Poetry project
Story of my poem: Disemboweling a dictator because he killed my family
Artist statement:
I do not really consider myself a poet of any sort. I don’t see myself constantly writing poetry throughout my life. So how do I work my way around this? Well, it’s simple, really, music. But not the music you are thinking of. While everybody else performs Hip Hop songs because Hip Hop is the most poetic of music genres, I decided to pursue my own interest in my favorite music genre, metal. For this example, I will be using the genre of grindcore and goregrind for my poem to tell a rebellious story, while making it metal as crap, by the request of Lori. Originally, I was going to do a Thrash Metal song revolving around equal rights, it turns out I do not know how to display equal rights, so I decided to go through my other interest, politics, more specifically how much I hate them due to the chaos of the 2020 election and the anger that people had at each other and the people in charge of the government.
Everyone in this country is angry at each other just because of their opinions. People getting into fights, people protesting for trump to remain in office even though Biden got all the votes, and even the white house being raided. And especially since my parents talk about it a lot, I just could not take it anymore. I am absolutely done with everyone, everything, and this entire country. Everyone arguing about Trump and Biden just needs to shut the heck up and cry in their trucks with American or confederate flags hanging off their tailgates. I just got so fed up with everyone yelling at each other about their opinion of who should be president that I started to come up with ideas to rebel against everyone talking about politics. But now, I am writing this song in order to release some of my emotions. The other experience that gave me the idea for this song is learning about Rafael Trujillo in Spanish class. The many things he did during his reign, killing tons of people and committing genocides towards people originating from Hati, gave me the idea to switch from just normal politicians to corrupt politicians. And the anger toward all politicians I feel (and my love for the band Cannibal Corpse) gave me the idea for the violent depictions as shown in the song.
I do not really consider myself a poet of any sort. I don’t see myself constantly writing poetry throughout my life. So how do I work my way around this? Well, it’s simple, really, music. But not the music you are thinking of. While everybody else performs Hip Hop songs because Hip Hop is the most poetic of music genres, I decided to pursue my own interest in my favorite music genre, metal. For this example, I will be using the genre of grindcore and goregrind for my poem to tell a rebellious story, while making it metal as crap, by the request of Lori. Originally, I was going to do a Thrash Metal song revolving around equal rights, it turns out I do not know how to display equal rights, so I decided to go through my other interest, politics, more specifically how much I hate them due to the chaos of the 2020 election and the anger that people had at each other and the people in charge of the government.
Everyone in this country is angry at each other just because of their opinions. People getting into fights, people protesting for trump to remain in office even though Biden got all the votes, and even the white house being raided. And especially since my parents talk about it a lot, I just could not take it anymore. I am absolutely done with everyone, everything, and this entire country. Everyone arguing about Trump and Biden just needs to shut the heck up and cry in their trucks with American or confederate flags hanging off their tailgates. I just got so fed up with everyone yelling at each other about their opinion of who should be president that I started to come up with ideas to rebel against everyone talking about politics. But now, I am writing this song in order to release some of my emotions. The other experience that gave me the idea for this song is learning about Rafael Trujillo in Spanish class. The many things he did during his reign, killing tons of people and committing genocides towards people originating from Hati, gave me the idea to switch from just normal politicians to corrupt politicians. And the anger toward all politicians I feel (and my love for the band Cannibal Corpse) gave me the idea for the violent depictions as shown in the song.
