For all of us who have Friedman, and are reading Wisdom of the Ages today's conversation in class can be applied directly to the section about Buddha. Buddha says not to let other peoples beliefs become your own, you should only hold a belief if you know it to be true by either experiencing it or just knowing. And I believe that people are inherently good. I do. And it seemed that it was Hanley, Ryan Fromm, Stephanie Grages, and Andrea Giardina against the entire class, including Friedman! I don't understand how people can see something as innocent as a child as inherently evil. If it's not inherently good then it's inherently neutral and its environment causes it to become either good or bad, one is not born that way. And Friedman brought up all these questions, like the Holocaust, the Civil Rights stuff, all of that, and tells us that we would all like to think that we would have been one of the few going against the norm of hating, and that hate and greed were what made all people evil. But hate is taught to children by their parents, their community, and greed is given to a child by its parents, because when a child is born all of the attention is lavished upon THEM, and then when they go to preschool or whatever and they realize that not everyone is like that to them, and they want it to be the same everywhere, that's where greed and jealousy come in, because they don't want to share. And he said it was survival of the fittest, and Stephanie said, well what about a person about to be hit by a car? Your natural reaction is to scream for them to get out of the road. Freidman said that only a dolt wouldn't scream, but based on what he had said earlier, a person who was inherently evil would just turn their back on the person about to get hit because they didn't care about what happened to that person, as long as it didn't harm them. I think that Friedman's wrong, but here's connecting it to Buddha. Buddha's ideas about owning your beliefs works, but in the grand scheme of things, all of today's debate only served to cause a rift between student and student, student and teacher. No one is going to change their mind based on what I say in class, I would like to think that I could influence someone that way, but I can't. And so no one who thinks that people are inherently evil (Laura Joseph again, she's freaking Jonathan Edwards) is going to listen to me and say, "yeah, she's right. people really are good." I really, really don't agree with Friedman. At all.

Tear drop 9:48 PM of Sarah

I did end up going to Fort Walton, but nothing happened. We drove 8 hours down to Fort Walton Beach, while rain poured down around us. Getting everyone and everything inside the hotel without getting it soaked was a major trial – everything was done in shifts, from room captains, to room keys, to grade level getting-off-busses. We (Alison, Erin, and I) got into our hotel room at midnight-ish, and we were asleep by 12:30. We got up the next morning to a slight drizzle of rain, ate breakfast, and got back on the busses to drive 45 minutes to our practice space. We only practiced for an hour, as Mr. Coleman was busy telling us about how disappointed he was in the people who had snuck out of the hotel last night to go run around on the beach, and had gotten caught. He told us that he was considering not even letting us compete at all, if we didn’t do amazing in rehearsal. So we practiced for an hour, got back on the busses, and drove to Choctawhatchee High School. As we drove into the parking lot, the bus sank into a foot of rain water that had accumulated over the past two days. The field was soaked, but not flooded yet, so the officials called off preliminary competitions, and told us that they would make a final decision at 5 pm as to whether or not the competition would actually take place. We were placed under room arrest from noon until 5:30, when we were summoned for Chik-Fil-A and a message from the grand Poo-Bah, Mr. Coleman. Coleman told us that the officials had cancelled the competition; the out-of-towners had pushed for a standing in performance arcs in the gym competition, but the judges wouldn’t budge. So we performed in the rain, standing in performance arcs, for the other band who was at the same hotel we were, and then went to the mall. We spent an hour or so at the mall, went back to the hotel, and promptly fell asleep. The next morning we woke up before the alarm went off, because a loud, terrifying shrieking sound was coming from our balcony. The ferocity of the wind and rain combined produced this scary effect. Needless to say, we did not visit the beach that morning, and loaded up the busses as quickly as possible. We drove the 9 hours back (bad traffic) and got home at roughly 8 pm, to do homework and more homework. So my family spent 450 dollars to send my two sisters and me to Ft. Walton Beach to spend a thousand hours on a bus, watch a lot of movies, stay in our hotel rooms, and visit a mall. My parents were very upset about the fact that we’re not getting any of our money back from the competition entrance fee, and that I spent a whole weekend unable to do the majority of my homework, which I’m doing now. The highlight of my weekend was when my hotel room received a prank call, asking if we wanted to confirm our order for College Girls: Live. We caught the prankster (from the other band) and went back to sleep.

