Stress !

A lot of people say that the holidays are the most stressful time of the year . I beg to differ . Especially for high school students ! After the holidays is exam time . The holidays for me was jam-packed , but I still had a few moments of relaxation . We've only been back to school for a week since the break and I have already had three breakdowns . I had one today as well . I was and am under so much stress over the exam involved in this course , I am just about at the end of my leash . But what do I do ? There are still two to three weeks left , and I'm already at the end of my leash . I have no idea how I am going to plow through it . Not only am I piled with exam work , I also have two essays to write for Ryerson applications . I wrote them today . The first essay was a research based essay . That took me approximately four hours in total to write . The personal essay , which was the second one , took me about the same amount of time . For some odd reason , I found the personal essay to be much , much harder . Although the first one required actual research and a bibliography , the words seem to just come to me and the essay was there after a while . But for the personal one , the words just weren't coming and this drove me crazy . Which is when I had my breakdown . I initially planned to achieve a lot of homework today , but could not due to the time consuming essays . I wanted to complete the entire scrapbook , and have at least half of my Leadership Reflection finished and then have tomorrow to work on my portfolio . Now , I have to do the scrapbook and reflection tomorrow , forcing me to push back the date of the portfolio once again and that aggravates me . I wanted to have an early finish of my portfolio so I don't run into the major issues I did last year .

Not to mention , I have been on the computer since 11AM this morning . I have a huge headache . And to add to the stress , I can feel a distancing between myself and my family and I want to fix it , but don't even have time to do so . I'm in a lose-lose situation . I am stressed .

Summer Fierce

Post-Secondary !

I have yet to make the huge decision of what career path I want to take . Thankfully I found a way to buy myself sometime with it . So the decision has indeed come down to choosing between lawyering and acting . I found out that to go to law school , you need four years of an undergraduate course , which can be any subject . That means that you can choose any field to study for four years and if you're smart , you'll choose the subject that you score the highest grades in . Which for me is , who would have guessed , acting ! So I have four years to test out my acting skills and see if it lands me where I hope it can . If it doesn't , than I have still built a path that can lead me to my alternative goal of studying law . I applied to an acting-related course at Ryerson University and York University . Both stellar programs . And I applied to a law-related program at Ryerson , since we have three choices and because Law was one of my highest marks as well . If I don't make it into the acting program at Ryerson , but I do make it into the law-related one , I will go to that program and do acting outside of school . The acting program that I want to get into has very high standards and quite a hefty load of requirements before you are can be qualified to be considered to get into the course . It requires two essays . I have no idea how I'm going to find the time to write these while I have the exam to worry about . If I blow the exam , I blow my marks and the chances of getting into University . If I blow the essays , I blow my chances of getting into the University . Either way , I lose . So I really have to work hard and manage my time sufficiently . I have not a moment to waste . The competition for the University is fierce and so is the competition to win actor of the year - which I really , really need to win .

Summer Fierce

ScrapBooking !

For the leadership positions , I applied and was assigned to be the lead on the scrapbook . Being the lead on this project is huger than I thought it was , because I couldn't really start it until we came down to the last two months of the course , which was due to lack of photos . So all through-out my break , I've been scrapbooking ! It is A LOT of work , but once you get past the editing , cropping , printing , cutting and pasting and start on the designing , it is really quite enjoyable . You get to tackle your own creative perspective in different ways , which I rarely get a chance to do . We are supposed to have one hundred leadership hours by the end of this semester . When we hit mid-terms and the class was asked how many people had over fifty hours and most of the class already had over seventy-five and I was just slightly over fifty . . . I was scared . I thought ' Man ! I'm not going to pass this course ! There's no way I'm gonna get fifty-or-so more hours by the end of the semester , especially having to focus on the ' monster exam ' . Well to my surprise I now how . . . over a hundred hours ! I was so excited after I finally finished calculating all my hours . That gave me a chance to take a well-needed breath of relief and time to focus on writing my monologue . Thankfully I made the right decision to complete a good percentage of the scrapbook over the break , because there is NO WAY I could handle struggling with it - trying to juggle the scrapbook with the exam two weeks from now . It would be utter chaos .

Summer Fierce

Selena Quintanilla Perez

I did indeed decide to bas my exam monologue on the life of Selena Quintanilla Perez's life . I wrote my first draft of the monologue over the break and to write it , I had to do more research on Selena's life . It was quite sad . She was just making it big with her career and it was all ended before she could do so . She was murdered . Yolanda Saldívar , Selena Fan Club founder and friend to Selena had been caught embezzling money from Selena's business . Yolanda had been working the unpaid job of managing Selena's fan club and to show her appreciation , Selena promoted her to a paid position managing her new business . Workers were warning Selena that Yolanda was stealing from her , but Selena did not listen out of loyalty to her friendship with her . When Selena finally confronted Yolanda about the stolen money , she denied it and pleaded that there were documents proving no money had gone missing . She could not present these documents and Selena had to fire her . Selena went to pick up the paperwork from Yolanda , who at the time , was staying at a Days In . An argument broke out between the two and as Selena turned to leave , Yolanda shot her once in the back . Selena fell to the ground . She struggled her way to the main lobby of the hotel , where she collapsed . She was rushed to the hospital . On March 31 , 1995 , Selena Quintanilla Perez was pronounced dead . Yolanda is now in prison with no chance of parole until 2025 for the murder of Selena . It is still in question whether the murder was premeditated , which her family and loved ones believe it to be .
http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20105524,00.html

I hope I can respectfully portray this beautiful young ladies life through my monologue performance .