Reflection:
During this project, I have learned to grow as a poet exponentially. I mostly learned to get a voice out about certain issues and my perspective about it. What really matters is that I learned how to do so in my own certain way doing a Metal song as my project. I also learned that I should only write about issues I fully understand. My first draft was completely different from my final draft in that my first draft was a stance on equal rights which since all equal rights stances are about women, I decided to make it about a man, but since I do not fully understand equal rights, I decided to shift my poem completely to tackle corrupt politicians. For example, here is one line from my first draft: “The man Suffers
And he Is still hated, The woman Is praised And she Lied That seems fair right?” and here is a line from the final draft: “Because now I have avenged the ones I love And I cannot wait to see them, when a coffin is where I am shoved”
The most important and prominent change is the complete overhaul my poem faced. I pretty much started from scratch at some point. Yeah the fact that it was going to be a metal song stayed, but the subgenre of metal changed and the everything else portion of the poem changed. First of all, it went from being about a man whose wife cheats on him and blames him for everything and even claims things he did not do into a man who assassinated the ruthless dictator of his country takes his family because they threatened his power and severed his town’s food supply to feed mostly himself. For example, the first draft starts the main topic out with the lines “Stranger Hits on his wife Manages to have his way with her Man Finds out His trust is betrayed He wants a divorce But wife beats him to court She Gets to make the demands She gets most of his money” and the final draft starts the main topic with “Into his office is to where I creep I go unnoticed as my baseball bat forces him into sleep, I drag him all the way back to my basement, Onto a stone table is his final placement”. This is because I believe I do not understand equal rights to much of an extent, and because of that I should not be writing about it. This changes the poem to reach out to people who feel bad for the people in oppressive dictatorships and wish to see bad things happen to brutal dictators.
The next most important thing is the genre change. Yeah, both genres are metal, but different types of metal. While the first draft is meant to be an old school style thrash metal song, the final draft is supposed to be a goregrind song. The best example of the changes is when the chorus kicks in the first draft, and the end of the first stanza on the final draft. The chorus of the first draft is the word “DESTROYER” repeated twice, which may not make sense now but it makes sense later on in the poem. Thrash metal songs usually have a title and a chorus that repeats the title that may not make sense. The final draft’s end of the first stanza “It will not be long till he is 6 feet deeeeeeeeep” ends with an extended version of the word “deep”, this is to signify that the song goes absolutely berserk at this point and the extended word is supposed to be a metal growl, thrash metal songs do not have growling vocals, making this separate from the thrash metal genre. I decided to change the genre because lori told me “if you want to go metal, go metal” which inspired me to go the most metal I knew how to go. This gives the experience of the poem so it would go with the NSFW gore parts.
The last change I can really think about is the change of structure between the first and final draft. For example, here is a stanza from the first draft:
“Man
Lives alone
His earnings and children gone
He
Gets a notification
Someone telling him to end his life
His ex wife
Has convinced
Everyone that he was in the wrong
She said
That he didn't support her
When she was in need
That
Was a lie
He went into debt to help her
She claimed
he beat and abused her
He wouldn't lay a finger upon her
Her new boyfriend
Treats her right
Or at least that’s what she claims”
And here is a stanza from the final draft:
“He wakes up tied down from head to toe
He looks around with the only light being a candle glow,
He sees the picture of him he forced me to put up
Outside of the frame and all ripped up,
Below it is a picture of a group that he had ordered to be killed
Below the words “do it for them” is written above a pool of black ink spilled”
As you can see, they look completely different. This changed because it needed to fit the genre of music more. Going from a thrasher that anything could go by, to a gorebath that needed a specific type of vocal style. This was to further fit the writing style of my inspiration song (Instinct of Survival by Napalm Death) to get myself a more accurate grind song which would improve the song by making it feel more close together.
During this project, I have learned to grow as a poet exponentially. I mostly learned to get a voice out about certain issues and my perspective about it. What really matters is that I learned how to do so in my own certain way doing a Metal song as my project. I also learned that I should only write about issues I fully understand. My first draft was completely different from my final draft in that my first draft was a stance on equal rights which since all equal rights stances are about women, I decided to make it about a man, but since I do not fully understand equal rights, I decided to shift my poem completely to tackle corrupt politicians. For example, here is one line from my first draft: “The man Suffers
And he Is still hated, The woman Is praised And she Lied That seems fair right?” and here is a line from the final draft: “Because now I have avenged the ones I love And I cannot wait to see them, when a coffin is where I am shoved”
The most important and prominent change is the complete overhaul my poem faced. I pretty much started from scratch at some point. Yeah the fact that it was going to be a metal song stayed, but the subgenre of metal changed and the everything else portion of the poem changed. First of all, it went from being about a man whose wife cheats on him and blames him for everything and even claims things he did not do into a man who assassinated the ruthless dictator of his country takes his family because they threatened his power and severed his town’s food supply to feed mostly himself. For example, the first draft starts the main topic out with the lines “Stranger Hits on his wife Manages to have his way with her Man Finds out His trust is betrayed He wants a divorce But wife beats him to court She Gets to make the demands She gets most of his money” and the final draft starts the main topic with “Into his office is to where I creep I go unnoticed as my baseball bat forces him into sleep, I drag him all the way back to my basement, Onto a stone table is his final placement”. This is because I believe I do not understand equal rights to much of an extent, and because of that I should not be writing about it. This changes the poem to reach out to people who feel bad for the people in oppressive dictatorships and wish to see bad things happen to brutal dictators.
