11) Something Unusual

I'll tell you what is unusual. My geography textbook. That one is an odd little berry. I read it and as I go through the chapter on America and all the states, the only thing I learn about is which states were involved in the Civil War and what the population statistics are. It is uninformative about any geography features whatsoever.
Sure, it tells me that the Piedmont runs through the northern states, but it does not tell me exactly what the Piedmont is.

I do know that America is in the middle latitudes and that most of the East has a moderate climate. But what do I know of the rivers? What do I know of the mountains? What do I know of the plains and hills? What do I know of the culture? Nothing.

As my elder brother put it so plainly, "You read, 'Idaho is well known for its potatoes.'" and in the Section Review pages, "What mountain range is in Idaho?" .........................................Potatoes?

10) The Weather

It's chilly and overcast
The warm and sun are in the past
It's January
It's melancholy

I miss you summer breeze
I miss adventure by the seas
I wish I was somewhere warm
Maybe listening to a summer storm

But since it's cold as ice
These sweaters are nice
Yet the three that I'm wearing-
I cannot move, they're overbearing

Winter clothes are pretty, summer's are better
Swim suits let me get cooler and wetter
I don't mind all of the sweatyness
It beats all the shivering-...ness? (What?..my confusion beats yours.)

less
dress
mess
stress
bless
press
watercress
excess
See my dilemma?

Winter clothes are pretty, summer's are better
Swim suits let me get cooler and wetter
I don't mind all the sweat
Although, you probably do, I bet

I'm drinking green tea and eating a muffin
Trying to rhyme better than my puffin
So I don't have a pet puffin, but you wouldn't know
Except that I told you so

And this poem keeps getting better and better
Now I'm going to rhyme that with fetter
And look up the word, since I forgot its meaning

fet·ter

ˈfetər/

noun

noun: fetter; plural noun: fetters

1. 1.

   a chain or manacle used to restrain a prisoner, typically placed around the ankles.

   "he lay bound with fetters of iron"

   synonyms:

   shackles, manacles, handcuffs, irons, leg irons, chains, restraints; More informalcuffs, bracelets; historicalbilboes "bound by fetters of iron"

   • a restraint or check on someone's freedom to do something, typically one considered unfair or overly restrictive.

     "the fetters of discipline and caution"

verb

verb: fetter; 3rd person present: fetters; past tense: fettered; past participle: fettered; gerund or present participle: fettering

1.

restrain with chains or manacles, typically around the ankles.

"a ragged and fettered prisoner"

synonyms:

shackle, manacle, handcuff, clap in irons, put in chains, chain (up);

 And that's straight from Google, it's seeming

And should I end this poem or not
What is it about, I already forgot
Oh yes, about weather and all of its dullness
Here we go again with those "ess" words

I'm done now.. thank you very much.

9) My favorite thing to do right now

Smiling is my favorite!

Not really, that's just what today's challenge makes me think of. Ha ha.

But I do like to smile. Just not always. Sometimes I stop smiling. But then I can still be happy. A strange kind of happy, such as contentment. That is a marvelous kind of happy, one that doesn't necessarily come with a smile.
Am I content, though?
 Sometimes.
 The feeling comes and goes. It is a delightful feeling that makes one happy and in want of nothing too splendid.
Maybe contentment is my favorite.
Perhaps being happy is.
I suppose that is the answer then. My favorite thing is to be content. For with contentment comes all sorts of things. I can be content when I am sad, melancholy, happy, joyful, excited, hysterical, and emotional. I can be content anywhere I am whether it be alone in the dark, piled up on our tiny couch with all five other people in my family, in a swimming pool with my friends, cooking with my mom, washing my neighbor's car with the neighbor's kids, writing in my frigid lair, curling up with a book in a comfortable nook, playing doll house with my sister, telling my little brother another Baba story (I shall have to post one someday...they are quite entertaining..), or being very content lying on a hospital bed being as still as possible so as not to feel the IV that is on my arm (I did that when I had an IV. I couldn't feel it when I was being still, so I was incredibly content to STAY STILL. And I wasn't so content when a nurse jostled the bed).

