Journalistic Essay~~Treading the Unknown Waters

“Shut up!”
“Leave me alone!”
“Hello, kinda busy here!”
“I’m trying to watch the screen!”
“What are you even doing here?”
The voices of the nicest kids around enveloped me like a safety blanket…if it was made of thorns, that is. Who would have guessed that a game of Super Smash Brothers would make the audience watching the epic battle become so aggressive? Where does the madness end? Honestly in my opinion I found it absolutely silly. Really, all I was trying to do was figure out what in the heck was going on and I was getting yelled at for asking simple questions.
I struggled out of the mass of kids who had their eyes glued to the TV like anxious five year olds waiting for SpongeBob to appear on the screen. When I finally managed to make my way to the back of the crowd, amazingly not angering somebody a single time, I let out a huff of angry breath. Exactly who did they think they were? Truth be told their evident addiction to this game I had no idea about was sort of creepy.
Instead of braving the crowd again and risk losing my head over a small, “Who is playing with which character,” I decided to stand at the back and observe their behavior. It was like watching a herd of animals interacting with one another. They were pushing and shoving trying to get the best spot that was closest to the screen. It reminded me of wild African animals fighting over the best drinking spot at the watering hole. They were pressed so tight together that I’d be surprised if a stick figure could squeeze through the cracks if they didn’t want him to. In that sense they reminded me of a herd gathering tightly in order to protect one another from any potential predators that might try to harm them. Though I might consider these people slightly more civilized of course.
“You had him!”
“Come on that was easy!”
“Finish him off!”
And of course my personal favorite, “Failure!” were the main conversational phrases that they managed to spit out hurriedly before returning to their trance like state. No one bothered to speak to one another, no matter if they were friends or not. Psshh, who would want to talk to someone when you could be rotting your eyes out? It almost felt like there was some unspoken rule about you couldn’t interrupt the quiet except in cases such as those, and even then you only had 10 seconds to yell out whatever expression you chose. It was a new country ruled by a dictatorship and the person in charge was Silence himself.
Once you got past the eeriness of not having any noise you could look closer upon the throng. There were so many different types of people. Boys, girls, short, tall, skinny, chubby, tan, pale, long hair, short hair, nerds that looked like nerds, nerds that didn’t look like nerds at all. It was amazing. In fact it was almost enough to give you a sensory overload. All of these different people come together in one group because they had one similarity: their love for Super Smash Brothers. My eyes roamed over their physical differences; I was used to seeing cliques that had the same physical features. This was new to me and I kind of liked it. It opened a whole new world of possibilities.
Normally cliques concentrate around having the same appearance on the outside, and having the same personality on the inside. Somehow though, it seemed these kids had learned a way around that. They didn’t all dress the same, have the same hairstyles, or any of that. They just dressed how they wanted and it seemed that as long as they were bound by their love of the game being played that was enough to hold them together. Could it be possible that any number of random kids could do that at any point in time? I began to believe so and if that was true then the entire social order could be reconstructed!
When you looked even closer you also could notice a similarity that they all shared with facial expressions. As I watched their faces would fall into a grimace together, raise into a smile together, their fists would clench and unclench almost as if they were one living breathing organism. When I looked at the small TV screen all I saw was two characters fighting back and forth. I had no idea who was winning, who was losing, or even how you went about winning in losing. Evidently I was the only one with that problem. Even though I had no idea how to digest the graphics on the screen, I always knew when something good or bad happened to one of the players by studying their facial expressions.
I eventually gave up on my crowd watching from close up and I returned to my normal group of friends that were sitting nearby. Thinking that maybe they might answer my questions I proceeding to ask my friend Zack exactly what the heck was going on. I was shocked by his reply.
“Would you just be quiet? Some people are trying to watch the game here. “
I stared at him in awe. The two of us had a very odd relationship with one another, saying mean things perhaps, but always meaning it in a joking way, but this time he was being absolutely serious.
What in the world was this game doing to people? I scowled in his direction, “Umm, you want to tell me exactly what made you so cranky today? Because last time I checked simple questions weren’t exactly illegal.” He just shook his head in my direction not even bothering to look away from the game as his did so. It was incredibly nice to know that watching that TV screen was much more important than talking to me.
Shaking my head and deciding that starting a fight wasn’t worth it I turned to my roommate, Caitie, and Zack’s roommate, my other friend, Derek. I was hoping that maybe from them I would finally get some answers that didn’t involve telling me to shut up. My hopes were quickly shattered by the fact that they were to absorbed in a card game called Speed. Who knew that in my quest for knowledge I would be left so alone?
Deciding that maybe I would try one more time to immerse myself in the group of zombie kids crowded around the television screen I learned that my earlier failure had been nothing. I made the mistake of walking up to the biggest guy in the group. He was very skinny, but he was also very tall compared to me. Before I had time to back out I spit the words from my mouth. “Who’s winning?” He gave me the worst look in the history of bad looks. He stood a good 6 inches over me and when he looked down at me his eyes were filled with what could be pure rage. I took a quick gulp. “Ummm, never mind, thanks anyways.” Within seconds I was back in my seat cowering behind the backs of my friends. I had just learned the epitome of the phrase “epic failure”.
Suddenly there were excited woops of laughter. Fists began punching the air and a steady chant of, “You’ve got him! Finish him off! Yeah!” filled the room. I could only assume that someone was fixing to win the challenge. Suddenly Zack jumps up and begins to join in the frenzy. His sudden actions scare me enough to almost make me fall out of my chair and flat on my face. Even Caitie and Derek look up to see what’s going on, an amazing feat in itself since they had been in their own little card world just minutes before.
I learned later that the game had been won…FINALLY. The cheers and random fist pumping seizures had been in honor of the winner. Amazing that I could guess that isn’t it? Maybe I’m physic or something; yeah let’s go with that one. Yet finding out who the winner had been wasn’t exactly my biggest priority. I still wanted someone in the darn group to tell me exactly what had been going on. I mean seriously I had gone through heck to figure out what in the world Super Smash Brothers was, how you played it, what the objective of it was, and all I got were mean comments, evil looks, and the ability to know that no matter how loud my voice may be I can be ignored if people really want to.
Finding my courage one last time, I walked up to a previously un-talked to groupie that I had seen watching the game with an intense look about him. If anyone would know what was going on I figured it just might be him. I walked over to him, “Hey ummm, I was just wondering if you could explain what the big deal is about this game. You guys seemed pretty into it and all and I have absolutely no idea about it.” He stared at me momentarily then with a big smile on his face gave me a reply that I had defiantly not been expecting. “Oh, don’t worry about it. It’s not that great at all.” Then he walked away to leave me there with my jaw hanging open. After all that I had been through for this one game, this was how the story was going to end.

