformed by brilliant teaching methods. One of the parts was: "I know that there is not a day that will go by, when I believe something is wrong, I won't do anything about it. It is better to take a chance and make a change, than it is to pass and pity." Especially after reading Jonathan Kozol and Paul Tough's books, I've become even more inspired to do something. Not only do I want to do something, I want students to do something.

-Another such sentence is: "If they were educated, like I am, they'd learn to see past shades and beyond exteriors and see people." I found it heartwarming to know that these kids who were once deemed the failures of the school were the ones admitting that education is so important. These kids took charge of their education, and thus took charge of their entire lives.

-A favorite of mine: "In any and every situation, nonaction is never a sane and rational approach." These are powerful words, considering that me sitting here, not taking action, is actually insane and irrational. And I agree. I'm not exactly sure what I can do at this point in time, but I'm determined to do something.

-A similar statement: "Silence ensures that history repeats itself." It's frustrating to me that so few people know about the inequalities facing kids and schools. I wish there was a way to make everybody aware and caring. While it's difficult for me to impact many kids while I'm juggling college courses and college life in general, the least I can do is make people aware. How I'll do so has yet to be determined. But until nobody is silent about the disadvantages facing so many of America's youth, history will continue on its current, cruel path.

-One student wrote about Ms. Gruwell: "Most teachers aren't like that; they give you your homework and then send you on your way, never getting to know you. Ms. Gruwell is so much different. She gets to know you...she wants to get to know you." This statement made me fairly confident that I can be a successful teacher because, like Erin Gruwell, I care about kids and I want to get to know them. I have no intention of throwing out homework and sending kids on their way. For that one reason, I know I'll be an above average teacher simply because I care.

-The final paragraph of the epilogue reads: "The Freedom Writers see this book as their third leg of the relay race. Anne's story inspired Zlata, who has been hailed as the modern-day Anne Frank. Zlata then reciprocated by passing the baton to the Freedom Writers. We hope this book will inspire you to be the fourth leg of the race by encouraging you to pick up a pen and be a catalyst for change." This paragraph was written by Erin herself, and, after reading it, I felt the need to give her a hug and thank her, because I so badly want to be a catalyst for change. It's difficult for me to sit here in my sheltered home in the middle of nowhere when I can be doing something big and important. Then I remember that I don't have teaching credentials and I have a lot to learn, but I know that by learning about The Freedom Writers and the Harlem Children's Zone and lots of other catalysts for change, I can be educated enough and aware of how to best tackle future challenges I will face as a teacher in the years to come.

-While reading this book, I began to feel lucky and proud that I chose to obtain an English endorsement, because the written (and spoken) word is so powerful. Erin also used English to teacher her students about history, another subject I wish to teach. I'm also glad that my major is based on anthropology, which teaches, above all else, tolerance and understanding. I feel like I have the passion for and knowledge of the humanities to make an impact on kids. I believe that all subjects are equally important, but I feel as though my tools to institute change will come from my love and knowledge of English, anthropology, and history...and my love for students, of course. Maybe now I'll pay more attention in anthropology and history courses...

--Elie

Shun. Shun the nonbeliever. Shunnnnnn.

2009-08-03T18:58:00.000-07:00

Made it through one day of camp Ruach Shovava.

And it was pretty much like any other camp day, I suppose. I missed camp last year but I was there the year previous, so it was sort of a home-coming. Only not really.

There are a ton of counselors-in-training this year, many of which are annoying, preppy girls, but luckily they are usually not around me much, and the ones in my morning group are easy to get along with. However, they make camp just a tad less enjoyable, although I do pride myself for not slipping into the trap of wearing a ton of makeup and dressing all preppy or gothic, or attaching myself to a label - or attaching a label to myself. Yeah, I guess the latter makes more sense.

What made today (and probably the future) a little difficult was this girl who is a counselor for the second year. We sort of made friends for the first time last year after knowing each other since pre-school, and I thought all was fine and dandy between us. But during the prep meeting on Sunday and during camp today, she totally ignored me. She also formed this sort of elite group with her, another counselor who I never got along with very well, and two other counselors who are usually pretty nice to me and who I consider friends. But they had this little clique going and I had to take a step back and understand that I wasn't wanted. I've always had this problem at Sunday School, but I thought the one or two girls would be more mature about it. And maybe they don't know they're doing it, because the members of the whole "elitist" group have been friends for a while and I'm seen as an intruder. I understand. It happens.

I was taken by surprise and was pretty disappointed that I was shunned from the "in" group, but then I realized that the surprise probably occurred because I've been so used to having the most magnificent friend ever...Jon. He's always always always been there and always makes me feel good about myself, and then I was all of a sudden stuck in this position where I was an outcast. And as a disclaimer, Ina is probably the only other friend who hasn't made me feel all shunned and whatnot but since she's a meanie face and doesn't go to Western and spend every waking moment of her free time with me, Jon is the winner. :D

So tomorrow I'll walk into the synagogue doors and keep in mind that although I'm welcomed by the campers (at least I THINK I'm welcomed), I need not try to be friendly with the counselors. I mean, I'll chat with a few of them when we're doing a project or something, but when that one particular girl is around the nicer counselors, they all flock to her. But I'm there for the kids, not the counselors.

I also find it ironic that this is all taking place in a religious setting. I've always felt disconnected and outcasted by many Jewish people, and trying to belong in that synagogue and with those Jewish people is sort of a ridiculous.

--Elie (who needs to write less and tell Jon to write more)

Just a Thought

2009-08-02T12:21:00.000-07:00

Jon and I are both in a club at Western called Students for Educational Equality. One of our yearly goals is to raise something like $1500 to give to a low-income student coming to Western. This is a great idea, but I think the funds could be put to better use. I was just researching the Harlem Children's Zone on the Internet, and our funds can go towards helping students and families of this program. I like my idea better because we would be helping kids to go to college not because they don't have the money, but because they would never have had the opportunity due to the lack of education. I just read that the kids who are going to college straight from the HCZ have received about 6 million dollars in scholarship funds between 190 students. It appears that they are not lacking in funds because they have made great progress and are excellent scholarship material. What we can assist with is keeping these kids going through the program. And let's face it, if I'm a college student who's lacking in funds, receiving $1500 for one year isn't going to get me through college. After all, we're in favor of equality - not just low-income and high income inequality, but racial inequality too.

--Elie

Some Current Musical Endeavors of Mine

2009-08-01T20:36:00.000-07:00

This summer, I planned on writing an album of "solo" music with an overarching theme; something along the lines of "nature vs. technology" or something. While I still have a couple of songs in mind with this theme, I've generally abandoned it. I also originally planned on trying to make an actual album out of this that I could duplicate, package, and sell to friends, possibly record stores, and maybe even a record label. I also hoped to send it to the EMP SoundOff, thinking maybe I could play that and even some other shows using "backing tracks" off of my Zune and/or laptop, but that might be more trouble than it's worth. In any case, I've been doing far less writing and recording than I originally planned, but I've still got some songs done, and more in the process of being done, and even more in my head waiting to get started on.

FINISHED SONGS:

"Cabin Fever": This was the first song I finished over spring break after I left Elie's house and came home to an empty house devoid of my parents; they went on a vacation to California to see family. I was bored, had writer's block, everyone was busy, there was nothing to do, I was lonely, etc. The song came rather quickly to me, although the concept of "weird-bare-bones-ambinet-ish-electronic-percussion-with-stacked-vocal-harmonies" had been in the back of my mind for some time. I lifted the chord progression from a song from the game Final Fantasy VII (click here to listen!). It was kinda hard to sing the weird rhythm. The sound effect at the beginning consists of me rattling my keys and then me blowing into a SoBe bottle, with a bunch of effects put on both of them. Also, I put distortion on my voice. Because it sounds more EDGY. Or something.

"Post-Apocalyptic Blues": I started working on this before "Cabin Fever," and then got writer's block, so took a break from it. Everything from the intro to verse was something I had in my back-catalog for upwards of a year, but never got a chance to actually use. The lyrics and a bit of the melody had been written during winter quarter totally separate from this song, but I soon realized that they worked together pretty well. I made the intro with my phaser and delay pedals on the guitar. The lyrics were inspired by I Am Legend, The Stand, Fallout 3, and other various post-apocalyptic stories, for which I have an unreasonable admiration.

"Ostrich in a Casket": After writing those two super-duper-serious songs, I decided I needed to lighten up a little and write a stupid song. So I came up with some annoying riffs and set out to write an obnoxious and outrageous super-fast two-minute song. The song title was inspired by a conversation Elie and I were having on the phone. There was an awkward silence and then said the first two random words that popped into my head: "Ostrich. Casket." Also, the night before I had a dream about Justin Timberlake leading a street gang, and another dream about penguins in Antarctica. Urban ninjas (what I call participants of parkour) and falling down an up-escalator (seriously... think about that) are two subjects I had wanted to write songs about, but during the writing of this I realized they don't really warrant entire songs (well, okay maybe they still do, but those would be weird-ass songs... as if this isn't...).