The next most important thing is the genre change. Yeah, both genres are metal, but different types of metal. While the first draft is meant to be an old school style thrash metal song, the final draft is supposed to be a goregrind song. The best example of the changes is when the chorus kicks in the first draft, and the end of the first stanza on the final draft. The chorus of the first draft is the word “DESTROYER” repeated twice, which may not make sense now but it makes sense later on in the poem. Thrash metal songs usually have a title and a chorus that repeats the title that may not make sense. The final draft’s end of the first stanza “It will not be long till he is 6 feet deeeeeeeeep” ends with an extended version of the word “deep”, this is to signify that the song goes absolutely berserk at this point and the extended word is supposed to be a metal growl, thrash metal songs do not have growling vocals, making this separate from the thrash metal genre. I decided to change the genre because lori told me “if you want to go metal, go metal” which inspired me to go the most metal I knew how to go. This gives the experience of the poem so it would go with the NSFW gore parts.
The last change I can really think about is the change of structure between the first and final draft. For example, here is a stanza from the first draft:
“Man
Lives alone
His earnings and children gone
He
Gets a notification
Someone telling him to end his life
His ex wife
Has convinced
Everyone that he was in the wrong
She said
That he didn't support her
When she was in need
That
Was a lie
He went into debt to help her
She claimed
he beat and abused her
He wouldn't lay a finger upon her
Her new boyfriend
Treats her right
Or at least that’s what she claims”
And here is a stanza from the final draft:
“He wakes up tied down from head to toe
He looks around with the only light being a candle glow,
He sees the picture of him he forced me to put up
Outside of the frame and all ripped up,
Below it is a picture of a group that he had ordered to be killed
Below the words “do it for them” is written above a pool of black ink spilled”
As you can see, they look completely different. This changed because it needed to fit the genre of music more. Going from a thrasher that anything could go by, to a gorebath that needed a specific type of vocal style. This was to further fit the writing style of my inspiration song (Instinct of Survival by Napalm Death) to get myself a more accurate grind song which would improve the song by making it feel more close together.
warning: bloody background images and vulgar lyrics ahead
Model United Nations
In the wake of the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan after the Taliban took the country over, Lori's class including me did a project where we worked on becoming the United Nations for a little bit and coming up with resolutions for the Afghanistan crisis. We started with researching the problem and what was happening inside of Afghanistan. Then we researched our countries and learned about their history and beliefs (I was South Africa). Then we combined the two, researched our countries current place during the humanitarian crisis and came up with a resolution writing from my country's perspective. And finally, we presented our resolution at a mock United Nations meeting and discussed our resolutions.
Final Resolution
Reflection
Knowledge:
During this project I have learned how the biggest international organization holds meetings to solve problems the world might run into. The UN is what is holding the world together, so learning how it works could be a helpful skill to know how the nations of the world decide to solve problems. After this project, when something happens in the world, I know how the United Nations will try to solve it. One example of a problem happening right now is the Ukraine Russia crisis, now I know that the United Nations will discuss this meeting in a similar fashion to what we did for the Afghan crisis. Now that I know how the UN works, I can now say that the UN works in an effective way in order to control actions that can solve problems.
Refinement:
During the MUN presentation on Monday, I ran into a large obstacle, my social anxiety. Because I got socially anxious, I did not talk that much to people during unmoderated caucasus, thus, I was not able to get enough signatories for my resolution, though it was presented anyway. And when it was presented, it was outvoted 3 to everyone else in the class. So if I were to do this project again, I would talk to more people to get more signatories in order to get more votes in. And with more votes I would rather have gotten my motion passed, or less of a humiliating defeat.
