Travel

Everyone wants to travel. The appeal is obvious; there are intriguing places scattered throughout the world, as far away as Milan, Italy or as close as Nashville, Tennessee.

Travel is an escape. It's a vacation from mundane routines, obligations, old faces, and suffocating surroundings. It's a chance to experience new things and to develop new perspectives. Ironically, it can be a relief to be thrown into a country where the words and signs are undecipherable. The novelty and confusion of ordinary tasks in a new environment can be an escape. The most rewarding part of traveling, though, is the rekindled appreciation for home. After a week of hotel beds, nothing is more comforting than slipping into familiar sheets. For the first time, you realize that your house has its own unique scent, a scent that can only be described as "home". Travel is an escape that washes away resentment for daily life and replenishes your appreciation for the ordinary.

Travel is education. Culture is not something that can be obtained in a classroom; only experience can broaden your mind to the fascinating and diverse ways of life around the world. By traveling to unfamiliar places, you expand your capacity to understand and appreciate diversity. You learn more than you can possibly fathom during a few days in a new environment than you can with years of conventional education.

Travel is adventure. Being in a new place is an opportunity to experience something new, whether it is a new food, a new activity, or a new view of the world. You can be an entirely new person and none of the unfamiliar people around you have to know your true identity. You can hang glide or parasail, or explore mountain peaks. The novelty of your location is adventure in itself.

Olivia

As a young child, my parents would tell me they loved me each night before tucking me into bed, to which I would respond, "I love you more." My parents would shake their heads and explain how that couldn't possibly be true and that I wouldn't understand until I had children of my own. I was upset that my parents didn't understand my capacity to love, but it was I who didn't understand. Last summer, I think I finally understood.

As an au pair in France, my life revolved around caring for a 13 month old infant, Olivia. Every day began at 6:45 and ended when Olivia finally decided that she had done enough crying, eating, and pooping for one day. The extent of care required to keep a baby alive can be maddening, and if you diverted your attention for a fraction of a second, Olivia could be en route to the basement stairs. Incapable of communication (other than wailing), it is imperative that you maintain focus, mentally cataloging time spans between meals, naps, baths, etc. Often times, once the baby is asleep for the night, you collapse onto your bed without concerning yourself with pajamas or even securing yourself under the covers. 

But there is something beautiful about raising something so innocent and vulnerable. Your heart lightens every time the corners of her mouth curve up into a toothless smile. You find yourself dancing before her like an idiot just so you can see joy in that precious little face. When she cries, your only purpose in life is to stop the tears, not just to eliminate the sound, but because her pain is yours. When you pick her up into your arms, you feel as though a void has been filled and that baby was intended to be a part of you all along. This is why, on my last day in that house in Montpellier, France, I was in tears as I held Olivia for the last time. 

The next day I stayed the night in London. A child's faint cry sounded from the next hotel room and it immediately jolted me awake. I was in emotional pain as I sat alone in the dark, listening to the muted sobbing until the child had cried himself to sleep. I could think of nothing but Olivia, who had become my baby. If Olivia had been old enough to talk and she had told me that she loved me more, I would have told her that it couldn't possibly be true. 

Photograph

My family's 2011 Christmas card photo looks flawless. My brother is wearing a starched, collared shirt and my sister and I both have on elegant blouses that match in color. We are huddled in front of the Christmas tree, embracing each other lovingly, bright, shining eyes radiating the essence of holiday cheer. Looking at this photo, one would think we were the ideal family. That is why photographs can be so deceiving. They capture one infinitely small place in time and betray the nature of the surrounding environment. If the camera could have portrayed my mother barking orders from behind the viewfinder and the intermittent complaining from my siblings, the card would have been much less appealing.

A photo can help us reminisce about the good times of the past, but how trustworthy is that image? The picture tells us what clothes we were wearing, who we were with, and where we were, but it neglects to accurately portray the emotion of the scene. Of course everyone is smiling amongst linked arms; it's a photo! But how are we to remember that that was the night we got grounded or we fought with our best friends? We use photos to capture only what we want to preserve in our memory and the smiling faces in the photos are not always honest.

Photography is a deceptive art. The goal of photography is to create the most appealing image possible by manipulating angles and lighting. It is an art that conflicts with the nature of existence. Everything is constantly moving, changing, growing, but a photograph freezes one instant of time and removes it from the context of the universe. Modern technology makes the photograph even less trustworthy. Fish-eye lenses, lighting effects, and photoshop have destroyed my faith in the honesty of photography. There is no way to discern which images are raw and trustworthy from those that have been altered to do the bidding of a photographer.

Defeat

Defeat is not a stinging pain; it is a lead blanket that descends upon your chest when the final buzzer sounds. The fiery anger that fueled your motions on the field is extinguished and you suddenly become aware of how difficult it is to move your limbs. The adrenaline drains. The spirit shatters. The impossible hope that your team could score ten goals to catch up in the last quarter of the game seems childish and you hate yourself for even considering it. Eye contact with teammates is rare, and if it does occur, it is unintentional. The turf beneath your feet dominates your field of vision as you fight the moisture gathering at the corners of your eyes.

