"The price of greatness is responsibility." --Fortune Cookie
I digress. Does this show fear of commitment? Fear of responsibility?
What are your thoughts on this Fortune Cookie philosophy? on responsibility?
I was originally going to write about Gidget, the movie, and get all feminist on y'all. But as I was looking for a picture of the movie cover to accent the blog, I came across this other person's blog that inspired me to write about something entirely different. On that person's blog was a survey about who you were most sorry to see die. It was either a) sandra dee or b)Hunter S. Thompson. Looking at the results, HST beat Sandra Dee.
Hunter Thompson was one of my dad's best friends. Hunter Thompson was extremely passionate about two things: professionoal football, and politics. My dad was in the NFL at the time, playing for the Redskins (he also played for the cowboys, rams, and eagles), and he was very close to the Kennedy family (my Godfather is Joe Kennedy--Robert F. Kennedy's son). They met when my dad was on the campaign trail for McGovern.
Hunter--or Uncle Hunter as I called him--knew me since I was a fetus. He played with me throughout my childhood when I went up to Woody Creek, and I shot my first gun with him. He also came to Hawaii a lot to cover the marathon. When he came, he would always drive around with me in his limo. He would usually bring some actor with him (because he was in the process of planning a Curse of Lono movie) the first actor that he brought out to Hawaii was Sean Penn. I was 11, and I vaguely knew him as an actor. Sean Penn had brought his wife, Robin Wright, and his daughter and two sons. His daughter's name is Dylan. We became friends in the limo playing the game "Concentration 64". The same limo in which I recently found out that Uncle Hunter was snorting coke in. He was such an old proffesional, and so graceful with drugs that no one noticed what he was doing (only my mom noticed because she is sharp on the observations from being a P.I.). He sure knew how to hold his stuff.
Uncle Hunter's death was really hard on my dad especially so, because dad because he had called my dad only a couple days before his death complaining about the football season ending. I was sad and cried from the bitter irony of it all, but soon accepted it because Hunter was in pain (he had broken his leg on the last trip to Hawaii, it hadn't healed well), and how else could he end is life in a more appropriate manner? He did things on his own terms, no matter what it was.
Looking back on my relationship with Uncle Hunter, I smile at my naivety. I didn't have a clue to what he had done, who his alter ego Doctor Gonzo was. I just knew him for who he was around me, and that was Uncle Hunter. Now that I'm old enough to read his books, and watch the movies made from those books, I'm awed and frankly inspired. He invented a whole new style of writing! It's in the dictionary.
I really feel lucky to known Uncle Hunter for who he really was, not the Doctor Gonzo personna that he puts on for most people. Like I said before, I feel inspired because of his fantastic writing, and his individualistic attitude. I hope I'll have his courage to stand strong, and be myself no matter what.
Here is a video clip from movie that my dad's friend made--it's Uncle Hunter's biography:
Here is a video clip from the movie version of his book Where the Buffalo Roam:
This I Believe NPR
Some questions came to mind after I listened to this podcast. Where does this guy live? Where has he been? These questions came to mind because in Hawaii, there's tons of cool (except we call it aloha). We are mellow people. On the road, though we may have the right away, we let the other person go. Merging is not a problem. And in our starbucks, I do see some people on their computer, but most times I don't even see the faces of the people drinking their coffee, all I see are the covers of books or the front pages of the newspapers (reading seems like a cool thing to do).
We learned in AP psych that some people like higher arousal in their daily lives (i.e. lots of stress or fast paced lifestyles), and some people like low arousal. So this cool factor all depends on what kind of person you are, or what mood your in. You absolutely need to express your anger, otherwise you get things like Columbine. So being pissed off sometimes is ok. I guess you just have to be careful about how you express your angry emotions.
If when he was talking about people being stressed and highly work minded he was talking about L.A., or some places in New York, sure. I can see where he's coming from. But those places are SUPPOSED to be like that. What if L.A. was relaxed and mellow? Would a vacation feel as refreshing? I would like to cite Mark Twain from his book Following the Equator. He says that without swearing, cursing, drinking, stressing, etc, you would never be able to relax. You would have no bad habbits to quit! This relates to what I was saying before because if New York, or L.A. was "cool", then it would disrupt the balance.
