Running from your fears will get you nowhere

Running in circles, otherwise known as
"Wasting a bunch of energy just to stay in the same place"

My mother is a great person, and I love her to death. However, there are some things she does that I don't agree with. My mother has this phobia of being just like her mother. It's a fear that drives her to her core and she expresses it in so many ways. One of these acts of fear that has the tendency to repeat itself is fleeing. The day she turned 18 she packed her stuff up from a small house in Notarealcity and moved straight to Noneofthesecitiesarereal in Georgia. Yet, that plan blew up in her face. Everything went bad after a while, and she had to move back with 2 kids and one on the way. For a while everything was okay, but then all Hell broke loose. My older sister went through her rebellion stage, and my mom and my grandmother kept arguing until we moved out again. Just this time we stayed a little closer. We stayed in the same predicament that we started in for a long time.

With all this happening my mother still couldn't understand how to deal with her fear. Because no matter how far she ran, she kept coming closer and closer to her fear. She was becoming her mother, a bitter lonely woman who had nothing better to do than complain about how everyone else was doing something wrong. I didn't understand why she was upset till the day she told me. In a twisted mindset I did the unthinkable. I told my grandmother that she was the very reason her child was upset, She cried. Then I asked her, no begged her, to talk it out with her daughter and she never did. She simply could not comprehend the fact that it was her fault. Because of her stubbornness neither of them really get along to this day. When they are around each other they act like they get along, but it is all a charade, and I can feel the tension. I just want everyone to be happy for once. From my family's mistakes I learned never to run from you fears. Sadly I never learned the outcome of confronting them head on either.

If life doesn't give you lemons, then grow your own

Life.

It doesn't always give you lemons.

As previously mention my Grandfather lived a hard life. Yet, he never asked for more than what he can get with his own two hands. With this I was able to learn yet another lesson from this hermit of a man.

These two lessons go hand and hand perfectly. George wasn't spoon-fed happiness, he was a “go-getter”, a do-it yourself type guy. He never had annything given to him. When he was 15 years old, he started working for his uncle for 15 cents an hour. He worked 6 hours a day, and yet he still was in school. By the time he graduated highschool he was making 50 cents an hour. He moved into the elevator trade right after that, and eventually by the time he graduated he worked up to getting 50 Cents an hour. He worked up from nothing. he showed me that hard work can get you anywhere.

Even a dull blade can draw blood

This is swan, well, at least it will be.

Robert is not the picture perfect representative of health. He was not honestly supposed to live past 13 but, right now he is the ripe old age of 16. If you think about it with his life expectancy he should be experiencing his mid life crisis right about now. However, he doesn't plan on wasting his life pouting. Robert plans to blow the world away.

Robert is not the best definition of health. As a matter a fact he has a scar going down the front of his chest from his many heart surgeries. However, no matter how many times this has hindered his playing abilities, he has always come out as not only one of the best musician that I know, but he is also one of the best catchers I know. With all of his talent however his heart conditions have held him back in many ways. Until he turned 13 he wasn't legally allowed to play in sports with other people because he was label as a "medical liablility". Still, he kept on working at baseball and just last year he was the varsity catcher at PCA.

If you only speak of happiness, then it is no more than a word

I'm yellow. Why? Because I want to be yellow.

My grandfather built his life up from scratch. His life as a kid was cut short, because instead of playing baseball with his friends, he had to work for his uncle for 50 cents an hour. Eventually he went into the elevator trade for 35 years of his life. Yet, as far as I can tell, this is one of the happiest men I know.

When my grandfather was my age he lost his father. The age that he lost his father was irrelevent because the loss of a loved one is imeasurable no matter what age one is. What amazes me the most however, is that although he was at a loss for words that day he refused to let that one moment in his life bring him down. He moved on with his life. He taught me that no matter what happens, if you want to be happy, then all you have to do is try.

You can tell a tortoise that it is a hare as much as you want, but no matter what; it is still a Tortoise

"...and that is why you should join the track team."

My mother has never forced anything on me. When I was growing up and I said I didn't like pickles on my cheeseburgers, she never once forced me to eat the pickles. I never questioned this of course because I was a child. I was just happy not to have to eat pickles. Now that I am older I understand that there are people who try and force lifestyles and even pickles on other people. My mother's mother is one of these people.

I learned (from my mother) that my grandmother was a very controlling person. If something was to be done, it had to be done the way she wanted it. sadly my mother had to grow up in that kind of house hold. My grandmother did her best to force her beliefs on my mom. For years and years she just went along with it, trying to conform to her mothers requests. As she grew up, she slowly drifted away from her mother demands. As a matter a fact, my mother has ended up nothing like what my grandmother is like. She is the exact opposite of my grandmother. She has taught me that no matter what people say, i will always be, what i was meant to be.

Papa

George grew up in a strange time in American society. To put it into perspective, when he was 16 he could buy beer from and store that sold it. He, like my mother and Robert, has suffered a harsh life. The one difference however, is that he can be considered quite “successful” and from what I have heard, he was a very happy man in everything he did from a child up till now. How he was able to stay happy, I don't know. If my father died when I was 11, and I  no matter how hard I tried could not read, I would be a most unhappy person. This man taught me about happiness and hardwork through example. Oh, and did I mention that he is my grandfather?

Cello Man

Not all of the people who have taught me lessons about life are old and wise. Some of the people I have learned from in my life are simply young and withered. My friend, Robert Fakelastname, is 15 and a musical prodigy. He was ranked fourth best in the south on the cello last year, and recently he was playing with the UWF symphony. However, this boy has many a heart condition, too numerous  in fact to be mentioned in this blog. My dear friend Robert will not live past the age of thirty, but he somehow keeps going. When I saw the way that he handled social aspects of life that other people would normally tremble under, I learned never to judge a book by it's cover.

My Mummsies

By far, the most cliché teacher in my mental repository is my mother who is formally known as Ida. Of course I learned lessons from my own mother; it is to be expected. My mother was born in Texas, at a date which I cannot retrieve at this point in time. Using the art of observation, I was able to many lessons from my mom about life. I observed what she is now, and what her parents tried to force her to be.

Introduction

          My name is Austin, and I'm a tenth grader at This Is A Fake Name High School in Florida; but we normally call it TIAFNHS for short. During this quarter of my English 2 Honors class we read two books about lessons people have learned in their life. The book I read was entitled “The Last Lecture” by Randy Pausch. The book tells of a professor and family man who becomes fatally ill from cancer and is given the opportunity to give one last lecture before he dies. He gives it on the many lessons he learns in life and who teaches them to him. In this very blog I, Austin R. Thisisnotmyreallastname, will be doing a very similar presentation. I'm going to be discussing various lessons I have learned thus far in my life and the people who I learned these lessons from.