Racial Tension

Unfortunately, honestly totally unfortunately, I was unable to see the racial panel because I was out of town. I was really looking forward to it. However, I really enjoyed the number of discussions we had about race last week. The video we watched on the case and riots were really eye opening. As we discussed in class, I found it really interesting to think about it from the rioter's perspective. I talked about it with my mom at home afterwards and it is so true, that although, as a white teenage girl living in an affluent area, I think what the black people did was crazy and uncalled for and so dangerously far. When I stop and think about what they were facing, it honestly makes sense. How else would they be able to progress forward and improve their situation. If they just spoke, there would be little to no action taken and their would still be policemen beating them up for no reason and judges and juries ruling against their favor. I think that race was a very interesting topic to study because it is something that we all deal with and experience everyday no matter our skin color, especially in the melting pot of the United States.

LGBTQ

A few weeks ago a panel of LGBTQ students came to speak with our class. I think that this panel was a really fabulous idea and I am sad I was unable to attend the race panel that occurred today. This was a really great idea to expose students to the thoughts, feelings, and experiences of different sexualities. As students at Stevenson High School, I think we are very comfortable in our own routine and very focused on ourselves and our academic lives, rarely taking the time to step outside of our own boundaries to consider the lives of people outside our friend group. Personally, I try to always be inclusive and kind, but I really didn't know much about this specific part of our population, nor do I come into contact with many of them. Hearing the events in their lives that have shaped them into who they are today was very touching, especially hearing the struggles they had to go through with their parents, family, and friends, as well as the everyday difficulties they have with bathrooms, locker rooms, etc. What was nice to hear, on the other hand, was the relief they felt when at Stevenson, with the exception of the bullies one might find in the hallway. Learning about their lives really taught me a lot more and increased the respect I have for these people. This really strengthened my perspective as a student from a very religious christian family, and living with my 90+ year old grandparents (who are very traditional and stuck in their ways and complete disdain all LGBTQ people). Living in a more liberal age and area, I think it is important for us to expand our horizons and step outside of our comfort zone.

The Mother's Trust Foundation

My mom has worked with the Mother's Trust Foundation for a long time. It is an organization out of Lake Forest that raises money and collects donations to give to underpriviledged families. A few years ago the organization opened up a teen section to contribute to donations and fundraisers. I began volunteering with them last year. Every year, the teen section runs a coat drive in December and a baby item drive in the Spring. As the only memer who lives in Long Grove, I opened up my own sector of the teen drive. Last Saturday I completed the spring drive, dropping off a toyota highlander full of items collected from various locations around Long Grove and Buffalo Grove, including St. Mary's Church, Reverie Dance Academy, and the Peppermint Stick. The items collected for this drive were donated to mothers in Lake and Cook County who had children between teh ages of 0-2 years old who are unable to provide for their children. Although I wasn't able to meet the mothers and children receiving this aid, the amazing thing about our coat drive is that I am able to meet the families receiving the winter apparrel items.
In the winter coat drive, what really was amazing to me was the gratitude I saw from people of all ages. I witnessed young girls jump with excitement when they saw a dirty, old pair of boots and warm, dry socks. Although I am not in a great inancial situation, especially compared to the majority of Stevenson, I was really able to gain a new perspective overwhat I do have. Most of the people there were people of color and the teenagers I saw probably went to a bad high school. Unlike me, who has the opportunity, drive, and support to work hard in my jobs and in school, they have very different support systems and role models. I really, really enjoyed this experience, meeting people of all different ages, races, ethnicities, and religions. People of all different walks of life who ended up in the same situation. It is really worth the hard hours and multiple phone calls to find places that will hold change and collection jars.

Sunday School

This Sunday I volunteered at my church, leading a youth group of ages 4-5. Every Sunday I volunteer with these children, teaching them about the Bible and the Lord, watching them grow. Because it is at a church the people, both young and old, are all Christian. It is, however, a nondenominational church, so the people are off all different sects of Christianity: Catholic, Protestant, Lutheran, etc. As a Youth leader I work with children and other adults. The people I work with are of all races and ethnicities. I ignore all of the skin colors and unique features that surround me, trying to include everyone whether they are in my group or not. Before church actually stops there is about 30 minutes where all the children have a time to play and interact with eachother. This is a really nice time for the children to meet others and to get to know other children from different areas and of different races. As a chaperone/facilitator/leader, I try to look for the kids that are playing alone or isolating themselves from others. If I see any children alone, I invite them to play with me and a few other children. The most rewarding part is as the children begin to play and interact in depth I am able to back away from them and watch as they form new friendships and strenghen bonds.
I volunteer as a church leader for 2 hours, and the drive one way is 30 minutes. That makes my voluneer service 3 hours every sunday. I don't mind this time spent in church because, first I don't mind being in church, but also because I truly love the relationships I have developed with the children I teach. I love working with children, all 5 of my paying jobs are doing something with children, but doing this on my own time and really having the ability to get to knonw the children all around, not just through their school work or in dance class, is a real treat. It is a really wonderful experience to get to know them in a peaceful atmosphere.

