Actually, I probably give some of the worst advice I’ve ever heard.
But, one thing that I’m probably even worse at is managing stress, and, more importantly, giving people advice about it. Because, in all actuality, I have no idea how to manage it and I don’t think anyone really does.
Stress comes in all shapes and sizes. It can be as little as that paper you know you should have enough time to write for your English class, yet you psych yourself out because, after all, it is a big chunk of your grade. And stress can be as big as….. well anything. It can take over your life and control you if you let it.
Photo Credit: anxietyuk.org
For me, one of my larger stresses I refer to as competition stress. This comes with all sports competitions, no matter the magnitude of it. It’s the pressure and the anxiety sitting on your shoulders like a bird watching its pray from way above so the pray can’t see them.
Lastly, the big stress, the whole shebang, is what I call the stalker stress; this is the type that even if you kick, scream, run, and hide it’ll find you somehow. It is the type of stress that resembles a person you don’t want to get to know, and one that you hope doesn’t know you. It is the boogie man hiding under you bed when you’re little and the clown hiding behind your door. It’s the reason that you hate walking alone in the dark because you don’t exactly know what you’re scared of at this point, you just know you’re scared.
But, I’ve learned one thing, and if people do ask me about stress this is the only true piece of advice I can give: it’s hard to manage stress, but it’s even harder not to be scared of it. So once you manage how to not be scared of the inevitable, life becomes easier, I don’t exactly know how, it just does.
P.S. I don’t want you to go on thinking that I have it all figured out, because I don’t. I’m so far away from it, but I’m managing, and will continue to until I can stop stressing about the little things and go on living life. But that will be a while, because it’s difficult and stressful.
I’m a sophomore, far enough away from college, but ever since I was in the seventh grade, all anyone’s been asking me during family reunions or Christmas is college questions.
When you’re younger you feel like you have no weight on your shoulders and have your whole life to figure these things out, but now as I’m sitting in the Journalism room, staring at the college counseling books stacked on the brown shelf in front of me, varying in different sizes, holding the futures of so many students, I realize that I have no idea what I want to do. I then turn to my left and see the wheel of felt college banners shaped in a circle which are where many students go and will continue to go.
My family has all these big life plans for me, which sound great and all, but I’m not sure that’s what I want.
And everything matters now, these are the final years before adulthood, where every mistake you make, every bad test grade you receive, every thing you say and write matters; your whole life is being documented.
Photo Credit: arabamericannews.com
This begins to make me think.
As I’m sitting in my living room staring at the French doors which open to my courtyard, filling out applications for college summer programs all over the country, I’m trying to write about myself as a student and about my life, but it’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.
This makes me realize how much I haven’t done in life; I’m finally transferring out of my childhood, out of my adolescence, leaving my past behind as I take on the next chapter in my life.
I watch all the movies where life seems to fall into place for so many people, and their whole life is figured out. They go on a date with their dream boy, and lie beneath the stars staring up into the heavens picturing what their life could be together, but I haven’t had that, and who knows if I ever will.
You never realize how much is passing you by, and how many opportunities you’re missing.
It feels like just yesterday when my childhood friends and I were placing graham crackers in our kindergarten cubbies for our Thumbelina dolls to eat, or sitting under the big, protective oak tree, hiding acorns from the boys in our class.
Flash-forward ten years and here we are today, possibly closer than ever, but yet there is a division between us, and secrets hiding underneath the smiles flashed to each other.
We sit down at the plastic lunch tables, and pretend to laugh at jokes we don’t get. We then walk away, our group separates, and we don’t see each other until the next class.
It’s weird to think we would hide anything from each other but maybe I did something that changed that. It’s hard to not always blame yourself, for things you know aren’t your fault, but maybe someone else thinks they are.
You try to confide in people who you once would, but things are uncomfortable, so you tuck your feelings away. And at last, your childhood friends are falling into different groups, and, finally, your group is divided.
The day before yesterday, we arrived at school after the weekend and were all drearily ready to start the day. The kind of smiles were flashed to each other saying “Hey, I don’t really know you but I don’t want to come off as rude,” as everyone walked to their first period.
I sat down in Spanish class on the cold plastic seats and wished I had worn jeans that day. I pulled out my binder and homework, and began to listen to the Spanish words that came out of Mr. Risser’s mouth, talking about how our weekends were, and giving us the “Refran of the week.”
The day continued as normal and finally, it came to an end, ending in a hardy soccer practice in the cold, and as night snuck up on us over the mountaintops, engulfing the players in the immense darkness.
I rode the bus home as normal and we were laughing and talking more than normal, but finally, sleep caught up to us and the bus went silent.
I returned home and started on my Chemistry homework. I started getting calls from some of the dormers, as well as, day students. I first declined them all thinking they just were asking homework questions, but this was not the case.
