Growing Up...

So I haven't been on here in a while, nor have I made a post in a while. A lot of stuff has happened since my last post in November. I turned 18, met my wonderful boyfriend Kenny, graduated high school, and lots of other fun stuff. Being 18 doesn't really make you feel any different, it just makes you feel like you can do more and you have more responsibilities. Me and my wonderful boyfriend Kenny have been together since December 2, 2011. Love you:) Graduating high school was by far the best thing that has happened to me since November. Graduating high school is always very emotional and wonderful for everyone. I can honestly say it wasn't what I expected at all but it was fun. Hardly any of my family showed up. Go figure. But luckily my Mom, Aunt Bert, Kenny, and Alex were all there for me. Love you all! It meant a lot to me that they showed up. My Sister and Brother-In-Law couldn't make it, along with my Aunt Darlene, Cousin's Mandi, Kevin, and Isaiah, and my Grandma Barb. It's alright that none of them made it though. I have learned over the years not to expect much out of my family. Them not showing up was no surprise. The hardest part of graduation was knowing that my Grandma Martha wouldn't be there to watch me walk the stage and receive my diploma. She passed away on my 16th birthday, in 2009. I used to be super close with her and i've never really gotten over her death. We all mourn for a period of time after the loss of a close family member. I mourned for quite some time, but unlike most people I never really got past it. I always wanted to make her proud and I know that on May 27, 2012 she would have been proud of me. My Grandmother had 3 children, 8 grandchildren and 12 great grandchildren. I was the youngest of the grandchildren. I was the first, of her 3 children and 8 grandchildren, to graduate from high school. It deeply saddens me that she never got to see me. I know if she was there that she would have yelled the loudest. Im starting to tear up just thinking about it. Im sure she had a party in heaven for me. I hope God is treating her well up there. I miss and love you Grandma. We shall meet again one day in heaven, for you are my guardian angel:)

And mothers are their daughters' role model, their biological and emotional road map, the arbiter of all their relationships. ~Victoria Secunda

I want my Mom to know that no matter what, I will always love her. I will always love her, and not just because she is my Mom. I believe that a Mom should not only be a Mom, but also a best friend and role model. My Mom is even more than that to me, she is my hero. I have always told her that she is my hero, and she is very well deserving of this title. She has been through so much in her life, and i am sure there's things I don't even know about. All of that is beside the point however, her being my hero has to do with what she has been through, how good of a mother she is, and who she is today. Even though she has been through a lot, she is a very great person today and continues to be. She would do anything and everything for somebody that needed help. She has always been that way, my Aunt is like that too. I believe its just the way they live their lives. Nobody is perfect, but they sure do all they can for the world. My Mom is a great person, not only to the world but to me. I hope when i grow up, that im at least half the woman that she is. One day when I have kids, I want to be their hero, just as my Mom is mine. We have had our struggles but I would say its just normal teenage daughter- mother issues. At the end of the day, we get past those and we have a good relationship. Last week I had my senior photo shoot. It was kind of bittersweet, but yet scary at the same time. The photo shoot went great but the thought of growing up kind of scares me. I'm really glad that my Mom and Aunt tagged along on my photo shoot with me and Amy Scott from RAARS Photography, Amy is a great photographer and im glad they got to share this great experience with me. The photo shoot really got me thinking about life though. Im going to be 18 in three short weeks. I will be "grown", that's scary. A lot of times us kids will talk about wanting to move out, and go away to college. As much as I want to do that, its scary, growing up is scary. I don't ever want to lose the relationship I have with my Mom, and we need to do more things like the photo shoot together so we don't lose our relationship. As we all grow up, we drift apart. You should never drift apart from you're hero....thanks for everything Mom. You truly are my hero.<3 Love you:)

Feel free to check out my Moms blog post about me on her blog.

