unbelievable_miracle's Xanga

People say smoking is a choice. But if you’re addicted to something, doesn’t that rule o

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 13:30:27 GMT

Smoking is a choice. A foolish choice, but a choice nevertheless. Don't endanger my freedom because you think addiction rules out the truth that I chose addiction in the first place.

I am relieved when I read other answers to this question. Honestly, if bueracracies like Truth are what our country has to look forward to, I am getting my butt out of here ASAP. But the responses I've read to the idioticy that is this question, I think there's hope for the US of A.

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Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Tue, 17 Jun 2008 14:59:53 GMT

"Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason, because bad philosophy needs to be answered." C.S. Lewis

This past week I spent some time challenging myself with tough questions such as . . . why do we value tradition, can we know anything if it is not revealed to us by God, what's the difference between romantic love and comrade love, and how did Ryan Seacrest become famous? I discussed these questions with respected peers and adults, and now I've continued to do some thinking about my questions by myself.

It's really hard.

I'm not kidding. I have gotten such headaches and once in a while I wonder if the confusion is worth it. I went to go answer a tough and thoughtful question posted by a friend and thought to myself, "Whoa, that's too much to thing about. I'll hold off answering that one." But that's just the thing - often times we don't want to challenge ourselves to think deeper. It's hard! But the benefits I have reaped are 100% worth it. Our brains are muscles - the more we use them to ponder, the easier pondering becomes.

It's so hard, but try it, it's really awesome.

I hate poverty

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:22:49 GMT

I love ice cream. I love free stuff. Put it together and today was heaven for me - Ben & Jerry's Free Cone Day. 30th anniversary, yo. We stood in line for half an hour, but it was worth it. Free Cone Day was in association with some teen organization that didn't do much of anything, but there was also advertising for 'One.' An organization to fight poverty. And fittingly, I had been thinking about poverty today.

We went to get gas for our car today and the prices were insane. And so my mom gave us a talk that basically said: recession's basically here, prices go up, income stays the same, which means our lifestyle must adjust. Neither my mom nor my dad were part of privileged families growing up. I mean, the 70's were obviously hard for everyone. Our family now, though, has been ridiculously blessed. But with the recession, a comfortable lifestyle is going to change for a lot of families . . . so what is that going to mean for the people who were barely getting by before?

Jesus said that the poor will always be among us. Poverty has been no stranger to history. The UN defines poverty as living on or less than about a dollar a day, and estimates that nearly half of the global population (3 billion people) fits this criterion. The US is about 5% of the global population. The US holds about 24% of the globe's wealth. About 1 in 5 children in the US live in poverty. It has been said that 760,000 people are homeless on any given night in the United States.

But thinking about this is gut-wrenching. I hate it, I really hate it. I hate thinking about it. There are few things that drive my heart to such violent emotion as when I think of poverty. That's partly why I chose The Glass Castle as my dramatic interp because when I read it I was affected, even if I did a lousy job of interping it. (Read it, by the way.) My parents tell me stories of when they were kids, and it makes me sick. When I visited DC, Lee, Baddeck, and drove through various places, I cried inside for these homeless people and these struggling to make ends meet. I wrote about how horrible it all was, but put it aside because I didn't want to reread what I had written.

But as much as it pains me to think about poverty or to see it in front of me, I can't just force it out of my mind. How selfish, to simply cope with being uncomfortable with reality. How selfish, to not suffer inside with those who physically suffer. How selfish, to pretend that things are something they're not. But I'm just a person, just an apathetic teenaged girl, with no real knowledge of poverty, with no real experience with poverty, and with just a general queasy conviction that maybe I should do something about it. I have zero qualifications to share my heart on poverty because there is so little I really know.

