"Insert High School Title Here"

High school is all about classifications, right? I mean, if you yourself don’t have a title by sophomore year, you just won’t survive high school, simple as that. It’s almost entertaining to just sit in a high school lunchroom and look around at the different tables, each one with their different “title”. Whether you were a “Band Freak”, a “Football Douchebag” or a “Theatre Loudmouth”, almost everyone belonged to a certain group in their good ole high school years.

Let’s start with my favorite group, the “Football Douchebags”. I went to a high school that was 100% focused on football. Our team went to State twice…and won, twice. The teachers adored the football players. I would go up to my teachers to ask for help on homework, and I would have to wait minutes while the teacher had a long conversation with a football player about the game they played that Friday night. Whenever she finally realized that I was standing there needing help, she would aimlessly direct me to a page number and return to her idolizing conversation with the hunky football guy. Of course, these “Football Douchebags” were something else. They always had this attitude about them that they were “the shit”. They got out of homework assignments, got all of the attention of both teachers, students, and even the principal, and they always dated the hot girls, of course. That’s all great and all, but whenever you’re as dumb as a box of rocks, AND you are conceited and egocentric, I am not going to like you. To top it all off, our football program got all of our money, while things like our journalism classes, art classes, and speech programs got little to nothing. Needless to say, I now hate football.

What goes along great with our “Football Douchbags”? Why, our “Slutty ‘I’m so dumb’ Cheerleaders”! Like the football players, our teachers and faculty adored our cheerleaders. They walked with confidence in our hallways because they knew all the girls wanted to be them. As soon as someone joined the cheerleading team, they dyed their hair blonde. They wore their short little skirts, flirted loudly with cute boys next to my desk so as to disrupt my education, and then turned around and daily asked to copy my homework. We would all hear stories about their weekend parties where they got so drunk and had sex with a random guy on top of their mother’s Corvettes. Cheerleaders at my school were so classy. Maybe I am just bitter because I didn’t make the cheer team in the 6th grade because I didn’t have “the look” for it, but I sure did hate those cheerleaders. I might have hated them almost as much as I hated the football players, but not quite.

Next we had our “Theatre Loudmouths”. This group belonged to the kids that used to have nothing to call themselves. These were the kids that never had a group before and found their place in theatre. After they acted in their first production, the “Theatre Loudmouth” came alive. Suddenly, they went from being the shy kids to being the kids always told to be quiet in the lunchroom. They gossiped constantly, and usually only dated and hung out with people that starred in the same plays. They were overly dramatic, and you could always tell who was a theatre kid and who wasn’t just by listening to them talk. While they were most certainly annoying, I was glad that my fellow classmates found a place where they belonged.

“Gangstaaas” were another big group in our high school. You would think that this group would consist of only African Americans, but at our school, it wasn’t. The “Gangstaaas” consisted of both black and white kids that wore baggy clothes, big colorful shoes, and talked like they didn’t know how to form sentences properly. They were always so loud, and you could spot them coming. This group revolved around laughter. They loved making jokes about other people’s “mommas” and picking on each other. Whenever they laughed, they cupped their hands over their mouths and yelled “OOOOHHHHH!” before going into a fit of laughter and stomping. This was always the group that was most fun to watch. They were some funny kids.

The “Mary Janes” accounted for a pretty good portion of our class. These were the kids that...well, loved pot. I had a couple friends in this group, and they were interesting. They usually talked about pot a lot. How much they smoked last night, when they are going to smoke again, and what they did “that one time” they were so blown. In art class, instead of painting pictures of landscapes, they were drawing mushrooms. Instead of making cute friendship bracelets, they were making hemp. While I never agreed with their lifestyle, I always thought that the “Mary Janes” were the easiest to get along with. They were always so calm and happy and optimistic. Sadly, most of the “Mary Janes” of my grade have yet to go on and be more. They are still stuck at their parents, smoking pot in the basement with their friends.

“Scenie Weenies” is what my group of friends were called. During high school, we all went to local music venues to hear the local bands play. We all wore skinny jeans before they became fashionable. We wore bright colors, Chucks, and we often put random color streaks in our hair. We gauged our ears and pierced our noses. We were made fun of relentlessly until we all decided to just give it up and retire our “scene” lifestyles.