I think cool is great, but to fully appriciate cool, you need some stress.
This I Believe NPR
"Sometimes a belief becomes clear only when being threatened."--Yasir Balloo
This American-Muslim Yasir Balloo is a legal immigrant and is working as an attorney. He feels that America is his home. As he walks through airport security or the mall, he gets strange looks, though he is an American. When goes and visits his relatives in the Middle East, he ends up defending American, our way of life, and our government. But when he is in America, his home, he has to defend his religion of Islam to his friends and coworkers.
How can a country made up of all the races in the world, and most of the religions be so judgmental. We are in the twenty-first century, living in a modernized, civilized country, and yet people living in this country still are judged by their race. Why? This man is an American, and as an American, he deserves to be treated fairly, like any other American of a different race.
Our country was started by people who were PERSECUTED FOR THEIR RELIGION. Why are we, the offspring of these founding fathers, persecuting other people for their religions?? That just strikes me as the ultimate hypocrisy.
Living What You Do Every Day
This I Believe NPR
"I believe in being what I am instead of what sounds good to the rest of the world."--Yolanda O'Bannon
Here is a poem that I wrote a while ago about myself and who I am in this world, about who I want to become. This poem has to do with stereotypes, also. For a while felt a little trapped by stereotypes, and I felt helpless. Then I read Maya Angelou's "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", and I felt wonderfully inspired. I wrote this poem last year and it has really become a huge symbolical force for me. I constantly go back and read this poem when I'm feeling trapped like I did before, or just helpless for one reason or another. I really felt that this ties in with the podcast because Yolanda felt a little trapped and scared to do what she really wanted to do because of what other people were thinking and their stereotypes. Then she just broke free from all of that and did what she loved and blossumed into who she really was (like a butterfly).
Forgetting reality
Forgetting the chains bound
Onto butterflies wrists
Forgetting the universe pressing [me] on from either side of me
Squashing what
I
Want to say
Because i’m so small and
I
Don’t have a chance
(Yeah right)
I’ve leveled mountains
At a glance
Changed the rivers course
With one word
Gotten through cat fights and
dream squashing lectures
And there’s a hell of a chance I’ll get through you
Cause I’ve sweat whole civilizations
And now I’m gonna breathe fire
Through flaming nostrilsBURN
A place for me
In old stone buildings and
Hundred-year-old cobblestones
In history books and the memories of thousands
And I’m gonna do the things people say
Aren’t possible
And see the things people think
Aren’t real (to hell with reality)
I’m gonna be a fire breathing
Chain breaking
One of a kind in the whole wide universe
BUTTERFLY
Ever since I was a little girl, I loved science. I used to dissect lizards in the backyard. I always got an A in science at my old school, and in this one. Throughout my life so far, I’ve been fascinated with the human mind, and how it relates to the body; how the outside world was interpreted by our brains, and how we expressed ourselves into that world.
But I also remember the first time I could read a word, as clearly as if it were yesterday. It was after Mrs. Taylor’s English class, and grandma was driving me home with Andrew. We had been trying to read these different level books (once you finish a book of one level, you move up to the next). I was at the highest level in my class, but the words still weren’t clicking. I couldn’t look at a word, and know what it was immediately. On the drive home with grandma, everything finally clicked. I remember looking out the window, and being able to read all of the signs! I cried out with delight and started laughing. I could read any word that grandma put in front of me. I finally was able to see the words that would teach me so much about myself, and life.
These were both my passions: science, and English. Math I didn’t like so much. Science and English both challenged me and made me happy, though people said it didn’t make sense, because I guess if you liked science, you had to like math. I’ve always been different, because I’ve always followed my heart, and not what people said were the “right” and “wrong” ways to do things.
