Only a Waitress

             I woke up on the floor this morning. My first sight? A sweat-crusted sock. The first thing I did? Sprang from my fungi-covered floor. The landing went as usual, I stepped on my mutt-dog, Prince, making him sound kindaof like a rabid kindergartener at star bucks. (Trust me, I know what I'm talking about.) I don't see why my mutt still sleeps in here… she always ends up leaving my room with patches of fur missing... or lice...either one.
                I grabbed my apron stained with meat sauce… and god knows what else, and tip-toed my way out the door; trying not to step on anything…unusual.

                As always, my dad was snoring his head off from the other side of our ranch, even though it was high-noon. But I learned to fend for myself and not to bother him. The last time I walked in on him and his girlfriend… well.. It wasn't pretty.

                Our molded front door was practically falling from its remaining hinges, so I decided to go out the back. Before I got to the door I remembered my phone. I had left it on my dresser. I needed it for work so I could call my dad to pick me up. I remember asking him why he couldn't drive me both to Flenny's Diner and back, and he had said that I "couldn't ask him anything while he was sleeping.".. Just like he was now.  It usually works for me to walk though, because we live in Northern California, the weather's usually pretty nice.

              When I reached for my flip-phone I looked through the partially brown window. Today's forecast, suck-ish, crappy, and snowy. Perfect. The day of the big promotion. I didn't want to walk, but I guess I have to. If I asked my dad to drive me… "I'd get a bam-bam in the nog-nog." he had said.  And I didn’t want that.. I think...

                I slipped my way down the stairs as I walked out the back door and landed on my face… don't worry. It broke my fall. Not.

                  My phone began to ring in my back pocket of my jeans. That was my only motivation to get up from the mound of snow. Today had been a bust from the start. Why continue? Maybe I could just get up and go back to bed. I could skip work once… I mean, I was only a waitress.

                 "Hello?" I answered. I hated not having caller ID on my phone.

                  "Hey Lisa! So why didn't you answer my texts? I sent you like… a hundred."

                  I sighed. "Dave, I told you! My...phone…does…not...receive...text...messages!!!"

               He hesitated. "Oh. Why are you such a grouchy-poo today?"

                 I rolled my eyes. This guy was an idiot. I mean.. He does not act like he's in my ninth grade classes at school. "I have to walk," I said simply.

                  "Oh," he stated again. "Your dad's not up yet?"

                    "Nope." I sighed again. It didn't make sense to me. I thought that Dave was an idiot, yet he's my best friend. I tell him everything. My life is messed up.

                   "I gotta go." I said quickly, then flipped the screen.

                  I started walking to Flenny's Diner to start my minimum-wage shift when I looked back. Waitresses usually have no lives and no dreams people in my town say. But they're wrong. Mine is to get away from this life. No matter how many sweat-crusted socks I have to dig through.

     

Character Analysis

When I was eight, I remember waiting in the piercing cold. I knew it was worth it to see my great grandma who had just been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s for the last time. Looking back, I saw my mom in the minivan, waiting. I told her that this is something that I have to do alone, not wanting her to see me cry. When Grandma Strelow answered the door, she replied to my smile by stating how much I’ve grown. I replied by saying,”Actually my grades are still the same.”

 She looked confused, because people usually don’t respond to “Look how much you’ve grown.” You see, I was referring to my growth “mental-wise”, not “height-wise”… and not accidentally.

Growth, to me, has always meant both physically and mentally. And someone who has not grown both physically and mentally, to me, has not grown and/or showed complete growth. Misha of Milkweed, is a boy who lives his life in a Ghetto during the Holocaust. The book also shows what it’s like after life in the Ghetto. The Ghetto was a jail-like place with no rights, which reminded me of the setting in The Giver, where a boy named Jonas lived out ignorant days. Both Misha and Jonas were trapped in a place they did not want to be. But despite their similarities, their growth ended with different results.

Jonas, at first, did not want to learn. He had no reason to. His life was perfect and brainwashed. But when he abruptly “became” an adult, he was forced into learning. It was his job. But when he learned, his thoughts point of view changed. Even his opinions altered (even though he really didn’t have any before). His anger about the blindness within his community matured from his newly formed opinions and information.

