Success

     It's basic human nature, to strive for achievement. For some of us, it's all we strive for.  In today's society we are constantly being pushed to be the best at everything we do.  Competition is everywhere, in sports, school, and basically every aspect of daily life.  Everyday we are searching for something that will set us apart from everyone else, to put us that much further ahead of those we are competing against.  But the unfortunate thing is: sometimes we don't even know what we are competing for.  In all truthfulness though, the blame for this generation's obsession with success can all be blamed on parents. They may have the best intentions, what parent doesn't want their child to succeed?  But sadly it seems that what they are doing when they are pushing us to be the best, is living through us. 
     This was a conversation brought up quite some time ago in communications class.  We arranged our chairs in something resembling a...  well it certainly couldn't be called a circle.  Some people had parents that certainly fit the definition of living through their child but some surprisingly couldn't care less about if their child was in the top 10% of the class or was going to an ivy league college.  But the main trend I have noticed in honors students like myself is simple.

It starts with an instrument, at a young age preferably.  Typically it's piano.  They want us to be the next musical prodigy before we turn 7. Anything to get the attention of colleges or prestigious boarding schools.

 

Then its on to sports.  This is a path my parents were relentless on.  Basketball, gymnastics, volleyball, tennis, swimming, diving, and nearly every other sport that could result in success.  Lets be frank though, I sucked at them all, I was somewhat decent at volleyball and diving but everything else was like my worst nightmare.  Except for swimming.  I loved that, I wasn't the fastest but I was still pretty good at it and won a few ribbons for  it when I was younger.

But then there is academics.  You cant have the perfect child unless their unnaturally smart.  Drilling the child with math problems until their brain goes numb and they are dreaming of the multiplication times table.

(credit for this picture goes to the original photographer)

Then finally the last part to creating the perfect child is throwing in a little something unexpected.  Something that is way above and beyond every other insane parent's child.  Something that the competition cant say they have done or accomplished. Something that makes them the-

    And there you go, all of the ingredients necessary to create the perfect child.  But if my opinion means anything I would like to add something else, something that truthfully maybe the most important. Determination.  Not the parent's, the child's.  They have to want it more then the parents do.  This is something that I believe is wrongly overlooked when parents try to create their perfect child.  So La veritá della vita: Parents are crazy, but make sure that what your doing, what success you are trying to accomplish is born from your own determination.  Do what you want to do and achieve success in something you love, or else, it is only success in the eyes of your parents.

Flower Power

I'm not much of a nature person, never have been, never will.  I avoid it at all costs like it's the plague.  Spending every possible moment within the safe confines of my home. However, there are those rare, choice events that can draw me outside of my cave.. ahem... I meant house.  One of those things would be the day the flowers bloom.  Personally there is just something ever so magical in the delicate petals of a flower.  Within it I can find endless amounts of inspiration, more so than nearly everything else.  Truthfully, while people are quite interesting, I just can't compare them to the unpredictable scenes found in nature.  While Katie may believe the exact opposite ("Flowers are boring!"), I will hold on to my belief though I can easily see her point.  Maybe it's just because I am socially awkward (to a painful degree may I add) that causes me to not take pictures of actual humans.  Or, maybe it's because I find it easier to see the flawed perfection of nature.  Nature does not judge, it simply exists in the most pure form of existence.  Where as I find it all to easy to see the darkness in people, the flaws they don't admit, the secrets, the lies, the deception of the human façade. But perhaps that is their form of beauty. Oppositely, flowers tell of no deception, what is seen on the outside is exactly what we know to be there.  Yet at the same time the way the flower blooms, it turns into something all its own.  It is random, it is unpredictable, it is beauty.  Perhaps I should give people a chance, one could see wonders through a camera if the subject allows for their flaws to be dominant... But for now I believe I will stay with the little treasures I find in nature.

Now La Veritá della vita is that sometimes we have to dig deep to find the beauty that lies within. But other times, it is just sitting on the surface.

Stumbling

   Well just the other day I was stumbling (no not the way you think!).  I was stumbling on the internet using a nifty little web-site called StumbleUpon when I found my brand new obsession.  This person is completely mental, I swear, it will blow your mind if you are nearly as easily amused as I am.  So here are some of my favorite videos...

 

Seriously? It would have been beautiful even after :56 seconds but then he has to go along and add a cave.

But wait! we're not done yet... we have to add a tree and birds.

