pretty the world

Berkeley...

2010-09-08T11:53:00.000-07:00

...rocks.

I am so happy. Seriously.

Sometimes, when I'm sitting out on the grass somewhere between classes, I look up and re-realize that I'm here. And it blows my mind every time.

This is the beginning of a wonderful four years.

here's the deal

2010-06-10T23:27:00.001-07:00

I am eighteen years old and no longer a high school student. I voted on Tuesday for the first time and paid the adult train fare today for the first time (this, by the way, is not one of the perks of adulthood. I will forever fondly remember the days when I could get to San Francisco and back for $4).

Naturally, I'm terrified. Soon I will be living without my parents - waking up on my own, buying my own food, being the only person who cares whether or not I go to class. It's crazy and I'm scared, but I'm also REALLY excited.

I had CalSO Monday-Tuedsay, which is Berkeley's orientation for incoming freshmen. It made this whole thing feel very real and it made me a lot more excited. I got REALLY amazing classes, too. If everything goes as planned with phase II of class registration, my classes for the Fall semester of 2010 will be:

PACS 10 -Intro to Peace and Conflict Studies
History 8B - Modern Latin America
Poli Sci 179 - Undergraduate Colloquium on Political Science
Psych 24 - The Psychology of Cross-Cultural Communication
Hebrew 1A - Elementary Hebrew

I'm so thankful for IB because now I get to dive right into classes that interest me! It's going to be amazing, and I really can't wait.

In the mean time, I'm trying to make this summer the best yet. I'm talking transformational. For one thing, I'm being healthier. I have a 9-6 job Monday-Thursday that will be fun and educational and great experience, and I'm riding my bike there and back every day. I am eating healthier, too. I am making, managing, and spending my own money. I just bought a new bike and some new clothes, and I'll be getting a new camera and laptop for college later in the summer. It feels nice and responsible to buy things for myself.

I also want to spend lots of time with the people I love and do things that are fun. I want to go to the beach, go shopping, go to movies, go camping, and have picnics in the park. I have a long, but manageable, list of books I want to read. I basically want to thoroughly enjoy myself this summer, and that's the plan.

I also have plans to keep serving my community over the summer and in college. I am going to keep up with CityTrees this summer and maybe find some time to volunteer at the library. I am excited to join Circle K at Cal and find some other service opportunities, too. Helping other people makes me feel good, and I know I'll never stop.

That's all for now, just a quick update. Happy summer!

A reflective English assignment

2010-06-03T00:26:00.002-07:00

Dear upcoming IB juniors,
Congratulations on finishing sophomore year! You’re half way done with high school and I promise the next two years will fly by more quickly than you can imagine. I’m graduating in less than two weeks and I can’t tell you how crazy that is – this moment has seemed so far away for so long, but now it’s here and I don’t know where all the time went!

I received a letter like this one from a few different graduating seniors last year. Each of the letters was very different, but most of them had one thing in common: their writers had negative experiences with and mostly bad things to say about the IB program and, more specifically, the IB Diploma. As a matter of fact, if you asked most members of this year’s IB Diploma class what their thoughts about the program were, my guess is that their responses would be quite similar to those presented in the letters I read last year.

My letter is going to be a little bit different. I’ll say it right now: I consider my choice to pursue the IB Diploma one of the best decisions I’ve made so far. To explain why, let me tell you a little bit about myself. I think the best way to describe me is goal-oriented. I make new goals every day and I am driven to accomplish them. Some are unrealistic, probably, but my long list of goals is what keeps me moving forward. There are so many things I want to do, learn, and experience throughout the duration of my life that I need to constantly be working towards them. I thrive on being busy, with a full schedule and, yes, a little bit of stress. There have been times when I’ve tried slowing things down and relaxing, and the truth is that I just don’t like it. When I’m idle, I feel like I’m wasting time. This is one of the reasons I chose to pursue the IB Diploma, on top of the many extra-curricular activities in which I am involved and the many responsibilities I fulfill on a regular basis. I like to be busy, I like to constantly work towards my goals, and I LOVE the feeling of accomplishment that comes with achieving them.