I volunteer once in a while at local missions. I love freerice.com. I pray often for people I know personally who have financial troubles. And yet it seems like I could do bigger things, and yet I'm not. But I'm going to San Francisco this June with Ignite (my youth group) through Youth With A Mission (YWAM.) I really have no idea what I've signed up for. But I'm hoping I'll be given an opportunity to tell someone about Jesus? And maybe God will use what I see there to turn me into something He can use to actually serve, rather than just pity, the poor.

What's your favorite movie? Why?

Mon, 03 Mar 2008 13:53:34 GMT

I love watching movies. It is my all-time favorite way to spend time. So picking just one is kind of hard. But my current favorite is Catch Me if You Can, yeah, with Leonardo diCaprio, Tom Hanks, Steven Spielburg. Why? Because it's inspirational. It was funny, because I saw it the week before my 16th birthday. And in the movie you have this kid, just turned 16, his life is falling apart, so he runs out of there and becomes a pilot. Then a doctor. Then a lawyer. He travels the world, and granted, he rips off a lot of people, but he had the ambition to achieve amazingly high heights. All starting shortly after his 16th birthday. When I first saw it I was really worried about where my life was headed and whether or not I had the capacity to aim high, and watching this movie gave me the encouragement to do big things in the here and now. I don't have to wait to grow up to make an impact. God can use me here and now.

I have seen a lot of really excellent movies in my short life, and dozens of wonderful movies come to mind, but only a few that have been real, long-standing favorites. So, runners up were:
Beauty and the Beast: long time favorite movie. It's witty, colorful, clean, and the themes are so positive and uplifting. Sacrifice, intelligence, love. I love the story, and I love the characters, and I love the songs.
Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure: You cannot beat the silliness of this movie. I'm a big geek about the importance of history, so I like that aspect of the movie, but mostly it's just quotable fun on film. And you gotta love Keanu Reeves.
The Princess Bride: It's a family classic. I was raised on this film, I was saying "Have fun storming the castle" before I ever even saw the movie, and it's lovable on every facet. You've got romance, comedy, action, drama, and fantasy, all thrown together. The book is even better.

I have a lot of other favorite movies, certainly not limited to, but encompassed by the following:
The Prestige, Awakenings, A Beautiful Mind, Master & Commander, 3:10 to Yuma, Little Women, Batman Begins, Newsies, Pocahantas, Empire of the Sun, The Court Jester, Anne of Green Gables, Pride & Prejudice, Indiana Jones, Star Wars, White Nights, Timeline, Robin Hood, Back to the Future, Anastasia, Pirates of the Caribbean, Much Ado About Nothing, The Princess Bride, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, On the Line, The Last Samurai, The Importance of Being Earnest, Ocean's 11, Ocean's 12, Ocean's 13, Dead Poets Society, Day After Tomorrow, Maverick.

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I didn't take the picture, by the way.

Tobacco products kill 1,200 people a day in the US, but it rarely makes the evening news. How come?

Mon, 18 Feb 2008 12:37:33 GMT

Because no one really cares! Ugh! I'm starting to get really upset about all this anti-tobacco propaganda on Xanga. If people want to destroy their bodies by smoking, then let them. It is their right, and in American they should have the freedom to do so, without some bureaucratic corporation breathing down their neck. Between diplomacy, the economy, and social issue, journalists have better things to cover.

It find it to be such a queer anomaly that left-wing activists are to passionate about outlawing tobacco, drugs, drinking, and yet are also so passionate about legalizing abortion, euthanasia, untraditional marriage. This inconsistency confuses to no end. More rights, more rights, for minorities, for animals, for the environment. Less rights, less rights, for the alcohol swigging, drug shooting, tobacco smoking. What the heck? Find a philosophy and stick with it.

Many people die each day from suicide. Many people die each day from car accidents. Many people die each day from a lack of organs available for transplants. Many people die each day from preventable diseases around the world. And many people die each day from destructive habits that include tobacco. Yeah, none of these things get much press time. And why? Because it's a fact of life. These things happen to everyone, and usually only one person has the power to stop it. Not a government mandate.

