We are proud of you

Tonight I went to a high school basketball game. My alma mater which I am still unconditionally (and a little disturbingly) committed to was playing. I enjoy basketball and, with that said, I apparently enjoy high school too because at this very time in my life I am training to be a high school teacher. My aspirations besides that are to be a basketball coach. I've lived a life that is mildly ambitious about accomplishing realistic goals. I have no perception of living life to the fullest. The lack of my goals in life being prodigious is not what I care to discuss though. My greatest concern at this very time is the fact that the cheerleaders at this game --in spite of their peppiness and desire to look like women much older than they (which they may or may not have accomplished)-- had to lead some of the worst cheers/chants in the history of competitive sports. I didn't fully understand some of them and there was flawed logic in most of them.

Now, being active in sports and only acknowledging the cheerleaders when I gawked at them, I know not what makes a good cheer good, nor a bad cheer bad. There are people out there who do, however, I am not trained in the art. One cheer that stood out to me in particularly was one that insisted "the Devils can't be beat." Yes, my high school's mascot is the devil, no I do not think that the devil is the undisputed champion of competitive sports. I found this to be, quite frankly, idiotic. I deemed it this because the team had actually been beaten five times this season. Count them: one, two, three, four, FIVE!! Now I have no doubt that this is probably a quality cheer to start the season off with, or when you're the 2007 New England Patriots up to the point of the Super Bowl. I can accept that. I might even cheer along. But these seem the only exceptions. Definitely not when you're team has proven on five different occasions that they are, in fact, very beatable.

Thinking this though, took me back about a decade to when I was in the 7th grade. I played football like many 12 year old boys do and the team I was on proved in every game of the season that we were beatable. We didn't just prove it, we almost reveled in it. Now, let me come to defense for my teammates and I. We were not well coached and we were undersized, slow Caucasian boys that were a little late in puberty. Beating us was not a large task. Don't think I'm exaggerating this either. We didn't even score a touchdown until there were two games left in the season. But such as memories go, what I think about the most when I remember that Fall is not that we lost every game, or the fact that I was scared every time I touched the ball. No, what I remember are the cheerleaders. After every game we lost my teammates and I would walk, heads hanging down, back to the sidelines. And the only thing we had to walk back to were our cheerleaders chanting "We are proud of you, we said are proud of you." This always was, and always will be, insult to injury. Getting murdered in football in front of your peers and elders can be traumatizing to a middle school boy. But this traumatic experience becomes tenfold when there are schoolgirls trying to cheer you up over that defeat. They know not the humiliation. And at the time, even right now, I always find it hard to believe that a group of 12 year old girls actually took pride in my lackluster performance in a football game. They didn't know about the game, they probably didn't know what it took to win. But that is not the point. The point is that cheerleaders, as harmless as they might seem, can really devour a boy's confidence. Sure their's was a harmless attempt at cheering us up. But I didn't want to be cheered up, I wanted to win a game.

Nobody wants pity cheers. Nobody wants illogical cheers. It's time this was realized.

Prose of a Lost Boy

Why did I do it? Why did I start this essay without any idea as to what I was going to write about? No attempt at pre-writing, no outline, no real though as to what it was going to be about. I was once told that a personal essay can be about whatever you choose as long as you made it two things: true and interesting. I'm not sure if this essay will be either one of those things. Well, it will most likely be true. However, I am not full enough of myself to honestly believe that anything that comes from my fingertips, from my mouth, or from my brain for that matter, is going to be interesting to the general public. There are those people out in the world who's words almost demand attention. My dad is one of these guys. I feel that he somehow possesses the ability to make people listen. Most world leaders are like this. Many stars somehow convince people to listen but they usually have nothing to say. I am not one of these people though. I tend to fumble around with words I want and usually use many out of context. I get caught up in what I'm saying, or writing, and it generally makes no sense. Almost like what I am writing now. I still do not know what this essay is about. It will probably be about my flaws. But it might be about other people flaws. Or maybe it will be about dogs. Or maybe I will try to dissect my brain and make that interesting. Why did I do it?

You Put Your Right Foot In, You Put Your Right Foot Out

The music of the world gets worse and worse with each new generations downfalls. This is a fact. You can probably look it up somewhere. Maybe Google it. I'm sure someone has blogged about the flaws of these generations without an overall ear for music. Or maybe I'm the only one that cares. Maybe I'm the only one who cringes whenever I hear that house beat bass drum. You know what I'm talking about. That pulsing on the kit that makes your heart feel claustrophobic. In comes the auto tune. Makes you feel like a robot is singing to you every single time. This is confusing to me too because, as if robots weren't starting to get more and more publicity all the time, we have to go and make our human voices like that of one. But its not even the beat or the robotic voice that gets me. Oh no, dear readers, its the lyrics. I mean really? What has our society come to whenever the main part of a song is "Boom Boom Boom?" Yes it rattles my soul and makes me want to get up and pretend I can dance. But it does nothing for the art of music. Is it supposed to be some sort of abstract work that has beauty inside of its simpleness? I know not. However, these are just the first of many lyrics that my   generation thrives on. We go out to the club after reading the same magazine secrets and doing our best to be different when we notice that by being a nonconformist, we've just conformed with the rest of the world. Screw it, lets do the dougie and look like a bunch of idiots together.