Family Matters

As I asked my mom the first question, about what expectations she had for me before I was born, she looked at me shocked and said nothing. I continued to prompt, trying to get some sort of answer, and she said literally all that mattered was having healthy babies. When I continued to question her, she explained to me why. My grandma had 7 miscarriages and 1 successful birth of a baby girl, who died when she was 3 months old. Finally my grandpa said no more and they adopted 2 children, my uncle and my mom. Because of this past, my grandparents basically said everything my mom did would cause a miscarriage, because this was what they believed/were told. She couldn't lift her arms over her head, or eat too much garlic (which is hard for us Italians). She lived in fear everyday that she would do something wrong and her baby would die, so all she ever prayed for and expected was a healthy baby. The values question was a difficult one for my mom to answer. Raising us on her own, she has done her best to teach us all that she could, and to be the best version of ourselves. She said that she tried to raise us with a sense of charity and service, as well as compassion and kindness. She also tried to instill a sense of family, home, love, and friendship. Done with the moral values, my mom said she also tried to teach us good work ethics and always told us to prioritize God first, then family, then work. My mom said that I act nothing like my father. I have my personality from her. It's a personality "filled with color" as she put it. That my giggles and love for laughter, happiness, and life itself come from her. I have also inherited her flexibility and free-spirit, enabling us to plan trips and change plans in a heartbeat (not always what my siblings like to do). I found this interesting because I haven't seen my father in 11 years so I was curious if she thought this was because of that, or I was born that way. To answer this question she told me that my brother and sister are much more like my father. Saying that the way they analyze and think about everything they are going to do is very much like him. Also, their stubbornness and need to always have the final word comes from him as well. Finally I asked her if there was anything from him she saw in me. She told me I got his big brown eyes and thick eye lashes, however, nobody knows where I got my height. She also said that in the morning I wake up just like he does, "like a turtle coming out of it's shell" is how she described it, emerging from the blankets in the morning, rather than burying myself under them (like my sister). I think looking at these things were especially interesting because they show what my brother, sister, and I received genetically from our father (because none of us know him) and what we all inherited from my mother as she raised us.

Tuesdays With Morrie

In Tuesdays with Morrie, Mitch quickly became the portrayal of a typical American. He was so focused on deadlines and time management that he rarely stopped to think and enjoy himself. This focus on deadlines stems from his, like many other's, obsession with success. He was so focused on having a "full" and "complete" life, thinking the way to do this was by creating a family, making lots of money, and having a successful/steady job. Even his Tuesdays spent with Morrie began for work, recording his stories and theories for his writing. Another folkway of the American culture that Mitch holds true is to not talk about death. Whenever the subject would come up, Mitch would change subjects, and if it didn't, he avoided it. 

Morrie, on the other hand, consistently breaks these folkways. He openly speaks about death and what is happening to him, often relaying his belief that "we must love each other or die". Morrie also teaches Mitch something that many Americans should learn, to just stop and appreciate. He wants Mitch to just stop, to take a break from all of his deadlines and requirements, and to look around and see the beauty in the world and appreciate the life he was given. Something that I really like that Morrie said was that "we always need others to survive. When we die, are born, and especially in between, however our culture looks down on dependency". I greatly agree with this statement. We all seek to become "independent". Personally, I have been looking forward to going away from home, far away, to college since I was probably about 9 years old. I love traveling alone and being able to get around without needing my mom to chauffeur me. Even though I enjoy this independence, I am still greatly aware of my dependence on others. I am connected to people and dependent on them for everything I do and receive. The food I buy from grocery stores, the gas I put in my car, the books I read, the clothes I wear, everything I use is made or grown or transported by someone else. I depend on my teachers, my parents, my friends, my employers, etc. This is not only me, but everyone in the WORLD, yet everyone glorifies this idea of independence, seeing it as a sign of success. It is like what Morrie says, "we must love each other or die". If we choose to not love each other, this dependency that keeps us alive will fail us, because we will refuse to accept this dependency or allow others to depend on us. 

