Month: October 2026

A Lesson Learned

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Recently I relearned the value of friendship and how to deal with the estrangement of someone. It’s not something you really think of till it’s gone.  It’s so weird to go from being so close to someone and their life to being complete strangers. You still see them every day but can’t talk to them, spend hours together like you used to, or even just complain about your class, they are just there. All of your inside jokes become a memory that slowly drifts away. I realized how easy it is for your judgment to get clouded and for mistakes to get made. You never truly understand the effect you can have on people. Whether it seems different to you, others can see it as so much more. I made this mistake, and now I have to live with this consequence. I can’t complain or be mad at the person, as it truly was my wrongdoing. All you can do in the end is hope that maybe one day the other person can find it in their heart to overlook your mistake and forgive you. In the end, we are all humans, we’re going to make mistakes. You can’t dredge up the past, but look towards the future. While I do hope that one day we can go back to even just a fraction of how it was before, I know I have to be realistic and leave time and space for maybe one day an ounce of forgiveness.

830+ Paper People Chain Stock Photos and Royalty-Free Pictures - iStock
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Writing

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I find writing to be a hard thing. It’s hard when you have to write about something that you have no interest in. It’s also hard to write about something that you are interested in because then you have so much to write about that the story tends to become a bit jumbled. In school, there is a lot of writing, and most of it tends to be about things that are not that interesting. So to me it’s pretty hard. One year of an English class, for a final, we had a prompt that allowed us to write about anything we wanted. I wrote about getting and training my wild horse. The comments that I got back were that I had a very interesting story, but I had too many grammatical errors. That is another hard part of writing, going back and checking over the formation and grammar of it all. When I finish writing something, I’m usually over it and don’t want to go back to check it over. 

PC- theguardian.com

“It’s never the horse’s fault”

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Riding horses is a strange sport. You are not with a team, but you are still working with a sentient being. Except they can’t talk or communicate with us in a way that is easy to understand. In order to have a successful experience with a horse you need to learn to give up the ego of being superior to them and stoop down to their level. Working with horses, especially wild ones, is crucial to go to their level. They know nothing other than their instincts. There is a saying that every rider has heard “ it’s never the horse’s fault”. In other words, it’s always your fault. It makes things less complicated to know that you really are the problem, and that there is no one else to blame. Other times  it can be hard mentally, especially when you know that you can do better and that you are the reason that things are going sideways.

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The Mind of A Cat

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Cats are such interesting animals to be around. They do what they want, and we just happen to exist next to them.

I never really knew what cats were like until about four years ago. They seem to only eat, sleep, and lick themselves, but occasionally play. It’s funny to think that they make their own choices and have their own feelings.  

What goes through their heads is something that I always find fascinating. How do they choose what to do, who to go with, and how do they determine who to trust? They’re very curious creatures and always try to know what’s happening like humans.

They can be very affectionate at times, but sometimes they like to keep their distance from people they don’t know or distrust. 

For solitary animals, they are quite social when you really get to know them. It depends on which cat it is, but it’s still fascinating to know about them and what they think. 

Gray Tabby Cat: 5 Patterns, Breeds & Personality

P.C – Google “Tabby cat”

Work

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Having a job has always scared me. I was scared of doing something wrong and getting fired, or not liking the people I worked with, but now that I have been working at Ojai Ice Cream for over a year, I’ve made more friends than I could have ever expected. I’m friends with most of my coworkers, and there are very few that I don’t like working with. With some of my coworkers, I’m friends outside of school and hang out with them after work, and a lot of the time we end up getting in n out. One of my best friends I met through work as well, and I hang out with her very often, and I’ve made new friends through being friends with her. My bosses are also the best, and they have me go through resumes and tell them who should and shouldn’t get hired. I’m very thankful to work at the ice cream shop, and I couldn’t imagine what I would be like if I didn’t start working there. 

Ojai Ice Cream (@ojaiicecream) · Ojai, CA · Instagram photos and videos

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Heaven

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The idea of heaven always used to scare me. What do you mean we live sometimes a short life, sometimes a long life, and if we’re good enough, we get to go to a place that’s supposed to be an eternal happiness. What would eternal happiness be to someone? Would it be seeing their dog that passed away or seeing their parents who loved them, but never got to say goodbye when they wanted to? Or would it be for someone the idea of having food each day, or for others, driving a luxury car? When I think of heaven, I don’t know what to think my eternal happiness would be for me. Would it be my parents loving me the way I always wanted them to? Or getting a second chance at life where I don’t stress about such minute  things. I have always wanted to meet God ask him what heaven would be like for me but to this day, I’m still unsure and hopefully one day I’ll figure out what heaven means to me.

Heaven in Christianity - Wikipedia

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Auditions

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This upcoming Sunday is my audition for OYES (Ojai Youth Entertainers Studio). I’m honestly somewhat terrified. This is the first play I’ve done that isn’t apart of school, so there’s no guarantee that I’d get in for sure. I feel like that’s the most nerve racking part of it all, honestly.

The musical that OYES is doing is Ride the Cyclone, which has been one of my favorite musicals for the longest time, ever since I found out about it in the 7th grade. It’s about a group of choir kids who die on a rollercoaster accident, and each one of them has to tell their story, in song form, in order to be set back to life by a fortune teller.

I have to memorize a one-minute monologue and sing a cut of a song. I’ve been paranoid about memorizing the monologue for the past week, mainly because it also applies to my theatre class on Friday, in which I have to preform. Might as well do the same monologue for both events, no need to memorize two different ones, right?

Still, I’ve been terrified. What if I miss a line, or have a voice crack in the middle of the song? It’s better not to dwell on it for now, only when I’m driving to the studio is when I get to sweat bullets about it. It’s whatever, if I don’t get in, there’s no big deal. Hopefully.

Theatre vs. Theater: What's the Difference? | Backstage

P.C.- Google, “Theatre”

College Stressors

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I have never felt this overwhelmed in my life. I never believed people when they said “senior year is so stressful all of a sudden.” I didn’t believe them because they said that junior year is supposed to be the most difficult, but for me it was amazing. Suddenly, though, a switch flipped; I was faced with an extremely challenging week, and now this week I’m faced with endless college things being thrown at me. I feel so unprepared. Did I do enough work over the summer? Are my activities good enough to get me into college? Do I like my essay? How am I supposed to show colleges myself in a 600-word essay? I feel like it was just yesterday I was doing this application process for high school; how am I already back applying, but now to colleges? I wish this process was easier. Not only that but I have applications for financial aid, capstone, endless amounts of games for sports and so much homework for every class. How am I supposed to get it all done while not getting sick or being tired everyday. I can’t wait for the moment all my applications are done and I can finally take a deep breath and relax a little.

College Options – Mrs. Koch's Counseling Corner
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