Holiday Spirit.

            The first writer, Amel Saleh wrote exactly how I feel about the holiday season. Saleh first sentence states, “The holiday season is driven entirely by materialism.” which is a statement that I completely agree with. Holidays are a time for families to spend time with one another, to celebrate and appreciate the good fortune they have. As of lately, I’ve noticed that during this season people place more emphasis on showing off the presents they received, having the biggest turkey, competition between who has the more extravagant Christmas lights on the block; it’s gotten out of control. It seems as though the expectations of what the holidays should be has drastically changed from when I was a kid to the children now. I was taught that holidays were to be all about family and appreciation rather than who has the better possessions and belongings.

            Family was always the most important part of the holidays. Having a big family meant that the amount of presents each of my siblings and I got were exiguous.  My mother would always tell us, “Don’t expect much this Christmas, instead appreciate that you even got anything and that you are surrounded by people who love you.” She always said that after one of the younger kids had a crying fit over a toy she denied them of having, so her tone wasn’t exactly the most patient when she said this. However, when Christmas day arrived none of my siblings and I cared about the amount of presents we received. What was important to us was watching the cheesy Christmas shows with our parents, having teamed snowball fights (the teams were usually always Team Mom and Dad vs. all the kids), and then warming ourselves with a home cooked family dinner. The time spent with my family is what I remember and cherish most rather than what present I got and I believe that’s the way the holidays should be spent. 

Transitioning.

The transition from attending a university to a community college has been a drastic change. Attending a university felt like an unrealistic dream with all the parties, the hectic sleep schedule, and the easy-going classes; it was everything I imagined for college life. However, all dreams do come to an end and that university dream was eradicated after I finished my first year and moved to California. Applying for a community college was highly discouraging to me after having the university experience, but I did it anyway because I still wanted to continue my college education regardless of if it was a university or not.

                Oxnard College was difficult for me to get into. Being an “Out of State Resident” meant that the tuition was much more expensive than if I was a “California Resident”. There was a whole list of conditions that I had to meet to become a resident, including waiting a year (and a day) before I applied, paying California Taxes, and even providing the school proof of when I moved here (i.e. Plane ticket, bank account resident change). A whole year (and a day) went by until I came back to Oxnard College to apply, but the Admissions Office was being rather difficult. I jumped through all the hoops that the Admissions Office threw at me before I could finally call myself an “OC student”.  Following the excruciating process of becoming an “official resident” came my first semester, which happens to be this Fall 2014 semester.

                My first semester at Oxnard College has gone rather smoothly. My transition from university to community college, surprisingly, hasn’t been awful. In fact, I feel as though I enjoy attending a community college better than a university. At Oxnard College, I focus more on my schoolwork because I don’t have the college party life distractions that I did at the University of Dallas. I’ll admit that the workload and teachers at Oxnard College are far less demanding than at a university, which is good because my sleep schedule is much more manageable now, but bad because I’m one of those nerds that like to be kept busy with school work. Although I don’t plan on staying at Oxnard College, attending this college has definitely been a good decision that I’ve made; especially for my future.

                Doing well in my future, becoming successful, and proving everybody wrong is what keeps me motivated. Of course everybody wants to do well in life and live happily, but to me it means more than that. My family couldn’t financially support my decision to pursue a college education therefore making them pessimistic towards my dream. It is my drive to prove, not only to myself, but to my family that finishing school and being successful is something that I can do.

Reality Television.

                Television is a part of our everyday lives. According to the New York Daily News, “Americans spend 34 hours a week watching TV”. That’s about five hours of television a day for the average American making it one of America’s biggest past times.  There are a variety of genres of television that they may indulge in, one of the most popular genres being reality TV. From FOX’s “American Idol” to MTV’s “My Super Sweet 16” reality TV can be found on any channel.  Since reality television is a significant part of our everyday society, it is difficult to be biased towards it; most people either love reality tv or not.