In addition, and perhaps more importantly, one of my greatest passions is knowledge. I simply love to learn. I think I explain this well in the following paragraph from my University of California personal statement:

“Sleepless nights of homework and essay-writing, and weekends filled with turned-down invitations to spend time with friends have never prompted any sense of regret. I put all of my effort into succeeding because the more of myself I give, the more I get. If I chose not to put my full effort into the program, I might not have discovered my infatuation with Russian literature. I might not have conducted an in-depth study of Jews in the Civil Rights Movement. I might not have become a vegetarian to reduce my carbon footprint. The knowledge and insight I've gained through my classes has changed me for the better and contributed to the open-minded, empathetic, analytical, and globally-conscious person that I am today.”

I love learning, and each of my IB classes has taught me so much. I especially enjoy learning about history, and though IB History has been one of the most challenging classes I’ve ever taken, it’s also been the most rewarding. Even if you do not plan to pursue the full IB Diploma, I encourage you to take IB courses in the areas that interest you most. Being interested in the material you are learning really helps make the class easier and the workload feel like less of a burden.

It may seem as though I think the IB Diploma is a good idea for everyone, but this is not the case. If you are planning to do the full Diploma only because your parents want you to, I do not think it is a good idea. You will have a negative attitude throughout the entire two years and you will blame your parents every time you become frustrated because your work load is a lot to handle. If you are planning to do the full Diploma only because you think it will land you a spot in the most prestigious, selective colleges, I do not think it is a good idea. I have several friends in the IB Diploma class this year who did not get into their dream schools, and some who did not get into any schools at all. There is a lot more that colleges consider over the fact that you are an IB Diploma candidate, and the process is so unpredictable that you can never be sure where you will get in and where you will not. If you are planning doing the full Diploma because you feel, for some reason, that you must take the most academically difficult course load Sequoia offers, I do not think it is a good idea. You will likely regret it along the way and resent your classes and assignments, making the entire experience much more difficult. In summary, I do not advise pursuing the full IB Diploma if you are doing it for the wrong reasons. If, however, you love learning and challenging yourself and you are willing to put in the immense amount of effort and the many, many hours that success in the Diploma program requires, I think it is a great path to take. It is by no means an easy path to take, but in my opinion, if you do it for the right reasons, the knowledge, experience, and college preparation it gives you are well worth the time and effort.

No matter what path you decide to take during the next two years, there are some pieces of advice I’d like to share that apply universally. These are lessons I’ve learned over the last two years as results of everything I’ve done and some things I have not done. They are lessons that, if you are at all like me, will help you through the next two years with your health, happiness, and sanity (mostly) intact.

The most important piece of advice I can give you is to stay healthy. The basic human needs of food, water, and sleep seem so obvious, but it can be easy to lose track of them in the midst of all the craziness of school, friends, family, and extra-curriculars. Staying on top of my health has not been a priority for me the last few years; I have slept much less than a teenager is supposed to and I have not eaten regularly for years. This neglect has caused real problems. I suffered from frequent spells of dizziness and nausea for various periods of time during junior and senior years, I have missed many days of school for colds that come up more often than is normal, and there are days when I am so exhausted that I can hardly function at all. These are serious problems that I need to learn to address before I go away to college next year, and I really wish that they had never been problems in the first place. I can’t stress enough the importance of eating three meals per day, drinking TONS of water (dehydration is the cause of many different health problems), and, as often as you can, sleeping eight hours per night. Maintaining your health should always be your first priority because if you don’t, you are jeopardizing your ability to do everything else. Form healthy habits now so they become second nature and you don’t have to worry about them as you grow older.

Something else that I think is very important to do is to find something outside of school about which you are passionate and to dedicate time outside of school to whatever it is. Many of you have probably already done this, but if not, I encourage you to find just one extra-curricular activity that you love more than anything and immerse yourself in it. It helps, when your academic work load becomes overwhelming, to have something to fall back on that can temporarily take your mind off school and that will give you something else to focus your energy on. This can be a sport, a club, an organization outside of school, or pretty much anything else. I have been very involved in my synagogue for the last four years, both working as a teacher’s assistant and serving as president of its high school youth group. I also spent two years as a member of a philanthropic foundation for Jewish teens. Each of these experiences has been valuable in that they have taught me important skills and been instrumental in balancing out my stressful and overwhelming academic life. Believe me when I say that taking time out of your schedule to do something you love makes doing all of the less enjoyable things much easier.