"Straight From the Heart": John von and I set out to write an awful late 2000's R&B song using auto-tune. This is the result. The lyrics consist of the stupidest love-song cliches we could possibly think up. The title came from the realization of how many musicians have a song called "Straight From the Heart," but we decided to put a ridiculous spin on it. We knew from the get-go we'd have to have some awfully placed "Shawtay"'s and "Motha-fucka"'s. John wrote the main synth-riff on the guitar. The key-change at the end was different from how we originally planned, but it worked.

Other songs I've been working on:

"Livin' It Up": It starts out as a throwback-rock-ish song, and then there's a verse with acoustic guitar and djembe, and then a buildup with ambient electric guitar and Phil Collins-ish electronic drums, then a guitar solo, then it gets all quiet and weird and moody for the last third of the song... I haven't written lyrics but I want to make them about unsustainable lifestyle(s) or something along those lines. Basically all I have is a bit of a chorus. But almost all of the music is done.

"[Latin Hip-Hop Folk]": I'm taking a Latin hip-hop drum beat and stuff and putting it underneath a downbeat folky song. That's all I have thus far.

"[Escalator]": A little electro-funk thing I've had in the closet for awhile.

"Southern Sun": I don't know why I haven't started working on this; maybe it's too serious for my mood(s) as of late? I originally planned for this to be all orchestral and epic, with violin, cello, clarinet, flute, timpani, concert bass drum, crotales, bells, and all sorts of other crazy stuff, along with drums, guitars, and vocals and such. It'll probably be relatively normal now. I thought of the lyrics while waiting for the bus at the end of Fall quarter, and wrote them during Physics 104. That class was super-easy.

"Tempest": Another similar to the last song, but instrumental.

John Von and I are going to write two more songs this week, hopefully. One will be a bad 80s duet-ballad, and the other will be a stupid southern-piano-butt-rock uber-patriotic song.

There are also a few songs I've either thought of covering or started and then stopped. The one that I am currently working on and hope to finish on Monday is "All the Trees of the Fields Will Clap Their Hands," by Sufjan Stevens, off of his Seven Swans album. It's very repetitive, so it should be easy to complete pretty quickly.

Anyways, I still hope to compile all of these songs into an "album," possibly with album art, and I may still send it in to SoundOff, and I may still try to play some songs live at open mic or something. We'll see how things go.

--Jon

Whatever It Takes

2009-08-01T20:11:00.000-07:00

I just finished a book by Paul Tough called Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada's Quest to Change Harlem and America.

It was about this guy, Canada, who has this goal to transform Harlem and America by closing the achievement gap and thus getting more low-income (and mostly African American) kids though high school and college. He set up the Harlem Children's Zone where expecting parents learn about parenting. Then their three-year-olds attend a preschool, then a kindergarten, and finally middle school specifically for low-income students of Harlem. It's much more complicated than this, but Canada's goal is to create a net that kids cannot fall through; where they'll have no choice but to succeed because they have all the resources, and everybody around them will be doing the same.

This book wasn't just interesting because of what it taught me about this Harlem project that is going on at this very moment, but it also taught me about why so many low-income Americans are African American. From what I took from this book, more African Americans live with a lower-income and in the projects than do white people because African Americans haven't yet completely recovered from discrimination. (One could also argue that white (and any other color) Americans haven't recovered because they're doing the discriminating...) Many obviously have recovered, but because they tend to live together for support (due to discrimination), African Americans were still discriminated against and left out of the loop that would help them prepare for jobs and teach them how to raise children according to the "correct" middle-class, American standard.

These people aren't bad parents; they're just different. For example, they don't promote eye-contact with their children, which hinders children in a society where strong eye contact is valued. African American families tend to not promote conversations with their children between parents and children. Adults are to be looked up to and respected rather than talked to on level ground with a young child. Again, this isn't the norm with all African American families, but it is with a majority of low-income families, no matter the color. In essence, kids are being raised so differently and in more difficult circumstances, often with a young, single mother with little money and in a society where many families live off welfare and don't have a decent education. And, most schools are of poor quality.

To quote the book: "However you measure parenting, middle-class parents tend to do it very differently from poor parents - and the path they follow, in turn, tends to give their children an array of advantages, both cognitive and non-cognitive: a bigger vocabulary, better brain chemistry, a more assertive attitude. As Lareau pointed out, kids from poor families might be nicer, they might be happier, they might be more polite -- but in countless ways the manner in which they are raised puts them at a disadvantage in the measures that count in contemporary American society."

I'm beginning to better understand how charter schools work. The students are chosen by lottery, but most of the parents who enter their children in the lottery are upper- or middle-class because they're more motivated to do so. Charter schools produce great students and great test scores compared to most public schools, but that's because of the quality of students they have. Most charter schools make the smart and wealthy smarter and wealthier.

This book further convinced me that I want to work at a low-income school. According to this book, experienced teachers can usually choose where they teach, and they almost always choose to go to a wealthier school - where they're needed least. The teachers with the least experienced are left with the jobs at low-income schools where good, experienced teachers are needed most. I think I may have written something about this topic in my blog about Jonathan Kozol's book. But anyway, knowing that I'll be needed more in a low-income school has made me want to teach there even more. Why teach where the kids already have the resources and where there are plenty of great teachers who can teach them the necessary material? It takes a truly gifted teacher to teach low-income students who have grown up disadvantaged from the beginning and how are forced to attend school with limited materials.

Geoffrey Canada said, "I want to get out of the business of trying to save failing students before their lives are destroyed. I've been in that business, and it's a tough business and a good business, and I'm glad some people are in it--but I really think it's the wrong place to focus." What Canada means is that efforts should be focused more on the children at a very young age so that they never get to the point where they're failing or disadvantaged because it takes a great deal of strength, energy, time, and resources to "save" kids. His endeavors with Harlem Children's Zone have proven his point; the kids who are in the program basically from birth flourish while the middle school students who entered the program in 6th grade are hopeless or almost hopeless. I realize that, more than likely, I'll be in the "saving kids business" because I don't want to teach elementary school. I probably wouldn't hate teaching the younger ones, but my niche is with the older kids. I know that a difference can be made, but I'll have to work very, very hard. I'm currently reading The Freedom Writers Diary and I'm starting to get an idea of how to reach kids who are "disadvantaged" and need saving. Canada also said, "If we continue waiting until middle and high school to intervene with poor students of color, I just don't think that we're going to change the numbers in America as a whole." This statement made me a little discouraged. Why should I teach middle and high school if I can't make a difference? Well, Canada isn't out to change a single person or class or school. He's off to change all of America. I'm not shooting for the stars like him, for better or worse. I want to make a difference, and I know that I can do so -- one class at a time. There are so many examples of secondary school teachers changing the lives of his or her students, and I want to be part of those success stories.

Furthermore, there will always be secondary school students who need help, and I want to be part of the help that they receive. In fact, they need help more than younger kids, even if the younger ones can avoid falling into desolation and failure, but the secondary school kids can still be saved from that failure; we can't just label them as a lost cause.

Obama and Canada were once on the same page - before Obama's election, anyway. Obama wanted to create a Harlem Children's Zone-type institute/program in 20 major cities to help the families that need it most, but let's see what Obama really does.

Part of me is really excited to jump into teaching, but part of me is reluctant. Sure, I'm reading a lot about low-income African and Hispanic students and what needs to be done to destroy the achievement gap, but can I do it? How will my reading translate to actually carrying out the act? At any rate, I'm more passionate about this subject than any other, and I'm nearly positive that I want to be a teacher in a low-income school, but I can't say that for sure if it's what I want to do for the rest of my life because I don't really know what it's like.

--Elie

Middle School Wrap Up

2009-07-25T22:18:00.000-07:00

As a warning, this blog is going to be incredibly long and probably not all that interesting for your reading pleasure, and it's actually more for me to look back on when I'm applying to the Woodring College of Education or whatnot.

Alas, summer school at Elma Middle School has ended.

The the beginning of the week, there were six kids in the math class who were in danger of failing. One girl and her father came in to talk to the teacher, and, during the final days of class, the girl bucked up and passed by .48%. I was so happy that she had passed, because I knew she wanted to and because she was smart enough. But then I realized that we shouldn't have taken pity on her, because she had every opportunity to get an A in that class. She simply chose to not put in the work or effort, then she freaked out when she was failing. She went to summer school because she played the same slacking-off game during the regular school year, and who's to say that she won't do the same next year? What this girl needs to learn isn't math or English or social studies. She needs to learn to be accountable for herself. Both the teacher and I were aware that she could do the math, so we both prompted her to actually do the work and finish her tests. I feel like we did all we could; we talked to the girl, the father and sister were involved, and, in the end, the girl came to, but it was only because she had an "oh crap" moment when she realized what her slacking off had done. My question for myself as a future teacher is: how do you make a kid want to learn, do the work, and be engaged?