Success:
That ended horribly for my resolution. Only three people voted for my resolution, and that includes me which honestly should not count. And when the all against went into action, the amount of hands that went up was overwhelming. So I did not pass my resolution during yesterday’s model UN. But Zoell’s group’s resolution was similar enough to mine, and that one passed and I voted on it. So I guess you might be able to call that a success.
Advice for future students:
The most important thing I can ask of you for this project is to talk to people. The more people you talk to, the higher your chances of success are. These being alliances, signatories, and votes you might get on your resolution. Do not let your social anxiety get the best of you during this presentation, talk to people, form alliances, get votes, get people on your side. Talking to people will make writing your resolution worthwhile because it will all not be for nothing when you talk to people and get signatories.
During this project I have learned how the biggest international organization holds meetings to solve problems the world might run into. The UN is what is holding the world together, so learning how it works could be a helpful skill to know how the nations of the world decide to solve problems. After this project, when something happens in the world, I know how the United Nations will try to solve it. One example of a problem happening right now is the Ukraine Russia crisis, now I know that the United Nations will discuss this meeting in a similar fashion to what we did for the Afghan crisis. Now that I know how the UN works, I can now say that the UN works in an effective way in order to control actions that can solve problems.
Refinement:
During the MUN presentation on Monday, I ran into a large obstacle, my social anxiety. Because I got socially anxious, I did not talk that much to people during unmoderated caucasus, thus, I was not able to get enough signatories for my resolution, though it was presented anyway. And when it was presented, it was outvoted 3 to everyone else in the class. So if I were to do this project again, I would talk to more people to get more signatories in order to get more votes in. And with more votes I would rather have gotten my motion passed, or less of a humiliating defeat.
Success:
That ended horribly for my resolution. Only three people voted for my resolution, and that includes me which honestly should not count. And when the all against went into action, the amount of hands that went up was overwhelming. So I did not pass my resolution during yesterday’s model UN. But Zoell’s group’s resolution was similar enough to mine, and that one passed and I voted on it. So I guess you might be able to call that a success.
Advice for future students:
The most important thing I can ask of you for this project is to talk to people. The more people you talk to, the higher your chances of success are. These being alliances, signatories, and votes you might get on your resolution. Do not let your social anxiety get the best of you during this presentation, talk to people, form alliances, get votes, get people on your side. Talking to people will make writing your resolution worthwhile because it will all not be for nothing when you talk to people and get signatories.
Adolescence project
During this project, I focused on adolescence and the aspects within it. I did multiple smaller projects revolving around adolescence to make up this bigger project. These project include a mask which resembles an aspect of adolescence, for example, my mask resembles the good and bad within adolescence. It also includes an essay which talks about the drawbacks in adolescence and how much it, in my own words "sucks" but near the end, I tell you how it can suck less. And for the presentation, I did a PSA along with Shea and Finn's Kahoot describing that stereotyping is wrong and that we should not do it.
mask
on the outside, there is a black side and a white side, the white side
resembles the good there is within adolescence, and the dark side resembles the suffering within adolescence. |
on the inside is two objects within that go with the white side and the dark side. On the white side, there is a pillow, the soft feeling and comfort resembles the piece and tranquility within adolescence. The black side however is laced with thumbtacks, the pointy needle and the uncomfortable feeling looking at it resembles the pain and suffering through adolescence.
|
Essay
This essay is what I consider the big part of the project, this essay talks about the hardships and suffering that comes along with adolescence, but near the end, I explain that it does not have to entirely suck, if not at all.
here it is in it's entirety
Adolescence Sucks
I am going through adolescence, and let me tell you, it kinda sucks. You constantly feel as if the people around you don’t understand who you really are, you always feel anxious about fitting in with your peers and trying not to stick out like a sore thumb, and your hormones don’t really know when to settle down and get some rest. Adolescence has me experience a sensation of a sour feeling of anger and sadness a lot of the time. But what if I told you that it doesn't have to suck. What if I told you that you can somehow make everything better. What if I told you that I can make your adolescence suck less and make sure you are making the most out of it?