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Driving - a lot harder than I thought

Sun, 17 Feb 2008 17:08:20 GMT

I finished the torturous 33 hours of driver's education at the end of January, and I have 1/3 of a driver's license: a permit. Wewt for graduated licensing! So my dad took me for my first driving lesson . . . in the snow. We practiced turning and stuff in a tiny parking lot. It wasn't really real driving. Then, a week later, my dad took me for a second lesson, and we went on an actual road. I was driving for four minutes on RT 116 and when I went to make the turn onto RT 12 (did I mention I had a huge black pickup truck on my bumper? RI drivers get mad when people drive the speed limit.) I almost crashed into the guard rail.

Then, that night, I went with my mom to Whole Foods. (I bought this $20 moisturizer there that doesn't even work! But aside from that, I really love Whole Foods. Except their chips. Nasty.) We finish shopping and go out to the car, and she gets in the passenger side. And she wouldn't get out! I was really almost angry that she would even suggest I drive home all the way from Whole Foods when I'd had so little instruction actually behind the wheel. Never mind that I had almost crashed earlier that day. So she drove home. Except she stopped on RT 12 and insisted I drive home from there. "It's a straight line from here," she said. "C'mon, you can do that."

Apparently they don't understand. My parents don't seem to get that I have never driven before. I have had no instruction behind the wheel. And what comes as second nature to them is completely foreign and scary to me. It doesn't help that I have an aunt that won't drive. Part of me is paranoid of ending up like her, and part of me feels like this fear of driving is already inherent in my DNA. I don't trust myself behind the wheel, and I don't know what to do to remedy this.

Learning to drive simply isn't practical. Lame.

The Beijing Olympics

Fri, 25 Jan 2008 17:43:05 GMT

Xanga has had wicked lame Featured Questions lately. Honestly, what rationale do they use to pick the Featured Question? Obviously none at all.

So the 2008 Summer Olympics is this August. Are you excited? You know, I vaguely remember reading an article two years ago, shortly before the Winter Olympics, about how the television rating for the Olympics were going down, down, down. And I thought to myself, that's lame. I love the Olympics! I've looked forward to them since I was old enough to know about them. The Olympics have been like vacation for us - I remember being allowed to take time out of school to watch the Olympics, time to stay up late to watch the Olympics, time to discuss the Olympics fervently with my sisters and friends. So yeah, I'm excited!

Or, I was excited. I've never been a huge fan of China, mostly because it get such negative press from the media, but you can't deny that China isn't exactly "the model nation." In regards to the Beijing Olympics, I was optimistic, though. China has such extremely rich heritage; I knew it would be interesting. I was so excited, in fact, that I decided to write about the 2008 Beijing Olympics for my composition class. And naturally the first place I turned to for research was CNN. Yeah, I know. And what the search engine produces is an article about the people who have been displaced from their homes to make room for the Olympics Village.

Hold the phone? I was stunned. The pieces of the puzzle fell together for me. I was vaguely aware of what was going on with China politically - their involvement in Mayanmar and Darfur, as well as human rights' and workers' conditions. But the news this article informed me of was unpalatable. I did a little more research, and the more I learned, the more disenchanted I became with the Beijing Olympics.

Many argue that an Olympics in Beijing would further open up the nation to democratic ideals. Yeah, just like free trade advocates argue that free trade would open China up to democratic ideals. See how that's going?

Think back to the last time a communist nation hosted the Olympics. Yeah, USSR. They were determined to prove themselves through the competition, and would stop at nothing to do so. The Games were a sham! There was blatant rule breaking by the USSR, and it was a Games that left a bad taste in everyone's mouths. And the time before that? Yeah, Germany. Commonly called Hitler's Olypmics. Also a regime trying to prove itself, only this time through racial slurs. There were no Jews on Germany's team. This Games, too, was a disaster. And people expect the Beijing Olympics to be different?