This week in the google reader world

I was actually very surprised when i logged into my google account and saw all the useful information on it. I was beginning to think that I wouldn't have much to write on this blog post because I wasn't finding much useful information. Yahoo answers has actually been helpful and its nice to see different peoples opinion on racism and if it will always be around. I read something this week that really opened up my eyes about racism. A couple people on yahoo answers said some very insightful things this week. One of those was " Racism will always exist, and not, as the black nation says because of white people, but because all people are different." Its true, everyone is their own person and we are all very different people. Until the world accepts the fact that everyone is different then racism will exist. Another thing that i found insightful was, "So eliminating those who do not fit the ideal race profile will "fix" the issue. The problem is that racism even thou a matter of color is more of matter of discrimination. So even if we "fix" the race issue people will find something else to discriminate about (i.e. hair color, eye color, nose shape, height, nationality, etc)." This statement was very powerful to me and made me think about racism as a whole, a lot. There is no way to fix racism because a big part of racism is discrimination. Discrimination will always exist because someone will always have something to discriminate about. Unfortunately that's just how our society is and probably always will be. I didn't find much on breast cancer and its causes this week, but im going to look into it more for my next blog post.

Inquiry...

My Personal Inquiry Questions:
1) Will racism always exist?
2) What causes breast cancer?

Racism is something that, for as long as I can remember, has been around. Its all around you and you can never escape it. No matter where you live, racism exists there in one way or another. Many strides have been made since slavery days, as far as racism and prejudice, but they both still exist. I grew up in a small town in the middle of no where with not much diversity, but there was A LOT of racism there. It seems quite ironic that such a place has more racism then Urbana does. There is a lot more diversity here in Urbana then there is but yet the level of racism is much lower? Its actually quite intriguing to me. I would hope that eventually racism will be something of the past, seen in history text books. Racism is something I want to research and learn more about. Racism could eventually be ended, but like world peace, it will probaby never be achieved.

What causes breast cancer? Im sure a lot of people would like to know the answer to this question. I sure do. I've heard that many things can cause breast cancer but I don't know how much of it's true and how much of it's fiction. I personally want some answers and to see other peoples take on the subject. Blogs are a great research tool to see others take on the subject of breast cancer and its many causes. Hopefully, breast cancer will have a cure one day. A couple of my close relatives, my Mom and Grandma, have both had breast cancer. Luckily, they are both survivors!

Breast Cancer Be Damned: This is actually my Moms personal blog that she started after she was diagnosed with breast cancer. A lot of what she writes is about life and her struggles with breast cancer. However, some of what she has wrote is about breast cancer and its many causes.

Yahoo Answers: On yahoo answers individuals ask their inquiry questions and others give their opinions on the topic and question.

Debate It Out: On debateitout.com individuals do just that, they debate about a topic and all give their opinion on the topic. This particular link is talking about racism.

Resist Racism: This site has different peoples views on racism and a lot of people talk about ways to resist getting involved in racism.

Dr. Lens Cancer Blog: Dr. Lens discusses many different types of cancers and they're causes. He discusses new findings in cancer research as well.

Pink vs. Purple

As many people know, October is breast cancer and domestic violence awareness month. Statistics show that 1 in 4 women and one in thirteen men will experience domestic violence in their lifetime, and one in eight women will be diagnosed with some form of breast cancer. I don't believe that either breast cancer or domestic violence are more important than the other. It seems somewhat strange to me that during October, you see A LOT more pink than purple. Breast cancer awareness has more backing then domestic violence awareness does. But if they're both of the same importance then why is this? Breast cancer awareness is backed by many organizations and corporations. There is a lot of events that donate their proceeds to breast cancer research, such as benefit concerts and volley for the cure games. You don't see many events that benefit domestic violence prevention however. It always seems to me like breast cancer awareness over powers domestic violence awareness due to the publicity and sponsorship. With all of the publicity and hype around breast cancer awareness, domestic violence prevention is over shadowed. Domestic violence awareness doesn't receive the justice it deserves due to it being in the same month as breast cancer awareness. If the two were in different months, domestic violence prevention would receive the justice it deserves. When you look around, during the month of October, you will see pink billboards, pink shirts, pink water bottles, etc. I'm sad to say however, very rarely will you see a purple billboard, purple shirt, purple water bottle, etc. Myself and my family are all very passionate about both breast cancer awareness and domestic violence awareness. My Mom has worked in the domestic violence field for over 20 years, and she was diagnosed with breast cancer just over a year ago. My Grandma was diagnosed with breast cancer about a year ago as well. I'm sure everyone knows someone that has or had breast cancer, and that was a victim of domestic violence. Many times domestic violence awareness is looked over during the month of October, and it deserves more justice then what it is getting. 