Now please. I don't really know if anyone but the darling Margaret reads any of this, but if you do and if you are real, comment below. Tell me what your favorite thing is! I would like to know!

8) five things from my bucket list

Today I must tell you about five things from my bucket list. Yet, I must confess that list I made of things to do before my next birthday had a few points from my bucket list...actually, all those things were from my bucket list. But I suppose I could come up with five more things.
Yes, yes, I can! Here we go!

1.Be fluent in another language, preferably a Latin based one...

2. Travel! I want to go to back to Japan. I want to go back to Haiti. (I'm pretty okay with not going back to Canada.) I want to go to the Caribbean. I want to go on a tour of Europe, Spain, Italy, England, France, Portugal, Sweden, and all those lovely places. Not one of those planned out tours that you have to keep to a schedule and keep up with a group. No, I want to explore that place on my own, taking as much time as I need for the exciting places and having personal adventures out of the blue. I want to meet the normal people. I want to roam and experience things, not just see them. And possibly live somewhere overseas too at some point in life.

3. Get an Oscar...It doesn't really matter which one. Preferably for best actress...and you know this also means that I would be in a movie-which is also on my bucket list!
Oh and it also come with fame...(that's on there too)
And probably money...
SO all that is covered.

4. Go white water rafting! 

5. Be a famous writer. Not one of those famous people whom everyone hates and talks ugly about, but one of those people who makes people smile. I want to be inspiring to the world. I want to be a good role model. I want to influence people to do good things.

Letters

A small scene I just wrote. I don't know if it's good or not. It is a conversation between a girl and her gentleman friend. He loves her more dearly than a friendship can withstand, but she tells him of another who holds her heart.

"Why are you still writing to him if he left you for something 'grander'?"
"If you are trying to imply that he is replacing me, he did not. He merely chose his wings and I chose my roots. He asked me to come along, but I would never have been able to bear leaving." She glanced into the other room at her family, reading by the fireplace.
"Didn't you love him?" He pressed her.
"Of course."She replied softly. "I still do."
"And you let him go like this? You said he would never come back. Don't you feel abandoned?" His voice grew harder as he became more and more irritated.
"No." She breathed out in an exasperated sigh, "I urged him to follow his dreams. I wanted him to have the life he had always dreamed of. I will never let him go either. Our letters may come and go at slower paces. We may run out of things to tell each other or discuss. We may never see each other again. But until we have nothing left to say, until the letters truly end, and until I know he is sure never to return to this place, I will never give him up and I will never consider another man." She stated this as firmly as she could muster, "So please stop trying so diligently to win my heart. You will get nowhere in a race that has already been won. I hate to see you waste your time and energy for something you could never possibly gain."
He looked at her, the hardness falling gently from his face, "I'll stop. But I'll wait. When there is nothing else for him to say and when there aren't any more letters for you to receive, know that I'll always have my arms open for you." He squeezed her hand before he stood up to leave. And as he was departing he pressed his lips to her head, with a tear in his eye.
She shut her eyes tightly so that he would be unable to see the pain or the tears she was trying to hide.
He softly shut the door behind him.

The letters never stopped. They came faithfully along with fresh news of the world abroad and pleadings for her companionship.She replied earnestly, telling him she was waiting for him to come home, but he waited forever for her to find her wings.

The End

7) Siblings

Siblings are marvelous creations most of the time…It’s true. And the least of the time when they are not marvelous creations, well, I feel I need not explain myself.

I have three fabulous siblings. They are funny, cute, entertaining, and smart.