First of all, let me introduce what is possibly the most important aspect of adolescence. I have hormones, hormones suck, and chances are, you also have hormones. And you totally understand my perspective. Recently, I had a hormone spike one day during school and I could not focus on schoolwork no matter how hard I tried, and it soured my mood up until the end of the day. That day, my hormones hit every single one of my systems randomly. I did not have the power flowing in my body to really do anything. During Spanish we had a test. My eyes felt tighter than ever before and my brain felt compressed, like it was a balloon getting tighter and smaller as it deflated. I asked my teacher if I could take the test another day. Lucky for me, she accepted my humble request.
Paragraph source 1 source 2
Obviously, as you have noticed, I am not the only one who is going through hormones. In fact, all adolescents have hormones, and chances are, you have had or are currently undergoing hormonal changes. Due to our body’s changes, we cannot escape it, no matter how hard we try. We are all just a few with hormones in a hormone filled world. So now is where I describe, what are hormones? Hormones are chemicals in your body that assist with growth and development. Think of hormones as the educators of the child that makes up your body, there to instruct it on how it works so it can learn how to function properly and keep you alive and kicking. But as you enter your adolescence, the sex hormones (estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone) kick in. When these hormones fluctuate, which means that they start unpredictably rising and falling like a roller coaster speeding up steep hills and falling short ones over at six flags where all the fun happens, your mood randomly swings, such as this one time I was in a pretty good mood, but then I was in a bad mood. It’s like playing a video game, just minding your own business walking through a blue glowing enchanted forest then all of a sudden the ground below you just collapses into a million rocky shreds, sending you pummeling into a deep dark cave underground, and accidentally discover a secret boss fight contained within this enchanted forest. It just goes from one mood or feeling to a completely different one. But the thing about hormones is that they are being controlled by the nature of your body and only the nature of your body. It is like a parent telling it’s child to do something such as cleaning the bathroom, and they refuse so much the parent eventually gives up and goes to sit down on the couch and watch “Grey's Anatomy” when suddenly a few hours later the child is on its knees in the bathtub scrubbing away. The parents could not control them, they cleaned the bathroom when they wanted to. This situation is a lot like adolescents and hormones. Unfortunately, because of these hormones and our inability to control them, people assume teens are soulless creatures who want nothing more than to party and get laid. And thus, we are dreadfully misunderstood, and even the ones who are not like this are not safe.
For instance, near the back of the bus is where this group of guys sit, and I sit back there as well. As I was sitting down where I usually sat, the bus driver told these children who were getting on the bus to stay away from there. I assumed she was implying that we were creatures who crawl around terrorizing the world with blood red eyes, scouring the world for 2 things, weed and children. I know I am not one of them but I took it quite personally, thinking of myself a bit less. But most of the time, adults and students think more of me than what I actually think of myself. They always describe me as the best thing that ever happened to them, they always talk about what I do right and what is so great about me. They always seemingly place me on a pedestal and worship me like cats were worshiped back in Ancient Egypt. They see me as an angel, as one who can do no wrong and who’s presence automatically lightens the room and brightens everyone’s smile with my own.
But they are dead wrong and here’s why. First of all, I only sometimes smile, so that is already inaccurate. But more importantly, they seem to look around all of my flaws and exclusively focus on what they think of me. I feel as if it is about time to focus on the real me, the actual me, the one with all of my flaws. I am not the messiah, I am not the golden boy everyone thinks I am, I am a normal human being like the rest of these people. I have my flaws, and what are those flaws? Well,
These make me feel a bit angry, knowing that people only really see one dimension of me and don’t see all the pain that I go through. I know more about myself than they know about me and it’s not ok for them to assume things about me. But they are going to do it anyway because I am a teenager, they will always see the thin one side that I always show on the outside. These people are thinking of me as a completely different person then what I actually am. I am not the man they think I am, I am the man I think I am. This is supposedly because I act differently around people than I actually act. That’s why they think of me as that person. I wish that they can open up my skull and take a little look inside of my brain and see within the person I actually am. Because that will make them see the kind of person I really am, the one they don’t think I am.
But how can you stop them from thinking of you differently than what you think of yourself? Well, you can’t. Teenagers are the most demonized age. And everyone will see you differently because of your age.
