Lemons or Lemonade?

I tried meditating once. Maybe twice. I couldn't sit still long enough, my back couldn't take sitting up straight, and I am not at all a flexible person. It's just not my thing. I also tried yoga in gym class a while back... I fell down a lot.

What's the point? I consider myself to be a fairly happy person, though that might be because I know so many high-strung people. All I do is just relax and take things for how they are. You can call this being satisfied with mediocrity, but you can also take it for always having lemonade and not lemons. Plus all that stress kills, literally. You don't need meditation or yoga or therapy (usually) to be a happy person. I'm saying "happy" because I wouldn't normally be characterized with the word "calm." Energetic, perhaps?

People stress over what they want too much. Goals are great to have, but I've always viewed them in a different light. On the varsity swim team, my coach would always tell us not to have a goal time to achieve, because it could set us back. It's just the wrong way to look at things -- you should be focused more on how to get better, rather than what to get better at. Sometimes, we get so stuck on our goals that anything below it crushes our confidence and sets us back emotionally, which is no good at all.

At this point, talking about college applications is simply unavoidable. Earlier this school year when I was sending out my 1298722394 applications, spending approximately $394872349712948712312, I had my heart set on Yale University (that part wasn't a joke... awkward). As unrealistic as it may seem now, I really thought I would give it a shot, and I spent so much time and energy doing interviews, writing essays, and just meeting with people. The whole time, I told myself in the back of my mind that I could not get emotionally attached to the idea of going to this crazy-hard-to-get-into school because of the huge chance that I wouldn't get in. Unfortunately, I'm only human, so I didn't follow my own advice and was pretty heartbroken when I got my rejection letter, even if I was expecting it.

After a lot of stress and demoralization with a stack of rejection letters piling up to remind me how much I should've studied in the past four years, I was accepted at Fordham University. At first, all I could see were lemons -- I had seen the city campus once and hated it because I absolutely need to be on an actual campus with some kind of grass or tree in sight. Turns out that what I had seen was Lincoln Center, but I'm going to Rose Hill which is GORGEOUS, and as I looked at the school more and more, I could definitely see how this could make great lemonade (terribly cliche metaphor I'm so sorry). I'm going to the Big Apple next year! *squeals* Honestly, at this point, Fordham looks like it's going to be way more fun and filled with opportunity than if I had gone to any of the other schools at which I was either rejected or accepted, and I could not be more happy about where I'm going next fall. Pretty much the only thing I'm worried about is my sense of direction. The second I'm outside the campus, I will either have my nose stuck in my GPS app or my arms clinging for dear life to a friend. 

Am I settling for something less than I wanted, or am I just living in the moment and not worrying about the opportunities I might have had? Being an optimist, I tend to lean toward the second option, and though it's not like I have no regrets in life, I like to think that only caring about what's certain and beneficial to your emotional, spiritual self can make life so much more stress-free and prevent the past from haunting or nagging at the present. To those out there who feel like they're stuck in the past or feel too stressed about what they could've had but didn't get: take a deep breath. Or twenty. To continue with my lemonade theme here, Elizabeth Gilbert (author of Eat, Pray, Love) said, "If life gives you lemons, don't settle for simply making lemonade -- make a glorious scene at a lemonade stand."

Why I Would Make a Terrible Critic

So I'm not sure whether to apologize for not writing recently or to note that I've been writing a lot more than I have in the past... I hope you're all enjoying these posts regardless. Now, on to self-criticism!

I like to think of myself as an optimist. The fact that I have to consciously think of the glass as half-full does not make me believe that I really am an optimist, however. That is, until AP Literature class one day. We were analyzing poetry by Sylvia Plath, specifically the poem titled "Child." For reference (and because it's short), here it is:

Child

Your clear eye is the one absolutely beautiful thing.
I want to fill it with color and ducks,
The zoo of the new
Whose name you meditate --
April snowdrop, Indian pipe,
Little

Stalk without wrinkle,
Pool in which images
Should be grand and classical

Not this troublous
Wringing of hands, this dark
Ceiling without a star.

 

From left to right: April snowdrops and Indian pipes. In case you were wondering.

While analyzing this in class, I noted that the last stanza could be interpreted to be a mother expecting a child. Get it? An anxious expecting mother wringing her hands, the unborn child with the mother's womb as a starless sky... Truth be told, I realized this really didn't make much sense in the context of the whole poem, but I often think on my feet and make no sense during class, so it's fine. I also realized that it had been mentioned beforehand that Sylvia Plath is one of the most depressing people/poets in history, having committed suicide with her children in the same house at the time. That said, it's not a simple thing to interpret one of her later poems as something innocent like a baby waiting to be born.

Then it hit me -- I must be an optimist! I have officially qualified by my own standards to start referring to myself as an optimist, and I'm probably way too proud of that. Judge me, it's totally fine.