I finally figured out about the fire when my friend, messaged me saying “THERE IS A FIRE.” I immediately responded, and my heart dropped as the words, “It’s at school” appeared on my screen.
The whole night phone calls were made and I could not stop constantly checking up on the status of the fire.
The power went out around nine that night and even though it suddenly became dead quiet I heard voices dancing around in my head reminding me of the worst, which turned this deafening silence into the loudest noise I have ever heard.
I was driving myself mad, and I couldn’t handle it anymore so I shut my phone off and tried to sleep, but the noises continued and I laid awake for a long period of time thinking about the future of the school.
The next day, the fire had reached Ventura, my hometown, and the air became heavy and filled with dense black smoke. The water became contaminated, and the entire town seemed as if a zombie apocalypse had started.
Masks were being worn everywhere, and no sounds were being made. Inhaling the air was the same level of toxicity as smoking cigarettes, so every crack where the air could have crept into my home was plugged up with towels and plastic.
I went to my friend’s house to seek refuge, while my home was full of the co-workers of both of my parents and my brother’s friends. We called many of the dormers and alerted everyone still on campus at the Lower School that our houses were open to them.
Photo Credit: twitter.com
Ojai was on fire; the hills were blazing and lit up like a Christmas tree. The sky was filled one way with giant puffs of blindingly red smoke, and the other with jet-black smoke, converging in the middle and creating a great divide. More than half of Ojai fled to relative’s houses and the small town felt emptier than ever.
My heart wouldn’t stop beating out of my chest because no words of the fire affecting the school had been said until around one in the afternoon when a heartbreaking, mouth quaking, tear-bringing picture was released.
It showed the science and technology building burned to the ground with flames rising up over the remains. When this picture was sent to me and my friend, we sat in silence not sure what to say or do because now we knew that the fire was right on top of our school, our home.
The next day, I went to the barn to get out of the smoke. Looking in the direction of Ventura all you could see was a thick cloud of black smoke covering the town like a baby with a blanket.
The air was so static and dry, and the wind blew fiercely through the canyon, knocking the jumps down and blowing huge ashes through the air and landing on the ground making a sort of white snow upon the ground.
The day went by quickly, the only thing that was slowing it down was the consistent check-ups from my mother and my friends about the school and the towns.
The fire had blown through Ventura bringing down hundreds of structures including houses of very close family friends and was still burning up top the “Two Trees Hill” and making its way to the beautiful town of Santa Barbara.
Photo Credit: CNN.com
That night I laid in bed, thinking about what happened and how quickly things can change. Experiences like this make one think about how much you take for granted, and how little you think about natural disasters like this affecting your home and your life.
I have always seen natural disasters and tradgedies happening around the world from watching the news, but never did I think that I would be stuck in the middle of one of them.
2017 has been a year of disasters, deaths, and controversy all over the world, this fire was just another thing on the list that if someone outside of the lstate saw on the news would probably pay attention to but wouldn’t really care about, or go on thinking about, or wouldn’t have it racing through the back of their mind for the rest of the year and probably the next year as well.
It would have little to zero effect on them because it doesn’t affect them personally, but that would also be me if I had seen an incident such as this on the news happening in a far-off state such as Oklahoma or Texas.
But one thing, and probably the most important thing I have learned from the fire, which was just contained two days ago, after spreading over more than 440 square miles, is to not take anything for granted anymore; because at least once in your life something will be happening to you and it won’t be just be something you saw in the news, it will be something you saw with your own eyes and something that you felt with your own heart.
It will leave you thinking about it for the rest of your years on this planet. That is what life is, a bunch of things that you would never expect to happen, and things you never thought could happen to you because you feel safe as though you are in a glass box, safe from everything, but one day that will not be the case. And that is the day that everything changes and, hopefully, for the better.
It was a relaxing day, the sun was out, and like any other day, I used my time as a wise person would, in the most interesting way, by bugging my younger brother.
I must have been four at the time and my brother was only a small number of weeks old, still too young to have hair upon his head. He had the attention span of a flea most of the time, but today his widened to the attention span of a poodle. As I always loved to do, I lay in his crib with him trying to become loving siblings, but somehow it always ended up with him disliking me.
Today, I carried with me one of the most prized possessions I had ever known existed; my bear, with the completely original name of “Bearie the Bear.” He was a small bear, only about a foot or so long and covered in a white, plush material with two big brown eyes staring into my mine. His face consisted of an unceasing smile and a brown mussel.
I took my usual walk down the hallway from my room to his, with the sunlight illuminating me as I strolled. I walked into his pastel baby room, starring at his wooden crib in the far left corner. Soon enough my mom followed me in, to make sure I didn’t harass my baby brother. With her, she brought an intricate, jet-black camera, which she recorded most of our childhood upon.