One thing that has always been a very important part of my life, especially during high school, is community service and volunteering. Helping other people is such a basic concept, but it can do so much to make the next two years both more bearable and more rewarding. I’ve recently realized that the IB program has a tendency to make people very competitive and somewhat self-involved. This is understandable, since you are forced to work so hard and devote so many hours to learning and processing material and keeping your grades afloat. It is unhealthy, in my opinion, to devote so much energy to moving oneself forward without helping others move forward, as well. It can negatively alter your priorities and desensitize you to the problems of the rest of the world. It is both humbling and empowering to do things that help others. I have spent many hours volunteering through my synagogue, and I participated in a program last year called Kids in Partnership, a tutoring program that is a division of Project READ. I have also been very involved in Sequoia’s Key Club, something I very much recommend to all of you. There are countless opportunities through Key Club to get involved in the community in various ways, and I think it’s extremely important to give back to your community in one way or another, even if it’s just a few times per month. Community service can help take your mind off rigorous school work and allow you to do something that positively impacts many more people than just you.

The last thing I can tell you is to have fun. It took me a while to figure this one out. I began the IB Diploma program with the mindset that I would spend two years working non-stop because the results at the end would be worth it. This idea of delayed gratification is positive in some ways, but I do regret having not enjoyed myself more during the past two years. Luckily, the content of most of my classes and the extra-curricular activities in which I have participated have been interesting and enjoyable enough that I haven’t been miserable, but it definitely would have been a good idea to spend some more time hanging out with friends, going to the beach or the movies, or just spending time relaxing at home. It is important to take time away from all of your other commitments to just have fun and relax; it’ll make the times that you resent them far less frequent and keep you happy throughout the next two years.

Obviously I’m not an expert on high school or IB or anything, for that matter, but I have experienced this for two years and this is what I’ve learned. I hope you consider the advice I’ve given you and make decisions you can support and be proud of for the rest of your life. No matter what choices you make, you’ll end up where you’re supposed to be. Good luck!

Sincerely,
A graduating IB senior

The final stretch

2010-03-30T23:58:00.000-07:00

Right now, it's Spring Break. Spring Break of senior year. When I return to school on Monday, I'll have two months left. Two months left of high school - that's it! Some things that are occupying my thoughts during this crazy time:

Joan Baez's rendition of Birmingham Sunday. I bought it on iTunes today and it gives me the chills every time I hear it. It is just so beautiful and simple and moving and blunt...please listen. It's really a two birds, one stone kinda song. Be moved while learning about a pivotal point of the Civil Rights Movement. What more could you ask for?
I am officially a Golden Bear, a member of the UC Berkeley class of 2014. Choosing between Cal and Mills was one of the most difficult decisions I've ever had to make, but I am happy and confident that I've made the right choice. If you are interested in what because the deciding factors, feel free to ask and I will share.
I have spent most of the last 4 years rushing through high school, hoping graduation would come as quickly as possible. Now that it's almost here, I just wish everything would slow down. I am excited, don't get me wrong, but I'm finally starting to realize, just in time, that I really love Sequoia and Redwood City and all of the communities I belong to right now. I'm excited to move on to college and I feel like I am mostly ready, but I don't necessarily need it to happen immediately. I could handle my current circumstances for a while longer. Since I have no control over the passage of time, unfortunately, my plan is to make the best of these last two months and summer. I hope to look back on this time in several years and be proud of the way I spent it.
Part of this involves my relationships with the people in my life. I want to strengthen the relationships I have with the people that matter to me. A lot of changes are going to come with next year, one of the most significant being a large increase in physical distance between myself and a lot of the people I care about. Losing these relationships is one of the things that frightens me most, and I know it is up to me to keep up with these people and make sure that loss of relationships doesn't happen. Can I succeed? I hope so!
I also want to read more. I have been spending a lot of time in libraries and bookstores again lately, and there is just so much out there. I wish I could read every book on the planet, and I know I can't, but I want to try. I am currently finishing up two incredible Civil Rights books (Walking with the Wind by John Lewis and Watch Me Fly by Myrlie Evers-Williams). They kind of make me feel like Sojourn is still happening! I have other books that I bought on Sojourn, too, but I want to start getting some fiction in, too, as well as current events-y stuff, too. There is so much to learn, to know, to understand, and lately I've been craving more of all of that. It feels good - like the world (of knowledge) is my oyster!

