Salvation

Belief Turning into Pure Pressure

Responding to Pure Pressure is part of the human nature- it can have effect on everyone.

                When reading the essay “Salvation,” I feel like it was more of a sense of pure pressure. I’ve been through pure pressure; like a time I was partying with some friends. For anyone who has been intoxicated, or in my case, too intoxicated, you know when enough is enough. But when you have friends around you saying, “come on, one more shot… just one more.” You seem to get irritated and finally give in and take just one more shot; later realizing it was a mistake. I feel like the little boy went through pure pressure having everyone telling him to go, “be saved.” There were people around him shouting and jumping, and people (including his friend Westley) running to the front of the church to be saved and see Jesus. I’m sure when the boy was sitting alone he got nervous and felt pressured to do the same. When giving in to his aunt, and people around him, he went to be saved and the outcome wasn’t so great; he didn’t see Jesus and therefore, no longer believed in him. I think it’s up to each individual to find out their own way to see if they believe in Jesus, not test themselves because of everyone else around them wanted them to. I feel sorry for the boy, because him trying to ,”be saved,” turned into him  not only no longer  believing, but, feeling ashamed, and as if he was a liar.    

Cell Phones... The Cause of Rudeness.

I think Charles Fisher is stating that cell phones are completely horrible. They do come in good use, especially for an emergency. He's stating that people loose respect to others due to constantly using their cell phone. I agree that people have become "Zombies," when texting or "facebooking" someone on their phone.
I've experienced many things with rude individuals on their phones. Such as people bumping into me and acting as if it were my fault. Or someone swerving at me in their car or cutting me off because their text message was SOOO important. I don't know, I do love my cell phone. It's nice to be able to keep in contact with my boyfriend through out the day when we aren't together, but there is a "right" and "Wrong" time to text each other. Like while he's working or while I'm in a lab class cooking. I just think people need to realize that they are allowing cell phones to completely take over their life, maybe if they realize, they will not zombie out into their screens anymore.

Darkness at Noon

I agree with his point of view all the way. I believe that his purpose is, everyone should be treated equally. Just because he's blind, doesn't make him non-human. People are so quick to judge that it's crazy. Hasn't anyone heard the saying, "Don't judge a book by it's cover," or "Looks can be deceiving." People are so quick to say no to him because he's blind, that they don't take the time to notice his education history, or get to know him as a person. How will they ever find out his talents if they don't give him a chance?
I can't say that I've personally experienced this, but I did work with the special needs children my senior year of high school. They were treated so poorly, and they had such big hearts. The teachers who would watch after them wouldn't let them say hi to anyone, or even waive. All I can remember hearing was, "DANNY... keep your hands in your pockets!" He was so sad and would sit and stare at the ground. That's why I loved working with them. Funny thing is, some could whoop my butt in basketball. Just because they looked differently, talked differently, or acted differently, doesn't make them useless. They were really intelligent too, I guess some people just don't have the patience to work with them.

"So, What's So Bad About Being So-So?"