Summer Fierce 

Merry Christmas !

Christmas just wouldn't be anything without my family . Forget about the gifts , the food and the decorations , if we had nothing but each other , I know it would still be amazing . Just being in their presence brings happiness to my heart . We spent Christmas how we do it every year ; the same group of people at one of our houses . We spend Christmas Eve with my dad's cousins and their families . I love spending time with them because I grew up always being around them at their houses and at mine . Each person impacted my life in some significant way or another . There was a beautiful dinner with so many of my favourite dishes . We watched a movie I was longing to see for quite a while called Salt , starring one of my favourite actresses , Angelina Jolie .

A little while after midnight , we did what we usually do . We exchanged gifts and had hot chocolate . I texted a lot of my friends wishing them a Merry Christmas , like I do every year ( Well since I got texting on my phone ) . After a while , everyone went home . Christmas morning , my family and I had breakfast and then sat around the Christmas tree exchanging gifts . My present wasn't wrapped because I went with my parents to buy it . They got me clothes , which for some reason sounds boring to most , but I love . I bought my sister this make-up set because I know she's always had a passion for make-up . But she said she prefers the make-up set she already has , so I exchanged it for what I was going to originally get her , which is a necklace that I knew she wanted for a long while . For my parents , I bought my mom a beautiful dress , which she chose and my dad , electronics . For my brother , I brought him a shirt from the Disney Store and a special edition UNO game . He had mentioned to me a while ago that he liked playing that game in an after school program , so I brought it for him . My sister bought me the perfume I've wanted for a long time - Glow After Dark - by JLo . We spent the rest of Christmas Day at my aunt's house , where we watched movies , danced and built gingerbread houses . I love Christmas .

Summer Fierce

It's Bringing Us Together . . . ?

The other day , over my spare , I was sitting in the main hall at school reading my book . I noticed something rather odd . The area I was sitting at had a line of benches by a window side and to the other side of the hall is the entrance to the school that is attached to ours . That entrance is well known around the school to be used by the ' smokers ' . So before they go outside , they stop by the benches to pull out whatever it is that they're smoking . What was weird is that all different people from every race and every stereotypical group were conversing and sharing their substances and lighters . Before they all became engaged in drugs , they never used to talk or pay any attention to each other's existence . Now that they all partake in drugs , they need a source or people who know someone to get it for them , so they all work together , buying , selling and sharing it . Isn't that kind of ironic ? Drugs are terrible for your body , your health and many times your grades and your relationships . But now , it's the thing that is bringing everyone together ? Am I missing something ? Another thing I noticed , is that some of the smartest and most innocent students are falling under the influence as well . I don't understand why people are turning to drugs now , especially in their last year of high school . It's only taking away from the life and education you spent fourteen years building , so why do it ? If it's to gain popularity , then that's just plain and simple stupid . Why would you risk so much for popularity ? Besides , even if you gain it , it'll be worth nothing after graduation because you won't see a majority of the people ever again . It just doesn't make sense to me .

Summer Fierce

AIDS Awareness - Original Spoken Word Piece

On Wednesday November 24th , our school had an AIDS Awareness Assembly . I wrote a spoken word piece trying to capture the emotions of someone who was a rape victim and as a result was diagnosed with the Sexually Transmitted Disease .

Seconds . Minutes . Hours . 

Seconds . Minutes . Hours .

Close your eyes

Cause here comes the cold shower .

Wash away the shame .

Wash away the lies .

Wash away the fact that

He had all the power .

He has no face .

He has no name .

He has no race .

He took away your dreams -

Your trust , your life .

A feeling of safe , you must now chase .

Although you make it seem

Like everything's alright ;

We see it destroying you

Like an endless night-mare .

It's a hidden burden

You refuse to share .

Cause your friends ;

You don't wanna scare

You keep saying you're

Tired of crying ,

But , damn girl ,

You're not even trying .

No one said it's gonna be easy .

You're always gonna have those memories .

So I'm askin' ; beggin' you

For the sake of yourself -

Please - stop blaming yourself .

You and I both know

That you had no control over how things went down .

You couldn't have said ' no '

It wouldn't have made a difference .

He wouldn't have let you go .

Lonely and cold

No where to go .

No where to run .

No one to hold .

No one to love .

Cause to them ; I'm a monster ;

The true meaning of evil .

Feelings - I can no longer feel .

They're failing to realize that I am the victim .

If they took a minute

to look me in the eyes

They'd see that it's him .

Seconds . Minutes . Hours .

That's all it took for him

to rip away my innocence .

What made him so angry ?

What made him resort to such violence ?

Was it something I said

That planted those sick

thoughts inside his head ?

What is it that could have led

To him demanding -

Forcing me to bed ?

A tale of unfortunate events .

I couldn't help ;

Change the way things went .

It was out of my hands .

Terrified and trembling -

So still , motionless I laid .

Maybe if I fought back -

Screamed ,

I wouldn't have been

Infected with AIDS .

Seconds . Minutes . Hours .

I'm still living , I'm still breathing .

Everyone's running .

Everyone's leaving .

I'm still crying

Cause I know

There's no point in trying .

It was  a mistake I made ; a choice .

I trusted him with everything .

He took it all , left me with now voice .

In a flash , my life was taken .

And from this night mare ,

I'll never awaken .

Seconds . Minutes . Hours .

Summer Fierce