That boy who kept failing all this tests despite massive amounts of one-on-one help did fail in the end. I think that part of the problem was a learning disability on his part, and he had very little patience and was very mouthy as a result. By the end, I was actually afraid of this kid - not just because he was bigger than me. I was afraid of him because he represented failure. Not only that, but I was afraid that he would blow up in my face when I was trying to work with him. At times, he would want to work and he would try and he would actually understand, then he would shut down other times. He sulked by himself for the first few weeks then changed his seat to a more central area. Unfortunately, he befriended three of the most outspoken and obnoxious kids, so he was constantly turned around, talking and laughing with them. I realized that he was happier but he concentrated less on his work. When he couldn't do the work, he'd just turn around and chat. This situation was no better than the first; he would first sulk by himself and get mad at me and not do his work at all, then he would spend most of his time chatting and not concentrating much at all when he changed seats. Just as I've witnessed kids getting much more work done while being isolated from friends, I've witnessed kids blossom while sitting with a friend, but this particular kid was a lose-lose situation. As a teacher's aid, I couldn't do a whole lot in this situation. Or at least that's what it felt like. If I was the teacher, I would have tried working one-on-one with this kid then contacted the parents. I would have tried to get the kid into a special-ed class where he could get more specialized help, because I know now that this kid needed it more than any other. Part of me feels awful for being so helpless and letting this kid slip through my fingers, but the other part of me knows it's not my fault; this kid needs more help than what I can offer in a classroom setting. There's still no excuse for his failing.

The second kid that failed was one of my favorite students. He was small (smaller than me) and smiley, but he hardly ever attempted his work. He hardly ever had a pencil, and if he did, he didn't use it, and I would have to prompt him to take out a piece of paper and begin writing. He simply had his head in the clouds, and I couldn't call him back to Earth. He failed every single test, and each time, he would keep the test until the last minute while chatting with the other kids. He wasn't cheating, he was just screwing around because it was more fun than working. I think he could do the work if he wanted to apply himself. I think his family needed to be contacted as well, but I can't help but hope that there are some tricks that the Woodring College of Education will teach me that will help me excite and interest kids like him and the girl I mentioned before.

The third kid that failed was an odd duck. He was a lot like the kid I just mentioned, but he actually did the work half the time. He probably would have passed had he not dropped out on the second-to-last day. I admit to not really knowing what was going on with this guy, and maybe I would have been able to get inside his head a bit more had I known more about him. What happened was that he was slacking off one day and the lady who followed the 8th grade class around told him that he'd better buck up or he'd be held back and not allowed to go onto the 8th grade. Apparently he said to her that it didn't matter if he failed because his mom would let him move onto the next grade anyway. I'm not even sure if parents have a say in promoting or retaining their kid. Anyway, what I have gathered from that incident and from previously having heard him back-talk to the other aid and myself is that this is a spoiled kid. I'm still not sure what I could or should have done differently. To say the last, I was never very fond of this kid (and for good reason), but how can I reach out to these kinds of kids who I just don't like and who doesn't like me back? That's not to say that I'll ever give up on one of these kids, but it's difficult to put extra time and energy into helping a kid who really doesn't care about school or you.

I was incredibly happy when the kids who succeeded did succeed, and that ecstatic feeling outweighed the feeling of sadness of the failures, and I now know that what I live for is seeing kids succeed and being part of that success. I know that kids will fail no matter how much you try to save them, and seeing some kids fail was hard for me, but it was nothing compared to the joy I felt with those who succeeded. I think I was more happy than them.

This whole experience has taught me a great deal and it can be summed up into two categories: what I learned I'm good at/what I improved on and what I have issues with. Er... I mean, on what I improved and with what I have issues. There. No more prepositions at the end of phrases. Phew.

What I'm good at:

1.) I've always been shy, and during the first few days of summer school, I was nervous to look over the shoulders of the kids and tell them what they'd done right and wrong. I was just scared to get in their faces. After a the first week, I gained confidence to crouch down with them and work out a problem out with them. In essence, I've gotten a lot better at connecting with the students and not being afraid of them.

2.) I have a lot of patience, and patience is truly a virtue in the teaching profession. I never got frustrated with a kid for being slow. I only became frustrated when the kids were slacking when they were completely able to do the work.

3.) I'm not sure if one can be good at having enthusiasm, but I definitely have an enthusiasm for teaching. I love the kids and I love helping them learn. The classroom is where I want to be for many, many years to come.

What I need to improve on: *ahem* On what I need to improve:

1.) I need to work on my discipline kills. I'm great at being the "friend" but not at taking control. More than once, I'd tell a kid to do or not do something, and they'd ignore me. Part of the problem is that I look as young as them, and I'm shorter than most of them. I need to learn to take control and at least look menacing. Ha.

2.) I still have yet to feel completely comfortable working one-on-one with kids, because I'm afraid they'll get frustrated at me as they struggle - whether or not it's my fault. I think I need more confidence.

3.) I know there's so much more for me to learn, but these were the blairing "goods" and "bads" and I'm sure I've forgotten many. It's late, I have a headache, and I'm not wearing my glasses, so my writing isn't to fabulous at the moment. As if it ever is...

Looking back, this opportunity gave me a chance to
-work with many Hispanic kids, not just white ones like I'm used to
-listen to discussions between parents and their children and the teacher
-learn how much energy middle schoolers have!
-understand that I don't want to work in a predominately white school. I want to help the kids that really need help not because of a learning disability here or there or a spoiled kid with behavior problems. I want to help the students who want to learn but cannot due to poor schools and inexperienced teachers.
-learn how much time and energy it takes to run a classroom
-learn that middle schoolers need to have something to do constantly, or they'll quickly get out of hand
-learn that middle schoolers need to have a great deal of direction or they're not likely to go in the correct direction at all
-get that happy feeling of walking into a school each day, then watch the students file into the classroom as I waited excitedly to start each new day and each new class period
-...and loads of other stuff too. I think my brain stopped working a few hours ago. I didn't get my nap today!

I left on a happy note, at least. I was given a nice thank you card from the teachers, and the head teacher said he'd like me to come back next year and asked if I had any friends who would be interested in volunteering as well. I kept thinking that I'd see if I could volunteer at the Elma High School next year instead of the middle school just to get a wide range of experience, but I want to go back to that middle school. I enjoyed the experience so much and I miss the kids, so I'll probably volunteer there again. And at this point, I'm not sure if I'm ready to instruct high school students who aren't that much younger than me. But we'll see.

--Elie (who won't be Ms. Hartman for a while, unfortunately)

Jon Does Some Ketch[ing]up [and Rambling]

2009-07-22T20:47:00.000-07:00

I actually hate ketchup. Anyways, my life has been quite uneventful. I've been working at the local Radioshack; helping customers and selling stuff are my main duties, but lately we've been doing lots of inventory and cleaning as well, and we always have the duty of talking about video games, movies, TV shows, web-comics, computers, and other nerd stuff like that. I really enjoy helping customers with their issues; it's always a nice feeling when someone comes in confused and I know exactly how to fix their problem and make it so that they understand how their device works even a little bit. I think working at Radioshack is partly why I was inspired to become a teacher. In high school, I didn't really do any volunteering. My parents didn't really encourage me to do it, and even though I knew plenty of people who did, it just didn't appeal to me at all; why would I want to "give back to the community"? What exactly had the community given to me? What did I have to gain? In high school, I tended to be rather bitter and cynical toward the people around me, and was not very thankful at all; I just wanted to be left alone and let to live my life. I started working at Radioshack late in my junior year, and I liked it a lot. I enjoyed working with electronics, I enjoyed the relatively laidback attitude of my employer, and *gasp* I enjoyed helping people. I didn't think about this too much, though, and my senior year, I figured it was "too late" to start volunteering. I was "too busy," anyways, what with my senior year and senior project and scholarship notebook and procrastinating in College English (the UW Outreach-sponsored Language Arts class from HELL). Then college came around. I realized that to get into Woodring College, the education program at WWU, I would have to "get involved" and turn in an impressive resume. So I decided to join some clubs and start volunteering. Much to my surprise, somehow, I enjoyed it. I felt accomplished. I felt like I was doing something positive, even if only in a small and minute way. I learned about how our education system is totally screwed. I still have much to learn, and I have yet to read Jonathan Kozol's book the Elie has recommended that everyone read, but I intend to read it as soon as possible. It's very important that people know about it, and now it's very important that I do my part in fixing it. When I graduate, I'd like to teach at a low-income school. I'll probably be teaching math, since most schools in low-income areas don't have music programs, but if there is one, I would definitely like to be a part of it, even if its just an after-school thing. Kids in those areas need something positive in their lives to keep their minds enriched, something that can make them even a little bit excited about school, even if it's just one part of it. I want to make kids excited about music and learning about it and making it. Even if I just start a drum circle club, or help out with a hip-hop club; anything relating to music, I want to be there with those kids. After mind-numbing days learning about stuff in an environment that totally lacks energy, I want to be there with the soundtrack that keeps them sane. It's a pretty high goal, but even if I just end up having a little club band that all the high-achieving kids participate in, at least I can say I tried. Math is a little harder to get kids excited about, but I'll be damned if I don't learn dem kids good. I'd like to figure out a way to make kids excited about math, to tell convince them that it's not nerdy to enjoy it, to show awesome ways to apply it to their lives... but I have a hard time doing that with myself sometimes! I'm up for the challenge, though.