Tonight when my mom was telling me that because I might not take a science course next year, somewhere down the road when Stanford (the college that I’ve wanted to go to since I could speak) is reading my application, there could be a problem. The people at Stanford might not think that I like science anymore, because of that gap. I can’t get into the head of the admissions people, but I can read every scrap of information that I can get from there website, and from my college counselors. Stanford’s website says that, “The qualities that unite Stanford students and faculty members as a community of scholars - curiosity, passion, imagination, and wonder - are the same qualities we seek to uncover in your application…As we review your application, the theme or idea that is always in our heads is “intellectual vitality.” We want to see your passion, dedication, and genuine interest in expanding your intellectual horizons throughout your application.” I have curiosity, imagination, and wonder for both science and English. So it doesn’t matter if I don’t take a science course, right?
It’s hard to decision, because as much as people tell you that high school doesn’t decide your future, in some ways it does. It helps you to choose courses that challenge yourself and help you to grow into a better person. For me, both English and science are important to me, and they’re both subjects that I wish to know more about. Choosing a course that will challenge me also is important, because I value my self-growth.
That’s why after an three hours of sitting on my day bed and thinking about my life goals, and my goals for high school, I decided that I will take a science course, even though I have three credits already (more than Punahou requires). I will still take one of the English courses that I wanted to take, even though I can’t take both anymore. I have two choices for my English course: either Speech: the Art of the Spoken Word, or Composition. And for my science course, I’m going to take Anatomy and Physiology, because this year I’m taking AP psychology, and it seems like it would be an interesting course to take after psych.
Strangely (or maybe not so strangely) I feel extremely emotionally exhausted from this whole processes. Is it supposed to be this time and emotion consuming? I’m going to go take a aspirin.
With names like Seven for All Mankind, and Citizens of Humanity, you would think that these jean brands would be interested in mankind and humanity in general, therefore promote environmental sustainability by using organic cotton, hemp, or bamboo to make their jeans. WRONG. They use the regular, pesticide covered cotton that uses a whopping 15-25% of the insecticides, pesticides, and inorganic fertilizer used in the world, though only accounting for 3% of global crop acreage. Not only is cotton using pesticides and insecticides that pollute our oceans and air (and our bodies), but they're using gallons upon gallons of fossil fuels to make and spray these chemicals. Also, cotton fields are major contributors to soil erosion, and the depletion of the natural minerals and nutrients in the soil. Because most farmers use the monoculture technique in planting, when they pull up the crop, the fields are left empty for months at a time (during the winter). This leaves the soil barren and often blown away. I'm not sure if any of the readers learned (or maybe remember) the dust bowl in the midwest states. We can't afford for that to happen again.
Anyways, as I was wearing my Seven for [hurting] All Mankind jeans today, I realized that this really needs to stop. From now on, I'm only going to wear jeans that use organicly grown material. When I got home and looked up some of the websites selling these jeans, I was pleasantly surprised at how cute they were. I bought a couple pairs and they should be coming in the mail any day now! Yay!
check this website out for more info: http://www.organicconsumers.org/clothes/
Here's a links for a cool website selling both male/female products:
http://btcelements.com/index.php?cPath=21_45
An Amazing Blog
As I was browsing around a few minutes ago, I came to this amazing blog. The first think that I noticed was that this blogger had over 200 blogs. Whoa! Talk about commitment. And the blogs aren't inconsequential, they are MASSIVE. Seriously, each blog is a loggorhea (I learned this word on his website!). Mr. Roth has the gift of the gab. Anyways, I just wanted to recommend this blog to anyone who may be bored and/or interested in learning something new. By the way, in case you didn't notice, the title "Amazing Blog" is a link to the website...
In this short, Robert Thompson reads a blog that talks about how a friend of the author's got a water buffalo from his daughter for Christmas. The author's friend isn't actually going to get this water buffalo, but it's supposedly going to a family in China. At least that's what the daughter thought. Apparently, if you read the fine print, it tells you that the water buffalo is actually a "symbolic gift" of what $250 would buy, and that there's no real family. The money just get's dumped into a charity. One of Robert then thought, what would happen if we got a real family from China a water buffalo. After talking with some poor farmers, they found out that a water buffalo "would be the best gift"--a water buffalo is worth a years salery to them.
