Weekly Blog: Week 21

We spoke of carpe diem this week, and I realized another way to seize the day is through photography. With a click, one can capture a moment in time that will pass instantly and be, from then on, unattainable. To seize the day is to seize the moment; we often are too rushed to appreciate the small things in life. We pass by a flower without seeing its petals or another person without acknowledging their presence. To capture a moment is to notice the value a single object can have.

Weekly Blog: Week 20

I was sitting as T.A. in Mrs. Riley's CP English class as they discussed the next book they are going to read. In preparation, Mrs. Riley created an assignment prompting her students to write a poem about a person who has influenced their lives, in good ways or bad. I had nothing else to do, so I began to write.

Through your destruction,
I learned to grow.
I learned to put on a face when that was the last thing I wanted to do.
Through your destruction,
I was destroyed.
My heart broken no more than it was torn
by the clashing decisions about when to give up,
if I haven't already.
Through your destruction,
I built myself up again.
I distinguished between those who would help me through it
and those like you.
I made choices for myself about my future,
about the person I want to be;
choices about how to deal with the present, move on, stay still,
overcome the past.
Through your destruction,
I first learned to love, to ignore the hard times.
I learned how not to hate, how to settle.
Don't get these confused;
they are very different.

Weekly Blog: Week 19

We read about post-colonialism in an introduction and the author brought up the subject of power. Power is an important thing; it allows people to do great deeds and evoke change in the world. Someone who is powerful can lead a movement to better humanity or the lives of a group of people. But power is also dangerous. Greed goes hand in hand with power, and the two together can cause people to act terribly-- tyrannically. Power is also the foundation of inequality. It is a complicated matter; as one seeks power, for good reasons or bad, it is inevitable that once that power is achieved, there are others less powerful. This creates an imbalance, leading to discrimination and the establishment of superiority, derived from the innate characteristics of people.