I walked over to his crib, and my mom grabbed me by the armpits, lifting me onto his tiny bed. As soon as my junior foot touched the soft sheets he lay upon, Morgan awoke from his slumber.
I could immediately see his tiny eyes drift toward the direction of my bear. They were dead set on him, not looking anywhere else. I could not bear to see the enthused yet mischievous look on his face, but I snuck a glare. To my misfortune, I could see a twinkle in his eyes that I had never seen before. None of this mattered though because there was no way that he was pilfering my bear.
He tried to grab it from my hands multiple times but failing every single one of them. I had a great advantage being the taller one, for once in my life. My mom saw him struggling and scolded me for “unnecessary taunting”, whatever that meant.
As my punishment, my mom stole my prized possession and gifted it to my younger brother. Still, to this day, I think about how somewhere deep inside his closet, is my bear.
I am overwhelmed with excitement for the ski season approaching; the visions of snowflakes float around in my mind, reminding me of the snow-filled times of last year.
While at Mammoth Mountain over the holidays last year, my dad challenged my cousin, brother, and me to ski the face of the mountain in a complete snow storm. My heart pumped with exhilaration as the word “yes” left my lips.
This run was called Cornice Bowl and is one of the longest runs on the mountain. My body was shaking with every step as I walked closer to the building housing the gondolas. My vibrant white ski boots squeezed my feet, and my blue Patagonia jacket clung to my body as if it was giving me a hug for support. Carrying my skis in my right hand and my poles in the left, I trekked up to the big cinderblock building, awaiting my next challenge to overcome in life. Slowly but surely, I walked up the metal steps and entered a big room with doors leading to numerous rooms on the left, and the rotating gondolas on the right.
We walked up to the ticket scanners and, just like clockwork, the season passes we held so dearly in our pockets dinged, leaving a slight buzzing in the air. We then walked on big black mats that covered the concrete floor up to the thin yellow and black line that kept us from crossing. Finally, the tall man dressed in the iconic bright green and black Mammoth snowsuit waved us forward. With swift pace, we walked up to the gondola entering the crowded room.
My heartbeat accelerated quickly. I could hear it in my ears, it felt like an elephant in the room. Suddenly, the man wearing the distinctive green suit directed us to enter the moving gondola.
I hurried as fast as I could, slid my skis into one of the plastic slots on the outside of the gondola, and hopped in. I slid across the fake leather seats all the way to the far right. The doors slowly started to magnetically close as the gondola slipped away from the crowded room.
The blur of white snowflakes overtook all sides of the gondola. I thought I would never know this feeling, but for once in my life, I was blind. The winter wind left ice kisses on the side of the gondola, crystallizing the windows.
The dismal weather warped us into a white wonderland, with swirling snowflakes and drafts of wind occasionally blowing by our capsule, leaving a sudden crisp chill inside. McCoy Station was seen like the light at the end of the tunnel. Our tiny world entered the big picture again as we entered McCoy Station. As we crossed the threshold into the dim cinder block building three more men boarded our gondola and then we continued on the path to the summit.
The snow became thicker; each individual snowflake doubled in size, making for utter whiteout once again. The temperature grew colder as the summit approached us. The snow had fogged up the windows, leaving us surrounded by a kingdom of white.
The gondola seemed to slow as we traveled up, finally reaching 11,053 feet. Our carrier entered the small building at the top of the mountain. The kind men helped me release my skis from the moving gondola as I waited for the rest of my family. We hustled into the closed doors that held warmth inside, just to step foot outside again into the treacherous weather.
My ski boots hit each stair with a loud clunk. The temperature was extraordinarily low, resulting in frostbitten faces or ones which were almost completely covered in masks. After posing by the nearly frozen trail sign for a few pictures, I stepped into the bindings of my skis. My dad reassured my cousin and me that this would be no harder than what we were doing previously. The only downfall would be the steepness factor and weather. Then, my dad had a short but sweet conversation with my brother that this was not the proper hill to bomb down at mock-ten speed, but to go slowly and practice his turns.
We headed down Upper Roadrunner, an easy blue run, which was short ways to the Cornice Bowl, our first Black Diamond of the season. Once we reached the edge of the drop-off, I could see dismal looks plastered on everyone’s faces. My dad told us only people with great amounts of courage would ski this run in a complete whiteout. Then, he went first to show us where to turn. My brother followed with the same energy he normally had, but at a somewhat slower pace. I followed him, or at least I tried as I couldn’t see anything but white and the hints of blue coming from my K2 skis.
I started my first turn; slowly, I placed my pole, and my skis swiveled. Soon enough I started to find a rhythm of turning. My dad stopped every once in a while to check and see how we were faring. One by one, we would emerge out of the white bliss, regroup and continue down. In my head, I listened to the rhythm of the pole turn and repeated this motion as we made our way down the precipitous slope. Then, I could make out the end of our run.