Basically what happens is that Robert Thompson goes out and hunts for a perfect water buffalo and gives it to a deserving family. The family is where the title of the short comes from, because there are four generations in their family are still living, but there are only four members of the family.
It was a pretty powerful piece. One thing that I found when juxtaposing it with Singer's Solution was that it actually inspired me to help, instead of making me feel defensive. I wanted to buy a REAL water buffalo for a family.
What Robert Thompson read in that man's blog was exactly what would happen if everybody just gave some of their money to charities that claim to be giving real water buffalos to real families. Not that I'm saying charities don't help, but I'm saying that sometimes their money doesn't go to all the right places, or maybe doesn't help buy the things it claims to buy.
The real difference between these to fairly similar ideas (Singer's Solution saying to give money, Thompson saying to give the family a water buffalo) is that one is saying just give your money to X charity and then forget about, while Thompson's saying to actually help these families, if not by getting personally involved, maybe sending items like school supplies to help the kids.
The way I see it, one man is saying give the poor, suffering people fish, while the other person is saying TEACH those poor and suffering how to fish. The money can be spent, and after it's gone, no one will remember it, and it will just be a thing in the past that they can't get back. While giving them the tools to make their own money (i.e. the water buffalo), the families will be able to run their farms more efficiently, and be able to make more money and have a better lifestyle.
Giving your money away is not bad, and the organizations that are giving away water buffalos, building schools, etc do need money to run their organizations. But be careful where you donate your money, and at all possible costs, try and DO something for the people.
I am millions of nuclei that are being orbited by sub atomic particles that release energy filled with joy, gratefulness, and love. I am a mind filled with unknown possibilities, filled with eagerness to learn, filled with knowledge already learned. I contain glands that make up my endocrine system and help me feel emotions. I have nerves that help me sense the world around me. I have eyes that interpret whatever’s out there into this world that I see. I have a voice that speaks loudly and clearly, never hesitating to let people know how my opinions on issues that we are forced to face in this young millennium. I am a body that’s strong, and tall, and not afraid to stand up for what I believe in. I am a human being currently living on planet Earth, located in a vast universe that, as far as we know, is both infinite and expanding. I am a philosopher who appreciates the laughing, smiling life that I lead. I am a teenager growing up in paradise surround by people that I love, and who love me.
I am a reader. I am always reading a book. Some of my favorite authors are Richard Bach, Mark Twain, Robert Frost, Marcel Prust, Wilbur Smith, Tom Robbins, and John Steinbeck. I feel like a fuller person because of reading. I’ve shared so many stories with people; I’ve shared so many lives. I feel like a small part of me becomes most of the character’s I read about, and they help to inspire me and lift me up. Those characters are a part of who I am; they make up my identity.
I am also a writer. I try to write everyday, but it’s really more like every two days. In my journal I put everything from newspaper clippings, to sketches and poems. I like to look back on my old journals and see how much I’ve grown, because I can see that I grow so much every second of every minute (and not just in terms of height). I love writing because it is a form of expression where you can create an entire world, without limitations, or where you can write ideas, and opinions, and they’ll be immortalized in the written word.
To summarize me, I would say that I am someone who gives out love copiously, but who also retains their self love, I am someone who loves to learn new things but makes sure to critically think about each idea to insure their validity, and I am someone who tries to be open minded, and receptive to other peoples ideas and beliefs.
This is a response to this article: http://www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/19990905.htm
In considering The Singer Solution to World Poverty, my first reaction was shock and confusion. It seemed to me that this man was suggesting that every person in the United States would be keeping $30,000 of the money that they made. All the rest would be ripped from our "greedy" hands and given to the poor, or the starving overseas. His source said that the average American household spends about $30,000 on necessities and necessities are all we need. I suppose that my first question for him would be what is an average American household? And also, what are considered necessities? Food? Water? Education? This doesn't seem anywhere near accurate. For example, take an average family of three who chooses to put their child in Punahou. Already half of their alloted money is gone on the Punahou bill (around $15,000). This leaves them with a meager $15,000 left. The rent for a "average" sized house in Kailua, for instance, is about $2,000. Take this times 12 (the months in the year), and what does it leave the family with? Nothing, actually. No, excuse me, less than nothing. It leaves them about six grand in debt. What would he have our family give up? The child's education? The families house, maybe? Does he want them to live on the street, starve, and have to have the other people who managed to stay under their $30,000 pay their way?
