My Sister and Me

            My sister and I have been trying to do more things together.  We are six years apart so growing up we never did much.  Eventually, I moved away and my idea of our relationship was of our mere memories together.  A major reason I moved back home was because I didn’t really know who my family was.  I didn’t want to go through life without a true understanding of my roots. 

After I came back I tried to become more a part of each family member’s life.  My sister’s has been the hardest to get more connected to, though.  We never really had a relationship in the first place so it’s like we were starting from scratch.  One area that we seem to connect in is music.  I’ll walk past her room and hear a lot of the same music I listen to.

            Seeing as my sister is a freshman in high school and is starting to spread her wings I thought I’d start taking her out to places with me.  For her birthday I bought her tickets to a Cage the Elephant show at the Rave.  She was pumped to go to her first concert.

            On the way down to Milwaukee we had time to just talk about whatever.  It was really nice.  We got to the Rave and I could tell she was a little nervous but I relaxed her and reassured her it would be fun.  Once we got in past security everything was fine.  The opener was a little weak but the second band, The Joy Formidable, were pretty good.  Then when Cage came on it was the exact show I wanted my sister to experience.

            Cage the Elephants was pouring of energy from the very beginning and carried that all the way to the encore.  Their lead singer moves about the stage violently the whole time and stage dove almost every other song.  At the end, he surfed along the crowd over the large balcony and got lifted up to the top, which was about 15 to 20 feet up.  After talking a bit, he climbed back over the railing and belly flopped back into the crowd.  It was insane.

            Overall, I’m happy my sister and I had that time to spend together and for her to see her first concert.   

The People We That Make Us

            Life’s a beautiful thing.  The way everything overlaps, simple and complex, joy and fear.  We have moments of clarity and then without warning find ourselves lost in one of the many fogs that lie waiting for us to come across on our journey.  At times, it seems as though nothing has meaning, holding no value.  Looking back on those valueless times and following their trails to our present day, brings some sense to the questions we have no answers for.  Our life is shaped by these experiences, but it’s the human element that carves the deepest mark on us.

            People come in and out of our lives daily.  The constant meeting and farewell we experience occur all while we have little awareness.  These brief greetings and long time relationships allow the flow of preference to enter our beings, creating expression and thought.  For example, you meet a man on the city bus wearing headphones that are radiating with exotic music.  Noticing that you are staring out of curiosity, he invites you to listen. 

Exiting the bus, you immediately head for the nearest music store in search of this refreshing sound.  It swirls through your mind; you’ve never felt these emotions before.  This man and his gift awaken thoughts that have never projected from you before.  Had you never gotten on the bus and met the music man you would never have expanded your musical taste or ability to think in the ways you do now.

On the other side of our human experience, long-term relationships twist together, playing off each other and moving in and out.  For many of us, the first impressions to our newly laid slates from the non-physical are of course our parents.  Depending on many situations, they dramatically influence our decisions and directions in this world.  Later on, friendships and life partners directly affect our preferences.  Our beliefs, our clothing, our diets; all affected by these relationships.  In one situation, a girlfriend may smoke cigarettes while you do not.  Her influence, although not at all an absolute result, may lead to your decision to bring tobacco into your life.  Up until her, you preferred to be smoke free but seeing as you enjoy the stimuli felt from thoughts and feelings from her habit you now smoke.  

People impacting people, creating preference and expression.

  

           

            

I just go to UW Sheboygan..

I’m glad I did this whole UW Sheboygan thing.  That’s what it was, anyway, until I really dove in.  As a senior in high school there were so many pre notions and pressures for going to a four-year university.  Honestly, going to Sheboygan sounded like a half ass experience and the epitome of practicality.  Coming from Elkhart Lake, just twenty minutes west of Sheboygan, with a smaller population I knew the social scene wouldn’t be so ideal. Like I thought, Sheboygan kids gather in groups, Kiel kids gather and so on.  Not everyone keeps to his or her high school classmates but the majority does.  Basically, there is no campus life and in reality with working and studying there isn’t much time for small bit that does exist.

            Eventually, after going about school totally hating my time here I decided to just really apply myself academically and to live with a welcoming mindset.  In doing this my time here has become so much more enjoyable.  My first few years out of high school I had absolutely no idea where I was headed with this life.  I blew a lot of money because of it.  Seeing as tuition is as cheap as it is here I managed to be okay.  Thank goodness.  I’d be far in the hole by now. 

            The people that go to school at UW Sheboygan all have wonderful stories and reasons for being there.  I feel as though we get pawned off as under par students or inferior to large university students.  I’ve talked amongst both groups of students and I love how Sheboygan kids are.  They have some intensity to them as students and as people that craves for life.

            The best thing about my “two year” college experience is how it’s made me really see what my community is.  I’ve heard countless conversations of dislike for Sheboygan and its surrounding cities.  They are ignorant and as a novice see’s only the surface, they lack in a sense of true knowing.  The people I’ve met, the stories I’ve heard, families and hardship, healers and drug addicts...  what lies unseen to the quick eye is a sorrowful loss.