That is why I think adolescence is the absolute worst time a human goes through. Your hormones, the people around you, everything just sucks! But, what are we going to do about it?
The best thing that I can tell you about this is don’t let it all go to your head like I had. You see that door on your head that is wide open? And you see all those negative emotions rushing toward it at a concerning rate? Quickly close it, if those things manage a way into your head, boy are you going to have a bad time. This may be the worst time of your life to live in, but I must tell you to make the best of it. It can be hard, and it will be hard at times, but if you find the right people to hang out during lunch, and convince the adults you know yourself, and ignore the ones against you, you can live a less miserable adolescence. I hope you take this advice and live a good adolescence, I would hate to see you suffer like I did.
here it is in it's entirety
Adolescence Sucks
I am going through adolescence, and let me tell you, it kinda sucks. You constantly feel as if the people around you don’t understand who you really are, you always feel anxious about fitting in with your peers and trying not to stick out like a sore thumb, and your hormones don’t really know when to settle down and get some rest. Adolescence has me experience a sensation of a sour feeling of anger and sadness a lot of the time. But what if I told you that it doesn't have to suck. What if I told you that you can somehow make everything better. What if I told you that I can make your adolescence suck less and make sure you are making the most out of it?
First of all, let me introduce what is possibly the most important aspect of adolescence. I have hormones, hormones suck, and chances are, you also have hormones. And you totally understand my perspective. Recently, I had a hormone spike one day during school and I could not focus on schoolwork no matter how hard I tried, and it soured my mood up until the end of the day. That day, my hormones hit every single one of my systems randomly. I did not have the power flowing in my body to really do anything. During Spanish we had a test. My eyes felt tighter than ever before and my brain felt compressed, like it was a balloon getting tighter and smaller as it deflated. I asked my teacher if I could take the test another day. Lucky for me, she accepted my humble request.
Paragraph source 1 source 2
Obviously, as you have noticed, I am not the only one who is going through hormones. In fact, all adolescents have hormones, and chances are, you have had or are currently undergoing hormonal changes. Due to our body’s changes, we cannot escape it, no matter how hard we try. We are all just a few with hormones in a hormone filled world. So now is where I describe, what are hormones? Hormones are chemicals in your body that assist with growth and development. Think of hormones as the educators of the child that makes up your body, there to instruct it on how it works so it can learn how to function properly and keep you alive and kicking. But as you enter your adolescence, the sex hormones (estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone) kick in. When these hormones fluctuate, which means that they start unpredictably rising and falling like a roller coaster speeding up steep hills and falling short ones over at six flags where all the fun happens, your mood randomly swings, such as this one time I was in a pretty good mood, but then I was in a bad mood. It’s like playing a video game, just minding your own business walking through a blue glowing enchanted forest then all of a sudden the ground below you just collapses into a million rocky shreds, sending you pummeling into a deep dark cave underground, and accidentally discover a secret boss fight contained within this enchanted forest. It just goes from one mood or feeling to a completely different one. But the thing about hormones is that they are being controlled by the nature of your body and only the nature of your body. It is like a parent telling it’s child to do something such as cleaning the bathroom, and they refuse so much the parent eventually gives up and goes to sit down on the couch and watch “Grey's Anatomy” when suddenly a few hours later the child is on its knees in the bathtub scrubbing away. The parents could not control them, they cleaned the bathroom when they wanted to. This situation is a lot like adolescents and hormones. Unfortunately, because of these hormones and our inability to control them, people assume teens are soulless creatures who want nothing more than to party and get laid. And thus, we are dreadfully misunderstood, and even the ones who are not like this are not safe.
For instance, near the back of the bus is where this group of guys sit, and I sit back there as well. As I was sitting down where I usually sat, the bus driver told these children who were getting on the bus to stay away from there. I assumed she was implying that we were creatures who crawl around terrorizing the world with blood red eyes, scouring the world for 2 things, weed and children. I know I am not one of them but I took it quite personally, thinking of myself a bit less. But most of the time, adults and students think more of me than what I actually think of myself. They always describe me as the best thing that ever happened to them, they always talk about what I do right and what is so great about me. They always seemingly place me on a pedestal and worship me like cats were worshiped back in Ancient Egypt. They see me as an angel, as one who can do no wrong and who’s presence automatically lightens the room and brightens everyone’s smile with my own.
