Happy Thanksgiving!

~ Sarrah Hakim ~ 4 Comments

 

I'm thankful for all this good food... oh, and the people I get to share it with! 🙂

I meant to post this yesterday, but it must have slipped my mind… I guess I might as well wish you a happy Black Friday as well!

Whether you eat turkey or not, I think Thanksgiving is a holiday everyone should celebrate… not necessarily by doing anything lavish or fancy, but just by appreciating how lucky we are. In fact, if you think about it… each day can be Thanksgiving. All we have to do is remember the things to be thankful for in life.

If I’m ever feeling down or upset, it helps to look at the big picture. Sometimes we get so caught up in school or work or whatever that we forget what’s truly important. Family, friends, passion, love… much more important than a quiz. At my school, a lot of people constantly worry about their grades. But you know what? If you get a  B on a test, the world isn’t going to end. Robert Frost said it: “In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life:

it goes on.”

My friend and I came up with something at school the other day: A’s are pretty, but they’re not life. Life is trying something new and discovering things you hadn’t known before. Life is doing your best and taking risks. Better to try and fail than not to have tried at all. Better to have gotten a B and enjoyed yourself than have gotten an A and stressed out so much that you ripped all your hair out.

That’s not to say you should be completely lax in anything concerning school… but it’s important to remember what truly matters in life.

And I think Thanksgiving’s the best time to do that. I hope you had a happy Thanksgiving and continue to have a happy life! Make sure to spend lots of time with your family and take a break from work or school!

How Rainy Days Should Be Spent

~ Sarrah Hakim ~ 3 Comments

 

Since I have now missed a total of four days of school, am sick, and have no hope of ever catching up on all that I have missed, I figured I might as well do something useful by updating my blog. Besides, I don’t want another month to slip by without any updates!

 

Since it rained yesterday during our field trip in gym and I spent a lot of time standing in the rain and freezing (which might have been the cause of my being sick today), I decided to do a post on how rainy days should be spent. (This does NOT include freezing to death in a tent with a hole at the top.)

The Elements of a Perfect Rainy Day:

1) A heavy blanket or comforter.

2) A fireplace with a blazing, toasty fire happily dancing away.

3) A cup of tea, hot chocolate, or something of the sort. (A bowl of hot soup is fine.)

4) A good book (comic books work too, especially Calvin and Hobbes).

5) A window, so you can gaze romantically out of it at the furious deluge outside.

6) A pair of thick woolen socks.

7) A friend to share the experience with.

8 ) And finally, a door, so that when the deluge is over, you can step outside and smell that lovely damp fragrance that lingers in the air after it has rained. (And so that you can watch the rainbow.)

 

Of course, this is mainly for those cold autumn or winter days. On rainy spring or summer days, when it’s warm outside, it can be nice to dance in the rain. 🙂

 

URL for the picture:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:RainAmsterdamTheNetherlands.jpg#globalusage

The Definition of Success

~ Sarrah Hakim ~ 2 Comments

Most people learn the secret to life when they’re old and gray, so it is useless to them. Fortunately for me, I learned it while I’m still young. I didn’t have to be staring death in the face to realize it, either. I realized it this year when I made a seemingly simple decision.

Here’s the secret:

Life’s too short.

I’m serious. It’s three simple words, but that’s all there is to it.

Until recently this year, I was in an advanced math class. If I had continued on that track, I would be taking crazy college level stuff in 12th grade and be working my butt off. I wouldn’t have had time to think, to eat, to sleep, to breathe-

Was I capable of it?

Certainly.

Here’s the thing: I had an A in my advanced class this year, and I had straight A’s last year. My teachers were super confused- why in the heck would I switch down? Only people who couldn’t handle the class did that. I could have continued on this track and done crazy math stuff junior and senior year. I could have majored in math in college. I could have become some freakishly smart math professor and maybe even made mathematical discoveries or had theorems named after me.

But I would not have been successful.

Success: The satisfaction you get from doing something you love.

If you think about it, we- that is, each and every person in the human race is capable of doing anything.

But life is too short to do it all. That’s just the way it is. That’s why you have to decide between your passion and your ability.

I have the ability to do higher level math. But I chose not  to, even though I’m dying of boredom in my math class this year. Because my passion lies in writing. And I’d rather spend time writing my book than working really hard at something that doesn’t interest me.