I would have to say that she is stating the fact that she enjoys doing many things, even though she does them poorly. She sees it as, you don't need to be great at something to love doing it. She likes having more than one hobby to keep herself entertained. She's also saying, don't worry so much about perfecting something, other than learning it to love it. Although, she isn't saying don't try so hard in work, but to do so in your other activities.
  I can go both ways with her on this. I don't fully agree or disagree. I myself, come from a very active, competitive family. My brother was a Football and baseball star. I did basketball for 2 years, volleyball 3, softball 10, was a cheerleader for 10 years, and cheer coached for 2. Also track for 4 years and cross country for 2. I was always into sports, I had to be active, and most importantly stay in shape. I enjoyed all of my sports. I'd have to say, I loved being worked hard, and I liked my strict coaches more so than my non-strict. Winning is fun! :) I'm sure everyone agrees. It's not so much fun to be the only one putting your all into practice, and have your team slack off because the end results are LOOSING. Who wants to be that one team that wins 1 game a season??? I've experienced this in Cheerleading. People say it's not a sport, but i disagree. I would come home more bruised and tired from cheer practice then my brother would from football. You try being thrown up in the air and not being caught. It's quite painful I must say. My first year of cheerleading I had a really strict coach and at cheer competition we won First place. The second year my coach was there for just fun, and we didn't place. There is a such thing as working too hard, and not working enough. It was a bummer to go from winning to completely loosing. Then when I took up cheer coaching some of the cheerleaders disliked me... especially my sister. I was pretty strict. I made most of them cry from working too hard, I will admit I felt a little bad. But when cheer competition came my girls worked so hard, and nailed their routine. When they announced the winners, (my team) the look on the girls' faces paid off. They were so happy and came and gave me a hug, and thanked me for working them so hard.
  I do understand that there are kids out there in it to have fun, and also in it to win it. But if you're one of the kids who want to just have fun, I say make a team with kids who just want to have fun. There are kids out there who want to work their butt off, and hate having kids on the team who are (say in baseball), in the out field chasing bumble bees around. But anyways, as I am saying, I like to work hard. Maybe if you're like 6 years old playing sports you shouldn't be too strict, but as you get older, things should be more strict. Most kids go into the game knowing they will have to work at it, and they accept it, others just don't, and you can't always change their attitudes towards it.

Stuff Is Not Salvation

            I would have to say that Anna's purpose is to show us is to value every penny, and don't take things for granted. The biggest most important things in life are the small things. To me things such as, pictures, baby books, and other things along the same line are MUCH more important than having a big TV, or a nice car. Sure, it's nice to have them things, but they can't make you happy; at least not fully happy. Just like the family in the story, "Having less, they appreciate more." I agree with that all the way. People in life who don't get everything they want because their families can't afford it, appreciate everything unlike rich kids who get whatever they please.
         I guess I have gone through something like this, but involving my step dad. About 4 years ago where I used to live, (Crescent City) we had a Tsunami warning. My mom and I didn't really think that there was going to be a tsunami, but my step dad sure did. As my mom and I finished up dinner, he was outside rushing, and getting together all his GUNS. How pathetic right? He said how expensive they were and blah, blah, blah. My mom and I had pointed out to him how pathetic that was; and he pretty much chewed our heads off. What about the family pictures, or things that are irreplaceable? I guess he didn't care, what meant more to him were his stupid guns. If there were a tsunami he'd hand cuff himself to his gun safe... if he could.
            

Fish Cheeks

         I think Amy's purpose of writing this is to show us, the readers, that everyones life style and culture is different. As you can tell in the story, she seems a little ashamed of her culture, because of a boy who she likes, who has a different culture. But her showing us that she is embarrassed, is basically telling us not to be embarrasses, be proud of who we are, what we eat, how we dress... etc.
       I pretty much gained that no one should be shy of who they are. We are all different for a reason. If we were all the same life would seem pretty boring. Because I myself, love learning about new cultures, especially trying new food.
       I wouldn't say that I had an experience like this with the culture. But I've had an experience being different from people. In the 8th grade I was the first one out of everyone to get braces. I wanted braces really bad, but I didn't want to show them off. I thought I didn't look good with them on, but within 4-6 months I got over it because more people started getting braces, and now I have perfectly straight teeth, so it was all worth it in the end.

English Blog 1

Hi my name is Kayla. This is my 4th quarter at Ai. I am here studying the Culinary field, so obviously I love to cook. I've been told many times that I eat too much :). I enjoy cooking and baking, dancing, music, singing, snowboarding, roller coaster, dirt bike riding, hunting, sports... and many other things. Today in class we just had the ice braker... introducing our partner. We went over the syllabus and feature projects, and at the end a little 50 question quiz to see where we are in English. Also the teacher spoke about boogers, wheather they were crusty or slimy. YUCK!