But they are dead wrong and here’s why. First of all, I only sometimes smile, so that is already inaccurate. But more importantly, they seem to look around all of my flaws and exclusively focus on what they think of me. I feel as if it is about time to focus on the real me, the actual me, the one with all of my flaws. I am not the messiah, I am not the golden boy everyone thinks I am, I am a normal human being like the rest of these people. I have my flaws, and what are those flaws? Well,
- I have Autism
- I might have ADD (attention deficiency disorder) which makes it very hard to focus on other people
- My sense of humor is very hit or miss
- I am quite lazy and pack a beer gut at 16, when I can’t legally drink yet (well, I am actually thinning up so…..)
- And finally, I am very depressed and have a slight chance of being prescribed with antidepressants
These make me feel a bit angry, knowing that people only really see one dimension of me and don’t see all the pain that I go through. I know more about myself than they know about me and it’s not ok for them to assume things about me. But they are going to do it anyway because I am a teenager, they will always see the thin one side that I always show on the outside. These people are thinking of me as a completely different person then what I actually am. I am not the man they think I am, I am the man I think I am. This is supposedly because I act differently around people than I actually act. That’s why they think of me as that person. I wish that they can open up my skull and take a little look inside of my brain and see within the person I actually am. Because that will make them see the kind of person I really am, the one they don’t think I am.
But how can you stop them from thinking of you differently than what you think of yourself? Well, you can’t. Teenagers are the most demonized age. And everyone will see you differently because of your age.
That is why I think adolescence is the absolute worst time a human goes through. Your hormones, the people around you, everything just sucks! But, what are we going to do about it?
The best thing that I can tell you about this is don’t let it all go to your head like I had. You see that door on your head that is wide open? And you see all those negative emotions rushing toward it at a concerning rate? Quickly close it, if those things manage a way into your head, boy are you going to have a bad time. This may be the worst time of your life to live in, but I must tell you to make the best of it. It can be hard, and it will be hard at times, but if you find the right people to hang out during lunch, and convince the adults you know yourself, and ignore the ones against you, you can live a less miserable adolescence. I hope you take this advice and live a good adolescence, I would hate to see you suffer like I did.
Reflection
I was a soldier clad in green doing my part in my special ops coup.During this project, I have grown in multiple different ways, academically and as a person. One way that I have grown this project is as a writer, as I have learned several components to writing a fantastic essay. First off, I have learned that for an essay, it does not have to be perfect the first time. In fact, you can make it the worst piece of literature ever written for your first draft, but then slowly work it up into your own personal masterpiece. A lot like a small seed which starts out looking all wrinkled up and just plain ugly but later sprouting out of the dusty rough soil and becoming the most gorgeous tree with a large brown stump and leaves that feel like silk. Oh yeah, speaking of a small seed which starts out looking all wrinkled up and just plain ugly but later sprouting out of the dusty rough soil and becoming the most gorgeous tree with a large brown stump and leaves that feel like silk, I learned how to show what I am writing about rather than tell what I am writing about. Now rather than, she cried when she failed her exam, I can say, a small, watery tear managed to crawl it’s way out of her tear gland and claw its way to the very edge of her cheek and take a leap so gracefully, suddenly, its existence was cut oh so short when it crashed and fell apart on a white paper with a big red F with a great big circle surrounding it. And finally, I managed to make my writing more emotional, for example “These make me feel a bit angry, knowing that people only really see one dimension of me and don’t see all the pain that I go through. I know more about myself than they know about me and it’s not ok for them to assume things about me. But they are going to do it anyway because I am a teenager, they will always see the thin side that I always show on the outside.” All of these elements I learned on writing combined was able to make the advanced writing style I used in my essay. And now that I know all of these, then that means that there are more essays to come from me using this kind of writing.