My mom actually had a great analogy for this. She told me that I was driving down the road, and I came to a fork. I kept driving, but before long I realized I was on the wrong path. So all I had to do was backtrack a little (move into the lower math class) until I got to the fork, and then continue on the right path. Better to do that then keep going on the wrong road.

A couple years ago, I saw a poster that said, “No matter how far you go down the wrong road, you can always turn back.”

Well, that’s true, but the faster you turn around, the less distance you have to cover. And the less time is wasted.

Life is too short not to follow your dreams, aim high and have big goals in mind.

Do what you can with what you have, and don’t waste time doing something you don’t enjoy. You were given talent for a reason, and you were given passion for a reason.

Now go out there and make it happen.

The Absence of Time

~ Sarrah Hakim ~ 4 Comments

Yikes. I realize I haven’t updated my blog in a month, and I apologize for that. But this also gives me a chance to talk about something that seems to affect all of us- and that’s the idea of not having enough time.

It’s actually quite sad. I was talking to someone about it today, in fact. Sometimes, life just feels so… routine. Each day you get up and do the same thing over and over again. You study like heck for a test; after you take it you start studying for the next test. And so… time is measured by tests? Before you know it there’s no time at all. A month has passed. It’s crazy.

With no time to do what you want to do in life, with no time to follow and live up to what you’re truly passionate about, how are you supposed to live? Because if you think about it… you’ve only got one life. Why spend it doing the same things over and over again, the same things that you don’t even like?

Of course, if you’re still in school, like me, you don’t really have a choice. Your future kind of depends on your education, so you have to do your best and work hard in school;  you have to be good and get good grades.

But let’s say you’re working super hard so that you can become a doctor. But… you don’t really want to be one. In fact, let’s go further than that- let’s say you HATE anything to do with medicine. Or you’re an engineer who HATES math. Why do it? Why torture yourself with the only life you’ve got?

True, this isn’t a perfect world, and you don’t always get what you want. But when you have the choice… why not make the right one?

Even if you like your job, but you have a passion for something else, you have to do something about it. Let’s say you love playing the guitar. Do you have to become a famous guitarist? Heck no. But how great would it feel to take your guitar out maybe once a week and break that awful monotonous routine of life? Of getting out of bed and going to school or work?

I don’t know. Different people think in different ways. Maybe you don’t agree with any of this at all.

But I do know about myself, even if I don’t know about you. My passion (as you’ve probably guessed) is writing. And I intend to get my book published, no matter how much darn homework my teachers give.

“You will never find time for anything. If you want time, you must make it.” ~Charles Roberts Buxton

Book Review: The House on Mango Street

~ Sarrah Hakim ~ 15 Comments

This is from the back cover:

Sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes deeply joyous, The House on Mango Street tells the story of Esperanza Cordero, whose neighborhood is one of harsh realities and harsh beauty. Esperanza doesn’t want to belong- not to her rundown neighborhood, and not to the low expectations the world has for her. Esperanza’s story is that of a young girl coming into her power, and inventing for herself what she will become.

I’ve never read a book like this one- the style of storytelling the author chose for this is just unique. It’s told in a series of snapshots- on the back cover it calls them “vignettes.” This the word origin and history for the word “vignette”:

1751, “decorative design,” originally a design in the form of vine tendrils around the borders of a book page, especially a picture page, from Fr. vignette, from O.Fr., dim. of vigne “vineyard” (see vine). Sense transferred from the border to the picture itself, then (1853) to a type of small photographic portrait with blurred edges very popular mid-19c. Meaning “literary sketch” is first recorded 1880, probably from the photographic sense.

I like the “photographic portrait with blurred edges.” That’s honestly the best way to describe Sandra Cisneros’s writing style. Each chapter is like a still in a movie… but the blurred edges make it more natural somehow. Even though you can picture it perfectly in your head, you still have the freedom to picture it in your own way. No one will imagine it the same. The main picture will be the same- but each person’s edges will be different.

I would definitely recommend this book- just because it’s so different from anything else I’ve ever read. This author has an amazing ability to write! Honestly, almost every other sentence has a simile in it. Or a metaphor. Or personification. Sandra Cisneros’s ability to use language is unbelievable. Her voice and style and writing just flows so well… so naturally.

Read it. If you’ve already read it, read it again. You’ll notice things you hadn’t noticed before.