Lets Get Personal

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Academia-Schmacademia

Thursday, January 26th, 2012

*ACHTUNG! The following article has nothing to do with video games, The Monkees, or tape worms. It is a speech I plan to give. You may read it at your own risk. Or you can go back to browsing the mature section of my art gallery for further amusement.

There is something to be said for being “the most improved student.” When I was in Jr. High, there were awards given to students who achieved academic success. ”Most likely to succeed”, “Least amount of absences,” and the incredibly unappreciated “Most improved” award. Many students do not realize how impressive the title really is. ”Most improved? Doesn’t that mean you SUCKED at first?!” And it does. It means you weren’t doing so hot in whatever classes you were taking. But it also implies you stepped it up, and overcame those academic and life obstacles that may have initially kept you from success.

When I was 7, my family and I moved out of a small town and into a bigger city. Being a quiet child, I found it difficult to make friends at my new school. And thus began the 15 year downward spiral of despising school and everyone who went. Up until 4th grade, I didn’t show any signs of being a troubled child. And then 5th grade came along, and BAM. GALLSTONES. Yes, I was 10 and somehow had gallstones. I went in for surgery to have the stones and affected organ removed, and when I went back to school, I found it extremely difficult get back into the routine. Part of this was because I felt like I didn’t have many friends, and I feared the other kids were talking behind my back. It seems quite silly at the time, but I was positive, in my neurotic, 11 year old mind, I was being ridiculed for having to have my gallbladder taken out.

Between the ages of eleven and fourteen, I longed to be popular. It was almost an unhealthy obsession – I wanted nothing more to be apart of the popular crowd, but I was too shy, and I was labeled a loser. As a child, it was impossible to foresee my future, not knowing that labels wouldn’t matter in college or beyond. I became so depressed and self conscious about myself, that I didn’t care about learning, or making the best out of my education. I was blinded by my own selfish thoughts and wants. The longer I went to school, the more I hated myself. So I did terribly. Present me would absolutely hate past me. I would kick my own ass if I knew myself back then.

I started high school with the same morose thoughts leaking over. I did not care to learn in my classes. I just wanted out. I fell into the awful category of people who go around spouting, “Why am I learning THIS? I will never use this in real life! Screw this garbage.” To make matters worse, my father was suffering with cancer at the time. When he died, my apathy for school turned into pure, irrational hatred. I was kicked out of public school and put into an alternative school. After my fathers passing, I dropped out.

It’d be easy to say that I dropped out due to my Father’s death, but it only played one factor in my decision. My father’s death was tragic, and of course affected me a great deal, but wasn’t the main problem keeping me from fulfilling my academic goals. It put a strain on things, but at that point, I still didn’t know what I was supposed to be doing with my education.

My mom pushed me to get my GED, and thank god she did. I owe her one. Even though I wasn’t very dedicated to going to my GED study courses, I passed, and it was enough to get me into college.

Without even thinking, I started college without any set plans as to what I should major in. I figured, “Hey. I can draw! I’ll major in art!”

I loathed it.

Drawing on command? Why would anyone want to do that?

I struggled with many majors between the ages of 18-23. Over those 5 years, my motivation seemed to slowly climb, but because I was so indecisive about what I was going to study, I never really got anywhere. Fiction writing, psychology, illustration…christ, I almost went into phlebotomy! And I’m not saying there is anything wrong with any of these subjects. But they didn’t keep my interest long enough, and my enthusiasm seemed to dwindle. My GPA was a 1.3. I had flunked three courses. Yeah, I was really going places.

It was not until I met a guy through some mutual friends, who was majoring in computer science, that I finally started to become passionate about learning. Before I go any further, I must admit to you guys, I am a hardcore nerd. Computers, video games, and anything technology related always fascinated me, but due to my ignorance, I never thought I could find a school concentration that allowed me to work with those things. I fell madly in love with this guy, because he was passionate about computer science. Always striving to be better. I wanted to be like him. He was now my hero.

So I followed in his footsteps, and with his help, I found a major that helped me learn more about computers and internet related technologies. Which is a great thing, because I am pretty much putzing around on the internet all day anyway. I suddenly felt like I belonged in school. The ideas of being popular were gone. Instead of my father’s death plaguing me, it inspired me. I enjoyed being smart, and I enjoyed learning about something I truly loved.