Let's see... in other news, I know I said I wouldn't talk about video games anymore, but I GOT A PLAYSTATION 3. $240. Pretty damn good deal if I may say so myself. Right now, I have Metal Gear Solid 4, Uncharted, Oblivion, and... umm... crap what's the fourth game... Assassin's Creed! Yesss. I might turn in Uncharted and replace it with LittleBigPlanet if GameStop has it tomorrow. I'm also playing through Final Fantasy X again. It's so addicting! So many heartbreaking moments... and I forgot to talk about some of the conversations some of the characters have about the religion in their world. At one point the essentially atheist character Rikku is arguing with the devout Yevon follower Wakka about the religion's ways and why they're wrong; if a few phrases and words were replaced in the conversation, it might as well have been had by a real-world skeptical atheist and blind, ignorant Christian [NOT to say that all Christians are ignorant AT ALL]. I find it very interesting. Anyways, I'm playing through it to try to unlock various secret stuff. And just to play through the storyline again.

Also, I've recently started watching Firefly on Hulu at the suggestion of several friends, and boy am I not regretting it! It's such an intriguing show. The basic premise is pretty standard sci-fi fare; a ship of space smugglers try to find jobs and avoid the Alliance's ships as well as super-bad criminals. But the characters are so very rich and interesting. Also, the show takes many action/sci-fi/drama cliches and twists them around for some hilarious moments. Example: the captain is lecturing a fugitive doctor about how he's done nothing good for the crew and how he got one of the crew members shot, and then says that that crew member has died. Dramatic music plays. The doctor runs down to the infirmary... only to find the crew member alive, awake, smiling, and waving. The scene cuts to the captain laughing hysterically with his crew about how they should have seen the look on his face. The show also has a Wild West tinge to it, to reflect the "frontier" aspect of space, where outlaws roam and the law is flexible on the outer fringe planets.

This weekend, I'm going to see several bands perform in Seattle at the Capitol Hill Block Party, a two-day music festival. I'm quite excited. I'll tell all about it when I return. Also, next week I'M SEEING ELIE AGAIN. It'll have been another three weeks [actually more], which has been rough. But you know, compared to most couples, I'm super-proud of us. We talk about once a day, and other than that live our lives normally. We still don't really argue at all. Our relationship is still perfectly healthy. It's impressive! I don't know if I know any other couples that are doing or have ever done as well as we're doing now. That sounds rather high-and-mighty, but it's awesome! Anyways, Squirrel Baggers United isn't going to go through any secession anytime soon, that's for sure.

--Jon

Wait...What?

2009-07-18T22:26:00.001-07:00

Now that I think about it, I never really clarified why The Shame of the Nation changed my life. First of all, it opened my eyes to severe injustices going on right under the nation's (and my own) nose. I was sort of aware of these inequalities before, but this book hit home for me. While I read it, I kept thinking "I have to do something." I knew I couldn't just sit back and let the injustices occur. What I'll actually DO is another story, but this book inspired me to do SOMEthing.

Secondly, this book made me realize how passionate I am about kids and teaching. After reading this book, I know that I can't be a teacher is some middle- or upper-class school with primarily white kids. In fact, I can't even teach in a middle- to upper-class school at all while I know that kids in poor areas all around the country are not receiving proper education. Even though my job will be made harder, I'll still be part of the struggle to educate the poor children who aren't getting what they deserve. Even if I do spend time teaching in a segregated school where there are mostly white kids, I'll make a point to educate them about the inequalities in America's education system.

Jonathan Kozol mentioned Teach for America a few times in his book, and I have seen the signs to apply for the program on Western's campus, but I never really understood what the program was all about. I went on their website and discovered that Teacher for America takes the top graduates from universities all around the US and provides them with adequate training to go out into low-income schools with mostly black and Hispanic children - where good teachers are needed the most. Apparently there are hundreds of thousands of applicants each year, but very few are admitted. Those who are admitted are sent all over the country to work in a school for two years. There are no schools for Teach For America in Washington, Oregon, or Idaho, so the closest place to teach is California. Seattle is a fairly segregated area as far as schools and such (as was mentioned in Kozol's book), but there are no spots for Teach for America students. After looking around, I decided that I really want to do Teach for America, even though my chances of being selected are slim. Apparently they reject thousands of applicants from Harvard, Oxford, Georgetown, Stanford, etc. In order to be accepted, I'll need one heck of a resume and ... I don't know ... I'll need to do some impressive things while I'm in college.

Thinking about Teach for America made me think, "how far am I willing to travel to teach?" Several months ago, Jon said he was concerned about us finding a teaching job in the same area and being able to stay together. At the time, I pushed away the idea because finding a teaching job and whatnot was so far away. But if I am accepted to do Teach for America, I'll have to travel, at the least, to California, but most teachers are needed in New York and in the South. What will happen to our relationship if one or both of us leaves for an extended amount of time? On one hand, I don't want either of us to hold the other back from any opportunity what so ever, but I happen to love Jon quite a bit and I honestly can't imagine being without him. I mean, I could live for a few months without seeing him, but what if it's longer than that? Will we stay together? Is it worth staying together if we can't see each other? (My opinion is "yes"...) Even if Teach for America stays out of both of our lives, what are the odds of us each finding a job in the same area, especially if I want to be in area where I can teach "minority" children?

Reading The Shame of the Nation has made me think about my future more than ever, and I feel like I'm chasing this dream of changing the lives of hundreds of children with my teaching, but I want Jon to be there with me.

--Elie

Education Inequality and Segregation in American Schools - It Exists!

2009-07-16T22:45:00.000-07:00

It's not often that one reads a book that chances his or her life. I was lucky enough to encounter one of these life-changing books, and it happens to be The Shame of the Nation by Jonathan Kozol. I won't summarize this book, because anybody who reads this blog should read the book for themself. Actually, every American (and non-American) citizen should read Kozol's book, because it contains information that everybody needs to know. In essence, he writes about how segregated and unequal American schools are. We always hear of people going over-seas to build schools for poor, innocent children who have been denied an education, but America suffers from educational inequality like any other country. Not only are schools very, very segregated (yes, segregation is still rampant in America and has gotten worse since the Civil Rights movement), but those segregated schools are in miserable condition. Again, I won't go into detail because I could never convey the true colors of what Kozol has done in his many books. I suggest you read this particular book because it's one of his most recent (published in 2005).

The hardest idea to grasp isn't that millions of poor black, white, and Hispanic kids are suffering from educational equality. What is truly amazing is that the government refuses to protect these children. The government refuses to desegregate schools and it refuses to fund rich and poor areas equally. Kozol wrote, "The majority opinion of the high court noted that, in order to bring to bear 'strict scrutiny' upon the case [the case was about a school board or possibly a parent suing the state - for not supplying sufficient funds to his child's school - or something to that extent. There were several court cases mentioned in this book; it's hard to keep them all straight. This case eventually went to the Supreme Court and was dismissed.], it must first establish that there had been 'absolute deprivation' of a 'fundamental interest' of the Edgewood children. Justice Lewis Powell wrote that education is not 'a fundamental interest' inasmuch as education 'is not among the rights afforded explicit protection under our Federal Constitution.' Nor, he wrote, did he believe that 'absolute deprivation' was at stake. 'The argument here,' he said, 'is not that the children in districts having relatively low assessable property values are receiving no public education; rather, it is that they are receiving a poorer quality education than that available to children in districts having more assessable wealth.' In cases where wealth is involved, he said, 'the Equal Protection Clause does not require absolute equality.'"

That's right - the United States Constitution doesn't promise an equal education for all, so education is unable to be protected by law, just as gays and lesbians are not protected because the Constitution is too vague. Although this Constitution of ours has done good for many, it's destroying America's youth (and gays and lesbians, but that's not part of my argument...at this particular time...) Basically, as Kozol wrote, "education, 'where the State has undertaken to provide it, is a right which must be made available to all on equal terms.'"