Lastly, there were the “Band Geeks”. Every high school had these. They all had one instrument they had played since grade school that they carried around with them everywhere. They were all very proud of their band accomplishments. They competed in music competitions and smiled proudly when they won their ribbons. “Band Geeks” were either whores or goody-goody. These were usually your good students as well.

ANNOYANCES

There are many things that just tick me off. Things that people do and say at times just have a way of sending me over the edge. It is sometimes hard to understand why people do what they do and then think that it is okay. A lot of people are good at standing up for themselves whenever people do something to make them angry. They can cuss, scream, and argue until things are worked out and justice is served. Me, on the other hand, I am a pushover. Even when I’m so angry that I think I might explode, I let people get away with what they do because I hate confronting them and making them even more upset. When I do end up confronting them, I am always super nice and relaxed about it, which almost always makes it worse because the problem hardly ever ceases. Yep, life sure is full of those little annoyances that have the capability to drive you crazy. The best place to realize these annoyances? College!
It drives me insane whenever people can’t take care of themselves, especially here at college. If you don’t know how to live with people, don’t live with them. Don’t leave your stuff everywhere if you know your roommate hates it. Don’t listen to people’s conversations that they are having in the other room and then comment on them. It makes people feel rather uncomfortable when they come out of their room after a phone conversation and the first thing they hear from you is “Oh, you’re going with Amy to Dairy Queen? I’m coming”.
Which brings me to my next point in this ongoing list: don’t invite yourself everywhere; when you invite yourself everywhere, it makes people not want to invite you anywhere. Don’t tell your roommates all the details of your…womanhood. Yes, we are all girls, but that business is more of a private matter. Don’t laugh obnoxiously at Saturday Night Live at 2 a.m. whenever everyone is trying to sleep. I know you cannot help how you laugh, but dear God, please, keep it down. Don’t ask for everyone else’s food if you are not willing to share your own. I’m not a greedy person, but I’m not just going to feed you for the rest of my life either.
Don’t bring over creepy random guys with greasy hair that you just met that night at the Loft to spend the night on the couch. It alarms us a little bit when we come home to guys we don’t know snoozing on our couch while you are shut away in your room on the computer. It also might be a good idea to not bring over friends that steal. Especially when you learned how they stole firsthand, by you missing 60 dollars. Why should I have to hide my money in my own room? One last thing…please, please, PLEASE, for the love of all that is holy, do no leave your puke sitting in a bucket on your bed for hours. When I walk in at midnight and find this bucket from 3 p.m. sitting there with all the contents still intact, it makes me want to kill someone.
You know, after dealing with all of that, you would think that we would hate that roommate. We don’t, or at least, we didn’t. I was still dedicated to being nice to her. She, on the other hand, decided to play a game of teeter-totter with us and go from being nice to being really mean. That’s another thing that really gets under my skin is when people take advantage of nice people. Whenever they know that they can get away with anything because that particular person is just so nice that you know they will get over everything with time. I have always been the person taken advantage of. I was always the person people would ditch when they had better plans, and I was always the friend to not get angry whenever this happened. People are constantly taking their anger out on me because they know that I will deal with it. Particularly, with one of my old roommates, I have this problem. All four of us dealt with a lot, and to be honest, she did not deserve people to be nice to her.