Life and Death....

One of my favorite quotes ever is,"Live life to the fullest." A lot of people take life for granted and don't realize how great life really is. Everybody goes through struggles, but that's just a normal part of everyday life. Its really easy to go day by day taking advantage of the fact that we are here. A lot of times, people don't realize how valuable life is until a tragedy happens. Its true that you should never judge a person before you've walked a mile in their shoes. It seems to me as if a lot of bad things have happened to me and my family over these last 18 years. There have been accidents, deaths, disease, and much more. The bad things that have happened that really stick out to me would be my Dads accident, cancer, and deaths. In July 2005 my Dad had a motorcycle accident. He was in a coma for 14 days and spent 3 months total in the hospital. He now suffers from brain damage and can't work. To this day, this tragedy still affects me. Just over a year ago, my Mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and a couple months after that my Grandma was too. Luckily both of them are survivors and are still alive and well. Deaths aren't something that are very common in my family, that is up until almost two years ago. In March 2009 my Great Grandma, on my Moms side, died at the age of 94 i believe. It was very much out of the blue and unexpected. Even though we didn't really have a good relationship its still sad that shes gone. The saddest part would probably be that now we cant ever have a good relationship. In that same year, on my birthday actually, my Grandma on my Dads side, passed away as well. This came out of the blue as well, and especially on my 16th birthday. I hadn't really seen her in a long time but deaths are always sad. Losing family is never easy, but when you haven't seen someone in a while, i feel its just that much harder. My family seemed really insensitive and fought over a lot of her stuff. It was all really childish and quite frankly sad. Through all the things that have happened in my life, it has been sad but at  the same time made me the person I am today. Without having all these tragedies happen, i wouldn't be as strong as i am today:)

Power Wheel Activity

For the Socratic Seminar this week we looked at the power wheel and had questions to respond to about the wheel.

Power Wheel Activity
a. Identify where you fit in all of the areas on the wheel
b. What do these aspects of our identities reveal about us?
    What do they not say about who we are?
    To what extent do they matter at school?
    To what extent do they matter outside of school?

Identify where you fit in all of the areas on the wheel
Gender: Women
Race: European-Anglo Americans
Class: Rich, Poor, Educated
Ability: Able
Language: English
Appearance: Young
Sexuality: Heterosexual

What do these aspects of our identities reveal about us?
All of these aspects of our identities reveal how society views us. Society either puts in one category or the other, either your marginalized or your not. With this power wheel and society in general there is no gray area, just an area of black and white (figuratively speaking). Everything is either one way or the other.

What do they not say about who we are?
These aspects have nothing to do about who we are as individuals. The wheel groups us up by a lot of things that have little to do with the people we are. Just because an individual is of color and i'm not doesn't mean that i am any better or worse then they are. This same thing goes for ability, class, gender, and all of the other categories in the wheel. I don't think a wheel should define a person and what they are about.

To what extent do they matter at school?
I don't think any of these categories on the wheel should matter in school, unfortunately, it seems as if they do. Many teachers, administrators, and students alike see people not as individuals but as a group defined by such a wheel. Its kind of sad that we all can't be our own person, and are defined by where we came from, what we prefer, or how we look. In a place such as school, every one should be able to be their own person and not be limited by our identity and how others see us.

To what extent do they matter outside of school?
I feel the same way about this question as I do the one before. The aspects defined on the power wheel shouldn't matter outside or inside of school but they do.