No Society can be Completely Equal

In my Freshmen English class we read a novel called Animal Farm written by George Orwell. Animal Farm is a book based on the idea of Socialism, and Marx's theory that there can be a society where everyone is completely equal. The book was written during the time of the Russian Revolution. I feel like the main theme of the book is in a society there has to be someone with more power, the problem in this is that it has to be the right person who won't abuse their power. During Animal Farm Old Major (who is an allegory to Marx) gives this idea of socialism, and all the animals being equal in power. An allegory is a symbol expressing truths about human life.When Old Major dies, the pigs take over his idea. The pigs both try to have this idealistic "perfect" society where each and every animal is equal on the farm. One of the pigs (Napoleon) gets big headed and kicks the other pig (Snowball) out of the farm. Napoleon then brainwashes the animals telling them that he is always right. Napoleon comes to more and more power, tricking the animals, and is running his own dictatorship. This shows how everyone can not be equal in a society. If there is a society without leaders, there is no order, and it is not really a society because eventually someone will have to claim power.

Looking Toward Thanksgiving

One of my favorite holidays each year is Thanksgiving. I love all the different foods and fun on Thanksgiving. Each year on Thanksgiving my family wakes up and watches the parade on television, goes to my Pawpaw's house with my mom's side of the family for lunch, and stays there until time to go to my nanny's with my dad's side of the family. We do this every year so that we can spend time with all of our extended family. Not only is Thanksgiving a time of great food, which I absolutely love by the way, but it is also a time that I reflect on my thankfulness. I have so many great things to be thankful for, and I am so blessed. I am thankful for my family, even though me and my younger brother don't get along well I love my family so much. I'm thankful that even though my older brother is in college, he's only 20 minutes away and he comes to see me all of the time. I love this because my older brother and I are very close. Thanksgiving is a wonderful time of year. Also, I chose this picture of ham because I don't like turkey on Thanksgiving, I'd rather have ham. 

Influence on Career Day

At my school, we had a career day on November 16, 2011. Everyone had to choose 4 sessions to attend. The 4 sessions I chose were Engineering, Law Enforcement, Ministry, and Nursing. My favorite session was the nurse session. I don't want to be a nurse, but the way that the lady spoke about nursing and all the perks made me consider to be a nurse. When I grow up, I want to be an actuary or an accountant. The nurse that spoke to us loves her job alot, and it made me think that maybe I would be happy with this job. She did a great job speaking, and I really enjoyed her presentation. I learned a lot about how nurses can work in such different fields with just being a registered nurse.

Food for Julius Caesar's People

This semester my freshmen English class read the play, Julius Caesar. In response to this play, we each had to do a project from a list of different projects. I chose to do the food project. For my project, I researched the dinner, Cena (Coena), from ancient Roman times. I learned many things about the customs and rituals of the ancient Romans during their dinner time. Did you know they layed on a couch to eat supper if they were rich? I didn't until I researched it. I brought in sparkling grape juice, a bag of fruit that included grapes and oranges, and a pork tenderloin that was cooked in grape juice. Each of these things were some of the things that the Romans would have ate duirng Julius Caesar's time. My whole class ate everything with their hands, because the Romans didn't have forks during that time. Here is a link to my presentation on the food.
Ancient Roman Food Prezi

"Be Transformed, Not Just Conformed"

At my private Christian school, we had a spiritual emphasis week during the week: October 31, 2011- November 4, 2011. A spiritual emphasis week is a week that we have chapel everyday, and it's a big emphasis on a certain topic each year. Our school usually has these weeks twice a year. This year the week is about being transformed, not conformed. The speaker, Brent, challenges us everyday to stop living out the good and evil and just live out the life of Christ. One of my favorite things we have talked about this week is the stuff we went over the first day, being refined. God is like a gold or silver refiner, he takes us out of the mood and dirt no matter how deep He has to dig, and makes us as good and as pure as a solid piece of gold or a glittery diamond. The refining process of Christianity, just like the refining process of gold and silver, is a very long and rough process. Each part of the process is going to hurt. The processes are: Being taken out of the mud, being cleaned off, being heated up to a liquid, being boiled and the gunk scraped off the top, being boiled with lead to suck out all of the impurities, and last being hammered and shaped into what God wants us to be. This process will require a lot of heart, dedication, and time, but it is something all Christians need to go through at some point. I love Mr. Brent's analogies and his whole speech on this day. I think that what he said applies to me, I just need to let the Lord refine me, just as a lot of Christians do. Being refined isn't something that will be easy, but with God we can all make it through.

