confluence, pa

i am ready for summer. this weekend made me ready. i forgot about school, about what age i was. summer will be nice at home. even if it will get old (like most things tend to do) the warmth of the air will remind me that time is fleeting, so enjoy it. i remember putting away books in the fall, amazed, so happy to be here at school.

"There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered."

everyone is outside

subjectivity

i miss hearing about just and unjust, not good and bad, right or wrong. why so often do we try to please people? why so often to people sit around and pick out people's faults, pick out how they think others should or shouldn't act? people are so... subjective. my one teacher tries to make a lot of things in class a joke, and i feel it's to engage the whole class who might not like real talk of ethics for 2 hours. also it might be because he think's he is a comedian. i am not trying to be mean, he said so himself, he really wishes he was a stand-up comedian. i really really like him though. i'd like to pick at his brain sometime if i wasn't so afraid. it's just kind of a bummer. i'm not sure what i think anymore; because i used to think that it was really great of this guy (as a teacher) to get the whole class interested in what he was saying. and yet now, I feel by doing so, his class lacks depth, lacks any sort of worthiness of our attention. sure, he gets people to laugh. but it has nothing to do with, anything. we dabble with many different topics and yet never really dive deep into any of them. maybe that's because it's only phil130? I guess i was too privileged to have taken two really great philosophy classes previous quarters. i miss steve hays, and james petrik. i also miss the sun. one interesting thing that mr. teacher did say today though, was he asked us to raise our hands if we thought that the KKK was "wrong." (what is wrong...... but that's besides the point) a lot of people raised their hands. he then asked "well, i bet if i were to ask you what 2 common beliefs the KKK hold are, you wouldn't know." i liked that. cuz ain't it the truth. so he asked, and no one knew. i think it's interesting how he words the things he says also.

ps

i often get caught staring at people. i'm sorry, i just find you so very, very interesting.

i have a soft spot for english and philosophy teachers. ooook and art teachers. i just think it's really great teachers do what they do, because i don't know if i could do it.

pps.

the best moments come after falling

wake up in the morning, the sun is shining and its still really early, drink some coffee, hug my mom, crawl in bed with a lover, go to a farmer's market, play soccer with little kids, take pictures of the sun shining in your face, go to the ocean, run around in the waves, sing with friends, drive around with you guys, windows down, music and the wind, climb a big mountain, play the trumpet and the flute on top,roll down it and get grass stains, eat peach and strawberry muffins, bang on drums, paint on the sides of trees and jump into water, pools, lakes, the ocean again. eat outside on a picnic table, in the grass, in the woods. being tired at night. bonfires and munchies. smores, peanut butter and jelly. sneak over and smoke a cig, the rush of scooting around my mother is amazing. sleepy. time for bed

passing by, i long to catch your eye

i wonder how often we cross paths
i wonder if i see your face in different places
if you study at the library
and party on mill
if you dance at casa
or climb bong hill
if you feel alive in the rain
but live for the sun

i wonder how often
you leave your skin
i wonder how well you let people know you
i wonder who you are
and if we cross paths more than once throughout the day
i wonder if you notice

mostly i wonder who everyone is
humans, yes

i wonder why people look down when they pass
and why when i catch someone's eye i look away really fast
i wonder what you are passionate about
i wonder,
if anyone feels lucky
lucky,
just to smile

i laugh
when i see people laugh for no reason
but i secretly laugh
all the time
about nothing, too.

and it feels so good

happy mom, happy family; happy heart

never has home felt so ... happy!!! my mom's happy, my dad's happy, my brother and sister and i are all a little older.. it feels so good. i am so happy!! growing up, i always thought my mom was my biggest threat.. same with my brother. but i'm starting to realize we are all on each other's side. a little late, i know.

who?

school seems to be a lot about the reasoning behind things,
why things are the way they are.
it's like this institution feels the need to pick everything apart
down to its bone
until there is nothing left..
no substance, no mystery.
study the brain, study the heart,
study my beliefs, study that flower
you find so beautiful.
the more i see, the less i know.
the more i learn, the more confused i am.

things were easier when i was 5,
and i just lived.
i didn't really worry about how i was living
or why.

ah, the bliss of being young and unaware.
what if we could live like that forever?
not unaware, but just in a child's world,
a world where things were less complicated
because we didn't know how to cause confusion
like we do now.
my confusion was only of the basic sorts-
hunger, sibling rivalry, bloody knees.
that's feeling alive, open wounds.
summer really was freeing-
because i didn't even know what day it was-
or what i would do tomorrow
or how i would get there.

tell me why,
in a world of 98579587359835 people,
i choose to blend in.
to have no opinion.
to not care about
so much,
and yet the things i do care about
slip right through my hand,
unable to materialize, actualize,
make sense of what these things
actually are.

this isn't a boo hoo to growing up
sh-peal
but more of a contemplation of why I,
[who can choose any path i want
and
swing, move, run , walk, skip,
dive, trot, whistle, sing, hoola hoop
to the end]
make things more complicated than they are,
and pretend to not know who I am
when i clearly remember the child I once was.

school is funny. i guess i mean public speaking is funny. i don't want to convince people of anything, i especially don't want to persuade. especially when the persuasion would be completely unethical- because convincing someone of something based on an emotional appeal isn't ethical in my opinion, no matter how you spin it. it's funny, we talk about ads in class and how they purposely try to suck us in to thinking a certain way. we are conscious of this, and yet i still feel we let ourselves be sucked in. why is it that simply b e ing isn't enough? i feel constantly bombarded in this society by the fact that i am not enough and i need something else to be enough. i need a major that screams "i will be successful". who tells me this though? i guess i rightly let myself be persuaded. i guess in this way, i am sucked in. and sometimes i do believe things can define me better than i can define my self. words, entities, etc. is this really who we are? does it really matter? why are we in college? to learn and to open up new avenues of our thought, or to be shown what a "real" successful life is like? but i think that the world needs beggars as much as it needs successors. the world needs garbage men as much as it needs businessmen. the world needs.. who we really are more than it needs .......


'the schools we are going to are reflections of the society that created them. nobody is going to give you the education you need to overthrow them. nobody is going to teach you your true history, teach you your true heroes, if they know that that knowlwdge will help set you free. schools in amerika are interested in brainwashing people with amerikanism, giving them a little bit of education, and training them in skills they need to fill the positions the capitalist system requires. as long as we expect amerika's school to educate us, we will remain ignorant'
- Assatta Shakur