The Lost Boys Move From Neverland

This week in sociology we watched a movie about a group of Sudanese refugees who were granted entrance to the United States and decided to come over to make their lives better. I have always been a very culturally aware person, maybe not as much as I could be, but very much so when compared to the "average American"(whatever that may look like). Anyways, when I heard the Lost Boy's perspective on Americans before coming to the USA, for example how they said we were lazy people, I could somewhat agree with him. There is a lot of success and a lot of hardworking people in the United States, however, some have become lazy, not needing to work extremely hard to get by. Compared to typical life for the lost boys the majority of Americans have it easy, we can buy pre-slaughtered, and cleaned meat, our food is packaged and already made, our water runs into our showers and toilets, our drinking water is purified and comes in bottles. This comparison and stereotype of Americans being lazy, although not completely true, didn't faze me. What did, was what they said when they were in America. I was literally disgusted by the way they were treated. I try to be a friendly person to strangers. I have learned this from my mom, to always be open to meeting new people, and because of it I have friends all over the country and world that I keep in contact with. For example, when I was in Nashville last summer, I met a girl from China and we still email back and forth. However, a lot of times people aren't as friendly back to me, like when I was in New York city and standing by someone in line, I started talking to them and literally received one word responses. This weekend I was a director for Operation Snowball, a retreat that promotes healthy lifestyle choices and expanding your boundaries, one big part of it is meeting new people. Thinking about the lost boys this weekend while I was leading my retreat, I realized that even suburban teenagers in the midwest (what's supposed to be a ridiculously friendly area in the US) require a specific weekend retreat to meet new people and feel comfortable talking to strangers. This was kind of a culture shock to me, allowing me to remove myself from what I was comfortable with doing and seeing, and realizing how other cultures may respond to it. Another thing that really got to me was when he said that they were no longer to walk into convenience stores in large groups because the store owners were stereotyping them and grew afraid. I was really disappointed to hear that, but not at all surprised. Even I am guilty of doing this. When I am walking on the street of a city, rather than asking a black man for directions I would most likely choose a white man. Although this may not always be the case, I realize how much I look at  race and gender and immediately make assumptions and judgements. This movie was really amazing to watch because it opened up my eyes to how closed off and isolated Americans have become. We are no longer about the inclusive, welcoming community, but the self.

The Ever So Sociological Lorax

The Lorax is a fantastic movie, coming highly recommended from a random high schooler who had the privilege of watching it in her sociology class. It is about a society that grows so technologically advanced and they live inside a little city area. Inside the city, they have every type of weather they want: beaches, snow, parks, etc. All of the nature, however, is fake, mechanical. The people of Thneedville's Social Construct of Reality is that the world is solely made of technology and nature is unnecessary and basically nonexistent. All they know is that nobody travels outside of the city walls, until a daring 12 year old boy travels outside in search of a tree. When he does this, he sees the dreary reality of life outside the city and what the citizens of Thneedville have condoned without even knowing it.
Throughout this movie, many sociological terms can be seen and identified. One such term is ethnocentrism which means culturally centered, in other words, you think your culture is the best. One specific example of this is at the end when O'Hare, the head of Thneedville, continues to fight against planting the seed and allowing trees to grow. He gives a speech about how living without nature is better and continues by singing this Brief Blurb in the middle of a song about letting the seed grow.
Another sociological term seen in The Lorax is when Ted uses his sociological imagination to think about the Trufulla Trees Audrey shows him and what life was like with the trees around. He decides to take this exploration of his sociological imagination further, going to visit the Once-ler to ask him about the trees. The Once-ler shares a story of a time when he was not very sociologically mindful. He only thought about his technology and what he wanted, rather than thinking about the nature he was destroying around him and how his actions would impact them.
When the Once-ler cut down the trees to create a thneed, conflict theory was exhibited between nature and society. Nature and society clashed and caused a major change resulting in the complete destruction of nature and the creation of the town of Thneedville.

Plungers Unite

I volunteered this weekend participating in the Polar Plunge in Fox Lake. I raise $120 to donate to the Special Olympics from 11:30 am-2:00 pm. Wow, what an experience. So first of all, we ran into a frozen lake in the middle of the winter on February 26th, 2013. It was FREEZING in the water. When I ran in I decided to go under completely, that's right, face, head, hair, EVERYTHING. I didn't feel the cold until I actually ran out of the water, then I felt like little needles were poking me everywhere, but more like dull needles that made me feel weird, rather than in pain.
While I was volunteering I took note of my surroundings, trying out this newly found sociological mindfulness. In doing this I saw people of all different ethnicities, ages, races, and genders. The oldest person plunging was an 83 year old woman, I'm not sure how old the youngest was, but I know at least 5. The people wore everything from bikinis to t-shirts to outrageous costumes. My best friend and I dressed as superheroes, her as batgirl and me as superwoman. My favorite costume was probably a family that dressed as the Addams family. There was one for every character, even cousin it and the hand!!
The people I came into contact with were of all different personality types as well. When the plunge first started, I tried to see those who were already jumping in, and people also trying to see the shore amidst the chaotic crowd were pushing and shoving to get the best view. Others, such as those working at the check in table and announcing prizes were excited, smiling, kind people. Some were screaming with excitement and jumping up and down in anticipation, others remained calm and collected. The people I encountered were from all over the area and were all very different.
At the plunge, lunch was served. They set out pizza, which was gone almost immediately (I didn't even get a slice) and a lot of different types of chili and soup, which totally makes sense because of the activity we were participating in. They also served coffee cake, coffee, and cupcakes.
Before actually plunging, like that whole week, I was so excited and couldn't wait for the plunge to actually occur. This feeling remained constant until I was standing on the beach about to run into the water and I realized what I was about to do. Expectations turned into reality when I was running out of the freezing cold water and could only think about getting into a heated tent and changing into my warm coat and sweats.
It was so ridiculously fun and I'd recommend it a million times to anybody who asks.

