Travel Journal: Clear skies

     My vacation so far hasn’t been exactly the most exciting; but today I woke up waiting for nothing more than a good day. Me and my family went all the way up to San Blas today and spent most of the day there. Of course no trip is ever perfect, at least not for me and my family. First of all,  5 in the morning?  I wanted to throw the pillow at my dad for waking me up. I nearly fell asleep in the bathroom.    The driver, ironically called Pacifico, picked us up at our house at about 5:30 and the whole way to San Blas he had on the loudest gospel music. In addition to that, he sang, THE whole way. Thank god for the loudest song on my i-pod and replay button. Other than that the day was good, no rain, clear water and clear skies all the way. I swear I could live at the beach.

San Blas 2011
Me and my sister

Lost Michaela

Michaela, she was known for being one of the few in her grade that was prudent and kept her grades up all year round.  Unlike our lackadaisical classmates her enthusiasm and school spirit exceeded any of the teacher’s expectations. Of course if you met her after those few months of tragedy in her family, you wouldn’t have known her like that. You would have never suspected that behind those bad grades and rebellious attitude she used to be the teachers one and only favorite. At the start of 12^th grade, the months past, she became troubled.  Her respectful attitude turned into an audacious one that teachers did not like or appreciate.

       I watched as more and more frequently, her serene manner in class disappeared as she would rankle teachers by mutiny against school work. No one knew exactly what had caused the recent change in this, before, conscientious girl. I knew though, her father had told me. I used to be her friend, that is, after all that had happened to her. But whenever in a principal’s, teachers, or counselor’s office (normally because they had confiscated things Michaela would pilfer from various students) they would ask her why she had become like this.

      She would never specifically depict the reason, only give certain inklings. She’d answer the questions with something along the lines of “There is a profuse amount of events happening in my life” and would leave at that, leaving everyone clueless.

       She found herself being rebuked by teacher’s everyday and just like me they grew despondent as to if she would ever go back to being the girl they all missed. On graduation day I watched from a distance as she sat among the parents, never having been able to graduate because of her slovenly class work. She sat watching as every single one of her classmates got on stage, received the award and stepped down. As I stepped up, I saw as she stood up and clapped the hardest she could, a smile on her face. I knew that girl I missed was somewhere, she wasn’t lost.
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Confession Tuesday: Destiny killed the Cellphone

I confess that when my parents heard the loud noise of a cellphone falling down 4 flights of stairs, it didn’t entirely happen accidently.  When my phone fell out of my pocket onto the floor, I was supposed to bend down and pick it up (something someone normal would do). But I stared at that piece of metal and plastic that I called my phone. So this is what happened, because that phone was everything I never wanted and because I’m particularly lazy on the weekends, I kicked it instead. Honestly I didn’t mean for it to go down the complete 4 flights of stairs,. Just one or two, I don’t know, maybe the phone wanted to die completely. Maybe it was destiny that the phone went all the way. But when it did fall all the way, i imagined my parents killing me. 

To top it off I ran all the way down stairs only to find my mom staring at the phone blankly. I looked at her, then the phone, then back at my mom. I literally threw myself at the floor; hugging that phone as if it was my new born baby. I whined and moaned for my mothers sake, but inside all I could keep thinking about was, when’s my birthday? Oh right the 26th. Great, I guess that’s when I get my new phone. I was having a joy fest in my head as my mother called Dad to tirade me about the responsibilities of having a cellphone. All I heard at the end of that conversation was what my father whispered to my mother. “I guess we have to get her a new cellphone for her birthday, we were going to anyways.”

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Memoir Monday: Hugging Strangers

            I don’t talk to my friends in Guatemala as much as I used to. I’m horrible in the concept of keeping in touch. And it’s not that my friends in Guatemala and me weren’t close, no. A lot of the time I wish I was still back in Guatemala being ridiculous with my friends there. And even though there is a lack of communication that I wish there wasn’t, I still think about them constantly. They haunt my mind, reminding me that I miss them.

            I feel like they haunt me even at the mall, all the way over here in Panama. Yesterday as I walked out of the movie theater I stopped in my steps as I saw what looked like my friend, Alex.
            Alex is the kind of friend that smiles at every moment of the day. Everyone has that friend that is constantly joking and in a cheerful mood ,well , that was Alex. And other than our names being the same, she and I were like the same person.

