January 10th

Finals week began today, and the whole school is in full stress mode. My school is not an easy one to attend at this time of year, because of the intensity with which it goes about studying. If you are not cramming for exams, you are simply not doing something right.

I have one teacher, though, who has been particularly outspoken about the finals frenzy. This teacher teaches on of my favorite classes, and has spent the entire year trying to encourage us to think beyond the walls of the classroom, to think about what we are learning on a more significant and worldly level. I think the class has achieved a greater level of success because of this encouragement, and I believe we have all gotten a little bit more from the class because of it.

During the week when most other teachers are attempting to fill our heads with the information that we will need to get an A on the final, my teacher was working on making sure that we knew how to use the material beyond that. The class he teaches does not cater well to a classic style of exam, so a final is a difficult thing to study for. He was quite critical of the exam, as a matter of fact, and even mentioned to us how stupid it is that we even have to take an exam, because he believes that it is better to have an assessment that reflects our actual growth in the class, something that the current exam fails to do.

I think my teacher is right on in this. Exams focus too much on letter grades: what do I need for an A-, what do I need to maintain my B average. The focus needs to start being more on how much we learned and how we can take that into the real world and benefit our community. How can we do that with simply an A on a report card?

January 9th

This morning, I played guitar at my temple, songleading for services as well as the parent open-house type program that my first grade class led. I played about 10 different songs, and was engaged in some serious songleading excitement. Of those 10 songs, eight of them were written by Debbie Friedman.

This morning, Debbie Friedman died at the age of 58. Her music, which began at OSRUI, the summer camp that I attend and love, inspired thousands of Jews all around the globe. Her beautiful talent brought great joy and light to the spirit of an entire movement. She will be greatly missed.

May her memory be for a blessing.

"Life is not the amount of breaths you take, it's the moments that take your breath away."

January 8th

Gettin more opportunities for freedom as we get older is part of what makes getting older fun. We are presented with the chance to become more worldly, and get to experience things on a level that we have never reached before.

When teenagers get freedom, they often do stupid things. They don't know what to do without someone keeping tabs on them, and therefore go out and think it is ok to get drunk or stupid (well, both usually). Most of the time, though, the stupid ideas come from the ones we are told to do. If you are home alone, you are TOLD that having a party is the "right" way of having fun in that situation. It is the true sign of maturity when you are able to overcome this by doing what is right, even when it is not what might be fun for the moment.

“Nobody ever did, or ever will, escape the consequences of his choices.” Alfred Montapert

January 6th

This week has been an incredible act of endurance for me. I have had more paperwork, more writing, and more studying to do all at once than any other time of high school. So much for an easy senior year.

Here is what I don't understand. With all of the work that i have been doing, I have had to stay up until 11:45 three nights in a row. Today, I could barely get out of bed. At school, I had trouble staying awake, and trouble even going from one class to another attentively. Overall, it was as if I was running on empty. How, then, do people do waht I am doing every day? I have several friends who can't even think about getting to sleep until at least 2 oclock in the morning. Every day, some people will even stay up until 1 in the morning, just to get up at 4 to finish. They come to school with three to five hours of sleep. Thnking about that, they get less than 24 hours of slep in a school week. That is rediculous. After how tired I was today, I can't even imagine how hard it is to function after so much work. It isn't even only about staying up late. It is also about what they, and I, are doing with the time we should be sleeping. We are working hard just to stay afloat with all of the school work, extra-curricular activities, jobs, and, in my case, youth group matters.

This is a vicious cycle. We stay up late so that we can do all of our homework to be ready for school, but by the time we get to school, we are to exhausted from the night before to actually be able to do well or focus.

I'm ready to go to bed, mostly because I want to make sure I am ready to work hard tomorrow.

"We accept the nature of the reality that is presented to us" The Truman Show

January 5th

First blog to say I can't blog. I have too much on my plate and just need to go to bed.

Great post. Better one tomorrow.

January 4th

Today was a weird day. Within one day, I went from incredibly excited to incredibly not. I went from happy to pissed at the drop of a hat. I went from stressed to at peace, and back to stressed again a thousand times. Overall, it was just a tough day. January is not shaping up to be an easy month.

January 3rd

Back to school day really gets a bad rap. So many people dread going back after winter or spring break. I am usually one of those people. This year, though, I just couldn't bring myself to be upset. The idea of getting to go back and see all of my friends and teachers was actually a really nice break from, well, break. I had missed getting to see everyone and work hard at school. So much free time on my hands was fun, but at the same time, I was ready to get back in the swing of things and restart my routine.

My favorite part of going back to school today was Physics. I know, who ever would have thought I would like Physics. Really, when you think about it, what is there to like? It is the math of science. I can't stand either of those two subjects. But this year, and especially today, I really enjoyed toe pursuit. The chance to fight my way through a problem to get the right answer. Because the whole class is really just a metaphor for real life. We are going to have problems. We are not going to have the answers. We are going to struggle, to throw "equations" at the problem and try to solve it. Sometimes we will get it right, sometimes we will get it wrong, but overall, our teachers and peers will be there to give us advice, guidance and support, and we will, eventually, sink or swim. Today, I was able to swim in Physics. Maybe tomorrow I won't. But it sure was fun trying today.

“In physics, you don't have to go around making trouble for yourself - nature does it for you.” Frank Wilczek