I've always believed that our personalities aren't determined by nature or nurture, but a combination of both, along with a will to become whoever we want to be. Besides those who are medically unable to change their outlook on life, people are generally capable of changing their beliefs, their personalities, and their ambitions, which gives the opportunity to be able to have control over their lives if they want it badly enough. Isn't that such a reassuring thought? Anyway, point is, achievement unlocked: naturally optimistic thoughts. I just gave myself brownie points in celebration. And chocolate almonds.

Looking back at the title of this post, I just remembered my actual point. Back to being optimistic now, I'd like to note that when I started this blog, I had originally intended to do a lot more film and TV show reviews. What I realized, however, is that a lot of good critics of everything are harsh and blunt about what they think. Being an optimistic person, I always look for the good things of a movie. I know several people who would make excellent critics (and I mean this as a compliment) because of their good eye for the not-so-great things that stand out in a movie, TV show, or book. I gloss over that stuff, and because of that, I make a pretty crappy critic. I can't even critique my own work, which is why all you're reading right now is a first draft of my spewed, disorganized thoughts. You're welcome.

Happy Monday everyone!

This guy is more optimistic than I will ever be. Honestly, who loves Mondays this much? That's right: no one.

The Host

Since I obsessed about the trailer to The Host earlier in this blog, I figured I should probably tell y'all what I thought of it.

First of all, I'd like to note that I really don't like awkward silences. Watching the Twilight movies made me cringe mostly because of the general lack of dialogue. In real life, I tend to make sure there are no silences in my life. Period. It's pretty terrible when I start filling silences which are not at all awkward with word vomit. Sometimes I even make up words like I'm doing scat or something. Skidilee dooo dat. Aweroh. Eewef. Fgie.

I feel like there's so much that happens within the silences that happen in the movies based off of Stephenie Meyer's books (or at least there should be), but none of the directors know how to implement those happenings, so they just leave it as awkward silence. There is a timing in many movies that can make silences suspenseful, scary, sad, and a whole lot of other "s" words. Awkward does not start with an "s," so clearly, there is a problem here. This was just about the only thing that bugged me throughout The Host.

I lied. Do you remember that ad for the Superbowl this year for GoDaddy.com? You know, the really uncomfortable one where "beauty meets brains," where all you can hear and see are two people making out. Lovely. Now get a room. Same kind of feel here in the movie, though to a much much much lesser degree. There are ways of making love seem romantic without constant make-out sessions. Just saying. Now to happy stuff!

The cool concepts, the action scenes, and the well-shot scenery definitely made this movie worth watching. I think us movie-goers take scenery shots for granted nowadays since they're much more easily accessible with the technology available (and green screens allow us to be anywhere from underground to outer space), but there are ways of shooting (or digitally creating) scenery that do not make them visually pleasing, so kudos for the camera crew of The Host for making a desert look cool.

I'm conflicted over how I feel about the acting. It was good... But not great. I always feel like I have to respect actors who do their own stunts, and Saoirse Ronan did a very nice job with hers, as per usual. I think this was a good movie for her in terms of showing more emotion, but I guess that's because the only other movie I've watched with her in it was The Lovely Bones, where she's kind of... dead. Dat accent though. They should've just rewritten the character to have an Irish accent. Oh well; both she and Max Irons had very nice American accents. Go 'murica.

Overall, The Host was preeeeetty good. Not my favorite, but it was just about as good as I expected it to be. I might've cried a little... Psh I cry during every movie who am I kidding. I even cried during the Hannah Montana movie, although that was because a fly had flown straight into my eye. Flying as fast as he could away from the screen I'm guessing. I almost forgive the little guy. That reminds me of that time when I was biking and a huge house fly got jammed inside of my eye socket and started whizzing around. It was like a freaking horror movie where flies start possessing people and shit. I was mostly crying out of panic. That was a really weird tangent. Anyway, watch The Host, don't watch horror movies, and avoid those big-ass flies. Or do whatever you want. It's pretty much my new motto anyway.

Prayer.

For the victims of the explosions in Boston, I pray that the injured may find comfort in the midst of pain and shock, and that the families of the deceased may be kept safe and supported within their communities as they endure the evil in this world. 

For those who do not take this tragedy seriously, I pray that someday they will see how much others are hurt by injustice and senseless acts of terror and that they will join the rest of us as we pray and act toward bringing about a less horrific world.

And for the rest of you out there, I pray we all get to live in a safer world someday, where the acts of the billions of good people finally drown out the few of the bad and eliminate those actions to the fullest extent possible.

Because it's relevant.

So I meant to include in my last post about the value of things, but I completely forgot about it until now, so here we go.

I teach swim lessons at my local YMCA. I've been working there for more than a year now, and every day I see these kids ages 3-12 who give me these hilarious and adorable stories to tell. Lately, though, I've been noticing a lot of sassy and spoiled kids. As a kid, I remember being terrified if an adult became angry with me! Now I have kids in my class who look at me and deliberately do the opposite of what I told them to do just to piss me off, I swear to God. Someday, one of them is just going to give me the finger and do a backflip into the water. Kids these days...

