Dear Class of 2015

            Everyday as I walk around campus, I am amazed at just how many people are texting and walking, completely oblivious to their surroundings. Then I reflect upon myself, and realize that I too often succumb to my cell phone while walking to class. It is enthralling to me that in today’s world, we cannot spend a mere four minutes in the fresh air without feeling as though we are missing something urgent in cyberspace. As a society, we fail to realize that what we are missing is right in front of our noses, however. We are missing the chance to smile at a stranger, and possibly set the impetus for a new friendship. We are missing the chance to lend a helping hand to someone in need, and possibly make his or her day. We are missing the chance to interact with one another, because we are too busy sending a trivial text or checking Twitter. Is this really more important than living? Fully living? If everyone in our student body were to simply drop their cell phones where they were, and strike up a conversation with the person they were stalking on Twitter, we would find ourselves forming real relationships with real people. We would find ourselves having real conversations, and making real memories, perhaps. As we spend our time “Direct Messaging” back and forth, however, we are only kidding ourselves. We are engaging in a false sense of contact, and a false, immediate satisfaction that this person is our friend, and will always be there for us; even though, we have only ever met them online. It’s ludicrous.
            As high school comes to a close, we are constantly searching for a way to ensure we won’t regret our last few months. Maybe this can be accomplished through focusing on the now, and living for today. Maybe the push away from technology and towards reflection needs to come from surrounding ourselves with new people and living a life interesting enough to not want to take a vacation in a world of cyberspace. Maybe by taking the time we spend on our cell phones and redirecting it towards pursuing interesting people, traveling interesting places, and simply engaging in interesting conversations, we can build lives that do not require distractions. We can build lives in which we see technology and social media as a needless aberration instead of a way of life. By truly investing in ourselves, instead of our online personas, we will discover the people we are meant to be upon graduation, instead of the people we wish we‘d become.

           

           

           

            

Clothed in Strength and Dignity

"You had to be stronger." The words ring in my head like sirens one after the other, each one more painful than the last. You put the weight of the world on my shoulders, when you should have made me feel at home. Instead of being complimented on the freckle in my eye or my childish laugh, you ravished me as a lion would its next meal. Is that was I was to you? No more than a piece of meat, satisfying your hunger just until you moved on to your next victim? Oh but I had to be stronger, you said. I wanted you to give me the affection I so deeply desired; to notice the small things, discover my flaws, and love me anyways. Instead, you took my flaws and exploited them to be used to your advantage. But I had to be stronger, you said. Well I say bullshit. I say bullshit to girls constantly being blamed for a man's lack of restraint. I say bullshit to men being portrayed as victims of their sexual desires, and their inability to control them. I say bullshit to women feeling the necessity to fulfill these desires, just because a man feels that as a man, he is entitled. I say bullshit to being taken advantage of and pressured, because I should possess the strength to say no; and no again, and again, and oh wait, once more. I say bullshit to men not finding the strength within themselves to say no. I say bullshit to my role in a relationship requiring all will power and strength, while his requires nothing but falling victim to his sexual stereotypes. But I should've been stronger, he says.. And I say, thanks to you, I am.