He says that he is a "utilitarian philosopher", someone that "judges whether acts are right or wrong by their consequences". Let's evaluate his ideas based on the criterea of a utilitarian philosopher. Singer tells us to call this number, or visit this website, and donate money, right now. He even suggests that we stop reading to preform the transaction. What are the consequences of our actions? Do we really know to where, or to whom, the money will be sent?
Here's one possible scenario of what would happen if we sent our money overseas: the money get's sent to the government of some poor, developing country, where the leaders are corrupt and are actually the ones causing the problems (as is the case in many countries). By giving money, we aren't actually helping the poor, dying children, but hindering them. The money that we send their government might get put into the development of the militia, and create more war, and less saving of lives. What now?
I've considered the possible consequences, and in the place of a utilitarian philosopher, it's obvious that this isn't the "right" thing to do.
Understand that I'm not propogating selfishness, etc by saying that throwing most of my income blindly overseas is not a good idea. I'm fully for the betterment of the world. Notice that I said entire world, not just overseas. Singer is only focusing on overseas problems, when he should simultainiously be focusing on the problems on our own turf. In America, we have poverty, we have unnecessary deaths, we have crisses, but Singer doesn't mention this in his article. Take Katrina, for example, the people are still suffering from that natural disaster. But instead of donating money to those families, Singer is saying we should send all of our extra money overseas to struggling families over there. What message does this send to the suffering children in New Orleans? Singer himself could be considered just as bad as "Bob" who chose to let the car run over, because Singer is letting children suffer.
Singer also talks about how our government only gives .09% to overseas organizations. This does seem like a small amount compared to Denmark's .97%. But as far as helping people overseas, isn't America going above and beyond in terms of monetary spending on Iraq? We are helping those suffering families there who were being tortured and killed by a ruthless dictator. We're giving their country an entirely new government, and helping them modernize their cities. Does this not count as far as our .09% is concerned?
It seems to me that The Singer Solution to World Poverty isn't the solution at all. For all the talk about being a utilitarian philosopher, Singer didn't really look at the consequences of his plan. Though he had good intentions, his article was biased and narrow-minded, and his solutions had serious design flaws. He seemed to want to make the reader feel unnecessarily guilt-ridden and selfish, when the truth is that they're most likely not. We all have the right of freedom. We have the freedom to make our own choices (whether they be right or wrong) about how we spend our time and especially money (what's left after taxes, that is), and I for one, don't like being told what to do with my freedom. But Singer also has the freedom of speech, so he can tell us in his self-righteous article that we are selfish people, and that we are immoral if we don't give money overseas, but we also have the right to tell him he's wrong.
Recently, it seems that butterflies have been coming into my life from all angles. In almost everything I've read, there has been a butterfly reference. This poem for example. I flipped open my Robert Frost collected poems and stories, and here it was. Magic? Fate? Then, in the book "Breath Eyes Memories" the main character, a young Haitian girl, is given a statue of her favorite spirit/god Erzulie takes a chronically bleeding girl and says to her that if she wants the bleeding to stop, she has to transform into either an animal or a plant, and she choses to turn into a butterfly. These are only two examples, but ever since I wrote that poem about me being a fire breathing butterfly, wonderful stories about butterflies have gravitated toward me. I've decided their my new symbol (ish).