There is more to talk about, of course, but it is late and I am sleepy and if there is one more thing I have learned about myself recently, it is that my body requires 8 hours of sleep per night. Who knew?

Sojourn to the Past 2010 - A Reflection

2010-02-21T18:50:00.000-08:00

I wanted to write a reflection about Sojourn to the Past so that I can bottle these incredible thoughts I'm having and emotions I'm feeling. I've never felt so changed by a single experience in my life, and I am endlessly thankful for having had this opportunity. If any of you have the chance to take this trip, please, please, please do it. Whatever it takes, find a way to make it happen. It will move you, transform you, and open your mind and heart to new ideas and feelings you didn't know were possible. There is no experience like it, and though you can read all about how it changed me, its effect on you will be different. So don't just take it from me, go yourself!

I don't even know where to begin. Just the fact alone that you get to meet so many veterans of the Civil Rights Movement in the places where important events took place after doing in-depth lessons about those events and people is incredible. One person on the trip described it as like a pop-up book: learning about the Civil Rights Movement in a traditional way would be like a regular, text-only book, but Sojourn brings those words to life -literally- though hearing from people who were there when everything happened, who were at the very core of the Movement. Someone else said it is like if in your history class, after just learning about World War I and Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points, Woodrow Wilson himself walked into the room and discussed what the war was like and why he felt so strongly about those principles. Both of these are great comparisons, but I don't think they come close describing how incredible it really is. These speakers that we met were the fire that fueled the Movement. They are the reasons children of all races can go to school together today. They are the reasons all US citizens can vote today. They are the reasons this country has come so far since Jim Crow. They are also the reasons we must keep going.

On the first night of the trip, we went to Stone Mountain, the Confederate Mt. Rushmore, in Atlanta, GA. We sat in the cold, looking up at the mountain, and listened to a recording from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech from the August 1963 March on Washington. Stone Mountain was a birthplace of the Ku Klux Klan and at the center of many of its activities. As I heard Dr. King's words powerful words about his vision of a just and equal world, I felt bittersweet. We have come so far since slavery, since the Civil War, since segregation, since the countless inhumane murders and other tragedies that occurred during the Movement. We've come so far since that time, but we still have a long way to go. One transformation I experienced over the ten days spanning Sojourn is that I now, as per the 6th Principle of Nonviolence ("Nonviolence believes that the universe is on the side of justice"), firmly believe that we will get to where we need to be. We just need to keep working for it.

The trip introduced us to countless amazing people who were involved in the Movement. Among the people we met were Minnijean Brown Trickey and Elizabeth Eckford, two of the brave young people that deseregated Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas in 1957. Each of these women is powerful, strong, and unique. Their stories are moving and above all, reinforced for me the incredible value of education and knowledge, as well as the importance of standing up for what you know is right. Congressman John Lewis was a participant in so many parts of the Movement - he was chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and led the march in Selma that became known as "Bloody Sunday." We met Reverend Clark Olsen, who was with his friend Reverend Jim Reeb as he was murdered by klansmen in Selma, AL in 1965 for marching for African-American voting rights. We met Angela Lewis, a strong woman whose father, James Chaney, was murdered during the Mississippi Freedom Summer when Angela was only ten days old. Chris McNair, the father of eleven-year-old Denise McNair, one of the four little girls killed in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, shared with us stories of his daughter's death and the incredible messages of hope and strength that it taught him and his family. Jimmy Webb, a youthful and spirited man with a contagious laugh, talked with us about his experiences as a brave, nonviolent teenager during the Movement. The children of Vernon Dahmer, a man killed by klansmen who set his home on fire and endangered his entire family, demonstrated the closeness and strenth of their incredible family and the urgent importance of their father's message: "If you don't vote, you don't count." Reena Evers, who watched her father die on her family's driveway at age 8, shared with us lessons of perserverance and redemption, as well as why it is important that young people learn about the Movement and then take action with issues today. Reverend Billy Kyles, who spent the last hours of Dr. King's life at his side, inspired us with hope and reminded us to never let go of our dreams, no matter how big they may be. There were even more speakers than the ones I've mentioned, and each contributed something unique and powerful to the overall experience.