TO ALL (not some) ON EQUAL TERMS. Furthermore, this court case, a fight to get one single school district equal rights, was denied. "From that point on, with few exceptions, legal efforts to reduce or to abolish inequalities in education were restricted to state levels." What this statement means is that there is no single all-encompassing law that protects educational equality. Now it's up to each individual state to look after its schools, and it's up to each state to determine where the money goes, and, as evidence shows, the money is not being distributed fairly.

As Jon and I were discussing recently, these schools could be helped so much if they were only given sufficient funds. Granted, giving much-needed money to the dilapidated schools won't desegregate schools, but at least the children (often black and Hispanic) will have a chance to learn as much and in the same way as their rich (and often white) counterparts. Maybe if the white, middle- and upper-class communities were able to see that black and Hispanic children are able to learn as much as their children, they'll be more willing to desegregate schools. Just maybe...

Back to my first comment that money can fix so much in this dismal situation. And it's not like the money simply isn't there. Just look at how much sports stars are paid and all the million and billionaires there are. They could easily build a few hundred schools and supply them with the necessary materials to help underprivileged kids learn as much as they deserve. According to Kozol's findings, "'the top 25 percent of school districts in terms of child poverty...receive less funding than the bottom 25 percent." and "In 31 states, districts with the highest percentage of minority children also receive less funding per pupil than do districts with the fewest minority children. Thirty-five out of 48 states spend less on students in school districts with the highest numbers of minority children than on students in the districts with the fewest children of minorities."

All of the statistics that Jonathan Kozol presented were worth noting, but I chose to highlight a few in this blog: "Nationwide, from 1993 to 2002, the number of high schools graduating less than half their ninth grade class in four eyes has increased by 75 percent." The percentage of minority students graduating from high school was already low and it has increased by an astounding percentage.

Furthermore, George W. Bush (praise Allah that he is no longer president) did nothing to help. (Actually, Jonathan Kozol has been fasting for quite some time (years, perhaps, I can't remember) in his protest against No Child Left Behind. George W. Bush, you are killing a 72 year-old man. President Barack Obama, please save Mr. Kozol.)

"I went to Washington to challenge the soft bigotry of low expectations," the president [George W. Bush] said again in his campaign for reelection [how the hell was this guy elected TWICE?] in September 2004. It's working. It's making a difference." It is one of those deadly lies which, by sheer repetition, is at length accepted by large numbers of Americans as, perhaps, a rough approximation of the truth. But it is not he truth, and it is not an innocent misstatement of the facts. It is a devious appeasement of the heartache of the parents of the black and brown and poor and, if it is not forcefully resisted and denounced, it is going to lead our nation even further in a perilous direction."

Here's another little tidbit for your reading enjoyment: "With the continuing effects of economic turndown undercutting state assistance to the local districts, even some of the less impoverished systems have been forced to such extremes as locking down their libraries for lack of funds with which to pay librarians. Full-day kindergarten in some low-to-middle-income district near my home has recently been cancelled. The only children in the district who receive full days of kindergarten now are those whose parents can afford to pay for it with private funds - this within a public system. The same undemocratic practice has been introduced in schools in Washington State, Colorado, Arizona, Indiana, Oregon, and elsewhere."

"We've got [the] money in place to fund the measurement systems,"' President Bush announced as school began two years ago. Even this was not entirely true. Many inner-city districts have been cutting back on buying education supplies because they are diverting funds to purchase test materials and test-preparation programs. Others have been forced to spend large sums of money to support a virtually new profession of 'test-checking' personnel to guard against he widespread cheating that has taken place, in Texas for example." Yeah, Texas, Mr. Bush. In Texas. It's ridiculous that much-needed money is not even being spent on "educational supplies" but on test materials. Test materials! These kids who are denied basic supplies and safe classrooms are being forced to take the same tests as everyone else who as enough money to spend on every little necessary thing and more.

As far as segregation goes, "And, despite the polls which demonstrate the large majorities of black Americans believe in integrated education and that only 20 percent of white Americans do not think it to be of serious importance, the drumbeat of opinions that are cited in much of the non-print media (virtually no integrationists are ever invited to express their viewpoints on this subject on TV) give many citizens who favor integration the impression that their own beliefs must be archaic or unique."

A heart-felt tidbit with which I heartily agree: "'White teachers and black and Hispanic teachers need to teach together. White children and black and Hispanic children need to learn together. You have to start it when they're very young, in elementary school, in kindergarten, when they're learning innocence.'"

Some hypocrisy: "'You hear them talk of 'standards' - 'national standards' - in the White House now, but when it comes to where our children go to school and how we're supposed to pay for them to have an education, it's 'a local issue.' It's 'states' rights'"

"Mr. Paige, the former education secretary, went so far a year ago [2004] as to call the National Education Association, our nation's largest teachers union, 'a terrorist organization' because it criticized the White House for refusing to deliver on the funding that it promised at the time its education bill was shepherded through Congress."

The last two paragraphs of the book which made me tear up: "'You cannot deviate from this. You have to say, ''Some things are good and right unto themselves'" he [Roger Wilkins] said again. 'No matter what the present mood in Washington is like, no mater what the people who are setting policy today believe, or want us to believe, no matter what the sense of temporary hopelessness that many of us often feel, we can not give up on the struggle we began and on the dream that brought us here.
"You cannot give it up. We cannot give it up. As a nation, as a people, I don't believe that we have any choice but to reject this acquiescence, to reject defeat.'"

Please read The Shame of the Nation. Perhaps it will change your life too.

--Elie

How To Succeed When Failure Is So Much Easier

2009-07-14T13:14:00.000-07:00

Today proved to be a difficult day in summer school. For the past week or so, we've been working on multiplication with the 6th, 7th, and 8th graders. Today, they were given their multiplication test. At least half of the kids (collectively) failed - meaning they received 60% or lower. If they don't pass all three of their summer school classes (English, social studies, and math), they won't pass at all and they'll be held back. Statistics have shown that retaining a child will significantly decrease their likelihood to graduate from high school or succeed in general. But these kids are not ready to move on. I don't know how they're doing in the other two classes, but their math skills are not up to par, even for elementary school. I don't think that holding them back is the answer, but they definitely need a significant amount of extra help in the necessary subject areas. Many of the kids who are having difficulty have problems at home, and their parent(s) are unable to help them study for tests or help with their homework. This is when the school system needs to step up. These kids shouldn't have been allowed to fall this far behind. Granted, it's partially the kids' faults for not caring or even trying to get the extra help, but the school system shouldn't have let so many kids fall through the cracks. When they reach summer school, it seems too late to help. Many kids are making progress, but many more just refuse to try. They should have been given extra help during the regular school year; they should have been pulled out of whatever class to get help. Maybe this did happen. I can't say one way or another, but my guess is that most everybody gave up on these kids.

There is one boy who I've been working with nearly every day, and he's showed little improvement. I knew he would fail the test, and he did. He got every single problem wrong. From his desk, he watched me correct his test and when I looked back at him, I saw sadness and zero hope in his eyes, and when he met my glance he knew how he had done on the test. I honestly felt like crying. When I sat down and talked to him he immediately said, "I got all of them wrong, didn't I?" It nearly killed me to show him that he was correct. This kid qualifies for special ed in at least math - probably other subjects as well, but his failure isn't justified, and my heart broke when I saw him so upset. Luckily, he asked if he could re-take the test, so the teacher is having him practice more (what I was trying to get him to do in the first place) before he re-takes it. But if he has to do extra work, he'll have to do so outside of school, and he probably won't do it. A majority of the kids in summer school are just lazy and will hardly do work in class, let alone at home.

There was another girl that raised some issues today. She's always had problems with completing and turning in work. The hardest part to comprehend is that she can actually DO the work; she just won't, and she won't try. She'll just sit there during class and only pretend to do the work when a teacher walks by. On her last test, she did half of it - the addition - and got it all right. The other half was subtraction, and when she reached that half, she shut down and hardly tried any of the problems. On this multiplication test today, she hardly tried; she did two problems and got them right, but she just sat in her desk doing next to nothing. She didn't even bother turning in her test at all, and the teacher had to track her down. The girl said that she didn't have the test, but when the teacher went through her binder, the test was found, incomplete and crinkled. This girl got out exactly what she put into the test. And then she broke down and cried in the hall way for the last hour - after she was out of the math class.

These are kids that have fallen through the cracks and are continuing to fall. They need massive amounts of extra, one-on-one help. Individual teachers cannot offer that extra help and time in a regular day, but leaving these kids alone is hardly an option. These kids are failing, and they'll continue to fail, but how can they be helped? How can I help these kids when I'm a teacher?

What scares me the most is how easy it is to walk away from these problems. If there's a kid who won't try, fine. Walk away. If they won't try, you can't make them. It's their loss. But to be a successful teacher (or a decent person, in my opinion), we can't let these kids go. We need to keep nagging at them to work. The principal and parents need to be contacted. Absolutely every single effort needs to be in place, and I don't think this is too much to ask. This is why teaching is so challenging. One can so easily just walk away, especially when the other option is working ridiculously hard on specific students in order to make them reach minimum requirements.