The Heart Has No Bones

My relations with the opposite sex tend to get drawn out, over analyzed, and romanticized to much greater heights than necessary. It's a rather shameful thing. Or is it? Am I to be ashamed that I hold such an intense ability to love people, women especially. Should I hang my head and withdraw to the passion of a flea just because I have such an intense ability to use this thing called the heart? I do not know. This is a bit of a problem for me though. I tend to make big issues out of small things. Things like small relationships that I am almost certain had destiny written all over them. It comes natural to me. I meet a woman, talk to her, recognize anything that is possible to love about her and completely disregard all of her flaws. This is no way to live. I hear that we are supposed to accept people for their flaws. And that our love for someone should make those flaws seem minuscule.  But I hear a lot of things. I find it much easier to just act like those flaws do not exist. This, of course, is a complete recipe for disaster. The dish that is served up cold is ultimately heartbreak and turbulence. And its a dish that I've tried often and one that I've served just as much.

Laziness and Indecision...and Growing Up Too Soon

I probably should not have been an English major. Sure, I like to read and I'm perfectly content with writing. But I do not know the first thing about teaching this particular subject. And trust me, I am completely aware that I go to college so that professors can teach me how to teach the subject and so forth and so on. However the root of this problem stems deeper than just not knowing how to teach it. This problem goes back to my high school days when I didn't even learn anything about English. My English classes in high school were more than just a joke. They were almost an entire stand up comedy routine. The result of this act was me getting the same A that everyone else got and also missing the same lessons. I mean, it took me two different attempts to pass Composition I. In my defense, I completely withdrew from the entire university the first time. And the second time I swear I was sabotaged by a beautiful, sexist who's approval I wanted nothing more than. But I'm sure that if I had at least learned a little something in high school, then the dominance of such a simple subject as the written word would have been in my grasp. I digress though. The point is that I should not have been an English major. But the greater question is, what should I have been? What really revs up my brain and keeps me primed for excellence? I'm not sure, but let's find out.

The Dog Days are Over

I'm not good at this. That's what I tell myself. So since I hate to be wrong, I go out and prove it. I mean if I am the one that decides whether I'm right or wrong, then I will do my best to make myself look good. Even if that means me looking like an imbecile. Its a vicious cycle that I have going on up top. I honestly think I'm terrible at this blogging business. I'm almost certain that my blogs have shown just that too. But I have no one to blame but myself. Yes, it's nobody's fault but mine. I'm a poor writer due to sheer laziness. At least that's what I tell myself. If I'm bad due to laziness then I guess I can control that by actually working at it. So since this is a free sight then maybe I will. I have at least a consistent audience (granted anyone reads this) and I already have it as a partial assignment. And I believe that doing this could pay sweeping dividends. At least two that I'm almost certain of.

One simple reason is that I'm going to be a teacher of English. It would be humiliating, detrimental, unexplainable, if my students were better writers than me. How am I going to explain that to parents?  After all, I paid people to teach me how to write. I paid people to teach me so I could teach others. However, the educator can only do so much. If my professor gives me a portal to become a better writer and I steer clear of it, then there is no logical explanation. So I will take this opportunity to become more comfortable with the written word. I do believe that it is an art form and I've seemed to be a consistent minimalist when it comes to things art. I've got no real natural talent for any kind but I am quite fascinated with a majority of all art forms. Music, literature, paintings, you get it. So I now take it on myself to at least exert myself and see what I have to offer in this form we call blogging.

Another reason I am to blog is because, although I think that its ridiculous that our world and mainly my generation feels the need to document our every single thought, I do like to do it myself. I am a bit of an oxymoron. I despise all technology but I still try to figure it out. I hate Facebook and other social networking sites but I still have one. This blog is a form of those and although I do not care for the blog itself, it does come in handy for me getting my thoughts out there and for the improvement of my writing. I'm really terrible at endings.

I Am of Many

It's not uncommon for human beings to daydream. Often times these dreams are what push people through the day. We let out minds wander off into some abyss, imagining scenarios that are never possible or even some that are within our grasp. We dream of playing in Super Bowls or flying down the half-pipe in the X-games. We dream about being president or the decisions we'd make if we were in charge. Being Hollywood actors or famous writers are also common places we explorer. However, there is also another sort of element that comes into play in our dreams sometimes. These are realistic, achievable dreams that we strive to achieve. They are the basis off what we live our lives. Maybe it's as simple as to make a moderate living  and leave our kids with minimal worries. (Which is no simple dream at all.) Or maybe it is to remodel a home, to learn the art of fine cuisine, or maybe even graduate college.

A dream of mine is to overcome my fickleness. My indecisive nature that has often times lead to confusion or regret is enough to make me go mad. This is not my only one of course but this one quality that I possess, makes all other dreams quite trying. I wander in my mind, day to day, and try to decide what it is I'll become. Like a young child who still dreams of the endless, I too, create so many goals that most seem unobtainable. One day I want to be a high school basketball coach, the next I want to go live in Colorado and build my life around snowboarding. After that I decide I want to train horses and spend my time roping. If not that, then I want to play guitar in a band that just barely gets by but is still playing music. Sure these are simple dreams for the most part. But to achieve them all seems a little unrealistic. This is the problem that I am faced with, since I am interested in so many things. I, by no means, excel at anything. I'm actually mediocrity at its finest, when pertaining to most of the aforementioned goals. But that doesn't mean I want to do them any less. I think if I was to let go of this fickleness, then maybe I could set one goal and work hard to accomplish it. But that sounds too boring. Is everyone like this? They want to do so many different things that they go through their entire life in a complex?