Then the coach speaks. He speaks softly, but there is heartbreak and disappointment in each syllable. It is more painful to hear than furious screaming. You shrink at his words as a taunting slideshow of your mistakes runs on loop in your mind: you missed the ground ball, you let your opponent race by, you shot wide on the free position. That lead blanket keeps gaining mass and breathing becomes a strained and voluntary action. If only the earth would split beneath your feet and swallow you so that this pain and disappointment could end. But it wont.

You sleep. You rise. It is a new day and a new game. The defeat still exists, but the pain doesn't have to. In lacrosse and in life, you can carry your defeat with you into the next day, or you can leave it on the field and grow stronger for the next battle. Throw off the lead blanket and prepare for victory.

Expectation vs. Reality

CALCULUS FINAL

EXPECTATION:

When I got home from lacrosse practice, I continued singing the song on the radio that had been cut short when I had taken the key out of the ignition of my car. My calculus book rested peacefully on my nightstand; I wouldn't be needing it anymore. Tomorrow was the final and I felt fully prepared for the three hour exam. Instead of unneeded cramming, I flipped on Modern Family and laughed cheerfully alongside my parents as we enjoyed the subtle comedy. At 10:30, I climbed sleepily into bed for a good night's sleep so that my brain would be at full power tomorrow morning as I took the future-defining test.

The gentle harp music sounded from my phone alarm and I was filled with an invigorating excitement. I confidently climbed behind the wheel of my car and began the commute to Chattahoochee. I was going to ace this test.


REALITY:

The cheerful, upbeat music playing on the radio was in such contrast with my mood, that it only added to my agitation and stress. I quickly shut off the radio and endured the ride home in silence. The second I got home, I snatched my calculus book from my beside table and ripped through the pages until the equations blurred together and I was more confused than before. As my mom passed my room, she invited me to watch the latest Modern Family episode with her. After noticing my deranged expression, she scurried along down the hallway and left me in solitude as I continued my desperate cramming. A glance at the clock told me that only six hours remained until the exam. Admitting defeat, I tossed the book aside, switched off the light, and stared at the dark ceiling until my exhaustion overpowered my nerves.

I woke with a start as my phone alarm blared with incredible force; I had carelessly set the volume way too loud the night before. I forced my shaking body behind the wheel of my car and began the drive to school. I was going to bomb this test.

I Should Have Listened to the Angel

Only an hour and a half remain of this stressful and nerve-racking week of AP Calculus exams, AP Lang quizzes, and AP Chem death. About three minutes ago, I sighed contently, reliving the horrors of my academic week and reminding myself that those horrors were all behind me now. That was when I snapped up at the realization that the week was 99% over and I was still two blog posts short of my weekly quota of two.

The assignment had lingered in the back of mind since the day the assignment sheet was distributed (as usual, my row was one short, and as the caboose of the row, it was my job to snag one from Sam's desk while he was preoccupied with throwing something at Kapil). That afternoon at lacrosse practice, as I tuned out the belligerent bellowing of my coaches, the online journal project drifted into focus. Had I been in the presence of a computer, it would have been done then and there, but considering that I was stranded in the middle of Taylor Road's dusty excuse of a practice field, the image in my brain of the assignment sheet faded as I shifted my focus back to the Coach Mac's barking instruction.

When I arrived home, the glow of my laptop beckoned me into my room. As I sat down to face the sleek screen, the cliche angel and demon versions of myself appeared on each of my shoulders.

Angel: "Just one tiny journal entry, hit the books, and then off to dreamland where you can repair your mind and prepare for a new day!"

Devil: "Facebook."

Angel: "Besides, the sooner you complete the entry, the more time you have to better your mind and soul with knowledge. The calculus final is approaching, after all."

Devil: "Twitter."

Angel: "The journal project is 10% of your semester grade, and all you have to do is type three short paragraphs. On Sunday night, you will be free as a bird and happy knowing that the work is done."

Devil: "YouTube."

Seeing as the clock now reads 10:51 PM, 4/22/2012, who do you think I listened to?

Reflection of Huckleberry Finn

Of every novel we have read so far this year (and that is a lot of novels), The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has been -unquestionably- my favorite. The combination of Mark Twain's simple language, energetic plot line, subtle (yet substantial) underlying themes, and the heart-warming friendship between Huck and Jim held my interest throughout all three hundred and something pages. I immediately sympathized with Huck at the mention of his drunken, abusive father, and my love of Huck grew stronger as he went from a pitiable little narrator to a complex character with fears, quirks, playful habits, adventurous desires, and a soft spot for sweet young girls who are being fooled and betrayed. 

The first time I read through the novel, I regret to say that I did not fully grasp the underlying satire that Mark Twain encoded in the pages. However, when I went back to read key passages of the book to prepare for the essay test (this being the day we reviewed satire), Twain's stance on the issues of slavery, racism, and following societal expectations began to jump out at me. What I had originally admired as a classic tale about a young boy and his travels down the Mississippi River, I now regard as a clever and cunning tool to get a meaning full point across.