I Want a Daughter

A majority of women grow up dreaming of having children at some point. They think of what their children will look like, how they will spoil them, and all of the fun times they will have with their future children. When it comes time for these women to actually have kids, there are these expectations in the back of their minds on what their experience will be like. I think that when my mother had me, her first daughter, she definitely expected me to be the daughter she had always imagined. This holds true even today. Ever since June 28th, 1991, I will always be a daughter. Oh, what a joy it is.
I want a daughter. I want a little princess that will always be sweet to me. I want a cute little girl with dark hair that I can put in cute little ponytails and bows. I want to dress her up in pink dresses and hear her say in her baby voice “I wuv you, Mommy.” I want to take her to the park and get lots of compliments on how cute my daughter is. I want people to be jealous that their kids aren’t as cute as mine. I want my daughter to be polite and nice to strangers, but also be smart enough to not follow them to her car. I want people to “ooh” and “aah” at every little thing she does. I want her to run into my room every morning just to snuggle with me. I want her to have tea parties with me and want to play house. I want her to love her daddy, but favor me. I want to hate whenever she has to grow up a little more and start school.
When my daughter starts kindergarten, I want to receive notes home from her teachers about how sweet my little girl is in class. I want to her to be shy with her classmates, but very nice to them. I want her to get citizen of the month frequently. I want to see all pluses on her report card. I want her to come to me after school and ask for help on her homework. I want her to grow and learn and dream, but I want her to be my little girl forever. I want to be in charge of all of her class parties. I want all of the kids to know that I am her cool mom that comes in to help the school whenever I can. I want her to have lots of friends over for sleepovers so I can bake for them and be like their second mom. I want my daughter to do what she wants. If she wants to play sports, I want her to play sports. If she wants to be in dance class, I will sign her up. If she wants to just be a nerd and read all of the time, I will buy her books. But whatever she decides to do growing up, I want her to succeed.
It’s going to be tough having a daughter in middle school, but I know she can do it. She is going to go through puberty, get her first period, buy her first bra, and experience her first boy pains. My daughter is going to go through a lot during middle school, but she sure as hell is going to get through it the right way. Instead of experimenting with drugs, alcohol, and boys in middle school like a lot of girls seem to do, she is going to be Momma’s good girl. She will always be the goody-goody of her class, because her mother would expect nothing less. When she does mess up, she is going to tell me, because her conscious couldn’t stand not telling her mom things. Middle school is going to be hard for my daughter, but she will succeed, I’m sure.
High school is going to be the roughest, but we can do it. My daughter is going to make good grades without me even hounding her about homework. In fact, I won’t even have to ask her how classes are going, because I know she can handle it. Somehow, without me pushing her, I will still be receiving report cards in the mail full of As and Bs. I will be so proud that my daughter has taken the responsibility upon herself to do well in school and succeed. Now, of course, my daughter will be dealing with normal high school temptations. I expect that she won’t participate in any of them, but I know that is unrealistic. She may try drinking, she may try smoking, she may even have sex with boys, but as long as she comes to her senses at some point and realizes what is worth it in life and what isn’t, I will be proud of her. I will be angry the first time I find out she drank, but she will tell me she realizes now how stupid it was and that she won’t do it again. I will hug her and love her for being honest. When she tells me she needs birth control, I may or may not be disappointed, but we will have a talk and she will make that decision on her own. My daughter is going to have her share of hard times in high school, but she will turn out like the accomplished, sweet, and amazing young lady I always expected she will be.
Having a daughter is going to be rough. There are going to be so many ups and downs. Growing up, dating, high school…it’s going to be a long road. But hopefully, with some careful guidance and knowing that she has a support system behind her, she will turn out like the daughter I always wanted. I want a daughter, so bad.