There are some incredible Civil Rights museums and memorials that we had the opportunity to visit, as well. The King Center in Atlanta has a wonderful museum about the Movement and is the final resting place of Dr. King and his wife Coretta. The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute is another wonderful museum, located just across the street from the 16th Street Baptist Church and from Kelly Ingram Park, the center of the Movement for the Children of Birmingham. The day we visited Civil Rights Memorial and Museum in Montgomery, Alabama was one of the most moving parts of the trip for me. The museum honors forty little-known martyrs of the Movement and features a Wall of Tolerance, a digital wall of the signatures of people who have committed to upholding the Principles of Nonviolence. Adding my signature to the wall was a deeply emotional and overwhelming moment for me, and one that I'll never forget. The Civil Rights Museum at the former Lorraine Motel, where Dr. King was assassinated, in Memphis, Tennessee, was the most extensive and informative museum we saw. Filled with both visual and auditory information, it was the perfect place to end our ten-day journey and fill in the spots where we wanted to know more.

And then there were just the experiences of being in the places where huge things happened. We walked up the steps of Little Rock Central High School and I could imagine the state troopers stopping the Little Rock 9 from entering, the angry students yelling and kicking and spitting as they tried to enter the school so they could have a good education. We sat on Medgar Evers' driveway, where he was shot by Byron de la Beckwith, and could imagine his family bursting out of the front door, his children begging him to please get up. We stood outside of the balcony where Dr. King was shot and I could feel the pain that his friends and colleagues felt, realizing they had just lost the greatest Civil Rights leader of all time. I imagined the pain and suffering that the families and friends of the four little girls must have felt as we learned and reflected in the pews of the 16th Street Baptist Church. As we stood in Kelly Ingram Park and joined hands with very young Birmingham schoolchildren and sang "We Shall Overcome," the anthem of the Civil Rights Movement, I felt my heart swell with hope for the future.

I am a different person now. I have always been passionate about history and education and social justice, but each of these passions has expanded exponentially. I am no longer cynical about the ability of justice to eventually prevail, about our country's political system, about my ability to affect change. Because I know we can do it. Dr. King said he knew we could do it in his final speech of his life, his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech. He said that he had seen the Promised Land, and though he might not get there with us, he knew we'd get there. And I believe that 100% now.

I plan to live from now on based on the Six Principles of Nonviolence. In case you are wondering, they are:

1. Nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people.
2. Nonviolence seeks to win friendship and understanding.
3. Nonviolence seeks to defeat injustice, not people.
4. Nonviolence holds that suffering can educate and transform.
5. Nonviolence chooses love instead of hate.
6. Nonviolence believes that the universe is on the side of justice.

What does this mean? It means that it is my responsibility to always stand up for what I know is right. It is my responsibility to reach out to those who need help and support, and to not be afraid to ask for help and support when I need them. It is my responsibility to work tirelessly for the change I know we need and know we can get. It is my responsibility to demonstrate love, not hate, and to have unwavering faith that anything, if it is the right thing, is possible. I am not going to be a silent witness anymore. I'm not going to listen to people use violent language without saying anything, and I'm not going to watch injustice take place without taking a stand. I'm making lots of changes, and I'm thrilled.