When I used to take swim lessons at the same ol' Y with my little brother, my mother would take us down to Target to buy a little toy every time we moved up a class. Lemme tell you, this was never an easy feat! I remember being flipped around my instructor's arm in front of the whole class because I was just so damn scared to do it by myself. Anything for a new box of LEGOs. Anything.

I thought for sure that all of the parents in the world had just stopped doing this. All I hear nowadays is "My mommy says if I jump in the water, I get a phone!" WHAT. STOP. LITTLE CHILD, YOU ARE SEVEN. Unless they mean this, in which case, way to go parents:

They probably don't even sell these anymore. The shame...

So I was sitting in the office one day, just munching on my millionth Tootsie Roll of the day, when a little girl rushes in with her  instructor (rushing because everything -- the water, the air, the souls of some of the children -- are ice cold), who gives her a high-five and a mini Tootsie Roll. This girl's face just LIT UP. I mean who knows, maybe she's never ever had a Tootsie Roll in her life. The kid ran outside to her mother, to whom my co-worker explained that she had just jumped into the water by herself at the deep end for the first time ever. Now the mother's face lit up, and she started rushing her kid into the locker room, saying, "I'm so proud of you! Ok, let's get you dressed so we can buy you a WHOLE SODA." Whoa. Slow down there. A WHOLE soda? Not like, just a little sip or anything? BEST DAY EVER. The kid looked like she was going to explode. All of a sudden, I felt like the spoiled little kid (didn't stop me from eating 5,000,000,00 more Tootsie Rolls though).

To all those people out there who think that not giving a child everything he/she wants is a crime, go on raising your little army of Dudley Dursleys, not letting them appreciate the simple things in life. See if I care. Actually, I might, since I might end up teaching them in my next class. 

Why? Because it's relevant. Kind of.

It's All About Perspective

Warning: Many many nerdy and confusing moments in this post. Bear with me. Or you could just go eat a pie. I don't know, do whatever.

In my AP Literature class, we've been reading the book Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Basically, it's about a girl named Tess who is stripped of her innocence because she is essentially raped by a creepy and mustached man named Alec who leaves her to raise a child on her own. She names the child Sorrow shortly before it dies, and goes to work on a dairy farm. While there, she meets handsome and chivalrous Angel, and the two fall in love. D'aw. She agrees to marry him, happy happy, then she marries him, happy happy, and all of a sudden, he falls out of love with her when she tells him about her illegitimate child, depressing depressing.

After all of these things happen, Tess is eventually stuck on her own, and has a tricky little encounter with a tricky little man, and she ends up sleeping in the woods in a nest of leaves. When she wakes up, she finds these injured birds who were shot but not killed, lying around in the woods. As she looks at them, all she can think of is how she was so foolish to think that her emotional pain was so terrible when these birds are dying. Now, considering what her life has been like, I wanted to just tell Tess, "So, hon... It's ok to feel a little stress if you're you. Don't you worry about those birds."

It's all about perspective. The value of objects can be predetermined by monetary or sentimental value, but don't let that fool you. Things change, and perspective can bring the importance of things in or out of focus. Something that's been on my mind is oddly... my phone case. My brother bought me a shiny new green phone case for Christmas since he knew I wanted a new one. The old one was just part of the package when I got my phone, but it was a good $30 at least (probably actually $20 because of a sale), and no one noticed it. It was black, boring, but it did its job. Now, as for this new shiny case, all of a sudden I got little comments left and right. Looks very sleek. Cool. I like the design. I knew that my brother had paid probably a maximum of $10, which gave me the idea in my head that it wasn't worth that much. But every time someone asks where I got my phone case, I'm more and more eager and happy to tell them that my awesome li'l brother bought it for me as a present.

In the book Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior, there's a whole chapter dedicated to the idea of first impressions. For any human mind, the first impression is always the strongest, and almost impossible to shake. It effects draft picks, job interviews, college interviews, etc. (so now you've been warned). My dad, who's the principal of a firm, knows when he's found a new employee within the first five minutes that they're in his office, because of the impressions they make just with their body language and their manner. I was particularly bothered by this chapter, because although I know it's basic human nature, there's always some part that wants to give people, ideas, and objects a second chance, to try and make up for a bad first impression. I'd like to think of any major change in someone or something as a second first impression (yeah that totally makes sense), and that opinions can fundamentally, 100% change, whether it be for better or worse. Unless someone is stubborn. Stubborn people are just... Outliers. Do whatever the hell you want.

Crap. I need to stop pretending to be an intellectual. I'll draw really bad cartoons or something next time. Anyway, bottom line is: try giving something a second chance. Especially if it changes your opinion of something for the better.