Stereotyping

Stereotypes are a part of everyday life, whether we realize it or not. People subconsciously make conceptions about others based on race, gender, or even style. It’s just the way our minds have become programmed over the years. Being a teenage girl, I’m sure there have been times that I have been stereotyped in situation where I didn’t even realize it. There are several examples, however, of times when people close to me have been stereotyped for various reasons.
There are a lot of stereotypes about older people. People think they can’t hear, they aren’t capable of doing things for themselves, and basically, that they are incompetent. My Nana is 72 years old, and there have been many times when I was with her that people would treat her differently, especially at stores. I found that when my grandma would ask the clerks questions about certain items, they would suddenly start talking at a very slow pace. They would repeat things several times, and put things in very childish terms. My Nana would just wink at me while they were talking, because she knew what they were doing. I think that a lot of times, people are just used to seeing the older people that have a hard time hearing and comprehending things, so they automatically think they are all like that. I must say, I am probably guilty of doing the same. When I worked fast food, I had a lot of older people that couldn’t hear what I was saying, so I started talking to them like they were children. It’s just become normal to think that way about older people.
Another example of stereotyping would be my friend from middle school, Justus. He was mixed, and adopted, and had a great family. At school, people always just figured he was like the rest of the black guys. They figured he smoked, drank, and walked the streets. He also lived in Howell Park, which is considered a “rough” neighborhood. He was very different from the other guys at school though. He rapped, but not the type of rap everyone thought. Justus is a proud Christian, and he was in a Christian rap group with his brothers. I never knew any of this until later. I always kind of put him in the “black guy” stereotype like everyone else. I was at a Christian concert my freshman year, and I walked outside to see Justus handing out cds. I thought it was odd that he was outside of a Christian concert handing out rap cds, but I took one anyways. When I put it in my cd player, the lyrics were extremely positive and uplifting. I was surprised, and I also felt pretty bad that I always stereotyped Justus to be a bad kid when he really wasn’t.
My boyfriend has also been stereotyped many times because of his appearance. There is a group of guys around town that have gauges, tattoos, and they play in a band. Generally, they are considered to be bad. People think that they all drink, smoke pot, and party all of the time. While it is true that a lot of them do, they aren’t all like that. My boyfriend is “above the influence”. He has never drank alcohol or smoked a cigarette in his life, and he prides himself on that. People are always surprised to hear that Jake doesn’t participate in that type of lifestyle. They see his tattoos and gauges and automatically stereotype him as a partying lowlife when, really, he is the exact opposite.
Another stereotype I have witnessed is about a girl I went to high school with. She had been dating the same guy for about six years, and he was in the army. As soon as she graduated, they got married and she moved in with him. Several months later, she announced that she was pregnant. Even though her baby was conceived a couple months after she married, she still dealt with people thinking that she conceived her baby out of wedlock. She was gossiped about a lot among people in our grade. Even when girls get pregnant outside of marriage, they are given the stereotype of being a whore, even if that is not necessarily the case. I know several girls that had babies in high school with the same person they lost their virginities to, and a lot of them are still with those people today.
Whether it be concerning race, gender, age, or circumstances, stereotyping is something most people do everyday. Subconsciously, you make judgments about people before you really know them. Is it right? Of course not, but it’s life. Stereotyping is part of everyday life.

College Adjustments

Coming into college, it’s nearly impossible to know what to expect. You are entering a whole new life it seems like. You no longer have your parents and high school teachers around to baby you; you are responsible for yourself. You have to realize that your mind is going to change a million times, not just on your major or your class choices, but it will also change your outlook on life. College requires a lot of growth and maturing. A lot of people find themselves changing the instant they start college. I know that whenever I left high school to move on to college, I certainly had a very different outlook on everything than I do now.
All throughout high school, I know I had it easy. I knew that I could get most of my assignments finished in class and I could do the rest in homeroom. I was even able to write my English papers in my journalism class, so I was left with virtually no homework when my school day ended. It was stressful trying to finish all of my work in class, but I preferred it that way so that I could relax when I returned home. I was excited for college, but I also dreaded it at the same time. I knew that my days of taking it easy would be over once I hit college, and even though I knew I was smart and capable of doing my homework, I was stressing that I wouldn’t be able to handle the adjustment very well.
I was right in some ways and wrong in others when I thought that college would be a huge, stressful adjustment. I was expecting to be doing homework all night every night, and never know what was going on in any of my classes. I guess I felt like I was going to be lost and confused. While it took awhile to get used to my classes, I was happy to find that they weren’t as monstrous as I thought they would be. I am still not totally adjusted to doing my homework at home instead of in class, but it is a work in progress. My classes have either met or exceeded all of my expectation and/or worries, but I am getting used to them.
History has always been my weak point. I’m not very good at history. Everyone who had already taken the U.S. World History course told me how much they dreaded it. I, too, dread it every day. It requires around 30-40 pages of reading each class, and the tests are pretty difficult. For someone who hates history and has a hard time comprehending it, this class is definitely a struggle for me. Fortunately, I did not go into this class thinking it would easy. It has met my expectations in that I expected this class to be extremely difficult and kill me.
Another class that has exceeded my expectations is my English class. I expected this class to be a lot of book reading and quizzes. I was thrilled to find out that this class was based more on writing than book work. I love to write, so this class has been good for me to practice doing so in order to get better. While sometimes it is a pain to have to write so much all of the time, I know that it is just good way to strengthen our writing skills.
Besides my attitudes and expectations in individual classes, college has also changed my outlook on life in general. Of course, being away from your family can sometimes make you miss them. I live several minutes away from mine and I still miss not seeing them every day. I think college has showed me how important my family actually was to me. College has also given me insight to the “party life”. I was never around partiers much in high school, and now I’m around them daily. The way they act and the things they say when they are drunk has just strengthened my reasoning on why I think partying is not a good idea for myself personally. College has shown me that life is real. We’ve had cases of rape on campus, car break-ins (including my own), burglaries, and drug busts. It’s just not something you see a lot of when you’re living a cozy life at home with your parents. Lastly, college has shown me how to take care and fend for myself. Everything here is my own responsibility. I have to make sure I’m up on time, that all of my homework is done, it’s up to me to talk to my advisor or get my major changed, it’s up to me to make my own doctor’s appointments, and that’s been a big adjustment from when I lived at home. At home, my mom took care of a lot of stuff like that. In my dorm, I have to clean, I have to do dishes, and I have to make my own meals. While I don’t necessarily like doing all of these things, it does give me a sense of independence and comfort knowing that I am capable of living by myself.