I will close with this: you may read this and think, "Wow, that trip must have been really cool. It is so neat that Sarah got to meet those people and see those places and learn so much." If that's what you're thinking, please don't just take it from me. Visit www.sojournproject.com and find out about going yourself. Send your children, go as a chaperone, or at least learn more about if. If you have any questions, I will always be more than willing to answer as best as I can.

Make this in beautiful English

2010-01-29T20:49:00.001-08:00

1. I am 99% sure I will be attending Mills College in fall 2010.

2. I leave for Sojourn to the Past in thirteen days and the excitement I have for that has definitely been the driving force that has helped me survive the past few weeks, which have been miserable.

3. My immune system, after a long exchange with the immune system of someone who never gets sick, has returned. I missed two days of school this week, and probably should have missed more.

4. Donate money to help the victims of the earthquake in Haiti. Humanity can't afford for this issue to lose attention, just as all other issues do. Don't stop working to make a difference.

An update of sorts

2009-12-19T13:31:00.001-08:00

Accepted to two schools - Mills College with a half-tuition scholarship guaranteed for all four years, being considered for full tuition. Willamette University with some money promised for all four years, though significantly less than Mills' offer. Not a problem, because I've never been terribly interested in the school.

I'm a second semester senior. First semester was one of the most stressful I've had so far, but my hard work paid off. Straight A's save for a B in calculus, but after having a C+ for a month (scary) and working my butt off to fix it, I'm perfectly satisfied with the B. Math is not my strength.

Sojourn to the Past is in just over a month and I am SO excited. It's going to be amazing and life-changing and transformative and other similar words. I can't wait.

Winter break is going to be very full, but hopefully also relaxing. Maybe I'll update more second semester.

It's been a while

2009-10-17T08:16:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's been a long time. I've been busy, to say the least. There have been lots of near-meltdowns in the last two months but, that said, I'm doing really well. I'm happy. Completely overwhelmed and stressed out 99.8% of the time, but definitely happy. I love all of my classes and teachers, I've applied to two schools, and my extra-curriculars are going well. My life has been a little bit lacking in the social realm lately, but that's picked up in the past couple of days and I get to hang out with people a lot this weekend, which is wonderful.

Today I am going to try and get a good first draft of my personal statements done and then get all of my homework done so I can go to Melissa's house tonight. We are all hanging out instead of going to the Homecoming Dance :) Then, tomorrow, I am having breakfast with the girls and then RENT! RENT RENT RENT RENT.

I am very excited.

More soon, I promise.

Rock, rock, rock, rock, rock & roll high school

2009-08-24T20:44:00.000-07:00

School started last week. SENIOR YEAR.

I have SUCH mixed feelings. On one hand, I am legitimately excited about this year. There is so much going on, and it's going to be crazy and busy and so fulfilling. On the other hand, I'm terrified that I'm not going to be able to deal with everything. I guess I always manage, right?

I am also really excited about college, but also scared. Update: Our East Coast college trip has been cancelled (per my request) because a) I really just can't see myself going so far away for school and b) an extra $1000 can't hurt, especially since...drumroll, please....I have to get braces. Yep. For two years. Yes, that does mean braces in college. You don't have to tell me how much it sucks and how sorry you are for me, because believe me, I know. Hopefully I can get them sooner than later so I can get it over with sooner than later.

In terms of schools at this point, here is the short list: Mills College (Oakland, CA); Lewis and Clark College (Portland, OR); UC Berkeley (Berkeley, CA)...and that's really it. Which is a problem, because I can't just apply to three schools. I am doing an official tour of Stanford sometime in the next few months, but I really just don't know. My problem has gone from having too long a list to having too short a list, and I don't really know what to do.

I actually really like school so far. Despite the fact that the most sleep I've gotten on a school night so far is 4.5 hours (tonight will be different!), I really like my schedule and all of my teachers. Plus I have two classes in computer labs. It feels like Degrassi and it is SO cool!

Okay, time to do a bit more homework and then go to sleep. Mmmm, sleep.

Summer days, driftin' away

2009-08-06T10:12:00.000-07:00

Summer is almost over! I start school two weeks from yesterday! This is crazy.