So my initial reaction was to run up to her and hug her. But again, like I said before, it was what LOOKED like my friend Alex. But when you see a stranger on the street that looks EXACTLY like someone you really want to hug, your initial reaction is to do exactly that, hug them. Of course if it ISNT that person, you might go through a series of awkward minutes trying to explain why you hugged a complete stranger.
            Luckily I didn’t have to go through those awkward minutes. But that girl, she looked so much like Alex that I just wanted to hug her for that fact. Just for looking like Alex.
When you find yourself wanting to run up to a complete stranger and hugging them, you know you might be a little crazy. But it made me realize, if I was willing to hug a complete stranger just because she looked like my friend, I probably miss Alex more than I thought I did. I wanted to give that complete stranger the type of hug you give your best friend the first day of school after summer. Those type of hugs that start with you walking towards each other but then transforms into a light jog because you are so anxious to see them after 2 months.
      Oh God, imagine if I would have given her that hug. Probably would have thought I was trying to choke her.
            But back to my initial point; I do miss Alex. I miss staying in the art room to turn the music up to the limit, I miss laughing to what nobody thought was funny, I miss making weird faces across the room.

I remember the first time I noticed that Alex might be equally as odd as me. It was in the middle of class as we laughed silently to ourselves, on either side of the room, about a word that had sparked a whole train of inner jokes. Sometimes I still wish I could share those moments with Alex. Sometimes I wish she was here or I was there, just so we could laugh on either side of the room, silently, to ourselves. One of my best friends, and one of the strangest.

A Book Is Made to Be Read: Catcher in the Rye

             

The main reasons that Catcher in the Rye appears on so many school list as banned might have been more logical in the past. However in our time what was considered obscene and worth banning before are concepts that the children and youth today are more familiar with. The way Holden acts as a teenager might have been less realistic before but today it isn’t as unusual as it was before.

         The reasons for which it is banned like the language, prostitution, sexual references and obscenities are things that teenagers already know about. Children aren’t as innocent as they were before and if the reason that it is banned is because of those things then it is absurd because if not already, eventually, children will stumble upon these topics. Banning the book for these reasons will not prevent the children to encounter the concepts that are shown.

         The book is relevant to the teenagers of our time. The issues that Holden comes across are those that many teenagers face and happen frequently today. For example, the youth going against the authority, not wanting to grow-up, being rebellious and trying to find where you belong. It is also a coming of age book and teenagers today can relate while reading it.

 Many schools along the south of the U.S have banned it for being “anti-white”, for going against the “perfect” image of an American family. It is close minded to ban a book just because it goes against that unrealistic idea of everything being perfect. But I believe the children should at least have the option to read the book.  They should decided if they want to or don’t want to read the book of their choice.

        

                                                                  

The House on Mango Street

In The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros tells about her experiences in a series of vignettes. She writes about her life while living on this street we have all become so familiar with, Mango Street.  In the book Esperanza struggles to believe that the house on Mango Street is truly her home. “I knew that I had to have a house. A real house.  One that I could point to. But this isn’t it. The house on Mango Street isn’t it.”(pg.5). She wants more, not a house that she is ashamed to live in. And although Esperanza hopes for and wants more, for now she is only a child and when growing up, there are certain limitations to being a women in her culture. But Esperanza soon finds out she does not want to let the limitations get to her.

The house on Mango Street is not her home, Esperanza dreamed of so much more.  Her parents would tell her about the house they would eventually own for themselves, a good life style. But unlike the house that her parents mention, this house lies of Mango Street; it’s a sad red house with small spaces and the bricks, that are supposed to be compact, crumbling.  Her neighborhood is filled with neighbors who are evidentially not

wealthy; many of them showing the same cultural background as Esperanza and her family.

While living there Esperanza is surrounded by many female figures. But all of them have been tamed. All have been tamed by their husband or father. She tells about her great-grandmother, who she is named after. She was a “wild horse of a woman” but when Esperanza’s great-grandfather became her husband all that freedom and independence was thrown out the window. She sat at the window all her life thinking of what could have been, never forgiving Esperanza’s great-grandfather.  And like her great- grandmother, many of the women in Esperanza’s family and on her street share the same story. “I have inherited her name, but I don’t want to inherit her place by the window” (11) This is one of the lines that I like most in this memoir because It shows Esperanza starting to be independent and knowing what she wants in the future. It shows the path she wants to take is a successful one unlike most of the women around her.

Esperanza knows of women who cry into the night, cry for their home, women that are abused by their father or husband, women that sit at their window wishing for more.  And it is these women that impel Esperanza to wanting more. Esperanza knows that her future does not consist of any of these things. She doesn’t  want it to consist of any of these things, she wants to be free, make her own profit; she does not want to be tamed, stopped by anything or anyone. She then realizes what will set her free is her writing. What had been just a pass time and something she enjoyed doing would be her future and hope of exceeding the expectations there was for a women in her neighborhood and culture.

At the end of the book it is truly Mango Street that has changed Esperanza. The people there have shaped her dreams and hope of becoming a free woman. At the end of the day, Esperanza decides, the house on Mango Street is truly her home. Where she will come back to after many years, and think of as her childhood, where she belongs. “They will not know I have gone away to come back.”(110)