Misha yearned to learn more throughout the book, like Jonas. And although his vocabulary develops along with his body, his thoughts are still the same, obsessive and immature; mainly because he didn’t know what to do with the information because unlike Jonas, Misha didn’t have time to form complicated opinions. His main thoughts were to survive.

Sometimes when Misha thought about something sentimental, he wasn’t trying to. He hid these memories from others… and from himself. I feel that if he had thought of Janina (another character in Milkweed) purposely, he would completely lose it. Misha had enough healing to do physically and had to deal with the changes from the Ghetto and from Pennsylvania, America. Like all the freedom he had later on in life, sometimes he didn’t know what to do with himself.  

When Jonas learned, it was forced and with great visual description. Unlike Misha, where it was hurried and came with no description, because like I said before, their main thoughts in the Ghetto was to survive.

Eventually, Jonas runs away, because it is the only way to return the memories to the Community’s people. This is done to “save” them from more ignorance. So they can live the life they want for themselves. But when Misha runs away, it is for self-preservation, because he has no intention to “save” his community. This is because people do not believe he can, so he doesn’t even bother to try.

Knowledge did not change Misha, but did change Jonas. This is why Misha is a static character, one that does not develop in time. He has always run away and with always do so, both physically and mentally.

           

Uncle Shepsel's Point of View

       Uncle Shepsel, is very predictable. He can never find the silver lining and never will. Even before the ghetto, he was upset and depressed, thinking that everything in his life had gone wrong. His character seems to be getting worse and worse each day living in the ghetto... its guarded walls and diseases and deaths driving him into insanity. He himself is convinced that Jews are dirty and gross, even though he is one. He is even trying to learn how not to be a Jew, by reading a book over and over about another religion. I believe that he has developed a very low self-esteem (I mean who wouldn't? Especially when Flops and Nazis treat them like dirt... but he's still worse than most). That's why he's mean to Misha, Janina and Mr. Milogram. He reminds me of a bully. The same circumstance, but he's an adult. I think that because of his desperate need to become wanted and not a Jew,  that he'll do anything for anyone... even betray his own family.

Giver Essay

                It’s hard for us to imagine something truly unfair, considering we live in a free country. We are allowed to live out our dreams as we choose, and determine our own futures. Not all countries are like this, yet their citizens still have a purpose for living. In The Giver, lives are laid out by The Community Elders which is unfair to the lives of the people whom it belongs to. Deaths are only by choice and happen all the same, jobs are assigned for them, and love and money don’t exist. The Elders believe this is the only way to live without emotional or physical pain; and if pain doesn’t exist, then neither does purpose.

                Their government has total control over every choice in The Community. The Elders fear that if they allow everyone to make their own choices, then some would make the wrong ones, and live in a world of despair and regret, which is a type of pain in their eyes; and  pain is not allowed. So they simplify the citizens’ lives by choosing their futures for them. One way they control this, is by selecting a job for you. They will watch your actions attentively, and carefully choose a job they believe is to your liking. But only one of each job exists for every generation; so two people of the same age cannot have the same job. You also cannot change your job as you get older, because that would mean disrupting the order of how jobs are assigned.

                When people plan their futures, usually it includes getting married, and having kids. But in the community, once you feel ready, you can apply for a spouse. And once you’re married to that assigned person for three years, you can apply for a child. The marriage situation reminds me of the olden days, where people would have an arranged marriage. The people in the community basically do nothing for themselves because like I said before, their futures are planned for them. All they have to do it live it.

                Another way lives are decided is when they die. People in The Community do not die of old age or sickness, their medicine is way too advanced for that. No, the Elders believe that if someone dies naturally there will be a panic, and no one will know what to do with the body and sadness. So it is arranged for them. This is called a release. The Elders brainwash the people into thinking that a release is a celebration of a good life and is a great honor, so they won’t be scared when the day comes. What really happens surprised me will much horror. They kill them. Not through violence or bloody murder, but they inject poison into your veins that kills you instantly and it happens without pain of course… You can apply for a release for a reason of your choice, in which most don’t decide upon… or the Elders will decide when you go.