After awhile, one of the school professors urged me to apply for a teacher aide/tech tutoring position at the school. She probably noticed that while I was in her class, I was constantly helping the other students sitting around me. So I applied, and got the job. Teaching people has been a truly gratifying experience. It’s a job that not only makes me happy, but makes others happy when they finally understand a concept they couldn’t grasp before. My confidence was now boosted. I currently have a GPA of 4.0 in my core classes, and a 3.6 all around. I still have two F’s on my school transcripts, but with my dedication to my concentration, I was able to combat the two F’s with a slew of A’s. It was not easy, and it took a long time. But good things are often difficult, and time consuming.

You will know when something truly clicks. The moment you “get it”; the moment you finally understand that math equation, or that programming concept, is one of the most rewarding feelings you will ever experience. And it is worth it. Even if you think you are trapped in a class that you may not ever use, you owe it to yourself to make the best out of those classes, and get the grade you really want. Pay attention to other people. Pay attention to people who are passionate about what they do, and let that inspire you.

Someone once told me that a large part of intelligence is not your ability to *do* your work, but the ability to adapt to situations, and have an understanding of what you are doing. I didn’t realize that when I first started my education. I always wanted the “best grades” award right off the bat. But I embrace my “most improved” status. Never lose heart, even when you felt like you’ve lost it. There are some things in life you can’t change; some obstacles that seem impossible to move past. But you can always go back and learn.

Posted in Deep Thoughts, Lets Get Personal | 10 Responses »

Thanksgivingful

Tuesday, November 22nd, 2011

It’s that time of the year when people obnoxiously overdecorate their houses, gorge themselves with holiday treats, and whine about Christmas music because it starts playing on the radio way too early. It’s also that time of the year when people reflect on what they are grateful for, are most often more considerate and thoughtful of the ones they love, and…uh…still gorge themselves on holiday treats. I count the gorging as both a positive and a negative, depending on how you look at it. (Mmmm, mom’s home made dressing.)

I figure this would be a good time to reflect on the things I am genuinely thankful for. Granted, I could blog about this any time I want, and should be grateful for things all year round, but like most people, these things hit more when it’s the holiday season.

One thing I think about more than anything else during this season is my family. I lost my Dad to a gruesome kind of way when I was 14, and he was the glue in my family. Up until his death we were pretty tight. These days my family is distant from each other for various reasons except for my mom, who I remain close to. Even though I miss my dad pretty much every day, and it’s easy for me to start feeling bitter about his loss, I am still grateful for having him in my life for the time I did. Loss of any kind is difficult, whether through means of death, break up, falling out, abandonment; it’s one of the hardest things to deal with. But there definitely came a time when I was done mourning the death of my father, and I instead started celebrating the fact that he inspired me so much, and I was proud to be his daughter, even if only for a short time. I feel when he was alive, I probably took him for granted and didn’t appreciate him enough until after his passing. That seems to be how it goes most of the time. I’ve always been grateful for having friendships and meaningful relationships in my life, but as time goes on we become complacent with people. We disregard phone calls, text messages, and emails, telling ourselves we’ll eventually get back to them, but most likely do not. I’m guilty of this very frequently. My best friend and I have become so comfortable, that we ignore each others messages through out the day, thinking this is acceptable because it’s no big deal, we will just see each other later. One of my friends was in a very serious car crash a couple weeks ago, and it was then that I realized we should never just become complacent with our friends. We should appreciate the fact that we have them, because even though we all know that anything could take us away at any given point of the day, it only really sticks when it becomes real, and you almost do lose someone. People are the most important thing in the world. Much more important than anything on the internet, more important than making videos, or tweeting about mundane bullshit you do throughout the day (which I am also very guilty of). Do not disregard your family members and friends simply because you can get back to them later.

No one can be a perfect friend, or a perfect daughter or son, but I do think it’s important to take a step back once in awhile, and think about the people you do have in your life. It is incredibly easy to forget about the important people and get swept up in yourself. We’re all pretty selfish when it comes down to it. So I’d like to take this moment to say I am grateful for my friends and family, despite whether we are close, or have separated in some way. I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season, and I hope everyone gets a chance to stuff themselves with dressing almost as good as my moms. (But it won’t be as good, trust me. Hers is the best.)

Happy Holidays!

Posted in Lets Get Personal | 5 Responses »

Revenge of the Nerd

Thursday, September 29th, 2011

When I was in second grade, all I wanted was a new computer. My aunt had an old tandy, green text on black screen and everything, which she gave to me. I played a lot of Treasure Mountain (400 LEVELS OF THE SAME THING THAT DOESN’T PROGRESS IN DIFFICULTY AW YEAH). With the arrival of CD-Roms and Soundblaster however, I wanted a computer where I could play these up-and-coming TALKING games. So I begged and begged, and a couple Christmas’s later, I got my computer, complete with creative labs CD-Rom and a package of games that would make any retro gamer pee their pants.