My youngest sister is four years old and a perfect princess. She is beautiful, kind, and encouraging.  She loves to dance and sing and be the most adorable baby on the planet. (Yes, she is four and we still call her “Baby”)

My little brother, who is six, is the one whom I call my favorite (but I really love them all the same). He likes to make up jokes, which usually don’t make any sense, but we laugh at them just to make him feel important, or because the jokes are just plain goofy. He likes to wear camouflage and pretend that he is an army man. He also has a Captain America Halloween costume that he plays in. He is the most adorable knight in shining armor too. He likes his swords and his guns. 

His is also a pure genius. He puts these wild creations, ranging from a big city, a tractor, a helicopter, or a lobster car (I don’t really know how to explain that one-it just happened and was amazing) that he builds out of Legos or K-nex. They always turn out fabulous. So much more than most of us could ever hope to achieve with those meager building blocks. But he has a way of making little things more exciting, and that’s not just with his toys-but in life as well.

Here is a story I must share:  Just the other day he lost his first tooth. It was quite amusing.

At lunch yesterday, he asked me for a bite of my mango. So I gave him a piece.

Of course, when he wants to try something new (a rare occasion)  something devastating happens.

His first bite of the fruit, I had explicitly told him not to bite the skin, he bites the skin. His front bottom tooth turned seventy-five degrees sideways and he freaked out.

He cried and wailed and wouldn’t close his mouth (he drooled all over the floor). It was incredibly humorous, despite his obvious distress.

But we congratulated him quite a bit. He calmed down once he realized that this was a natural occurrence in life and became exceedingly  glad that he was going to grow new “big boy teeth”.

He never finished that mango, or the rest of his lunch. He swore he would never eat again until he had completely lost his tooth.

We encouraged him to wiggle it out. So he did. Thankfully before dinner time.

Now we come to my big brother, whom I love most dearly. My mother once said that we never quarrel. That is true. He and I are like peas and carrots. He is the one that inspired me to become a writer. He is the one whom I look up to for most things. He is the one I ask for advice for on most things. I don’t know what I’d do without him.

Another thing that makes him awesome is that he’s Asian, and really good at math, unlike myself. So he could be referenced to as my own personal calculator.  Or my savior when it comes to video games. Or my hero in anything else awesome that I am unlikely to be good at and he usually is.

6) Someone who does not live in my country

Ahh this be hard. I've met so many people! I've been to Japan, Canada, Haiti, and California...

Yes, that was a joke. You may laugh. Even you, Margaret. 

Let's see...I think I will talk about a Haitian, as that is where I have last been too and met so many lovely people there.

There were so many of them! But here are a few who stole my heart:

Rose Myrtha. This is a beautiful young lady who works at a mission house in Guittan, Haiti. She helps prepare meals and loves to smile. She has a delightful sense of humor and is always kind. She never ceases to laugh, hug, or make one feel welcome in her home. She is always eager to teach anyone what she knows about cooking or a place she had been or the languages she spoke.
Rose Myrtha always looks lovely, and is the belle anywhere she is, no matter what clothes she is wearing. Her beauty lies in her eyes, which are always shining, and in her soul, which is always singing. She likes pretty things, as all girls do and enjoys helping others look their best too. (I know from experience how talented she is at doing hair!)

There is also Evans. A deaf man who has been the nicest gentleman I think I have ever met and maybe ever will.
He can't hear, so he can barely speak, Creole or English. He makes signs with his hands, but mostly remains quiet. Despite his handicap, he has the funniest sense of humor! He likes to prank and joke and make people laugh.
He likes to watch the sunset on the beach.
But what I noticed most about him was how much he takes care of people. He didn't know us very well when we met, but he always ensured our safety and comfort. When we took hikes, he was the one standing over the dangerous ditch to lend a hand to everyone. He was the one in the back of the group, making certain that we all stayed together and no one was left behind. He was the one who went outside in the dark to make sure that me and Margaret would be okay while we searched for a missing friend.
He was that kind of gentleman.

There are so many other people that I met! All the Haitians were kind and compassionate. They always had open doors and open hearts. I could go on and on. But these two people give a small window of the people I have met over the seas.