Tear drop 12:05 PM of Sarah

I am not going to Fort Walton Beach. I am not going to high school. I am not going to graduate. I am not going to wake up in the morning ever again, and above all other things, I am not going to college. I am going to KILL my mother, and my father, because it's all his fault that DURING MENOPAUSE he decides to go to frickin CHICAGO for a week and leave my mother with sleepless nights in which she gets even grumpier than normal, and then decides to freak out on my sisters and me ALL NIGHT. She's still yelling about how we don't respect her, and about how she gets respect like the kings got their right to rule from God. When I kindly pointed it out that that wasn't believed anymore, she flipped out even further. Perhaps I should have left that out. But I was enraged. I'm not allowed to leave my house at 8 o'clock to go to ECKARDS to buy some stuff for my trip because it's unsafe, I don't have any money, and she doesn't want to go. All she has to do is open her wallet to give me 2 dollars, but no. Is it that simple.... why should it be! My mother starts yelling and eventually works her way up to tears when she realizes that I'm mad at her for saying this (I've only been screaming for about 10 minutes) and when I point out that I don't LEAVE SCHOOL until 9:30 on Tuesdays, she tells me that if I say another word, she'll take my car away. I love my mom. Really I do. Can't you just feel the excitement I get from thinking about next month when my dad leaves on the 4th and comes back on the 26th? Yeah. Great. Let me tell you.

Tear drop 8:27 PM of Sarah

So I just had an interesting phone conversation with Casey. Apparently he fell asleep on the highway last night. Yeah. He's fine, don't worry. He was the only person on the road, and it was only 8 o'clock at night, and he ran over the median and hit the metal thing on the edge, and killed his car, completely. The cop who arrived at the scene told him that he should have been killed. Thank god for airbags. All he had was a nosebleed and a split lip. That's really crazy. I'm glad he's ok though. He told me that the cops told him to take anything he needed out of the car that night and take it with him, and he did, and the only thing he grabbed was Perks of Being A Wallflower . How cool is that? I'm really, really glad that he's ok. I'm to exhausted to think about it anymore.

Tear drop 10:34 PM of Sarah

I smell like a football field: mud, muck, grass, sweat, and Gatorade, pounded into my flesh, my hair, my eyes, my clothing, my teeth - every part of me that is available for muck consumption. And I feel great. It's hard to imagine that after months of sweating, running in the rain, pulling flags out of the mud, burning in the sun, learning and drilling new work and drill into my memory, playing keep-away with shin splints, and spending thousands of hours with a group of about 200 people, it will all be over in a few weeks. Beginning in June, I spent almost every day slaving away, rain or shine, to perfect my senior show - the second show I'd ever done. We went to competition after competition, winning Grand Champion, winning first place guard, working harder and harder. I've spent hours on away busses with these people, laughing, singing, watching movies, crying, and sharing in the wonder that is marching band camraderie. This weekend is the biggest competition, the one we have been working towards, the Friendship Cup. We placed 10th in final rounds last year, this year we hope to do better. It will take us HOURS to get there, and we will have no sleep to draw energy from, and we will come home restless, exhausted, and completely devoid of completed homework, but we will have gained an experience. Last year my friend Marcus cried on the bus ride home, because it was his last competition. I can only wonder whether or not my senior friends and I will cry. We miss the Chattahoochee game in order to get more sleep than we would if we left after halftime, and the next weekend is Senior Night, and the weekend after that is the last game, in Murray County. Wow. I kept saying that I hated it, I hated it, I couldn't wait for it to end, but now I'm kind of sad that it's almost over. I'm not ready to let go. I keep thinking about doing Winterguard, but I just found out that Bocian is going to do a captain per competition, which does not go well with my whole authority problem thing. But whatever.... we shall see. If I really want to do it, I suppose I'll end up doing it.

Tear drop 10:53 PM of Sarah

I did homework for the first time all week tonight. Real homework, I mean, not stuff I had to finish from the previous weekend. I can't tell if I love or hate homework. Do you all know what I mean?

Today Paul and I goofed around like best friends again, and even made tentative plans to do something (just us!) after Ft. Walton. Hopefully it will work out, but what I'm really worried about is the dance. See, Paul and I learned a dance this summer, and he has promised me since the day that we learned it that we would dance it at Homecoming. And he kept promising. And kept promising. And then, a week or so ago, he stopped mentioning it, and changed the subject when I would bring it up, when I actually got the chance to talk to him. Should I be worried? Let's hope not. Because Erin Schaub and I might have a showdown on the Homecoming Dance floor if he doesn't dance with me. I will be tres pissed.

Breakfast Club rocks my socks off, and its even more fun to be doing something illegal. My parents didn't want me to take a "handout" job from Jason after not getting the part, so they forbade me to do it. In turn, I defiantely turned around and requested a handout job. Now I'm sneaking around saying sisters and I are going out after school, or I'm studying, or something, whenever we have a rehearsal I can go to. Much fun, much fun. Opening night, I'll be making a jailbreak, woohoo.

