Today's homework was to write a poem about ourselves. The poem started and ended with "I am -namegoeshere-." In the poem there are eight other lines. Four of those lines are true things about ourselves and the other four are lies. I thought it was interesting that my teacher wanted us to write lies about ourselves. Was it for fun, so we could pick out which parts were right and which parts were false?

I've never been much of a poet myself, I'm afraid. When I was young I tried my hand at writing a poem. I think I still have it tucked away in a notebook. Now that I look back at it, the poem seems rather meaningless and rough. I guess that things always look different when time passes, though. Drawings that seemed good to me when I was younger just look funny when I get older. And seeing pictures of myself a few years ago, I think, "Wow, I looked really different then." (But after a while I always looked similar in the pictures. I suppose it means I'm getting old.)

Sometimes I wonder if it's better to always tell the truth or if it's okay to lie sometimes. Most of the time telling the truth is the better thing to do - it shows you have integrity, and people who lie tend to get found out anyways (unless they're good at lying. I mean, I heard all the best thieves are never caught).

But telling the truth can be a harsh thing. Sometimes this happens to me, or I see it with other people... A person asks their friends, "Do you like my ____?" or says, "My drawing is so terrible!" And their friends would just say they liked it or that their drawing was bad right away. I wonder if they really mean it or if they're like me...Sometimes, even if I don't really think as highly of something as the person asking me does, I just say "It's nice" or something like that anyways. I figure they'd be offended if I say "I'm not really that fond of it." I don't want to hurt their feelings, so I just pick the safe choice and pretend.

But how much longer can this go on? How much longer until it all unravels? I can't always live my life like this, can I? And yet speaking my mind could be costly too. I don't know what I would rather do.

There's also a different situation, one I haven't come across yet, but still a possible one. Say there is a person who actually has some health problems. In fact, they have a terminal illness, but they don't know it - but some people close to them know. The person would become depressed and listless if they found out about it, but as long as they think they're not going to die soon they are able to live their life happily and blithely. Do you think they should know because they deserve to know their own fate? Or should the truth be hidden from the person so they can enjoy what life they have left?

Anyways, on to a different topic... Today in PE class, my PE teacher spoke to us about a girl who has one of the school records for triple jump. She is still in the school (in fact, she is in my grade). The teacher said, "I've heard a few people suggesting she's been using steroids. That's not true at all. She trains really hard every day with a professional coach, and worked to make her legs and body strong. Don't say that she's been cheating and taking the easy way out by using steroids. She has really good work ethic. I think people who are saying that she uses steroids are just jealous. And yeah, it makes sense to be jealous, but you can just say, 'Wow, she's good.' You don't need to mention steroids."

There are some athletes out there, such as a few baseball players, who use steroids. Some folks think that athletes who have used steroids should be taken out of the Hall of Fame or whatever records they got into. My PE teacher had an idea for it...He said he should leave both the records of people who used steroids and those who didn't in the records, but that the people who used steroids would get a * next to their name. I think that's a pretty good idea. That way everyone will get credit, but people who decided to use steroids would have some shame. I think it's only fair. If you do something dishonorable, you have to pay the consequences. (I believe in poetic justice. But it's not always dealt like that in life.)

Labels: athlete, baseball, death, fate, friends, happiness, innocence, justice, lie, life, opinion, PE class, picture, poem, pretend, record, steroids, thief, time, truth

The inspiration for this post came from what I heard on the radio. I think the station was PBS (stands for Public Broadcasting Station), but I'm not quite sure. On the radio, the topic was Japan, and how it has kind of "swept the world" and become known as "cool". The Hayao Miyazaki films, such as Spirited Away, were mentioned. (I was pleased with that, seeing as I am very fond of those films.)

A man went to Japan, and was guided by a woman called Lisa (or Risa, if you want it to be more Japanese :o ). Lisa showed the man a place that was totally filled with photo booths. Photo booths are not that common in the USA. I've only seen them in two places - in Chuck E. Cheese (I know because I have a picture taken with my dad from there. It was fairly simple, though, we didn't get to decorate it or anything like that) and at a local mall (there is a place with a couple of photo booths. The place is called Angel Pix, I think). There were a few people trying out a photo booth, actually.

Well, Lisa told the man that he wouldn't have been able to go inside the photo booth place unless he was accompanied by a girl. Apparently guys aren't supposed to go into the establishments. On the radio, they even said that "If a guy asks to see a girl's photo booth sticker collection, that's very offensive. It's like asking to see someone's underwear." (I don't really know if it's true, but I'll go with the flow) The man and Lisa picked a photo booth that would make you into a Beautiful Girl. The man was given the chose of being a Sweet and Pretty Beautiful Girl or a Colorful Beautiful Girl, and he chose the former. They had to make a certain pose for the picture (not sure what the pose was, since this was on the radio, not on TV). Then they could decorate it, adding bees, and butterflies, or whatever things you can add. And then some sheets came out of the machine, with many identical little stickers of the decorated photo. (I heard that it cost 400 yen. That's like $4 in the USA.) Thus, the man had become a Beautiful Girl. XD

Afterwards the man said that he had seen girls in schoolgirl outfits just like the ones in the manga his daughter read. I thought this was interesting since when I had been in Japan, I had seen some students, but their outfits were black, and not like those sailor-style seifuku (uniforms) that you'll see often in anime. I wonder if I just didn't go to the right place. I'd like to go to Japan again, and go to Hokkaido so I can see the Sapporo Snow Festival, but unfortunately the Snow Festival is in January, so I'll be in school and I can't go.

There are other things I think about besides just things that are impossible are highly unlikely to happen, though. I think many of my peers are still caterpillars. They are young and restless and still innocent. They're still gold, like that poem by Robert Frost...

"Nature's first green is gold
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay."

I saw this poem in the book The Outsiders. The meaning of the poem could be said to mean that nothing perfect can remain; something will go wrong and ruin it, because that's part of human nature. And it can also mean that you might be young and innocent, but you won't always be.

Some people strive for things, like getting all A's or becoming a doctor or making a million dollars or finding a cure for cancer. I've been wondering why they have such goals. If you want to be a doctor, is it because you truly think you can save lives? (If you're a veterinarian, you'll have to be prepared for killing animals, too, because sometimes you must euthanize them.) Or is it because your parents wanted you to? Because it was a respected career or for the money? Or for the title of Doctor? (Ashamedly, if I wanted to be a doctor, I would probably want it for the title.) I hope that my fellow people understand what their motives are for doing things. If you want good grades, is it to better yourself? To feel that you have improved and are striving for your limits? Or is it to keep your parents from hitting you and from taking away your privileges? It'd be good if everyone would take a little time to look at what they want to achieve, how they will achieve it, and why they want it. If they can't answer the why, a very important part, then probably they're truly a part of the rat race. I heard the rat race being described as, "We keep going and going even though we don't know why we do."

It's when you know yourself and your dreams and are fighting to achieve them that you truly turn into a butterfly.

Labels: beautiful girl, doctor, dreams, hayao miyazaki, innocence, japan, nothing gold can stay, photo booth, poem, radio, rat race, robert frost, sapporo snow festival, seifuku, the outsiders, uniform, youth

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