Sociological Mindfulness

Sorry this is late! I thought I had already done a blog, I'm really not even sure if I'll get credit for this, but I'll still do it! So last week we did a sociological experiment. My group tested to see the typical student's purpose of working to obtain money at Stevenson High School. Whether it be out of necessity or luxury. Our hypothesis said that the majority of Stevenson High School Students had jobs solely to have extra spending money on things they wanted rather than needed. As my partner and I were creating the survey and asking the questions I realized how just a few weeks of class had already made me act more sociologically mindful. Rather than asking questions like "What is your gender?" and having two answers: boy or girl, I asked, "What gender do you identify yourself as? and included 3 answers: boy, girl, and other. This new mindfulness also occurred while I surveyed people. When we arrived at the question about ethnicity, rather than looking at their ethnic features and skin color and answering it myself, I took the time and consideration to ask. Although some chuckled at the question, replying, "I'm obviously caucasian, do I look black?" a few surprised me, being latino rather than caucasian or half of something. This new sociological mindfulness has crept up on me from just a few weeks of class and a short amount of learning, I can't wait to see what it will do for me and make me observe as the semester continues.

Nothing.

Nothing. No one. Standing in the middle of a public space, doing nothing, felt beyond odd. I wasn't bored, I have a talent for entertaining my mind when nothing is going on, but it was almost as if I went unnoticed. I stood in the mall for 10 minutes doing absolutely nothing. No phone. No iPod. No talking. Just standing. I'm not sure what exactly I'm supposed to do for this assignment, so I guess I will just blab about what happened and what I noticed.

Throughout the entire 10 minutes, I went basically unnoticed. A few people passed glances at me or shot looks at the wierdo standing alone in the middle of the mall, but other than that people just passed, only really looking at me if they were about to run into me. It was like standing in New York City where everybody is too busy to stop and look around at the people and places they are passing by, except I was in the suburbs of Chicago. I guess this was a good lesson to experience. People should take more time to enjoy those simple moments in life, to just breath. I think that everybody in today's society are so caught up in the latest technology, newest design, and most expensive car, that we don't stop to appreciate the abilities we have and the beautiful things we can see with this new technology. So many people don't even talk face to face anymore. How many girls have had their hearts broken over text because their significant other can't gather enough courage to break up with her and see her reaction. Although it may seem like a lot, this is what I got out of doing nothing for 10 minutes.

As for my wandering thoughts during those brief 10 minutes, I began to notice the minor details that would have blown right past my brain had I been speed walking to the next sale rack. I saw the loving gaze of the old man staring at his wife and the way two young siblings laughed with each other without a care in the world. I noticed so much more than I normally would have, and than anyone around me. No matter how uncomfortable I felt in the first few slow, agonizing minutes, as my mind adjusted it was almost fun doing nothing.

The shades I wear are made of optimism and hard-work, pink and blue, unique family lifestyles, independence and just going with the flow. They were built by my adaptable mother and traditional Italian Grandparents as well as my friends, acquaintances, family, and community. My parents have been divorced since I was 2 years old and I haven't seen my father since I was 7. What a sad thing you may think, but in reality my life is probably much better without him. My life experiences are a big part of the shades that I wear. Living with only one parent and no contact with the other for more than half my life has required me to step up in my responsibility. I take on many more tasks, as well as many more responsibilities than many of my peers. Another thing that has impacted my shades greatly is the fact that my 93 year old grandmother lives with me. Having constant relations and contact with two different generations at once has expanded my tolerance for others and my acceptance and knowledge of different viewpoints, whether they be more conservative or liberal. Only living with one parent has also caused a lack of planning. Often times my mom will ask us what we're doing for the weekend and if the answer is nothing she'll say, "great pack up and let's drive somewhere". The trips usually end up in Tennessee, Wisconsin, and sometimes even Florida. This has caused my personality to take on a high tolerance for adaptability, spontaneous actions, and adventures. Another aspect of my personality is my acceptance of different cultures. My mom works with people around the world, constantly traveling to their countries or inviting them to stay at our house when they are in town from their own. This has given me the ability to learn about so many different cultures, standards, and customs around the world and has allowed me to be comfortable around and accepting of people who are different from me.