It came with Doom. It was so cool.

I decided my new computer was amazing. I loved it. It could play games, I could write papers on it, it had Windows 3.1, which I was personally amazed by because previously, I had been using DOS computers, AND it had that RADICAL MS-Paint program that I could paint really stupid portraits of myself in. COOOOOOOOL.

In my amazement, I decided to write a paper on my new toy. It was for either 2nd or 3rd grade if I recall correctly. I don’t remember the exact time, I just have the visual in my head of reading my paper out loud to the class. The subject of the paper was to be “The best thing I received for Christmas.” So I wrote this completely in depth paper about my computer. How it had Windows 3.1. How it had a CD-ROM. How soundblaster was new, and that my games could talk. I was a very passionate 8 year old.

I spoke my words proudly and eagerly. And when I was done, the clique of snobby girls sitting diagonal from me laughed. And then I realized that I had ostracized myself from my fellow students for the rest of the year. And even the rest of my time spent in elementary school. Being a “nerd” or any form of “computer geek” was the worst thing you could be when I was growing up. It wasn’t accepted as being cool like it is today. No, when I was growing up, my friends of the female persuasion would rather involve themselves in the exciting, fast paced worlds of boy bands. And jewelry. And sometimes shoes. I hate shoes. Eventually I got tired being a nerd and ran amuck through my high school years, resulting in me getting thrown out of public school. ….But that is really a story for another day. *coughISortOfThreatenedThePrincipalcough*

It blows my mind that “nerdy” things have become such a trendy thing. Now we have websites devoted to selling geek swag. It’s COOL to be a nerd. You WANT to know about things like Star Wars, Back to the Future, Computers, iPhones, programming. Man, I’m COOL now. And because I actually teach students technology based subjects at my job, I’m even MORE COOL. Students depend on me because I have the upper hand. I HAVE POWER. ….sorry.

But then I thought, is being a nerd cool because people actually find it cool? Or is it more of a matter that technology has become so useful, that people depend on nerds? I teach students of all ages and from all kinds of different backgrounds. I constantly get young girls coming in with their iPhone. Young, teenage girls who are fresh out of high school, and honestly don’t have a clue, and for the most part are required to take *some* form of computer course just to complete their core. These girls do not care about learning the computer. But they DO care that their iPhone is working properly, so they depend on us computer dorks, programmers, and hardware gurus to make their everyday accessories work. Now, for the most part, I get students who love learning. But every now and then I get those bratty, spoiled types who could care less about what they have the opportunity to learn. Apathetic as they are, they are not like the girls who made fun of me in elementary school. They respect people who have the upper hand.

I think another reason being a nerd has become so accepting over the last 15 years or so, is the fact that video games have become more popular than ever. And good video games require good programmers, good designers, good artists, and because games have become so lush and cinematic over time, it’s something everyone can get into. Unless you are one of those gals who break their boyfriends PS3s in a giant butthurt fit then uploads it on youtube. Man, I hate that.

I remember being young and being ridiculed for liking the computer games that I played. Now I hop online, claim to like video games, and all of a sudden I am some hot commodity for having girl parts, and enjoying games. It’s absolutely insane the way things have changed. It’s pretty nice not having to worry about getting picked on for having been a huge nerd in the past. I mean, that’s what my obsession with the Monkees is for. Pick on that, for cripes sake.

Some things never change, however. The other day I taught a girl who wore pants that read “juicy” on the butt. I was teaching her Microsoft Excel. She didn’t understand something, so she just outright laughed and called it stupid. Nobody laughed with her.

Posted in Lets Get Personal, Speak Geek | 19 Responses »

Constructive Criticism, or “I Think You Could Have Done Better…”

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

When I was in college, I decided there was no better way to make myself completely homicidal than to double major in Fine Art, and illustration. Five hundred bottles of caffeine pills later, I realized these majors were not for me. As much as I loved staying up until 5am working on a full written parody movement on an Ernest Hemmingway story, I felt like there was something better out there for me.

Even though my education in the art department didn’t last too long, I did gain some valuable experience points. Being an *extremely* minor internet personality sort of reminds me of being an art major. I create something to show other people, then I get critiqued. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad. Sometimes people really like it. Sometimes people despise it. Sometimes people are downright honest with you in their criticisms. And sometimes that stings. After all, you spend time making these videos, or artwork, or novel, or whatever it is, and when people don’t like it, it’s a tough pill to swallow.