                I am one of those people that do not and have not watched tv in years. However, for this blog entry I did watch an episode of “Keeping Up with the Kardashians”  and an episode of a show called “Amish Mafia” to better understand what is considered to be reality tv. What I saw was completely ridiculous, I couldn’t even stand to watch the whole episode of either show. These shows were the furthest thing from reality and I hardly found any entertainment in either of them. Both of these “reality” shows were completely scripted and it was quite unbelievable how overdramatic the people on the shows got over something that can be considered so small in real life. In fact, I actually got a bit angry and had a slight revulsion that these shows are as popular as they are. Instead of being productive, people are spending their time watching these people pretend to live their overly dramatic fake lives. If all “reality shows” are like “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” and this “Amish Mafia” show then I believe that it is harming our society. It’s not like these reality shows are setting a good example for anyone and I highly doubt people are gaining any knowledge from the shows that could benefit our society.

                I try to avoid television and I can honestly say that I don’t keep up with the Kardashians or any kind of reality show. My personal opinion about television is that it is a waste of time. Five hours a day on television is excessive; there is so much a person can do during that time besides sitting around watching this “reality” tv. There are many people that may find these shows entertaining and can’t go a day without watching it, which is fine.  However, I would rather go out and live life instead of watching people pretend to.

Citation:

HINCKLEY, DAVID. "Americans Spend 34 Hours a Week Watching TV, According to Nielsen Numbers." NEW YORK DAILY NEWS, 19 Sept. 2012. Web. 12 Oct. 2014.

Change.

Change is a constant part in our society. Without change, people would not be able to create and develop not only themselves, but the world we live in. Whether it is our opinions, beliefs, or our perspective of how we view certain topics, we do change. The change that occurred with me came gradually. That change was my perspective on having my own children.
When I was little I had always wanted to have kids, I was an only child at age 4 until my first brother, Christopher was born. I was so excited; I would always look after him, want to feed him, carry him, and even want to change his diapers. Then my parents had another baby boy named Matthew, I was happy, I thought it would be like having two babies of my own to take care of. After Matthew, my parents had another baby boy, named Luke. There were problems with this brother. My mom and Luke were hospitalized after he was born; I was only eight so the doctors didn’t want to tell me exactly what was wrong with them. I may not have known what exactly was wrong, but I was old enough to know that there was some kind of problem with the pregnancy. Luke and my mom came home healthy after a few weeks and my mom let me take care of Luke more than my other two brothers. After Luke, I finally got a little sister, Emily and I was overjoyed. By this kid I was a professional at making bottles and changing diapers, I could even watch after the other kids too. My parents had another boy, Xavier. I was twelve years old; excited to have another brother, but I was also getting tired of watching and taking care of another baby. I thought that Xavier was the last sibling I was going to have, but it turns out my mom was going to have one more. She had another girl, which we named Bridget. I was fifteen years old and I felt like I was too old to be taking care of a baby.
Unfortunately for me, I was fifteen taking care of a new baby. My mom at this time was a single parent with three jobs so I was left to care for the kids and newborn. Having to bring the new baby with me to go grocery shopping was always embarrassing, especially in a small Texas town. People would constantly give me looks. Quite often people would tell me how beautiful what they thought was my daughter, but they would always say it with a hint of accusation or disappointment. After they walked away I made promises to myself to not have my own kids, I hated being judged like that. I did feel like a mother though; making dinner for the kids, making sure they did homework as I warmed bottles, it was tiring.
 I had always wanted kids when I was younger, but over the years of growing up I wanted none. My family and friends completely understand why I don’t want kids. I saw how my mom struggled with the pregnancies. I got firsthand experience with newborns, toddlers, preteens, and now teenagers. I don’t want to put myself through that experience when I begin to start my own life. I’m still young; I could always change my mind when I get married. However, I have my heart set on not having my own kids. No matter what happens though I already feel like I’ll always have to look out for my siblings like my own mother would.