College?!

Fresh out of high school, it’s easy to think that college is going to be a breeze. It’s easy to think you can sleep in until noon every day, throw together a paper, and be done. In high school, it was easy to look at your older peers in college and think that they have the easy road. They didn’t have to deal with the same kids every day, they didn’t have to wake up at the crack of dawn, and they only had the same class once a week. Sure, it seems simple enough to be a college student. While it is certainly easier than living the high school life, college is not an easy thing; it requires a lot of hard work. To succeed in college, you must end the habit of procrastination, you must be dedicated, and you must learn to go with the flow.
By high school, we had all learned too well how to procrastinate. It was easy to get away with when your teachers only wanted a finished assignment from you. I know of many times that I Aced a paper I just put together the night before simply because not many people tried hard enough to even throw a paper together. We get in the habit of putting things off until the last minute because we can get away with it. In high school, it’s easy to pass off really good grades without hardly lifting a finger. In college, however, procrastination will often leave you stressed and out of luck. Tests are harder, assignments are harder, and the teachers are harder on you. So when you decided to put off your paper until the night before it’s due, chances are your professor will be able to tell and give you the grade you deserve: an F or a D. They don’t tolerate many excuses, and while they are not totally mean all of the time, you will usually get somewhat of an attitude when you start making excuses for why you didn’t turn in your homework. It’s insanely tempting to procrastinate in college. There’s always a party down the hall, there’s always friends to hang out with, and you don’t have your parents there breathing down your back. With all of the commotion and fun going on, school work is probably one of the last things on your mind. Procrastination is a hard habit to break, but if you are able to, it’s the first step in your college success.
Dedication is another key factor in being successful in your college career. If you are not dedicated, you lose sight of why you are at college to begin with: to learn and earn your degree. Professors don’t care if you don’t have your homework in; you have to care. They aren’t going to baby you and make sure your assignments are in so you can show your good grades to mommy and daddy. If you fail a course, you pay to retake it, simple as that. You have to keep your main goal in mind, and that is to graduate with good grades. It is certainly hard whenever there are so many distractions around you, but if you keep that dedication it takes to keep up with homework and have good study habits, it will be worth the trouble. When you are sitting in your dorm at night with your books out studying, you have to remind yourself that you are doing all of this hard work in order to be successful later in life. You will never regret hard work in college.
Lastly, to succeed in college, you must learn to go with the flow. While structure is nice and everything, sometimes college just doesn’t work like that. Occasionally you might have to change your schedule for a class, or change your schedule in order to make more time for studying. You must be able to handle that. Also, however, you must learn to go with the flow because you will enjoy college more that way. Taking on this kind of attitude will help you maximize your college experience by allowing you more opportunities to experience things and make friends. Making friends is very essential to college. Your friends become your support group because they are all dealing with college life just like you.
While it is hard to transition from high school to college, if you’re prepared, making the switch will be a little easier on you. Knocking off the habit of procrastination early on will help you be more successful. Like anything else, college also requires dedication. If you are just dreading college and you couldn’t care less about it, college probably isn’t for you. You have to want to be here. Lastly, college is a great experience; learn how to go with the flow and have fun. You can work hard while staying focused on school. It may not be easy to be successful in college, but it sure is possible.