From these projects that made up the Adolescence project, I have learned some very valuable lessons. But the biggest one I learned is going to have to definitely be that adolescence is very hard for everyone, but it does not have to suck. The best example of this is actually in my own essay, where I write about the struggles and the downsides of adolescence. But then in the very last paragraph, I write about how you can make it suck less. Because teenagers are so demonized, we are very misunderstood, our sex hormones do not know when to get a rest, and overall it is just not the best time to be alive in. But the best advice I could give is not letting it all go to your head. And to resemble the good and the bad, I based my mask around it, making a light side and filling it with pillows on the inside, resembling the good, and a dark side with thumbtacks on the inside, resembling the bad times during adolescence. Because of these essays and my mask, it helped me understand that adolescents don’t get it well. But with struggle comes glory, because 1, it will not last forever, and 2, there are still good moments within adolescence.
Throughout this semester I have grown as a project worker greatly. This is due to the fact that I have learned to expand throughout the project as the time went by. When the project starts I gain a basic understanding of what I need to do. But as the project goes by, your brain manages to reach its hands out and grab more and more chunks of information until it gives birth to your final project. This is best exemplified by the essay due to the draft system that Lori used. As I wrote the rough draft, I was told to put every effort into writing it. But as the second and final drafts rolled by, the effort grew and grew up until it became a beautiful golden glowing masterpiece.
For the actual exhibition I was placed in a group with Shea and Finn, and in that group contributed an important piece of our presentation. For this presentation, I made a PSA that advertises the troubles and problems of teenager stereotyping and why it should stop. It was heavily based on the BCSPCA and AASPCA PSAs which feather this Canadian singer named Sarah McLachlan with all the sad looking dogs, yeah you know the ones. I feel like I have done the best that I could have done this project due to me doing my special part and letting my classmates handle their own ideas for the presentation. If I were to do this project again, I feel like I would have done the same thing along with helping the other guys with their projects a little due to them helping me a little bit. But overall, I was a soldier clad in green doing my part in my special ops coup.
From these projects that made up the Adolescence project, I have learned some very valuable lessons. But the biggest one I learned is going to have to definitely be that adolescence is very hard for everyone, but it does not have to suck. The best example of this is actually in my own essay, where I write about the struggles and the downsides of adolescence. But then in the very last paragraph, I write about how you can make it suck less. Because teenagers are so demonized, we are very misunderstood, our sex hormones do not know when to get a rest, and overall it is just not the best time to be alive in. But the best advice I could give is not letting it all go to your head. And to resemble the good and the bad, I based my mask around it, making a light side and filling it with pillows on the inside, resembling the good, and a dark side with thumbtacks on the inside, resembling the bad times during adolescence. Because of these essays and my mask, it helped me understand that adolescents don’t get it well. But with struggle comes glory, because 1, it will not last forever, and 2, there are still good moments within adolescence.
Throughout this semester I have grown as a project worker greatly. This is due to the fact that I have learned to expand throughout the project as the time went by. When the project starts I gain a basic understanding of what I need to do. But as the project goes by, your brain manages to reach its hands out and grab more and more chunks of information until it gives birth to your final project. This is best exemplified by the essay due to the draft system that Lori used. As I wrote the rough draft, I was told to put every effort into writing it. But as the second and final drafts rolled by, the effort grew and grew up until it became a beautiful golden glowing masterpiece.
For the actual exhibition I was placed in a group with Shea and Finn, and in that group contributed an important piece of our presentation. For this presentation, I made a PSA that advertises the troubles and problems of teenager stereotyping and why it should stop. It was heavily based on the BCSPCA and AASPCA PSAs which feather this Canadian singer named Sarah McLachlan with all the sad looking dogs, yeah you know the ones. I feel like I have done the best that I could have done this project due to me doing my special part and letting my classmates handle their own ideas for the presentation. If I were to do this project again, I feel like I would have done the same thing along with helping the other guys with their projects a little due to them helping me a little bit. But overall, I was a soldier clad in green doing my part in my special ops coup.
Works Cited
“Teenage Hormones and Sexuality.” Newport Academy. Published 15 December 2012. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GatmkqBXU1UKaoVCQGafcxG-Wt7oTf8f7DcRJKGTh04/edit?usp=sharing. Accessed 18 November 2021.
Dr. Ananya Mandal, MD “What are Hormones?” News Medical Life Sciences. Published 5 November 2019. https://www.news-medical.net/health/What-are-Hormones.aspx. Accessed 18 November 2021