I am about to finish English homework. I finished math last week. Tomorrow my mom is taking Jenifer and I to visit Cal Poly SLO and I will work on personal statements in the car. History project and ToK essay will be next week, I suppose. Then it's arena check-in, Oregon for a few days, and school! So crazy.

Speaking of personal statements and colleges, I visited Mills College in Oakland a couple of weeks ago and absolutely fell in love. It just felt so home-y and right. In terms of admission statistics, it is a bit substandard for me, but I don't think that matters. It doesn't necessarily translate into substandard academics, and even if it did, college being a teensy bit less stressful than high school was would not be the end of the world.

I took my sister to the Jonas Brothers concert on Monday night. Our seats were in the last row of the highest section -- pretty much as far away as a person could possibly be. But then my friend Jenna (who was in row 9 of the lower section) came and met us with her two friends' tickets and brought us down to her section! We sat in two unoccupied seats two rows in front of them. We went from being in the very last row of the venue to being in row 7 of the lower section. We could see so well! It was a lot of fun and a great "first concert" experience for my sister. She is now teaching herself to play "Fly with Me" on the piano and doing really well! I'm impressed.

Okay, I should go keep working on homework. Just wanted to do a small update!

And in the end, the words don't matter...

2009-07-23T10:57:00.001-07:00

...'cause in the end, nothing stays the same. And in the end, dreams just scatter and fall like rain.

Summer is coming to a close very quickly and I don't like it. Not so much because the idea of going back to school is so terrible, but more because I just have so much left to do and seemingly very little time left with which to do it. I've been working at the temple a few days per week and working on homework and SMRTY stuff, and finding a little time here and there to hang out with friends, too.

This MLK, Jr. assignment I have for English is actually really cool. I finished most of it yesterday, and it feels nice to get things done. Today I want to try and finish math before my orthodontist appointment and then MATTY tonight!!! I am so very excited.

I don't have much else to say right now. Off to do math homework!

Together we can change the world

2009-07-09T10:36:00.000-07:00

It's been a while, I know. I've been crazy busy doing summertime stuff. Hanging out with friends, cleaning, summer homework-ing, starting college apps, etc. Some of this stuff is more fun than the rest, but it all needs to get done and I'm trying to be as diligent as possible about it. All I know is that I don't want to spend the last few days before school starts maniacally trying to get everything done. I can't really, seeing as I will be in Oregon until the 18th...

Next weekend, I am participating in the San Francisco AIDS Foundation's annual AIDS Walk. My goal is to raise $500 by July 19th, though I can accept donations until sometime in early August. I am a little over halfway there, and though I know this blog in my little corner of the internet is not very widely read, I figured I'd write about it here and cross my fingers that someone will see it and decide to sponsor me. Online donations have to be a minimum of $25 for whatever reason the fundraising website decided, but every cent counts, so if you are interested in making a smaller donation, please let me know and we can most certainly figure something out. My personal fundraising page is here. You can track my progress towards reaching my goal using the thermometer in the bottom right corner of this blog.

In other news, I am starting to freak out about the whole college thing. At the same time, I become more and more excited every day. Part of me is really looking forward to senior year (and everything that comes with it: SMRTY President, Key Club secretary, handing over Va'ad Tzedakah, finishing IB, taking journalism, etc, etc, etc.) and the other part of me would just love to skip it and go straight to college. Eh, you can't always get what you want, right?

In case you are interested, the college list looks like this so far: UC Berkeley, UC Santa Cruz, Stanford, Mills College, Lewis and Clark, Clark University, Brandeis, and Barnard College. I'm not sure if I'm going to apply to all of these yet, but this is definitely the top 8 (unintentional MySpace reference) list. I've crossed off a few recently, namely George Washington, American, Amherst, Columbia, Brown, and UC Davis. The list was far too long to begin with so I had to start eliminating schools, and I did! It feels nice to have a shorter, more concise list. Making decisions feels good.

