Month: October 2023

If I could trade places with someone for the day, I would swap with my older cousin Stella. I would swap with her because I would like to see the Mater Dei campus, enjoy the idea of getting to sleep in every day before school, and meet Stella’s friends. Firstly, I would like to see the Mater Dei campus because I’ve heard lots of positive things about it and even Stella herself has said the campus is really nice. Secondly, I would enjoy being able to sleep in before school because I would feel more relaxed and refreshed when I wake up everyday. Thirdly, I wish to meet Stella’s friends because she’s shown me so many pictures of them on social media and they look like really nice young women.

I would describe my ideal day as relaxing and optimistic at this vacation house in Idyllwild. I would wake up at around 7:30 and go into the kitchen to make a tasty breakfast with fluffy homemade buttermilk pancakes, smoky bacon, creamy scrambled eggs, and a tall glass of sweet but sour orange juice. After eating my meal, I go back to my bedroom to get dressed into workout clothes (even though they’re workout clothes, they’re still soft and flexible enough to qualify as comfy clothes!). Then, I go to the bathroom (that’s just across the hall!) to brush my teeth, wash my face, etc. I then go back to my room to read on my bed. After reading for about an hour, I make myself a delicious lunch of cream cheese, lox, avocado, capers, and Everything But the Bagel Seasoning sandwiched between two slices of lightly toasted plain bagel. After eating and regaining my strength, I go to the TV room to play video games on my Nintendo Switch. I pick my favorite game – Mario Kart – then pick single player, then choose the VS Race option, then pick my favorite character – Pink Gold Peach – then pick my Kart components – Standard Kart, Hot Monster tires, and the Super Glider – then choose the game settings – 100cc, team game, easy COM, all items, all vehicles, and 48 races. I then pick my team – the blue team – then I pick my favorite race course – Rainbow Road (Wii U) – then start playing. Once I’m done with all 48 races, even though it’s only 8:30, I’m so tired that I just skip dinner and just get ready for bed. As soon as my head hits the pillow, I’m out cold.

If I could choose, I would like to be twenty-seven years old. I want to be twenty-seven years old forever because I would have more knowledge about the world around me, but I won’t be too old to experience any signs of cancer or other body-aging side effects. I would be able to go about my daily life without any problems. If I stopped aging at twenty-seven, I would be of marrying age no matter how much time has passed. I would have a job designing houses with an assistant, but otherwise alone. One of the houses I would create would be the house I described in my Sunny Desert Home blog. In my opinion, twenty-seven is a magnificent age!

This year, I’m participating in my school’s cross country team. In my opinion, it’s kind of hard because I want to get a good workout in and to accomplish that, I have to work hard. There are many different things we do at practice, from interval training to track sprinting. My favorite workout is the off-campus, 1 1/4-mile long, run. I like this run because, towards the middle, there’s a slight hill that’s about 1/4-mile long. I feel like this hill is in the right place because you’ve had the first part to warm up and get ready for the hill; you are now ready to run up the hill and not stop. After running up the top of the hill, I like to sprint down (at a controlled pace; who wants a skinned knee?). Once I’ve done all that, I run slower to imitate a cool down, and I do this back to the starting point.

This month, I’ve been reading Divergent by Veronica Roth. Divergent is a dystopian novel about a sixteen year old girl named Beatrice Prior and how she attended the Choosing Ceremony in order for her to pick her home (a faction), where she will live for the rest of her life (there are five factions-Erudite, Abnegation, Dauntless, Amity, and Candor-and each faction values different personality traits). To choose your faction, the test administrators read off a list of names. They read the names off in groups of ten because there are ten testing rooms. Once you hear your name, you walk out of the exit and into one of the testing rooms. There’s another test administrator who has you sit in a reclined chair (basically, a dentist chair) (in Beatrice’s case a woman named Tori) and the test administrator connects wires and electrodes between their head and your head, and then you’re given a vial of clear liquid to drink, which causes your eyes to close and then you enter a simulation where you make a series of decisions, decisions that will help the test administrator give you the best recommendations as to which faction(s) you will do best in. The next day, you either ride the elevator or climb the stairs up to the twentieth floor, which is a large room where you will pick your faction based on your test results (in Beatrice’s case, the elevator was crowded, so she and the other Abnegation took the stairs). You arrange yourself in alphabetical order (she stood between her brother, Caleb, and Danielle Pohler, an Amity girl). The responsibility to host the Choosing Ceremony changes from faction to faction, and this year it’s Abnegation’s turn. A political leader (Marcus, her dad’s coworker was the political leader in this case) reads the opening address and then read down the list of names in reverse alphabetical order. The five large metal bowls that each hold a item that represents each faction: gray stones for Abnegation, water for Erudite, earth for Amity, lit coals for Dauntless, and glass for Candor. When your name is called, you walk to the center of the circle of bowls in silence and the political leader offers you a knife which you will use to cut your hand and sprinkle your blood over the bowl of your chosen faction. You are now an initiate. Once you get to the part of the city where your faction lives, you go through initiation. If you pass all three stages of initiation, you are officially a member of your faction. If not, you become factionless. I’m enjoying this book because it’s romantic, adventurous, and daring. It’s romantic because one of the the initiation instructors falls in love with Beatrice, the book is adventurous because the initiation process is very violent and you have to be bold and strong to pass each stage, and lastly, Divergent is daring because the people of Beatrice’s new faction like to jump onto and off of fast-moving trains as entertainment.

My favorite character is Beatrice. She’s my favorite because she’s strong, smart, and pretty. On pages 54-55, Beatrice jumps off of a moving train onto a rooftop. “‘One…two…three!’ On three we launch off the train car.” This shows that she is strong and she has great courage to be able to do something like that. I know I would never be able to do that! My favorite line from the book comes from page 274 when Four, the initiation instructor, tells Beatrice, “‘You belong here, you know that?’” This quote is my favorite because it makes her feel good about the rest of her life in her new faction knowing that she belongs even though she’s Abnegation.