Today is Friday, February 10, 2012
Today is Friday, February 10, 2012
Food entails its own living culture: what we eat, how we eat it and with whom we share it. It can produce a “feel good” feeling, and more often than not, the health aspect is not the predominant factor in what we choose to eat.
The celebrations begin after the sun is out of sight. Once it hits the horizon line the jubilant colors burst out, friends and family unite, fire crackers sparkle in the dark sky and the smell of exotic spices fills the elated atmosphere. The sunset marks the arrival of Diwali, the Hindu Festival of Lights.
We were five, six and seven years old when the images of a nation under attack flashed across national television on September 11, 2001. Our parents scrambled to make phone calls, while our government cried for war. Though we may have been too young then to fully understand the loss and sacrifice of human life, ten years later, the smoke has cleared. Where are we now?
While we were at Montclare, the radio crackled to report a serious accident. It was haunting. Normally, we all hear bad news on the TV station, after the content has been edited and processed, and, most importantly, already happened. Now, I was in the middle of it.
Cerebral Palsy confines her to a wheelchair for eight hours a day.
An average day for me consists of going from class to class, spending my passing period trying to squeeze my way through waves of people usually without much consideration from anyone except for the occasional thoughtful person that will give me the room to pass by. It’s nice when someone offers their help without having to be asked, not that I expect it though; at times it’s nice when people aren’t fussing over you and going out their way to accommodate you. I realize that people are often trying to be polite, but in my mind the over compensating that I see from those eager to help does not come from a place of their willingness to help but more from a place of pity and lack of understanding.
The bell rings for first period to end. Out of the halls come almost 4,000 thundering pairs of feet, all rushing in separate directions. Amongst the crowd of passing students, the buffer between model citizenship [...]
The workers were ninjas, and I felt sorry for any Dutch Crunch that got in their way.
“Well today everyone, we have a very special visitor. Can you guess who she is?”
The first thing I noticed upon entering Officer Neal Randles’ office was a SWAT vest next to this year’s Homecoming shirt. The vest made multiple appearances in the pictures and thank-you cards from schoolchildren. Looking at the cards gave even me the warm fuzzies, and I thought that they must be a huge perk of his job, which he referred to as “a school liaison officer to the public.”