    Just thought I'd share that with you... like I said before "easily amused".  But hey, check out some more of his insane paintings on The YouTube or his website Spacepaintings but sometimes the magic is in watching it unfold, impossibly, right before your eyes.

    So what educational lesson did we learn from watching this that will further improve our lives and help society? We didn't learn one. But la veritá della vita is: some of us will simply never be this talented... or bored enough to learn how to do this.

Her face looks south towards Meca

    Ive never really been to a funeral, not a real funeral at least. But what I have gathered from television, movies, and books is that there are really only two types of deaths: the sudden unexplainable ones and the ones that you know are coming.  The death that I had a run in with was the sudden, heart wrenching kind. Not to say that some deaths aren't heart breaking but, some are more so than others.
    I was certainly not expecting to find death on the 4th of June but I did all the same.  I was expecting to find my blue Aero sweatshirt with the broken zipper in the dryer for the SAT's that I was going to take in a few short hours. But I wasn't expecting to find death huddled up in the corner of my laundry room.  I had known that she was sick, she had lost a little weight but she was getting better. She gained the weight back and even a bit more. She was healthy, happy, alive.
    I broke down. I couldn't proses what I was seeing because there was simply no way that she could be dead. But she was and I didn't want to believe it.
    To make matters worse I had to head out and take the tiring SAT's.  Now on the way there I tryed to convince myself that this would be ok, it would be a distraction, anything to keep me from thinking about Deliciae meae minime.  But life really is not that kind to me.
   I was blessed to be in a communications room.  A room filled with Romeo and Juliet posters.  If one has yet to realize who I have been talking about... well then you probably weren't there during my lunch break down. My little darling bunny Juliette had died. And of course the world was against me by turning my one chance at a distraction into a relentless reminder of her death.
     That Sunday was the day of her funeral.  The only funeral I had ever technically attended.  I chose the most beautiful place I could in my suburbia backyard and began to dig.  I finally was able to appreciate Harry when he had to dig Dobby's grave.  Now I know just how difficult it really is.  It isn't the manual labor or the sun beating down on you. It's the feeling of how you are the one to "seal" their death.  A funeral makes it all the more official.  Closure in its most mundane and raw form.  It truly is the most heart breaking experience that I will ever endure and I don't wish to go through it ever again though I realize that it is an inevitable part of life.
    Death is sneaky, it creeps up on you in the dark of night and steals away the ones you cherish most.  This pulled everything into perspective for me.  I think that I now realize that every moment I live could easily be my last, and I can only wish that when my time comes, it doesn't break the hearts of my loved ones. No one should ever feel that pain.
   But all the same, the funeral was all I could give to her, my last chance to show just how much I loved her. To show her that she was a part of something so much bigger than she ever realized.  Well at least to me she was.  She was so much more than a pet or a family member. She was my everything.  She was the one that I could  tell anything because she couldn't judge, she wouldn't.  Yes she was a bunny but all the same, doesn't everyone have an odd relationship with their animals? A relationship that is impossible to describe to the outside world.  I told Juliette secrets that I've never told anyone else.  Things that would cause my friends to worry about my sanity, and things that I would be to afraid to admit to anyone else.  I told her my secrets because I knew she would take them to her grave.  I just didn't know how soon that would be.

So la verita della vita is that it is short, and we have to cherish every moment. Because it just might be our last. Rest in peace my darling Juliette, Julietta, Julie, Jewles, I will love you forever.
Is it pathetic that I am crying right now? 

What on earth is this??

So quite some time ago, I went on vacation, yes shocker, but when I was there I had the opportunity to see some pretty awesome looking sea creatures.  Albeit it was from behind a thick bullet proof sheet of glass but still they were quite interesting to look at and one in particular makes me laugh every time, you may be able to guess which one.

 This one just gives me the creaps... I mean really, just look at it and then look at the peeping tube thing. It's just plain weird.

Ok so honestly the first one is obviously a sea horse but if someone asked me about the last three, I wouldn't have a clue.  Any ideas?

Dont kill me but....

Well Im alive. In case you were worried about me possibly dropping off the face of the world.  And well, if you weren't then.... huh I cant seem to make up a smart-alack response, maybe because I was up all night reading.  But truthfully I did drop off of the world, the world wide web I mean.  Life has been hectic and I been trying to get even a scrap of time to sleep so my apologies but sleeping comes long before blogging in my priorities list so you'll just have to deal with it because I'm no Sydney.  But I will try to update more often on the weekends and hopefully later today.