There’s always talk about people not being able to accept constructive criticism, that they have “thin skin.” Could be true. Some people *don’t* take constructive criticism well. My best friend in art school got incredibly irritated whenever ANYONE suggested his stuff was anything other than perfect.

I think there are a few problems with constructive criticism. My experience was not pleasant, and not for the reason of “I can’t handle the TRUUUUTH” way.

Every week in my creative art studio, we’d post a piece on the wall, so that everyone could critique it. It always went the same way, and the comments were ALWAYS the same. “I think you could have done this better” or the classic, “I like it!” I believe people become frightened to give truthful criticism. Granted, not EVERYTHING needs to be critiqued. Sometimes you just like something. But in this case, none of us in that art class had the guts to be truthful, and actually speak what is on our minds. The internet operates on a different level. Nobody is in the same room, nobody has to look you dead in the eye and tell you your severed head sculpture is terrible (it wasn’t THAT bad, dammit), and you can even give criticism anonymously. It’s a little harder to accept criticism from people you don’t know, and can’t see. I think it has to do with not knowing who that person on the other side of the monitor is, and not knowing what their experience is. In my art class, we were all artists. I appreciated a fellow artists opinion. Posting videos on the net, well. I don’t know WHO is critiquing my work, or what experience they have, or if their advice can actually help me. It’s hard to take a screen name seriously.

Even so, at the end of the day, I always look at constructive criticism positively. In fact, I owe a lot to advice I’ve gotten from other people, and tips I’ve learned just by reading the comments section on my articles, or my videos. I know how hard it is to be brutally honest, so I would never discard something I feel will help me in the end. It takes time to watch someones video and come up with thoughtful critique. This isn’t to say I’m going to agree with everyone. There cannot be a united opinion on everything. We wouldn’t be diverse people if there was. But I appreciate advice, and if someone doesn’t like something, I brush it off, and improve. And for people who have a hard time accepting critique: don’t take it as a personal slight. People have some great ideas out there, and we shouldn’t push them aside over a few hurtful, but truthful comments.

Posted in Lets Get Personal | 24 Responses »

Butterfly Kisses Are Better

Friday, April 29th, 2011

I’ve been thinking a lot lately. After much deliberation, I have come to the very essential conclusion that I in fact, do not take any kind of pleasure in what is otherwise known as “French Kissing.” There are absolutely no physical benefits to tongue kissing, except maybe tasting the other persons saliva, and you BETTER HOPE they were not eating pizza while drinking orange juice prior the lip lock. I’m not sure why I equate pizza and orange juice with bad things. I think we can all agree that pizza and orange juice can be described as what vomit tastes like. You want none of that shizz.

Let me distinguish though; open mouth kissing is entirely okay. As long as you keep the tongue FAR AWAY FROM ME. I’ve found this is a growing fear within me in that, every time I am kissing someone, I get completely paranoid that the person will try to slip their tongue into my mouth. Then the kiss goes by slow and awkward, cause I am trying to keep my lips locked together and REALLY CONCENTRATE on what’s going on. I also end up opening my eyes because I become completely distracted. Then the other person opens their eyes, wondering what the hell is going on. Then we stare in a embarrassed silence. And I say something completely charming to clear the air. ”…..that was nice…..?”

….Not that I am speaking all from experience! I’m a totally good kisser, and I don’t need to get defensive about it! (totally being defensive.)

Of course, this aversion to tongue hockey might have something to do with my first kiss incident, which went something like this. Names will be changed to protect the dimwitted. Let’s just call him Smelly!

(Me and Smelly are sitting on my couch in the basement. I am 15. Smelly is looking around with shifty eyes.)

Me: Let’s watch a movie.

Smelly: (points somewhere behind me) LOOK OVER THERE.

Me: (Is a stupid naive teenager and looks away, interested)

Smelly: (Shoves his face into mine and gives me the most sloppy kiss ever. Pretty sure he licked my teeth.)

Me: …..um. Thanks. How about Waynes World?

Needless to say, that relationship lasted a mere month or so. Probably because he kept trying to clean out the inside of my mouth with his freaking tongue. I honestly, genuinely, cannot find anything sexy about this. And teeth bumping is the absolute worst. Whenever I bump teeth with someone, I imagine two metal panels scraping together, and sparks flying around and shrieking noises happening. Or maybe I am just nitpicking.

The moral of the story here, is wear deodorant, because if we happen to kiss in the future and I tell a story about it, I won’t choose a completely offensive and juvenile name to represent your being. MUAH!

Posted in Lets Get Personal | 18 Responses »