Being a True Friend: In-text and in Life

My freshmen English class read a Shakespeare tragedy, Julius Caesar. In response to the play I am applying a theme from the play in to real life. I think the most important theme of this play is "What it means to be a true friend." Being a true friend means you are always sticking by your friend's side, letting him know if he's getting off track or too prideful, and always being there to stick up for you friend. In the play, the protagonist, Brutus, is not a very true friend. Brutus thinks of what his friend, Julius Caesar, might do if he became king. He did not warn Caesar not to be too ambitiousness or warn him to be too prideful. Instead, Brutus just killed Caesar thinking of what Caesar might have done. On the other hand, Mark Antony was Caesar's true friend. Antony stood up for Caesar when Caesar couldn't stand up for himself. Antony proved that Brutus's accusations were wrong and avenged his friend. In real life, true friends stick up for each other. If another person is gossiping about you, your true friend would stick up for you, and he/she would say it isn't true.The friend might even say that the group shouldn't be gossiping about you. This is what a true friend is in real life.

Hunters in Today's Society

     In response to "The Most Dangerous Game", a short story my English class read, I have been asked to answer a question. A man in the story named Rainsford made a statement, "The world is made of 2 classes: the hunters and the huntees". I have been asked if I think this statement is true or not. I think this statement is true because, not in literal sense, the world is full of hunters, hunting people. I think of this as the government and bosses are hunters; they try to find employees to boss around and control. The employees remind me of the huntees; they are just trying to stay alive. The bosses remind me of the hunters, because they usually have an advantage and use that advantage over the employees.

Goals to Set a Better Foundation

       As a freshmen I have set myself a few academic, social, and spiritual goals for the year to start off my high school career well. Some of the academic goals I have set for myself are to maintain my straight A's, improve my study skills and habits, and get better at not procrastinating. I always tun in my assignments when they are suppose to be turned in, but I always wait until the last minute to do them. I give myself enough time to do them, I just should get it over with faster so I don't have to worry about it so much in the end. The social goals I have set to accomplish are to spend more time with all of my friends, I'm always so busy between sports, school, hanging out with my family, and hanging out with my boyfriend that I hardly ever leave time for all of my friends. I spend almost every weekend with my best friend, but not any of my other friends. Another social goal is to meet all of the new kids in my grade, we have about 17 new kids in 9th grade and I have only met half of them, 2 weeks into school. One last social goal I have set for myself is to stay out of the drama, and don't be involved in gossip because your name can easily get thrown somewhere it shouldn't. The last goals I have set for myself are spiritual goals. I plan on getting closer to God and improving my relationship with Him. I would also like to tell at least one other person of the amazing love Christ has for them. In this picture are my goals for my freshmen year, and I know that if I keep my mind to it I can accomplish them.

Appearances Don't Tell a Person's Story

         The theme of The Outsiders, a required summer reading book, is: People may appear to be complete opposites on the outside, but on the inside they are exactly alike. The Greasers and the Socs are completely different people looks wise. The Greasers have greased back hair and are very poor, but the Socs are rich, drive cars and get everything they want. They appear so different on the outside, like the animals in this picture  but on the inside they both are the same. They feel hate because they want more than they have, and they feel loss for the loved ones who have been killed. The animals in this picture look completely different on the outside as well, but on the inside they just want one thing; to survive.