So... Cat's Cradle test was not as hard as everyone told me it was. I walked in there thinking I was going to die. And perhaps I shall, because my Hamlet test proved to disprove every truth I've ever held about Shakespeare, Lit Class, and myself.

I'm getting reccommendations tomorrow, yay, going to see Jones and Ms. Hammack, Mr. Friedman, and Serkie, and my wonderful non-guidance counselor, Ms. Edwards, who is 3,000 times better than Ms. Durden. Yay for her. Argh. Here's an Ashleigh breakdown for me:

guard stress 10%
school stress 76%
illegal drama stress .04%
boy stress (casey, paul, joel, etc.) 2.75%
finding-a-job stress .19%
college application stress 10%
not-being-a-mooch-like-Bethany stress .01
diet stress (argh it's not going to work, I'm too tired) .5%
driving skills stress .01%
apathetic stress .5%


Like anyone couldn't have predicted that.

Tear drop 11:48 PM of Sarah

We stole Bethany's shoe. That was one of the greatest moments of my life. :)

Tear drop 11:13 PM of Sarah

This weekend was a much needed relaxation. Friday I went to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner, which is my favorite restaurant in the entire world, and had the Club sandwich, which is the best meal in the entire world, topped off by Chocolate Tuxedo Cream cheesecake. Sounds devilish, eh? And then I came home and slept a good 12 hours and got up and took the frickin SAT II's, and made the mistake of listening to Scott Snyder say, "well if you took Precal then you can handle the Math II C." No. He was wrong. I had no clue what I was doing, and left so many blank that I was reminded of the AP Physics exam. That's pretty painful. But writing was pretty simple - alluding to Jimminy Cricket, Hamlet, Pinnochio, Bill Clinton, and Mother Teresa all in about 4 paragraphs is pretty cool, and I love how I was able to use "give a little whistle, pheee" and the end of my paper. Wow. Literature was NOT as bad as Amy said it was. Did any one else notice how one of the passages was excerpted from "The Yellow Wallpaper?" Oh yeah, it was pretty cool. And enisled - is en- isled, which means kind of like an island, right? Cool things. AND I managed to take the SAT II's with Daniel Glenn's brilliant and gorgeous girlfriend, whom I met by overhearing her conversation with another Centennial-an..."and I took playwrighting as a minor at GHP this summer...." and I asked her, "Is your name Allison?" and she replied in the affirmative, and we eventually got around to the point that we had both heard of each other and were supposed to have met each other, and then, random of all encounters, end up taking the SAT II's together. Weird, huh? The rest of Saturday was spent lounging about, watching movies, etc. I've watched Almost Famous 4 times. Wow. Great movie. Lounging about pretty much made up my entire Sunday, too, except I slipped in a bit of homework here and there, with a few college applications (yeesh) on the side. How can the applications still be here? I thought I finished them, man, but then I realized I had completed NO essays, and am lacking in all forms of adult reccommendation, plus I haven't listed any activities/awards, because I haven't decided which are pertinent enough to place on my application, which only has about 4 boxes. AIE! No second period tomorrow, means I can delay finishing my lab report until WEDNESDAY (yay), and we will be doing absolutely NOTHING all week. Hallelujah. I think I'm going to go look up stuff on IMDB and then put Almost Famous on again while I go to sleep. This could be what Kelly refers to as an obsession.... ah, who cares?

Tear drop 11:26 PM of Sarah

There is no other movie quite like Almost Famous. Man, that movie rocks my socks off. Penny Lane, William Miller, the music, oh man, the music. I would give anything to have been around at that time. Anything in the world. "It's all happening..."

Tear drop 12:40 PM of Sarah

Argh, day from hell number 3,671,482,999.9 happened today. Yay. I am so mad. People who shall remain nameless (though all band nerds and people who are friends with band nerds will know) are going out, and have been for some time. And while I supported this in the beginning, I fear that I do not support it anymore. One of these said persons was supposed to be one of my best friends, but now, said girlfriend, is telling said best friend that he is not allowed to speak to me, not allowed to hug me, not allowed to hang out with me if she's not there, not allowed to sing with me on the competition busses....and today they completely ignored me. So I asked him what was going on, he didn't say hi to me anymore? And he responded, well, not all the time. Now, isn't it the practice for people who are best friends to normally greet each other in the hall to say hello, give a high five, or even hug? Yeah I thought so. Definitely normal to acknowledge ones presence, correct? Apparently not. And this, on top, of everything else, led to a fight. Yeah, great. Stellar day.