The Joys of Working in Fast Food

Working fast food seems simple enough. You go in, you take some money, and you flip some hamburgers. Or so everyone seems to think. Working fast food, especially an “upscale” fast food place like G.D. Ritzys, can be tedious and downright exhausting. Ritzys prides itself on making all of their ingredients. They make their own ice cream, their own croutons for the salads they put together themselves; their own chili, coleslaw, and they even shred their own cheese. Many don’t realize that it is often times the employee’s responsibility to do these everyday tasks that people don’t think of. You can go on thinking working fast food is the easy way out, but just take a look inside our workdays and you will find it is not anywhere near an easy thing.
I arrive at work at 8 a.m., even on the weekends. We don’t open until 10:30 a.m., so there are two and a half hours of preparation before we even open. We all are assigned our own jobs. My job is to do salads. I go in, put on my hairnet, booties, and gloves, and get busy. The first thing I do is see what salads and toppings are left to use from the night before. I have to check all of the leftover salads to make sure they are all fresh; freshness is very important to the Ritzy image. I discard the ones that have any hint of brown in them. Next, I take the leftover lettuce from the night before and fill up the lettuce containers for the sandwich makers. I take all of the leftover lettuce to the salad, where I chop it up. We have huge sinks in the back that we fill up with chopped lettuce to make our salads; we usually go through around 70 salads a day. The chopper is heavy and a burden to use, but it’s what has to be done.
After I chop the lettuce, I start making salads. I get out the tomatoes, the hardboiled eggs, and the carrots. I have my own way of making my salads. I line up as many bowls as I can on the counter of the sink. I fill each container with salad, and then I top each with two tomato slices, three hardboiled egg pieces, and a handful of carrots. Then I go through and put the lids on each one, stack them up, and bring them to the refrigerator. This whole process has given me nine deluxe salads. I repeat this process until I have 70 deluxe salads, 16 side salads, and 6 taco salads. It would be lovely if my work ended there.
I then must chop more lettuce to give the people working the next day some help. I chop until I have an entire container of it, and I put it in the fridge. I then cut more lettuce for the sandwich people. Around this time, it is nearing 9:30. I have to have my work done by 10 in order to get my break, so I start hustling. I cut, chop, and dice more tomatoes to fill the container. I cut up more hard boiled eggs, and I skin more carrots. By this time, I usually have a big mess to clean. I must clean every bit of lettuce out of the sink so the dishwasher can start to use it. I must clean every bit of the little pieces of lettuce left in the chopper, which let me tell you, takes forever. Lastly, after my mess is cleaned up, I am to help whoever has not finished their tasks yet; no one goes on break until everyone is done. Finally, 10 o’clock rolls around and I can take my twenty minute break to eat.
That’s probably one of the busier parts of my day. By this time I am usually already exhausted with all the lifting and carrying I had done. But then, I must start my 10:30-4 shift. All day long I work the cash register and take peoples orders. I get them salads, I get them drinks, I get them ice cream, and everything in-between. I clean up spills, I deal with angry customers, I wipe tables, and I refill ingredients, to name a few. We don’t get any breaks to sit down. We are literally on our feet all day. By the time 4 o’clock rolls around, everyone is beyond exhausted. I go home with a sore body, an exhausted mind, and a terrible grease smell imbedded on my clothing, hair, and even skin.
I’m not saying there aren’t rewarding parts to working fast food. You do, after all, get a paycheck every two weeks, and you will occasionally deal with customers that you just love. But for the most part, it is just an exhausting job. I’m not sure how there are some people there that use this as their full time job. Flipping hamburgers is alright and all, but I’m beyond glad to be at college so that I can have a job one day that doesn’t require me to ask “would you like fries with that?”