--Ms. Hartman

"Year One" and "The Hangover"

2009-07-13T12:21:00.000-07:00

Last night, I saw both of these movies at the drive-in theater in Port Townsend with John, Ben, Emma, and Max. Neither movie really impressed me, but contrary to the opinions of my fellow movie-goers, I actually enjoyed Year One more. Sure it was very, very run-of-the-mill material, especially from Michael Cera and Jack Black, and it just wasn't very funny (something arguably necessary in a COMEDY), I just feel it had more value than The Hangover.

I liked how Year One had a sort of allegorical feel to it in terms of religion and authority, even though this allegory wasn't exactly very deep. The movie also had a sort of episodic feel to it, like a series of comics or YouTube videos; in fact it almost would have felt better if it was released as a series of YouTube videos, although I'm sure it would have made like --$84847236590 in profit, because this movie definitely looked pretty damn high budget, which is a shame considering its overall quality. Anyways, there were just little tidbits that didn't add to the movie at all and just went nowhere. Cameos were had for the sake of cameos [i.e., Paul Rudd's 5-minute appearance as Abel]. There were a few funny lines and segments scattered throughout the movie, but overall it was boring and just not very funny at all. [SCORE: +0.6 (on a scale of -5 to +5)(anything positive was enjoyed, anything negative was not enjoyed)]

The Hangover was exactly what I expected it to be, which doesn't say much for it. In essence, it's a bro-movie.

[best urbandictionary.com definition I could find of "bro": "An alpha male idiot. This is the derogatory sense of the word (common usage in the western US): white, 16-25 years old, inarticulate, belligerent, talks about nothing but chicks and beer, drives a jacked up truck that’s plastered with stickers, has rich dad that owns a dealership or construction business and constantly tells this to chicks at parties, is into extreme sports... identifies excessively with brand names, spends an... [absurd] amount of money on clothes and obsesses over his appearance..."]

While I don't think the characters in the movie fall into this stereotype, I feel that this was most definitely the majority of the intended audience when the movie was made. I suppose as someone who doesn't drink and has never "blacked out" or had a hangover or anything of that sort, I couldn't really identify with the characters as much, but still, saving any "Anyone who would get into this situation is a moron" mentalities, I just could not get into this movie. They took every typical "Dude, what happened last night?" circumstance and magnified it to a level of Hollywood ridiculousness. Now, this ridiculousness was probably the best and funniest part of the movie. There's a tiger in their bathroom. There's a baby in the cupboard. They have a stolen police car. There's a naked Asian man in the trunk of their real car. These situations just keep piling up as the movie goes on and they realize more and more about the night before and search for their missing friend. I'm a fan of ridiculous, so these parts were, indeed, funny. Also, Zach Galifianakis' character had 90% of the hilarious lines in the movie, and his dim-witted character was very lovable. However, none of the other characters in the movie were even like-able. They weren't exactly very unique. There's the aforementioned loveable token moron. The prude guy who has to lie to his girlfriend about going to Las Vegas so she doesn't get mad. The crazy party guy who's always telling the prude guy to chill out and have fun. The mediator middle-of-the-road guy who goes missing after his Vegas bachelor party goes haywire. WOAH, UNIQUE. As the credits approached, I was informed that they were the best part of the movie. I disagreed profoundly. Alongside the credits, a slideshow was shown of the night before, consisting of typical, moronic, drunk party pictures. Of course, they're upgraded to the same level of ridiculousness of the rest of the movie, but I still didn't find it very funny. Maybe I wasn't paying close enough attention. One redeeming quality of the movie, however, was the sort of hero's journey that the prude character went on, from being sheltered and controlled by his judgmental, hypocritical wife to being independent and free-thinking. In the end, the movie probably just wasn't for me, and maybe that's okay, but I just thought it was pretty lame. [SCORE: +0.5 ]

--Jon

Guess Who Got a New Computer. Just Guess.

2009-07-11T22:13:00.001-07:00

Elie did!

I got another Toshiba, ironically. My previous laptop was also a Toshiba and, well, we didn't get along very well. I got this laptop pretty cheap, then got a $100 rebate. It doesn't do anything special, but compared to my old laptop, it's amazing. This new computer has wireless Internet (that actually works!), burns CDs, plays DVDs, and ... well, it's just a lot better. Not only that, but Toshiba gave me 50 free downloads from some music website. Of course, there are massive strings attached, and they'll probably charge me $12 for my "subscription" but I've already downloaded three albums - all by Ludovico Einaudi. That guy has so many albums, and I've been wanting to download ALL of them, but I don't want to spend the money, but I just got three albums for nothing. And even if I wind up paying the $12, it'll be less than what I would have spent if I had payed full price for all three albums. I'm pretty excited.

Before going on a computer adventure, Abel and I played in the McCleary Bear Festival parade with the McCleary Middle School band. Those kids (including Abel) drove me insane. I know, I know, it's bad that I think this because I want to teach middle school. It was only a few of the kids who were obnoxious, and they were even MORE obnoxious because they were outside of school and had instruments in their hands. I bet they're a bit different/less obnoxious when they're in a classroom setting. Plus, the band director allows a lot more chaos to happen whereas, if I had been in her position, it wouldn't have tolerated it. But because I was so annoyed today and was sick of sitting in the sun for hours on end listening to these kids hit each other with water bottles and blast their instruments, I seriously considered not participating again. I might do it again just to say I've participated for 10 years, but I'm not sure. I love music and performing, but I'm not sure if it's worth it. Usually when the next summer comes around, I've forgotten about how annoyed I was about the previous year's experience.

At any rate, today was a really good day because I got an awesome-tastic computer plus three fabulous-tastic albums by one of my favorite composers. Unfortunately, the music site didn't have much by Eric Whitacre... The only thing missing from this day was Jon. Texting is not enough! ...nor is phone-calling, but oooh well.

-Elie

Tomorrow is the Big Day

2009-07-01T23:03:00.000-07:00

Squirrel Baggers United: REUNITED. I am leaving Sequim for Olympia at approximately 9 AM, probably arriving in Olympia before noon, where I will be meeting Elie. Then, we will wander Olympia and such and be TOGETHER AGAIN. And eventually we will retire to her home in McCleary, where we will spend the night. The next morning, we will leave for Sequim. During our time, we will hopefully visit various spots in Port Angeles and Port Townsend. On Sunday, her father will come up to Sequim and bring her back home. It will go all too fast, I know already. I will cherish the time while it lasts, and I'm sure Elie will, as well.

--Jon

SQUIRREL!

2009-06-27T21:31:00.001-07:00

While Jon was peacefully sleeping through his non-existent alarm, I was having a horrible, horrible dream about Jon dying. Then I woke up, realized what I had dreamt, realized it wasn't real -- then broke down out of relief. And, at that moment, I wanted nothing more than to run into Jon's arms, but, alas, it was impossible. I finally forced myself back asleep again, but I've felt a bit weird all day, and, as a result of the dream, I was basically ecstatic when Jon texted me.

I believe this dream was a product of seeing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - for the third time. At one point, an older woman says, "Benjamin, we're meant to lose the people we love. How else would we know how important they are to us?" I don't think this is true. Maybe we feel the void of losing a person and we "don't know what we've got till it's gone," but we can appreciate what we have now, before it's gone. But the woman was kind of right, because my dream did make me realize how lost I'd be without my significant other and fellow squirrel bagger.

I, too, went to see Up. And it made me cry. See, the elderly woman dies before her husband, and he misses her. Ironically, the woman's name is Ellie and the man is Carl (Jon's brother's name). So, while the little kindergartners and their parents joyfully watched this movie, I was crying because I imagined what it would be like to lose Jon. Now I understand why Jon cried because of a video game. Man, we need to see each other soon.

The best part of the movie, in my opinion, was "SQUIRREL!" It hit home for me because Jon and I are always like "SQUIRREL!" in the middle of sentence if we spot one of those furry creatures running around.

Oh, funny story. Yesterday, Penguin the cat came out of the bushes going "meow, meow, meow, meow" which is more than he usually says all at once. Then my mom and I realized he had a small furry something dangling from his mouth of which he was incredibly proud. I ran over and made him spit out the fuzzy thing, which turned out to be a mouse. While I was hoping the little mouse would run away as I restrained the disappointed Penguin, Buddy the poodle wanted to get in on the fun, so my mom held him back as we both cheered on the mouse as it....didn't run away. Rather, it wandered in circles. It was probably dizzy from being played with; hopefully it wasn't injured. My mom was able to usher the little guy into the bushes where Buddy stood guard, hoping the mysterious furry thing would come back, and Penguin slumped onto the sidewalk and glared at us. This incident made me remember one part of Family Guy I watched. Stewie was accusing Brian the dog of being immature or something, and he pointed out that once Brian left a dead bird at the doorstep. Brian angrily said, "That was a gift - for the family, you bastard." I'm sure Penguin was equally pissed at us for taking away his fun and not appreciating his gracious gift.

