Journal 43

    I continue to talk about the story I created last week. Although all the people in Heaven think that Lily’s drawings and paintings are ugly, Lily doesn’t care about those negative comments. Traveling is Lily’s biggest interest. That is how her inspirations of creating artworks come from. She can stay at the same place for more than a week because she will leave until her painting is finished. Looking from her appearance, Lily seems like a quiet and confidence girl. However, she is very lonely and depress due to her breaking family. Beside these unfortunates, Lily enjoys the time creating her artworks. Most children play after school, but Lily doesn’t because she is afraid to talk to others. Some kids play jumping rope, some play soccer, some lie on the ground, and some chat with each other. Each time people see Lily, they don’t treat her nicely instead they speak some dirty words to her and tell their children not to play with her. Lily has no choice. She can only do her paintings or drawings alone. As an artist, Lily doesn’t look clean because she spends almost her free time creating artworks. That is why her shirt and face are usually stained with pigments. Her works look special and colorful, but people in Heaven don’t appreciate them.

Journal 42

     I add some personal perspective into the common app short essay , and I hope that it looks better now. Although I still need to work on this essay because it hasn't finalized yet, I will continue to think about the structure. Here is the essay which I edited yesterday. Performing every movement slowly while inhaling, exhaling, and stretching in order to adjust my Autonomic Nervous System, I can give the muscles and tendons in my body a deep breath. In order to maintain a healthy condition, I began doing yoga in seventh grade. At the beginning, I thought that yoga was an exercise for elder women because all the movements were too slow to follow. Stretching from my arms to my fingers and from my legs to my toes with regular respiration, I allowed the fresh oxygen to run through my whole body and arouse me both mentally and physically. To me, Tendons like a big cable with many wires from the upper part of the body to the lower part. Each yoga pose switches on a small wire, and causes the others to work for the cable. Now doing yoga seems to be part of my daily activity because it is able to release my pressures. I realize that yoga is not just an exercise; it is a means by which I can refresh my body and mind.

Journal 41

     Last week I wrote about a setting for a story. I created the main character for this story, and briefly talked about how her personality is. The big garden is located in a village which called “Heaven.” People in this place are all energetic and lively except for Lily, who is tall, fat, and quiet. No one has ever known how she is here and where does she come from. Lily lives in a wooden made house which is a little bit far away from the garden. When every child plays in the garden, Lily seats on the ground and starts drawing or painting. Children throw little stones toward Lily just because she doesn’t have a good appearance. However, she never complained about how other people treat her badly. “Hey girl! How is your artwork? Oh my god! It looks like you draw all the garbage together.” Many children say some bad words and make fun to Lily’s artworks. Lily has no parents, siblings, and friends. She lives alone. Everyday she walks an hour to a town outside the Heaven and sells her artworks. That is the only way how she earns her money. She puts all the money in a box and calculates it almost everyday. Actually, she is a good kid, who behaves well, knows how to live by herself, and is more independent than other children.

 

Journal 40

     Wow! The midterm week is over! There were two tests on Friday and I thought that I didn’t do a great job on Mr. Portor’s test, so I asked him whether I could do some extra works to earn more points or not. He said that I could do additional power point and present on next Tuesday during class time. I needed to choose a type of music and introduce it. My choice is ballet music because I learned ballet almost seven years. I have strongly feeling when I hear this type of music. I find some ballet music and will bring my ballet shoes to the class on the presentation day. I spent around three hours to do this project, so I hope that I can get at least A- or A for this class. After midterm week, I am still busy now. Majority of my stress comes from the college application. I face a serious problem now. I planned to major in education, but I found that most schools don’t provide this program for undergraduate students. Communication also is my interest, so I change my major from education to communication. I did research information in communication area, so it is not a big issue for me to make this decision.

 

Journal 39

    Today is Thursday. There is one more day for final week. I have two tomorrow-History of American Music and AP Human Geography. For the first one, Mr. Portor said that he will play the music which we have already learned since the beginning of the class, and then we have to match the music with the player. It is not easy because we have to remember around 12 types of songs and also some people’s names. Although the teacher posted the song list on the veracross, we still need to spend a lot of time to review those songs. I search for each type of music and memorize all the people’s names which will be on the test. Majority of students’ grades for this class are not very high so far, so everyone wants to get a higher grade on the midterm. I want to get at least 90. We had our midterm presentation last week, and Melissa and I got the second place of this project. I hope that it would increase my grade. The other test, AP Human Geography, Mr. Jones said that our test questions are all from the past tests, so there is no reason for us not to get 100 on the midterm.

 

Journal 38

     Here is a setting of a story. Wind softly blows in the air. It is clear to hear the twitter from a group of birds right in front of the garden. Not many trees are planted here, but a tallest one is a wonderful place for children. After school, majority of children put their bags under the tree, and start any kind of games which they want. Laughing, screaming, and shouting are around the garden. By the way, it is a big garden that it too big to see the edge of it. That is why there are many people inside the garden. Flowers on the ground are small but colorful-red, pink, yellow, and white. Those flowers are little girls’ favorite because they are beautiful and attractive. The garden is not a piece of grassland; however it is a wooden floor. During the summer, all flowers look vividly with great smell that also brings people good moods. It is very reasonable why children like to play in this garden. Without the school pressures, children play happily and carelessly. During the winter, we can see nothing in the garden but snow. No children, no flowers, no lively laughing, and no bags under the tree because the only time that children can’t play here.

 

Journal 37

    I finally came out an idea that I am really passionate about it-yoga. I decide to use it for the common app short essay. The following paragraph is the second draft of the common app short essay. This topic is finally approved by Ms. Pamela. I hop that it will be finalized by the end of this week. Performing every movement slowly while inhaling, exhaling, and stretching in order to adjust my Autonomic Nervous System, I can give the muscles and tendons in my body a deep breath. In order to maintain a healthy condition, I began doing yoga since seventh grade. Stretching from my arms to fingers and from my legs to toes with regular respiration, I allow the fresh oxygen to quickly run through my whole body, and arouse me both mentally and physically. I follow these simple steps several times a week because they are able to release my daily pressures. Tendons form a big cable with many wires, from the upper part of the body to the lower part. Each yoga pose switches on a small wire, and causes the others to work for the cable. I realize that yoga is not just an exercise; it is means to heal my body and mind.