Sadly, I'm not talking about Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy, sorry to disappoint you video gamers out there. XD The weather's been gloomy the last two days, just a grey veil of clouds that blocks the sunlight. I don't like days like that. I think it should either rain, snow, or go back to being blue skies with my favorite kinds of clouds - the voluminous ones with clear edges, light parts and dark parts.

I guess it reflects my mood. I was feeling pretty melancholy yesterday, partially because it is now Finals season, and there's a lot to do, studying and a speech, but I just don't feel like doing it. (I find myself growing lazier and lazier the longer this year goes on. For a while I was actually doing well - I was actually socializing, getting a somewhat decent amount of sleep, was scoring high on my exams - but I've fallen back into a slump.) Or it could be a natural fluctuation in mood.

What's really troubling me, though, is that I'm terrible at dealing with people. It always seems that after I've been friends with someone for a couple of years, I start to notice a lot more of their faults (or is that just a natural consequence from their aging?) and I wonder if that's why my relationships with other people always start to deteriorate. Or maybe it's more because I don't like to make the first move. I might not say hello even if I see someone I know, as I prefer the other person to greet me first, like what happened yesterday. I was helping a classmate with some homework, and we happened to be sitting at a place where a group of friends meets at brunch. I saw two of my friends, though we didn't really say hello to each other. I told my classmate that I had to go and left. Later, at PE, one of my friends, who I hadn't spoken with a brunch, asked why I had left without saying anything. I was rather awkward and defensive when I answered, because at the time, I had reasoned, There's no need to say goodbye to someone you hadn't even said hello to, is there? I wasn't there to socialize, I was there to try and help someone with homework. Maybe it would've been better if I had said something, but
then again, isn't that something I usually do? Just go off without saying anything? Still not used to it by now?

Labels: communication, depression, family, fate stay night, finals, forever alone, friends, mood, pattern, princess lover, problems, relationship, season, strife, talking

Uh, no, I haven't been trying to mix blood and water together in a glass or something like that, don't worry. I'm not one of those people who does things at home when they were told "don't try this at home".

What I mean by blood is heritage. Genes. Posterity. The person or people that will carry your torch when you no longer can. For several years, I have thought that if I decide to raise children, I want one of them to be an adopted child. I once said so to my grandmother, and she reacted in a way that I found strange. She seemed repelled by the idea, even a bit angry. Back then, I didn't know why. But earlier today, my mom gave me some information.

My mom said she didn't understand why I wanted an adopted child. "If you want children, couldn't you have some of your own?" she asked. (She thinks it's reasonable for people to adopt children if they are unable to get pregnant.) Personally, I think adopting children is good because...

1. I read somewhere that siblings that aren't related by blood get along better. (That means I could have one child of my own, and adopt one child.) I think that's good, if it's true, because kids often feel unhappy or underappreciated if they are compared to their siblings. One of my friends says she feels her mother is easier on her sister. I don't want my children to treat each other badly and resent each other.

2. It is helpful in reducing world population. If I had a child, I'd be adding to it, but if I adopted one, the population wouldn't change because that child is "already there". I'm really upset about overpopulation. In fact, I sometimes think of drastic schemes to reduce it. (Like researching diseases and creating or finding one that could just infect people I don't like, and not hurt others. This way criminals and people with irksome personalities could be removed. But I guess then someone would say, "You have to give them a second chance! They can change!")

3. Orphans seem more exciting. Probably actual orphans would find this offensive since it is not a good thing to lose your parents (unless they were really terrible ones). But still, you see orphans in books and movies and all, and that is because they're more interesting. Imagine, if I had an adopted child who was orphaned, they could write something dramatic for their college application.

Then I asked my mom what my grandma found wrong with adoption. My mother responded that it was simply the old beliefs of China. Bloodline is very important (such as having sons to pass on your last name) and so having an adopted child isn't good since they have, really, no relation in genetics (unless you were to adopt a relative, or something?). Also, my mom said that sometimes adopted children lead troubled lives. She knows someone who adopted a child who sometimes gets very angry and needs to be taken to the hospital to be calmed down.

