Lent

I have been giving up something like soda or candy during lent for as long as I can remember. As I am getting older, I am now spending more time deciding how I want to sacrifice during the Lenten Season. I have decided this year that what I will do is try to better myself and my community while also, mainly for tradition, keeping my yearly Lenten promise of giving up soda. I will spend less time on line and more time with my family. I will strive to be more aware of my surroundings and those around me. If I see someone struggling, I will try to reach out and help them. Now that I am older, I realize what Lent is really about. I will focus on prayer, fasting, and reconciliation while deepening my  relationship with God through the process.

Love In Music

Love is something that cannot be planned. It just happens. If you spend your life searching for love, you will get hurt far too many times. Love comes through unexpected circumstances and in unexpected ways. We all must be open to all kinds of love because the love we expect may not be the love in our future. Love is portrayed in many varying ways. Many songs depict the positive sides of love while others show the dark side. I tend to enjoy listening to the happy sides of love because I feel like I have an optimistic view of love. For love to be true love, it needs to be healthy and positive.

In Taylor Swift’s song, “Tim McGraw”, she sings,

“When you think Tim McGraw
I hope you think my favorite song
Someday you'll turn your radio on
I hope it takes you back to that place
When you think happiness.”

This is about a high school love. She knows that it might not last, and she is okay with that.  It is important to experience all of life to end up finding the right one for you.  Your past relationships shape the person you become and you should not regret that time of love.

Parachute’s song, “Forever and Always,” on the other hand, is about the kind of love that will last forever, even after death. 

“I want you forever, forever and always
Through the good and the bad and the ugly
We'll grow old together
Forever and always”

This is the kind of love to build a marriage upon. I believe that love should be supportive. I want my husband to picture us old and gray sitting on our front porch together. Although love is somewhat in the moment, you must also build a stable relationship to last throughout your life.  In my opinion, a person’s soul mate changes as the person changes. The person you are meant to spend the rest of your life with depends on the choices you make leading up to the relationship.

In Lady Antebellum’s “Our Kind of Love,” the love of two best friends is described.

 “Just like driving on an open highway
Never knowing what we're gonna find
Just like two kids, baby, always trying to live it up
Whoa, yeah, that's our kind of love
Mm that's our kind of love”

I feel like you need to be both in love and best friends with your spouse. Having just one will but a burden on your relationship. Love should be fun and you should “live it up.” Fun should be a main component of your relationship. I want my husband to want to simply go “driving” with me.

Michael Bublé’s “Everything” is a song about having stability in your love.

“And in this crazy life, and through these crazy times
It's you, it's you, You make me sing.
You're every line, you're every word, you're everything.”

Your spouse should be the main person in your life. Everything else should form around him/her. You should not spend your life searching for Mr. Perfect because what you think is your everything now will most likely not be your everything in a few years. I want my husband to grow into my everything through love.

Death Cab for Cutie’s Song “I Will Follow You Into the Dark”, illustrates that if love is true love, it will wait.

“If there's no one beside you
When your soul embarks
Then I'll follow you into the dark.”

If someone truly loves you, he or she will let you know that he or she will always be there for you. They will wait around and always be a support. Sooner or later, you will realize that they are the true one for you. True love will make itself known. 

Sexuality in the Media 2

This is an ad for American Eagle clothes. I feel like it does a very good job at modeling the product.  The models are all fully clothed and they seem to be doing normal stuff.  In many ads, the models are portrayed doing things normal people never would. This ad is very realistic and people can relate to it. The clothes are portrayed in a way that would make someone want to buy them for the right reason. This ad has a positive effect on consumers because they can easily picture themselves partaking in the photo.  The ad portrays that the  models are having a good time and so will the costumer if they buy the product.    

Sexuality in the Media

The product is the jeans. There is so little of the actual product shown that by just looking at the picture, it is not at all obvious.  There is not anything exactly inappropriate about this ad, but it does portray women in a powerless way.  The seller wants to make their product appealing to young women who find this attractive. They are stereotyping by portraying the male as the one in the relationship with all of the power.  He is holding her arm down and lying across her body. The product could easily be shown in a different light and hopefully have the same results.  The woman could be fully clothed and in a different setting with the man.  This ad makes women stop and look at the ad because of the models and then the look at the product. Its the models first, but the product does get looked at second.

My Family

My family has always been an important part of my life.  Not only am I close with my immediate family, my cousins are like my brothers.  I have four boy cousins who are brothers who live 3 minutes from me.  We all went to grade school together and two of the boys, Alex and Zach (twins), are in my grade.  Ever since we were born (we are 17 days apart), we have been inseparable. Although we are so different, we always have something to talk about.  Every weekend my family goes to their house for Sunday Night Dinner.  No matter what I have going on in my life, I can always rely on my cousins to be there for me.  

Finding my New Passion

Since 1^st grade I have played the piano and since 3^rd grade I have played the flute, but it was not until high school that I started playing percussion.  Being a member of an all-girls orchestra, there are many flute and piano players.  There are very few drummers.  Our conductor, when I was a freshman saw me playing the drums one day before rehearsal.  He immediately told me that I was being moved to the percussion section of the band.  I barely had a choice. I eventually came around to the idea and now am known to fully embrace my position.  Of course, because I was a freshman at the time, I got stuck with all of the odd, yet extremely important, percussion instruments, such as the triangle.  All of my friends used to tease me about playing the triangle.  It’s true it doesn’t take much practice to master, but that doesn’t make it any less critical to the orchestra.  Now, at every concert, all my friends come with triangle shaped posters and signs.  For Halloween this year, I was a triangle.  My leading role as the “first chair trianglist” is a welcomed point of good natured ribbing from my friends.  This self-effacing humor has helped me embrace my new identity.  

Having to Change

The summer before I went to the Mount, I was looking forward to playing soccer in the fall for my new high school and then in the spring playing softball. My whole grade school life revolved around my sports teams. I was looking forward to making many new friends on the team and being part of a new community. My shoulder had started bothering me in 6th grade, but I didn’t really think much about it. I saw many orthopedic doctors over the next three years, but nothing was really being done and I was still playing sports. In the middle of the summer before Mount, my doctor at the time told me that I would need to have shoulder surgery to fix the pain I was having. I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to play sports again. Sports were my life and I didn’t think that I would ever be able to live without them. I went ahead and had the surgery. My shoulder felt fine for a few months, but when I started playing sports again, the pain came back. This time it was even worse. I couldn’t even throw a ball correctly. I knew that my sports career was sadly over. Although I did have another shoulder surgery to try and fix the problem, I had a feeling that I would never be the same. I came to realize that I would need to take a positive out of this life changing experience. Because of the process that I went through with the surgery, I now know that I want to be an orthopedic doctor. I never want anyone to have something that they love so much taken away. I learned that out of a bad situation, comes a growing experience. My identity has been changed, but definitely for the better.