Alright, now that I've satisfied Julia's request that I post more often and done my little plug for AIDS Walk, it is time to return to homework-ing and brainstorming for personal statements. More soon(er than last time), I promise!

Summer daze

2009-06-10T09:35:00.000-07:00

Everyone is starting to head off on their crazy summer adventures now....Alli leaves for camp today, the CITS leave in a few days, Juli'as going to Brown, Emily to Notre Dame, the Confirmation kids to Israel, various people to various places. I'm not going to Israel, and I'm okay with that. What I'm not okay with, though, is letting another summer go to waste.

My brilliant idea is to meticulously plan out every second of this summer. I may be crazy, but I really want to make these 2.5 months worthwhile. This week and next week I will probably spend mostly at home cleaning and working on homework so I can get my boring responsibilities out of the way. That's not to say I haven't already had lots of fun!

Friday was SHS' graduation, which was really nice, and then Julia and I went to see The Hangover. I wouldn't recommend it personally but lots of other people love it so I guess it's good if you like that kind of thing. Sunday was Kelsey's graduation party, and even though I missed Israel in the Gardens for it, I had a lot of fun. She is graduating today and I know we have the entire summer together but I'm definitely starting to feel nervous and upset about her and Alli leaving.

I guess that's all for now -- Julia wants me to update more now that it's summer. I suppose I will.

A Solution

2009-05-22T22:32:00.001-07:00

I really, really love writing. Really. A lot. But High School English has completely discouraged me. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE my English class. I've loved every English teacher I've had at Sequoia. But when it comes down to it, the kind of writing that an IB-level English class demands is not my kind of writing. Analytical writing about literature is neither something I particularly enjoy doing, nor is it something that I am good at. And that's fine. I can still love writing, right...?

Some of my favorite things I've ever written have included this year's ONLY creative writing assignment, My Querencia (a reflection about the place I feel safest and most comfortable), the biography I wrote of Iby Heller, an incredible woman and Holocaust survivor that I had the opportunity to meet and interview, and some of the articles I wrote for our 8th grade unit in Journalism.

Journalism?

YES. Perfect. I've never enjoyed writing mandated by an English class more than I did during that unit in 8th grade (and I hated EVERYTHING about 8th grade English). It's non-fiction writing that allows for personality - humor, satire, sarcasm, criticism, anything!

My dream is to be Copy Editor of the Daily Californian, U.C. Berkeley's student-run newspaper. I am taking Journalism at Sequoia next year, the first time it will ever be offered, and my plan is to fall in love. I would love to discover that my true calling is journalism, because I can really see myself enjoying it for a long period of time.

Never mind that classic Journalism as a career is vanishing more quickly than Earth's natural resources (arctic ice may be completely gone by the year 2040!) - my mommy insists that there will be other venues through which journalism will become a bigger deal (internet, etc.).

Not that I, Sarah Ducker, like to plan obsessively for the future or anything, but being excited about having a plan is not a bad thing. If nothing else, my crazy plans for my future are one of my most significant sources of motivation, so that's positive.

I guess we'll see what happens next year with Journalism, but I really hope everything works out. How cool would that be? Very.

In other news, all I want to do lately is listen to Matt Nathanson. That boy is attractive, talented, and good for my soul. He is playing Golden Gate Park on June 21. I am a happy little girl.

P.S. If you want to be a happy little girl too, you should take a looksie (listen-ie?) at this video.

Determination, I suppose.

2009-05-18T14:16:00.000-07:00

I'm trying out this blog thang one last time. I really do need a place to just write sometimes -- with no restrictions or assignments or guidelines. The journal dealio isn't working out because handwriting things SUCKS. And who knows? Maybe I can be funny and witty and satirical and philosophical and interesting.

Maybe not. That'll be okay, too. Writing feels good and I'm going to need somewhere to document my summer 09 adventures...assuming there will be any worth documenting. My mission for this summer, though, is to prove to myself that I don't need camp or Israel or expensive summer programs to have a good time.

Right now, though, back to my World Literature 2 -- A Diary of Sofya Semyonovna Marmeladov. Selfless, heroic martyr or sinful, immoral prostitute? Or both?