About the poem by Robert Frost, I started crying when I read the line " Thou didst not know, who tottered, wandering on high,/That fate had made thee for the pleasure of the wind". It just seems so wonderful. I guess because it seems like we are all butterflies, made for the pleasure of the wind, whatever that may be. It just seemed so true and perfect. Don't you just love how Robert Frost picks his words, and how each one not only sounds wonderful when you read it, but really means something. And not in the way that you understand it, or it's clever, but it means something. Robert Frost came up in this huge discussion that I had with my parents about what is art (including literature style art), what makes it good, etc. I was taking the ultra-liberal point of view, which is "everything is art, its just the way you look at it" sort of thing, and they were taking the "good art/bad art/not art at all" perspective. We ended up having this discussion all day! It reminded me of politics. Here is my conclusion: don't even try to label art work (at least for now). I will just like what makes me feel good, and for the pieces that I dislike, I will attempt to like them, but if I try and can't like them, I'll just let it go. I've decided that judging art is impossible (what's good or bad in art is really, really relative) if you want to be fair, because it's someone's point of view, and no one else will nessicarily have that same view. So that's it.
Robert Frost--My butterfly
Thine emulous fond flowers are dead, too,
And the daft sun-assaulter, he
That frighted thee so oft, is fled or dead:
Save only me
(Nor is it sad to thee!)
Save only me
There is none left to mourn thee in the fields.
The gray grass is not dappled with the snow;
Its two banks have not shut upon the river;
But it is long ago--
It seems forever--
Since first I saw thee glance,
With all the dazzling other ones,
In airy dalliance,
Precipitate in love,
Tossed, tangled, whirled and whirled above,
Like a limp rose-wreath in a fairy dance.
When that was, the soft mist
Of my regret hung not on all the land,
And I was glad for thee,
And glad for me, I wist.
Thou didst not know, who tottered, wandering on high,
That fate had made thee for the pleasure of the wind,
With those great careless wings,
Nor yet did I.
And there were other things:
It seemed God let thee flutter from his gentle clasp:
Then fearful he had let thee win
Too far beyond him to be gathered in,
Snatched thee, o'er eager, with ungentle grasp.
Ah! I remember me
How once conspiracy was rife
Against my life--
The languor of it and the dreaming fond;
Surging, the grasses dizzied me of thought,
The breeze three odors brought,
And a gem-flower waved in a wand!
Then when I was distraught
And could not speak,
Sidelong, full on my cheek,
What should that reckless zephyr fling
But the wild touch of thy dye-dusty wing!
I found that wing broken to-day!
For thou are dead, I said,
And the strange birds say.
I found it with the withered leaves
Under the eaves.
Messiah's Handbook quote of the blog:
"There's no disaster that can't become a blessing, and no blessing that can't become a disaster"
This relates to what I was talking about before, about art. Disastorus art can become a blessing in someones eyes (someone who share's the same point of view as the artist), and vis versa for good art (some people hate Monet...).
Forgetting the chains bound
Onto butterflies wrists
Forgetting the universe pressing [me] on from either side
Squashing what
I
Want to say
Because i’m so small and
I
Don’t have a chance
(Yeah right)
I’ve leveled mountains
At a glance
Changed the rivers course
With one word
Gotten through cat fights and
dream squashing lectures
And there’s a hell of a chance I’ll get through you
Cause I’ve sweat whole civilizations
And now I’m gonna breathe fire
Through flaming nostrilsBURN
A place for me
In old stone buildings and
Hundred-year-old cobblestones
In history books and the memories of thousands
And I’m gonna do the things people say
Aren’t possible
And see the things people think
Aren’t real (to hell with reality)
I’m gonna be a fire breathing
Chain breaking
One of a kind in the whole wide universe
BUTTERFLY
Blackness
Pure void
What can I do but stare?
When such a flamboyant
Display of
Inter galactic
Mystery is before my eyes
I am dizzy from it all
When does it stop
An infinity expanding into more
Electrons fizzing, spinning
Sharing, they don’t care
Where they go, who they are
Look eyes, look
Physical limitations prevent
Me from really seeing
What is there, instead of the
Absence of color, and light
Rods and cones confused
Burn burn burn
Take me back to the
Periodic table elements
No more bullshit
No more finite
Skin holding these
Tangible limits
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