The problems started with acne. The boy reached the age where he was going through puberty. His mother figured it was okay to let it be since his father had acne when he was that age and had grown out of it. However, although his parents didn't mind his face because he was, after all, their son, the boy feared that his classmates would keep away from him because of the acne on his face. He grew very sensitive about it and resented his parents for not taking him to a doctor (I mean, then he could've gotten some medicine. I heard his acne was pretty bad, worse than average) and even struck his mother. Sometimes he would get into a real frenzy and he'd be taken to the hospital to be electrocuted or some other cruel and unusual thing to calm him down. But such effects are only temporary, after all, and so he also grew to hate the hospital because of what was done to him there.

This did make me a bit more wary, but I still will not change my mind about wanting to adopt a child. I think this kind of situation can be prevented if you are very aware of what your child is thinking. I know probably even if a mother asked her child what he or she did at school, he or she might still respond, "Oh, nothin'," or "the usual". Even if it makes you appear bossy and annoying, you should try to worm it out of your child. You should keep everything out in the open in your family. But don't tell your child's problems to other people. Otherwise, I bet anyone would feel like they have to keep things to themselves if they don't want the whole world, or at least the people whose opinions they care about, to know.

Hmm, I haven't decided where to adopt a child, though. Maybe I'll go to China and adopt one of the young girls there. (There are more girls in orphanages and stuff than boys, because you can only have one child in China unless you pay the fine or something, and people prefer to have a son. Especially in the countryside, because sons will stay and work, but girls will marry off) I mean, I might even be able to find someone who looked like me. (But then it would be harder to explain to them that they are adopted since they'd be saying, "What? But I look like Mommy" or "I don't remember any other parents")

Labels: acne, adoption, blood, children, china, daughter, disease, family, lineage, orphan, parents, population, pregnancy, problem, relationship, relatives, rivalry, secret, siblings, water

That bond is a very important one, one that many people have. The bond differs from person to person...I have read or heard about pretty close bonds, and I wanted to share them.

My dad watched a movie called District 9, about aliens who landed on Earth, in fact, near Johannesburg, South Africa, I think. I was pretty freaked out by the movie since the main character had something happen to his arm and started turning into an alien little by little or something... We call the main character the "sweety man" because in fact, in the movie, he had tried to tempt out an alien child by saying "It's the sweety man!". So now we're addicted to saying "sweety man". But anyways, the point is, that even the aliens cared a lot about their children. It was the sweety man's job to move the aliens to a new camp outside of Johannesburg, so then he tried threatening to take away an alien's child unless they moved to the new camp. The alien, who was previously calm, then became very worked up and upset.

And then there are cats and their kittens. My dad's friend is getting a cat soon, from a "cat club" that was set up at my dad's workplace, what with lots of stray cats hanging around Cisco's buildings. Apparently someone who helps take care of the cats came up to my dad and said he was very worried about the mother of the cat that was getting adopted. He said the mother was fretting and stressed because she didn't know where her child had gotten off to suddenly. My mom thought the solution would be for my dad's friend to adopt the mother and its child (but I doubt their family was planning to get two cats). Either way, I hope that the mother cat can see her child again. If she did, then she would know her child was safe (and hopefully happy and well taken care of) and then she wouldn't have to worry.

Guardians aren't always in the form of parents. Sometimes grandparents serve as the parental figures. I started reading a book, and when the mother of the main character's friend mentioned that not doing something would be like child abuse, then the grandmother of the main character allowed the main character to do something that she'd forbidden until then. The grandmother was always concerned about someone taking her granddaughter away from her, because they might think she was too old to take care of a child, or something. So hearing "child abuse", even if the person only meant it figuratively and not literally, probably made alarm bells go off in her head.

But sometimes the relationship between parents and their children are...less than perfect. A good example is Alice and Kev (yep, that's a link, click on it!), a story about a homeless girl and her father, created with the Sims 3. Unfortunately there isn't really an ending to the story. But it's pretty cool, seeing a video game being used to tell a compelling story.

Labels: alice and kev, aliens, bond, cat, child cruelty, children, cisco systems, club, district 9, grandmother, homeless, parents, relationship, sims 3, sweety man

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