--Elie

This Morning... (pt. II)

2009-06-27T09:34:00.000-07:00

I work(ed) at 9:30 AM, so I set my alarm for 8:20. My mom woke me, and asked if I worked at 10. I said no, I work at 9:30. I looked at my phone, and... I had set my alarm for 8:20 PM. Luckily I got to work on time.

--Jon

This Morning...

2009-06-26T19:51:00.000-07:00

I was super tired. I stayed up until 3 AM reading xkcd comics (my latest favorite) (...and another) and did not want to get up for work at 11 AM. So after much struggling to awaken myself, I got up, got ready, and went to work. Much to my confusion, Garrett got there the same time I did. I got out of the car. He got out of the car. He said "...Didn't we switch schedules today?" Not according to my phone we didn't. So we went inside to check. Lo and behold. I wasn't scheduled to work until 1:30 today. So I went home and sat around for a couple of hours. Couldn't back to sleep because I was already too awake. [Insert "d'oh" face that's not working because of stupid html stuff. Grrrr.]

Tomorrow I think I'm going to see Up. IN 3-D!!!

--Jon

I've Got Nothing to Report

2009-06-26T16:13:00.001-07:00

Well, that's a lie, because I'm writing a blog entry.

I just want all of our many, many readers to be aware that I still love my job/volunteer position in the middle school and I haven't been scared away from teaching. There's not a whole lot to write about, as each day is similar, except every day I become a little bit more comfortable being around the kids. I've always been shy, but I'm working on it and I'm finding it easier to help the kids and be around them more in general. It's exhausting, though, and I'm glad we've got a week off of summer school. And Squirrel Baggers United will be REUNITED AT LAST come Thursday!

-Elie

I Just Cried at a Video Game

2009-06-23T23:55:00.000-07:00

Let me start this post out with an arrangement of a beautiful song that accompanied this somewhat potentially pathetic event.

Now that we've got that out of the way... Final Fantasy X. Definitely one of the saddest games I've played in my life, and one of the saddest stories I've ever heard. I'll give you a basic outline of the story and its world, but I'll save nasty details this time.

The story revolves around... Tidus, a guy who is initially lost in an unfamiliar world and searching for a way home... and Yuna, a girl attempting to save her world from an enormous city-sized death-machine of a beast known as Sin. They are accompanied by Wakka, a former athlete, Lulu, a black mage (both of them were childhood friends of Yuna), Kimahri, a quiet giant and lifetime guardian of Yuna, Auron, a man who seems to know both Tidus' world and this new world called Spira, and Rikku, Yuna's cousin who tries to kidnap her to prevent her pilgramage.

Final Fantasy X differs very slightly from the usual RPG archetype. In many Final Fantasies (and many games/movies in general), a "random Joe"-type character goes on a personal quest, joins other random Joes and Janes, and then ends up having to save the world. Not (quite) this game. Tidus, the main protagonist and narrator, just wants to get back to his homeworld of Zanarkand. Yuna is the party leader who is, from the get-go, on a quest to save the world. After travelling for a long time with Yuna and learning that in order to save the world she has to, in essence, kill herself, his mission no longer becomes to go home, but to save Yuna; saving the world is a convenient side-effect. Along his journey he finally realizes that he can't get back.

The world of Spira is plagued by an enormous city-sized (literal) beast known as Sin. It destroys entire villages for no reason, and according to the world religion, it is a punishment for vanity and other sins, which include use of "machina," forbidden machines. Of course, one people, the Al Bhed, ignore the teachings of Yevon and become outcasts. Sounds kinda fishy, eh? It is. Yevon ends up being a corrupt front for a thousand-year-old lust for power in the aftermath of a devastating world war. Sin is just the creation that came from wanting to find an ultimate weapon to get the upperhand in that war (note the similarities between this and World War II/the Cold War/atomic bomb (the game was made in Japan, thus far the only victim of the atomic bomb)).

This knowledge is not known to the majority of Spirans; very few actually know it. Summoners sacrifices their lives to defeat Sin, and then it is reborn. Sin is a "spiral of death" around which the world revolves (hence the name Spira). It rampages unchecked until a Summoner brings the "Calm" for a couple of years, and then it is reborn, "punishing" the world for its sins.

Tidus is from a city called Zanarkand separate from Spira, but when it is attacked by Sin, he is transported to this other world that seems totally alien to him, and he sort of tags along for the ride, accompanying Yuna on her pilgramage, whose endpoint is the ruins of a city dead for a thousand years: Zanarkand.

Tidus thought his father had died 10 years ago at sea, and before this, his father was am arrogant star athlete and teased him a lot, mostly about his crying. A lot of the game revolves around Tidus coming to terms with his father and accepting him, as he learns from Auron that his father truly loved him, but didn't know how to express it.

As one might be able to tell, much of the game also revolves around death. I'm getting sleepy and don't have much else to say about that.

There are several emotionally poignant points in this storyline. A) Tidus learns that his father has somehow become the latest Sin incarnate. B) Tidus learns that Yuna has to kill herself to save Spira (there ends up being another way, negating the corrupt world religion). C) After being labeled as traitors to Yevon, Yuna considers giving up her pilgramage, and talks with Tidus about all the things they can do, like go to his Zanarkand and just live life, but she then begins crying, and realizes, "I can't." As she softly sobs, Tidus embraces her and kisses her. [...then a bad J-Pop ballad plays and it's weird and awkward for awhile, but that's beside the point] D) Inside of Sin, before Tidus has to fight and defeat his own father, who he has come to hate over the years:

Jecht: You're late, Auron.
Auron: I know.
Jecht: (Turns and waves to Tidus) Hey.
Tidus: Hi.
Jecht: Hah! You got tall, but you're all bones! You eating right, boy?
Jecht: You've really grown.
Tidus: Yeah, but you're still bigger.
Jecht: Well, I am Sin, you know.
Tidus: That's not funny.
Jecht: Well, then... I mean...you know. Let's end this.
Tidus: Dad?
Jecht: Yeah?
Tidus: I hate you.
Jecht: (Chuckles) I know, I know. You know what you have to do.
Tidus: Yeah.

And after the fight...

Jecht: You'll cry. You're gonna cry. You always cry. See? You're cryin'.
Tidus: I hate you, Dad.

But we know he means the opposite. Moments later, he says, still crying, "You know...for the first time, I'm glad...to have you as my father." This scene was hard to me because of my relationship with my own father, which isn't exactly positive most of the time... but I could really, really, really relate to the main character in this sense.

Then, E) Auron dies. We learned slightly earlier in the game that he was actually dead, but was holding onto the world of the living because of a promise he made to Tidus' father and Yuna's father, but now that the battle is over, he can let go of life finally.

Then, F) Tidus begins to disappear. He learned earlier, but didn't reveal to his friends, that his home of Zanarkand was actually a "dream" being summoned by the creator of Sin, but upon entering the real world he became real. Nonetheless, he will disappear along with the rest of Dream Zanarkand when Sin is truly defeated. After the battle, he begins disappearing, and Yuna is confused, shocked, and utterly, suddenly depressed, shaking her head. He apologizes for not being able to show her his Zanarkand and starts to walk away. She runs towards him, crying, but falls right through him. She gets up slowly as he continues to disappear, and she says "I love you." He walks to her and hugs her one last time, then jumps off of the ship, seeing Auron, Yuna's father, and his own father on the way down, giving him a high five, showing that he has truly reconciled.

Yuna is then shown practicing whistling (Tidus tought her to whistle earlier in the game), and then giving a speech to the people of Spira, ending it with, "The people and the friends that we have lost, or the dreams that have faded... Never forget them."

The scene where Tidus disappears reeeally hit me hard because I kept thinking of my own relationship with Elie, and how utterly and completely heart-wrenching it must be to lose a loved one like that, to watch them literally fade away before your own eyes. The emotional music didn't help. So yes, I cried at a video game. First time crying in six months, and it's at a video game ending.

I had more written, then somehow half of got deleted, so I cut it down and summarized a bit... my back hurts, I'm going to bed. I hope this is my last video game post for awhile. >_<

--Jon

Summer School is Fun!

2009-06-23T20:47:00.000-07:00

One girl actually excitedly exclaimed that summer school was loads of fun - which is great! - but weird...