I know better than most that the spirit of the Olympics is friendly competition between nations, a way to bring countries together. And I want to believe that spirit will be preserved in the Beijing Olympics, but history tells us otherwise. Besides, why would the United States want to be a part of a Games that is so marked by blatant barreling over the rights of life and property? I wish with all my heart that the United States would boycott the 2008 Beijing Olympics, but there's no hope left for that.

Enjoy the Games!

If you had to name the one thing that most frightens you about growing old, what would it be?

Tue, 01 Jan 2008 19:25:43 GMT

I could not pick any one thing! I must confess, I have a secret phobia of growing old. Losing my memory, my body wearing out, being treated differently because of my age, and having that different treatment be somewhat warranted. I hate the thought of losing my independence and leaving my well-being and quality of life in the hands of a person who may or may not care what happens to me. It's degrading and scary. I've seen too many elderly people be mistreated or neglected, and it fills me with dread knowing one day, I'll be in their shoes.

This speaks volumes to me about my treatment of old people. My grandpa is in an assisted living place, and I'm so haughty, I never eat the food there when we go to visit him. I open all the doors with my sleeves and I never touch the remote or banisters. I act like older people have germs or something! But it bothers me to see people who were once vibrantly living decompose before my eyes. Joints enflame, eyes strain, skin gets dried out, bones get brittle, hair thins, brain slows, and so many awful sicknesses tear these people apart. The vulnerability that the elderly must embrace after they acted as caretakers for everyone else. Then they are considered worn out and obsolete, having outlived their usefulness to society. It's enraging!

So I sit here at my computer raging, and fearing, because I know that eventually that will be me. And no matter people speak out about treating the elderly with respect, and no matter how much they live that out as an example to the rest of us, this does not change the general perception of old people. But what can I do? I run errands for the elderly I know, or see about, but I treat them with dignity, or at least I try. I'm still a full-of-it teenager so I struggle with treating many people with dignity, but I'm working on it. ; )

But is my fear totally unfounded? And what can I do to help change this degrading perception of the oldest generation?

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Are you ready for the end of the world?

Fri, 28 Dec 2007 11:43:43 GMT

This topic has been weighing on my mind for a little over a year, probably longer. Hence, I've got a lot to say on this subject. This is probably going to be a long, wordy post. Prepare accordingly. What got me in this mindset was:

• Reading Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank. This is an excellent book, very well written, and classic American 20th century literature. You're probably familiar with it, but if you're not, I highly suggest you go out and read it. It operates on the premise of surviving after a nuclear holocaust, but if you're not into that stuff, don't worry; it's not really about that. This book is filled with deux de machina, naturally, because these people have to build up a civilization that's been destroyed. The major theme is how the actions of one person can change the streams of civilization, from the one fighter pilot who caused the nuclear holocaust, to the one man who provided leadership to a town that was killing itself from its panic. Very interesting.

• Watching The Day After Tomorrow. (I just rewatched this recently and it almost prompted an entry on global warming, but my browser shut down and everything I had written was lost. I was too lazy to rewrite.) I love this movie, in spite of the lack of realism, propaganda, and how depressing it is . . . I mean, it has Dennis Quaid and Jake Gyllenhaal in it! Who can pass that up?! But again, it tells the story of a civilization wiped out due to circumstances beyond anyone's control, giving global tragedy a face. It helps us to imagine what a wiped out world would look like, and piques our imagination of how people would react and what would happen to civilization as a whole. Also, I Am Legend. These movies on the end of civilization are plentiful. The Day After Tomorrow just happens to be my favorite.