Tear drop 4:46 PM of Sarah

I really like all of these predictions that we're making, because it makes me really think about what I want to do. I'm 99.9% positive that after I graduate I'll spend all summer teaching girls how to do guard work as staff for the band. Then I'll go off to the college of my choice, probably Hobart and William Smith, maybe UGA, who knows. I'll graduate with a degree in Creative Writing and perhaps double major with something to do with International Affairs. I'll minor in education, and probably end up becoming an AP Lit teacher who is the guard instructor at the school. On the up chance that I end up falling in love with International Affairs, I'll work with the government for a bit, writing as I make my way through different countries. Bill Bryson-esque, perhaps. If I end up as a teacher, I'll probably be like Bethany says, a Sylvia Plath/Francesca Lia Block-esque writer without all the death.
I'll wake up in the morning (early, whatever I do...) and race down to the Starbucks to grab my coffee, where I'll grab the New York Times and read the hilarious front page headlines, crafted by Nick Ciarochi, after spending too much time making fun of them in high school. I'll shove the paper into my bag, along with my current manuscript, and race to school, where I'll spend the day teaching the children of Bethany Watzman, who always swore she wouldn't have children. She'll be somewhat soccer-mom esque, as she stays busy with her overacheiving, if short, children, while writing fabulous articles in Rolling Stone, similar to the ones I enjoy now. We'll do lunch on the weekends, going out to see the newest artsy flick, and review it, throwing popcorn at the screen if it's bad. During my planning periods I'll finish reading the paper, with book reviews in it, and miraculously my name will be in the top five, along with the names of two of my friends from high school. Laura Murphy will publish her poems about MTV and the like, and be showered with devotion from poetry fans worldwide, while acting her way across off Broadway shows. Drew Dir will be living in Chicago, writing books on the number one bestsellers list, while being a teacher like myself, and penning a weekly comic that reminds one of Doonsbury. President Daniel Glenn will be rocking our world, I'm sure, by singing the Four Tops on national TV when he's sure that no ones watching. Amy will be working in Hollywood as an agent, trying desperately not to scream at her clients "you SUCK" until she hits the jackpot with the next Ewan McGregor. It turns out she meets Ewan somewhere along the way. Ashleigh will have graduated from Dartmouth in the top 5% of her class, and shows us how stupid we really are by being the CEO of a major corporation and NOT being indicted because of fraud. Instead her company invents the best thing since air-conditioning, and she is richer than Bill Gates. Kelly will be winning the equestrian portions of the Olympics, wherein she'll meet Steven Clawson and Melissa Klein (I don't know how...) and reminisce about the old days and wonder whatever happened to those people they knew as teenagers. Jason Perlman will be some smiley-faced director trying not to pull his hair out while directing and living with Emily Baumbusch in off-Broadway productions that Laura Murphy refuses to audition for. And Nick Castillo will be a band director at the same school I teach lit classes at (while being a guard instructor on the side), and every Halloween we go around dressed up as Frankenstein and the Bride of Frankenstein, and laugh about that Drew kid, and think about the days when our band won first place. Then again, he may move to New England and become a vet that discovers the substance that rids the world of ticks and worms.
How amazing is that?

Tear drop 11:44 PM of Sarah

Just so you know - all you people who are making predictions about the future and not putting me in them.... thanks a LOT. I love being forgotten.... oh well. I have a list of predictions, etc. But I don't have time to post them right now, so you'll get to see my view later on. I'm really really happy though - last night Nick and I were like the last people to get off the field after we stormed it, and we were still crying and laughing and hugging, and we ran up the stairs and hugged our parents, and then we were walking back to the busses, actually singing, dancing, and skipping back, and we saw the Grand Champion trophy. That thing is over 6'2" tall! We wanted to carry it (and as Nick's drum major, it's his right), but Ross Cortez was talking about how it was his last chance, and I brought up that I'd never carried one before, so he was like back off guys, let her have it. They were all complaining, man it's too heavy for her, to big, she can't balance it. But I was like, I'm colorguard. We got first place. I can do anything. And I did! I got to carry it by myself for a while, and that was fun stuff. And then Nick came up and we both carried it back, and we sang Pomp and Circumstance, and the Wedding March (Nick and I are getting married on Halloween, just so you know...) and then the Death March from Star Wars. It was so awesome. And the whole time I'm crying and laughing.... it was great. My senior year is definitely off to a great start.

Tear drop 12:56 PM of Sarah

WE WON GRAND CHAMPION! WE WON BEST COLORGUARD OUT OF THE ENTIRE FREAKING COMPETITION! WE WON EVERYTHING! WE WON WE WON WE WON WE WON! WOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (i like winning)

Tear drop 1:22 AM of Sarah