My cousin and I made it to the flat, where my dad and brother had been patiently waiting. We decided to take a sharp turn to the right and head down a piece of uneven terrain on the side of a somewhat small cliff and start powering our way down the mountain to McCoy Station. At McCoy’s, we headed back to the main lodge, where the main gondola station is located. As we slid into the crowded area of people, we all announced at once that we wanted to go again.
The competition was fierce with girls finishing at 15:49 (Claudia Lane). I am so overwhelmed by how amazing every single runner there was and I only hope that our small but mighty team will continue to qualify for this competition for the rest of my years in high school.
The course was a flat, dusty dirt course, with hundreds of spectators cheering you on on the side and helping you push yourself that extra mile in order to achieve your goal.
A gun was shot into the air symbolizing the start of the race, and everyone on the starting line sprung into action and begun sprinting their way to the front of the pack, including myself. We resembled salmon in a hatchery, all swimming against the current, piled against each other, pushing ourselves to the limit.
After everyone settled down, paces were found and the true part of the race began. Normally being in the top ten in the races, it was strange for Ojai Valley School to settle into the middle of the pack with fifty, sixty, or seventy people in front and behind you. It was nerve-racking for everyone, but comforting knowing every runner felt the same pain in your lungs as you.
Adrenaline kicked into the runners as we made our way onto the third mile of the race. Strides lengthened, breathing became harder, and you began to pass people you never thought you would pass. Suddenly, you saw the finish line, the symbol of relief. The last quarter mile- a straight-away to the finish line- flew by as the runner zoomed down the dirt path, and the tracker-chips woven into their shoes crossed the finish line.
Tears were shed, and hugs were given knowing that we gave it our all. The overwhelming excitement hit us all at once knowing that we had completed our first CIF Championship meet. And even though we did not qualify, all the underclassmen are determined to return to the course next year and try, try, try again.
I can not begin to thank the coaches enough for an amazing season and helping me push myself to times I believed were unachievable. Having never run before and to come out of the gates increasing my PR (personal record) by over three minutes was groundbreaking for me, and I could not have done it without Mr. Alvarez and Ms. Stevens.
The heart beating as one, eyes seeing as one, love and devotion for the sport and for each other connecting as one, but all of this is leaving, disappearing when all I can think when I’m lying alone, is that it is my fault.
I can hear the hooves beating maybe way up above me but that is not where they are supposed to be, that is not where she is supposed to be, she is supposed to be next to me, down here, in my arms, not up there in the heaven, away from me and my life but as I’m drifting away in my emotions all I can think is it is my fault.
Even with all the people dying, and the children crying, and the murders, shootings, and the bombings happening in the world, all I can think is that it is my fault.
The disease creeps up on her like a kidnapper sneaks up on his kid, the beautiful angel, my best friend, all I can think is that it is my fault.
Maybe if I had checked her temperature again, or her nose, or her stomach it wouldn’t be my fault, but I didn’t; I left in a hurry, not thinking about the consequences, not thinking about what my life was for six years; not thinking at all, and I was the last person to ride her, to see her, before my trainer came, the vet came, and all the sirens and gunshots and noise in the world froze, and time came to a stop, the world stopped its rotation, the crickets froze their legs, my heart took its final beat before I was told the news… My mom spoke very slow but the words crept up to me, I tried to bat them away but they fought back throwing me against the wall forcing me to listen to what I thought was the impossible, I kicked and I screamed and I thrust myself away from the inevitable but the words felt like ice against my heart, “she’s sick,” she says and from then on the only thing that matters, the only thing that is keeping me up at night, and keeps my heart racing is that it is my fault.
And if this truly is the end, I know I need to be by her side, away from the noise and the chaos, and everything else because she is what matters, my best friend, the only one that would listen, who I can talk endlessly to, I can trust with my life and darkest secrets, because even when the clocks stop turning and the world stops moving, and the sun stops shining, and the birds stop chirping, and the people stop talking, and the hearts stop beating, and the voices quiet, and the earth fades away, admitting the darkening, skin crawling silence, it will still be my fault.
A tight backstage room.
Fumes from hairspray intoxicating a tight backstage room.
Chaos,
bobby-pins, tan and black,
flying aimlessly.
It is hot backstage,
the walls the color of earl gray tea.
The toes of the apparently perfect, are broken, bruised, concealed inside pretty pink slippers delicately touching the chalk buckets in every corner of the room.
Pandemonium.
Bustling people elegantly dressed in every color imaginable.
Feathers,
diamonds,
flowers,
leotards,
point shoes,
tights,
tutus.
Dancers racing around behind the curtains struggling to find their cue.
The frightened ballerinas pacing backstage,
with visions of turns and leaps dancing in their heads.
Dance ballerina to the sound of the classical piano.
All the chaos backstage concealed from the elegance on stage.
All concealed from the wealthy parents sitting in velvet chairs.
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