I'm beginning to realize what an interesting group of kids I'm working with. I just ended that sentence with a preposition. As Dave told us in his last email, "I just ended that sentence with a preposition. Deal with it." But anyway, most, if not all, of the kids have some kind of learning disability or need for special ed. Furthermore, most of them cannot do simple math problems, even at the 7th and 8th grade level. I know there must be kids all over the place with these issues and who are so far behind, but I don't think there's any reason why so many kids are this far behind. The math they're struggling with in middle school is what I learned in elementary school - adding and subtracting whole numbers and decimals, and multiplying, adding, and subtracting fractions. These are the basic building blocks of math that these kids cannot grasp. If they can't get a handle on all of this, they'll go onto high school with this sever disability in their math reasoning. And it's not like this school is in a ghetto; it's in the middle of a prospering little town, and the school has the ways and means (and funds) to teach these kids well; it just doesn't happen.

Luckily for them (or unluckily), Elma High School is in such poor shape (as far as education goes) that few students are challenged. Okay, so maybe that's a generality, but now I understand why the Elma School District is so far behind. What I want to know is how this happened in the first place. Maybe it's the teachers' faults. The teacher I'm working with is actually decent. She's not bad at all, really- from what I can tell, anyway. In one of the classrooms (not belonging to any of the teachers of summer school) there was a piece of paper with the rules of how to use the classroom library and she wrote "you're" instead of the correct "your." I think it's these little things here and there that the kids just don't learn that puts them at such a disadvantage.

Now it just sounds like I'm complaining. I'm still incredibly grateful that I'm in the position I'm in, and I know I'll have a small opportunity to help these kids, because the teacher and I can work with them one-on-one. The bad part is that I'm stuck in a math classroom; I want to observe in the other classrooms, but I'll look into doing so in a few weeks.

--Elie

P.S. I ordered a custom-made clarinet mouth piece AND a fancy ligature. The good news is that this mouth piece/ligature combo will make me sound loads better, and I basically made what I just spent by being in various musical groups, so I don't feel too guilty for spending well over $200 on clarinet accessories. Now I need to order new reeds and a reed case and maybe a new clarinet case if my mouthpiece won't fit. Argh. Good thing I've got a steady job of volunteering.

I've Come to Realize...

2009-06-22T17:18:00.000-07:00

Especially after receiving the WEST-B scores today, I've come to realize that Jon is quite a bit more intelligent than me. A few years ago, I wouldn't have been annoyed by the fact that I was dating someone intellectually superior, but now I'm glad for this. It's no fun being around someone who is less intelligent than you in everything. And I'm sure Jon will argue with me, but I know what I've said is true, and I am honestly proud to be the girlfriend of such a smart guy. :) Oh, and it's also ironic that Jon's dad put such emphasis on me being smart. Sure, I'm smart, but Jon's smarterer. Yeah, smarterer.

Although the WEST-B kind of got the best of me due to my less-than-desirable scores, it's concerning to me that people actually fail this test and then become teachers. Mind you, they've got to pass the test before becoming a teacher, but many people said they've had to re-take it. Yikes.

I've also come to realize that there is really no need for Jon and I to have a joint blog. We could do the exact same thing with two different accounts. But having a joint blog makes everything more exciting. We're attached at the hip anyway, so there's no reason our blogs should be separate, right?

My name is now Ms. Hartman. It is weird, let me tell you. In the last blog entry I wrote, I mentioned that this opportunity of working in a middle school would either make or break my ambition to become a teacher. Thus far, I've loved it. It wasn't fantastic or anything, but I enjoyed myself and I succeeded, at least a little. The teachers/staff treat me like an equal and the students treat me like an adult, which is hard to understand. It's difficult for me to not be at their level and be their friend; I'm their teacher now. I've got to keep reminding myself of this. It's a difficult transition to make, going from a kid myself to being superior to these kids who aren't a whole lot younger than me.

As I looked around the classroom and at the middle schoolers and at the teacher, I pictured myself teaching the class - and doing better than the teacher. I'm not being unnecessarily critical; I like the woman I'm working with and I respect her, but there are a few things here and there that I would change if I were in her position. The sad thing is that last year was her first year teaching, and she got booted due to budget cuts. Even so, she isn't openly bitter about it (although she mentioned it to me like a dozen times), and she treats the kids well although she won't be working with them again or in the near future.

Observing and helping in that classroom today made me realize how much work it takes to be a teacher and how mentally draining it is. I was there for a little over 3 hours and I was exhausted at the end, and I wasn't even leading the class. Part of my problem is that it takes a great deal of mental strength for me to dive into a new situation and confront new people - even young children - and it was a mental struggle to simply go up to a kid who looked ticked off at being forced to attend summer school and do his assignment. Once I did confront those kids - or any of them, for that matter - I was greatly rewarded because I felt like I was getting through to them.
I also pride myself in getting through to them because all these kids need extra help because they didn't succeed during the regular school year; these kids are the ones most likely to fall through the cracks, but I'm getting through to them!

I understand why so many people say that middle schoolers are the hardest to handle. They have loads of energy and they're very immature most of the time, but that energy can be put to great use. I don't feel as though the particular math class I'm in (which teaches 6th, 7th, and 8th graders) will test them to apply themselves, which is why I want to explore the social studies and English classes that I wasn't placed in. With so many people telling me that teaching middle school was a death wish, I was beginning to get scared, but I think I can do it. I can't right now, of course, but I could probably handle the kids I'm dealing with now, because there aren't more than two dozen kids in each class at a time. The thought of managing a classroom of 30 of these kids for 5 or 6 periods a day is daunting, but I'm confident that, with training, experience, and time, I'll gain the necessary tools to deal with this sort of situation.

I'm truly lucky to have gotten this position, even though I'm in a math class and not in English or social studies, because it's giving me a great opportunity to observe a teacher and work first hand with the kinds of kids I'll be working with in the future. Mind you, the Elma School District is known to be a ways behind the standard level they're supposed to be at (half of the school fails the WASL each year), but they still need to be challenged, and maybe they'll get that opportunity this summer, and maybe not. But overall, this opportunity is a terrific resume booster, and I'm excited to go back tomorrow.

--Elie

Squirrel Baggers United

Stress Sickness

Sometimes Awesome Things Happen

A Dream Come True?

THE DISMEMBERMENT PLAN IS COMING TO SEATTLE

Songs to Cover

Songs of Which I Will Never, Ever Play Covers

Forgetful Me

Finally In Over My Head

PERSONAL: An Album by VR Trainers

5-10-15-20... Ripping off a Feature by Pitchfork

Five (5) (V) Albums to Which I Have Been Listening Lately

What Makes a Good Video Game [for Me]

Sequim: Land of Death

Those Evil "Illegals"***

Just Another Way McCleary Screwed Me Up

Various Babblings That Deserve Far Better Articulation

Vegetarian Criticism

It's Summer and I'm Sitting in a Classroom

I M 4 Rlz

My Place and Amy's Place

There Will Be Blood

An Ongoing List of Things That, Contrary to Popular Belief, Are Not Cool [updated]

Bad People

An Open Letter to Everyone

I Have a Surprise for You

Imagine Shakespeare Got Drunk...

Take the Good and Bad and Make the Best of It

Your Probably Thought I Was Dead

I'm Going to Try to Become a Vegetarian

Composin' Me Some Music

I Finished the Book in 9 Days

My First Time Buying an ACTUAL Book In a Long Time... And I'm Thinking of Returning It

Final Fantasy XIII: Awesome, but... (a game review)

Custodians

Craziest Week Ever!

I'm Wasting My Time at College

"Advice, Like Youth, Probably Just Wasted On the Young"

It's Been Awhile [What's Up! Pre-Awards Show 2010 review]

The Teen Pregnancy Welfare Dilemma

I Think Life is Trying to Tell me Something

Of Fish and Men

Here's a quote that I don't like

"Alcohol is the anesthesia by which we endure the operation of life."

-G. Bernard Shaw

Musically Disadvantaged

Bellingham is A-Buzzing

Just For the Record...

A Complementary Sample of Inane Winter Break Babbling

My Pants Fit

Dear Popular Girls of Middle School,

With a Little Help From My Friends

As a Matter of Fact, MY God's Last Name IS Dammit

A Little Worse Than Mediocre

Feeling Pretty Mediocre

Hurricane Ridge is For Sale Online

Me and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

My Life, in List Form

Fail

*phew* The Week in [Brief] Review

An Overview of My Music Stuffs (ALBUM FOR SALE)

L'Shana Tova

Every Romantic Comedy Ever

RPGs Need a New Name

Amazing Grace

"Smile Time!" - a math professor at Western

Brand New – DAISY [an album review]

All About Love for a Child...

I Don't KNOW

Somewhat of a Failure

Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word

Ruach Shoveva!

Carpe diem quam minimum credula postero

Rise Up! Rise Up!

We Now Pass the Baton to You

Shun. Shun the nonbeliever. Shunnnnnn.

Just a Thought

Some Current Musical Endeavors of Mine

Whatever It Takes

Middle School Wrap Up

phew The Week in [Brief] Review