• Attending an economic lecture. The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) helped to shed some light on the current economic condition of the United States. First, I learned that we don't need to worry about the trade deficit, or illegal immigrants sending the money they're earning here to Mexico! What a load off my mind. But I also got some perspective on the dire situation our economy really is in, mostly due to government meddling, IMHO. The value of the dollar is dropping, but the Federal Reserve just keeps printing more money. People are not spending or investing money wisely. Banks are handing out loans like candy and the housing market is in shambles. And our stock market . . . ! Obviously, I'm no economic expert, and I have only a rudimentary understanding of economics, but anyone can see the US economy is headed in the wrong direction. And when the economy collapses, the civilization must start over.

• Hearing the news of Bhutto's assassination. I got the news from the radio and my CNN homepage simultaneously yesterday morning. My mom was stunned. I mean, yes, everyone saw it coming, but that didn't make it any less tragic or shocking. So now what? The most dangerous nation in the world (a nuclear nation, you will remember) has launched into turmoil and chaos that is incredible, even for them. The US has also lost a key ally against terrorism and al Qaeda is stronger than ever. It seems like this puts everyone involved between a rock and a hard space. (And it's killing me how people are connecting this to the issue of democracy, and the spread thereof. Please, people! Democracy is a system, not a good in and of itself! Respect the dead and stop bringing this back to our foreign policy! But that's another entry for another time.)

So between the threat of nuclear weapons, natural disasters, terrorism, economic collapse, super viruses, or whatever, the ending of US civilization as we know has been on my mind. What would I do? How would I react? How could I contribute? My parents were discussing our distant relatives in the South somewhere and mentioned trade school, and this was me: "I wanna go to vocational school!" My parents were both irked that I had been listening to their conversation and confused by my sudden interest in trade school. I've always been the scholarly type. But I explained that I wanted practical, useful life skills in preparation for the end of our civilization. They gave me a strange look. And you're definitely thinking I'm a nut-case, if you've stuck with me this long. But I know that all of this stems from my two desires: to be prepared, and to be useful. To have no regrets and to be good for something. I'm not a fanatic, or a conspiracy theorist, I just want to be prepared for and part of something bigger. The end of the world is your chance to make a difference. No longer can you leave it to the politicians, teachers, or parents. We must all lead, and best to start learning it now.

"The other night I tripped a nice continental drift divide. Mount St. Edelite. Leonard Bernstein. Leonid Breshnev, Lenny Bruce and Lester Bangs. Birthday party, cheesecake, jelly bean, boom! You symbiotic, patriotic, slam, but neck, right? Right."

Broke = need to make money

Fri, 21 Dec 2007 12:52:53 GMT

So Xanga's got new ads. That's nice. Face it, people, they've got to make their money somehow. (An addendum: I wish the ads would be super sterile. Some of them I am highly embarrassed for my siblings to see.) These ads are absolutely everywhere, on almost every web page, every Google search, and even every networking device site, such as Myspace, Facebook, or Xanga. They're annoying, yes, but I personally just tune them out. I hardly ever notice them anymore.

But they're still there, and that bugs some people. It's not like they serve any purpose for us.

Ah, but dear reader, they can! Imagine, getting paid for having these ads on your site. Imagine, getting paid to invite your friends. Imagine, getting paid for doing what you're already doing! Too good to be true? Yeah, probably. But as a broke young person, I'll take what I can get. We have a capitalist system, after all. Exploit it! (See the economics book I say I'm reading? I actually am reading it. Consider me knowledgeable on the topic.) Enter Yuwie: a social networking site that pays you for participating. Not a bad deal, considering how much time some of us pour into our sites just for fun. Now you can turn that wasted time into dollars and cents. Click the banner, you know you want to . . .

I, personally, am still testing the waters. I was referred by a friend of a friend who I know distantly . . . long story, but I trust him, and he's been doing well on Yuwie. And what's the worst that can happen - so you don't make the bucks you were hoping for, but you still get the free networking capabilities of these sites you're already a part of. While I cannot in good conscience recommend you join, there's no damage or danger in exploring a bit.

Wow, I sound like a tacky salesperson. ("Buy my stuff . . . please!!")