                Everything above is unfair to the people to the people of The Community… even if they don’t know it, because they live in a world of ignorance and blindness. But what is even more unfair is for the Elders to take away the purpose of these people’s lives (which they don’t know about either).

                What they don’t know is that they live without love. There’s no compassion or love for others. The first time a person feels love for another person they force them to take a pill from then on. They call love “the stirrings”.  So without love, what is the purpose for living? That’s what makes the world go round, right? But that’s not how the Elders see it. They think that love leads to broken hearts, and pain. So they thought of a way to eliminate it.

                Money, (as some people say) makes the world go round too…which is another thing that the Elders were determined not to use. So why are the citizens working then? There’s no point to work if you don’t have motive, and most of the time, money is the motive for working. Obviously they don’t know that there’s no point for working, because they don’t know about money. Everything is provided for them because they do nothing. Without money, no one feels jealousy of another because they have more objects or money. No one goes hungry and feels the pain of starvation, and no one fights over it. But the sacrifice is the purpose for working.  

                If the citizens of The Community realized what they were missing, they would understand my point, but of course not, they live in ignorance. All of this is done for the absence of pain. But is it really worth it? I don’t think so. Pain branches to so many opportunities of life, so many great and wonderful things…The feeling of success, love for another and the purpose for living… none of which exist in The Community. The government basically played a big game of would you rather? And I fear they chose wrong, but their fear of pain was so strong and determined, it won over the joys of life. I would feel bad for them, but no one (except for Jonas and the Giver) would understand why.

               

By Tori Johnson

Hook

        Plants grow with nurturing from the sun, water and soil. Like plants, everything grows taller and stronger. Not only is it living things that grow, but as do lifeless objects. Our world is advancing in knowledge, leading into a world of technology. Technology is that plant. It is growing stronger and stronger with every new discovery. Rumors are spreading of the wonderful things that us humans can do in the near future. Some talk of the ability to enter one another’s mind and read their most valued of thoughts. But is this a good idea? In some circumstances, yes; although, not only would that cause the lack of privacy, but even worse situations… I firmly believe that one another’s solitude is much more valuable than the knowledge and understanding of a new technology. And no one should be able to destroy the precious gift of privacy. Fortunately, you cannot read my thoughts, so I will explain why I believe why mind-reading is a terrible ability to posses.

The Importance of Color

Everyone has motives for their doings; not every motive is considered reasonable, though. The Elders of The Giver, have decided to eliminate color for their own reasons. This caused problems, yet it also solved some. Here are my motives for saying so…

            I am first explaining how the Elders saw the situation. Their thinking was probably much like this… “Without the ability to see color, we would no longer have to deal with racist issues, making everyone equal. No one would be able to look or dress differently, so no one would stand out if they happened to be wearing neon, because no one would see the neon. And finally, people who are color blind will not be anymore, because everyone will be. Because that issue, creates a difference, in which we cannot have or tolerate…” Thinking like that only shows one perspective. But by thinking as someone else would, you would see that there are two arguments to the situation.

            Others would explain that “without color, no one would be able to see the beauty of the sunset, which creates pleasure and joy, and would make someone happy (this really means that people in the Giver’s world cannot feel pain, joy or love). And without color, rainbows do not exist, and neither would the sun (which radiates heat, which leads to warmth and happiness). People would not have tans, without the sun or color; which makes others like their appearance more, feel happier and have a higher self-esteem.

            So basically, without color, we would be missing the beauty of life and the feeling of happiness in our hearts, (which makes us who we are). By destroying color, it leads to bigger problems, in which are linked to other problems and on and on.” I personally agree with this point of view, because without color life would be boring, and nothing would be worth living for then.

            Yet I fear that for every motive, someone would disagree with it (just as I have) … and maybe even their authority. Not to mean that I agree with the Elders though. Some people just go way too far thinking that what they’re sacrificing is the right thing to sacrifice…

            The plan of the Elders was to destroy not only color, but with it, individuality. This was sacrificing way too much, and too many problems rise with less issues being solved. The Elders have made a very poor choice and when I say this, my motives (as I agreed with above) are right behind me.

By Tori Johnson