Online classes

“Change is the only constant in life.”

-Anonymous

     I am not a fan of online classes. That’s the easiest way to put it. The routine is the same as any other school day, slowly wake up, take a shower, brush my teeth, eat some breakfast, but this is where it feels different, instead of walking outside to get in the car I walk downstairs and turn on my iPad to begin my day of school. This part of the day has felt really weird so far, now I’m sure I’ll get more used to it over these few weeks and it will become my new norm, but so far it has felt far from that. To help me get into this routine I’ve set two alarms and told my mom to send my dog into my room to wake me up, but unfortunately, this only worked for one day because I woke up at 9:10 on Friday missing the first ten minutes of advisor. 

Taking a break from life

”Ow, I hurt my leg, I can’t run, a lion eats me and I’m dead. Except I’m not dead I’m the lion.”

-Dwight K. Schrute

     As I stood atop of the tower bolted into the dock floating on the lake debating whether or not I should dive head first off of the ten foot tower, Jack Bretl in the background yelling for me to do it. Finally came to a decision and dove. Hoping for everything to go well and then slap. I slam my chest on the water. Taking a break from our daily life and just spending time with your friends is important for everyone to do every once in a while and that’s what we’re able to do as a grade at Camp Belknap.

Christmas Traditions

”At the heart of every family tradition is a meaningful experience.”

-Anonymous

     Traditions define a family. In my family every Christmas morning we have certain things that we do every time that crate this tradition. For most people when they think of Christmas the first thing they think of is presents. In my family there are a lot mor traditions then just presents on Christmas Eve and Christmas morning. These two days for a lot of families are built around traditions. 

The three themes

”A mighty book requires mighty themes.”
-Herman Melville

     The first twelve books of The Odyssey give us a look into the ancient Greeks; it teaches us a lesson about everything they live by at the time. We are introduced to powerful themes like the power of the gods, glory and honor and disguise. These three themes are what defines The Odyssey, they are part of the reason the book is so well known around the world.

The power of imagination

“The power of imagination makes us infinite.”

-John Muir

     “It was on the afternoon of Christmas Eve, and I was in Mrs. Prothero's garden, waiting for cats, with her son Jim. It was snowing. It was always snowing at Christmas.” In A Child’s Christmas In Wales, by Dylan Thomas, he explores the theme of the power of imagination. He writes about an adult reflecting on his memories on Christmas Eve in Wales as a kid. It brings us through every little detail that he could remember from the day. 

Time to move on

”Inhale the future, exhale the past.”

-Anonymous

     I can’t believe our time is up. This final year has been crazy, I would say it ended as everyone expected and hoped, but at least we will be remembered well. 

The weak and the strong

”The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.”

     In every part of life, there are the weak and there are the strong. In the book Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, the theme the weak and the strong is found constantly in each chapter. Right from the very first chapter, it is clear that the weak and the strong would have a major impact on the story, and it certainly has so far. In chapter one when all the boys gather on the beach for the first time, Ralph and Jack take control of the situation. The group decides to take a vote and decide a leader, everyone votes for Ralph except the boys in the choir who voted for Jack.

This toy of voting was almost as pleasing as the conch. Jack started to protest but the clamor changed from the general wish for a chief to an election by acclaim of Ralph himself. None of the boys could have found good reason for this; what intelligence had been shown was traceable to Piggy, while the most obvious leader was Jack. But there was a stillness about Ralph as he sat that marked him out; there was his size, and attractive appearance; and most obscurely, yet most powerfully, there was the conch.[Chapter I, page 22]

This quote is one of the very first examples of the weak and the strong. It is used when the author starts talking about the appearance of Piggy, Ralph and Jack. He talked about how based on his size, handsomeness and the fact that he was the one who blew the conch that Ralph could be a great leader. I think the author made a really good choice by constantly pushing this theme in the book because it relates to almost everyone. Gene Wolfe said, “Weak people believe what is forced on them. Strong people what they wish to believe, forcing that to be real.” The theme of the weak and the strong can be found in most books, but it can also be constantly found in each of our lives.

The Fenn community

I have the power of choice in every moment. Where will I place my attention? What do I hold sacred?

-Fred Small

     We all have a place where we live life at full speed, that place for me is Fenn. Having a place like this is really important because as a kid it’s important to have a place that you create brand new memories at.

Also so when you get old you can look back at your childhood and say you can brag about the fact that you better childhood then all your elderly friends. 

Run through the woods

”If it doesn’t challenge you, it won’t change you.”

-Fred Devito

     Today I went on a run in the woods. Recently I’ve been running a lot more, that probably has to do with me basically having the whole afternoon to do whatever. My mom took me to some new trails, she had run on them a bunch, but somehow I’ve never been on them. Almost every time my mom goes running she brings our dog Vada, but recently people started complaining about dogs being off leash, so the town made a rule that dogs have to be off leash while on the trails. This means we can’t really take Vada on a run anymore because she’s such a pain on when she runs on a leash. Today on my run I ran about 2.5 miles, the whole time we only saw one other person, who by the way had two dogs off leash. Right when I started running I noticed that the trail was really cleared out and that it wasn’t one of those trails that you had to run in the tall tick infested grass. I also thought they would be really cool trails to bike on, but the trail is covered in pine needles which would make it really slippery if you were trying to go down a hill, but that doesn’t really matter to much. At one point we dropped down next to a small river and were just about to jump over it when my mom screamed and pointed at the ground, it was the smallest water snake ever. We continued on and about three minutes later we saw probably four deer running over a hill right in front of us. I quickly ran further up the trail to see if I could get a better view of them, but by then they had ran away. The rest of our run we didn’t see any other animals or people. This run was very relaxing and helped me the calm before I got back to the house and started doing my work.