The Republic: Chuck Norris Style

Original by Plato:
http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.html
It's about justice basically

Chuck Norris Style:

Socrates was asked, "what is justice?" Chuck Norris answered with a roundhouse kick.

The Road Not Taken: Chuck Norris Style

Original by Robert Frost
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Chuck Norris:

There were two roads,
I took both;
at the same time.

The Iliad: Chuck Norris Style

Original by Homer:

http://classics.mit.edu/Homer/iliad.html

Chuck Norris Style:

Paris chose Aphrodite, he (kinda) stole Helen from Menelaus, war started between Greeks and Trojans. I tell Zeus to end it, he can't; I did.

Essay

“Blech…that’s nasty…” I said. I said it a lot. Pictures of slimy tapeworms were on my computer screen. Smelly clams and octopi lay in a dissecting tray. All of this alongside three other girls…even worse or even better? Sometimes I couldn’t tell. Fourth period was a trip, but outside of class became even more of an unknown environment.

Science is a good subject, at least for me. My teacher, realizing some others and myself were ahead of the class, set us aside for an independent study. She said we could make it our “dream classroom”, doing projects none of the others could. The elite group was all girls, including me. The other three had always hung out before, but I didn’t hang with them that much. During our studies, we started off slow, barely getting any work done because no one was there to see. We’d sit and talk and make fun of each other until we got bored. Then we’d do a miniscule amount of research.

At first, the group was a partnership. Things ran pretty smoothly. My partner, Lauren, didn’t talk much. What little things she did say were usually insults, jokes, orders, or facts for projects. The insults and insulting jokes never really got to me: they were pretty funny, and I laughed at them too. Every science class, we’d head to the library. We’d sit at the same two computers. Every day.

Our first project was about worms. Both of us gagged continuously. The pictures, the life cycle, etc. were not the prettiest thing in the world. Thinking it was acceptable, I goofed off a lot, making jokes and giving Lauren looks that told her she could, and should, join in. She rarely complied, but she laughed a little before telling me to shut up and forcing me back to research. Our project media was to be a power point. In Lauren’s eyes, I’m guessing, it was to be informative (boring). In my eyes, it was to be both informative and entertaining (awesome). I struggled to make it funny, and she let me at least try, thank God. We had a picture of Dr. Oz and Oprah holding a tapeworm, against Lauren’s wishes.

When the assignment was finished, I went over well. We got a good grade and were ready for a new challenge. One of those challenges was new people. Two more girls were added: Ashley and Kylie. According to our teacher , they got in because “Ashley kept whining”. Our group was as full as it would get, any fuller and we’d be in trouble.

Our next topic for an assignment was mollusks and echinoderms (at first I was thinking the exact same thing you’re probably thinking now, “What…?”). We wanted to go deeper into the freedom of independent study, so we ventured into dissection and models. Ms. Houston, our teacher ,got us some clams and octopi to cut apart. The smell of fish was killing us all slowly. Out in an open part of the hallway, the stench wouldn’t go away. We occasionally had to go to the window and stick our heads out just to breathe. Being the vegetarian of the group, I was actually the one doing the most slicing and dicing (ironic much??).

Constant “ew”s and disgusted shivers came from Ashley. From Kylie, Nasty looks and “this is gross”s. From Lauren, the occasional grossed out “ugh” and weird looks. Some of these expressions were also uttered on my part, though I did tell the others to quit freaking out. The clam’s little foot stuck out of the shell, and I reached for the scalpel. I wiggled the knife in between the two sides and began to pull the clam apart, little by little, onlookers disgusted. We took pictures and moved on to the octopi the next day. Similar grossness accompanied these little things. Turns out, since they were purchased from a grocery store, they had nothing really in them. Waste of time. But Ashley still shivered, especially when I accidentally got the octopus on her hand. It was funny, but she freaked out. After we were done with the “dissection” we tried not to touch anything (the octopi were very slimy. Yuck.)

From the escapades with the clams and octopi, we learned…barely anything. To make up for that waste of time, we researched the anatomies. We continued to joke around all the time, but we knew we had to work. Our deadline wasn’t far ahead. Then came the Play Doh. Making the models was fun, especially when not actually making them. When Lauren and I tried to mix colors, automatic freak outs came from Ashley and Kylie. Not angry ones, they were still smiling, just concerned. They thought we would run out of Doh. I could care less. I needed a color, so I reassured them we would not run out of their precious clay.

Myself and Lauren then proceeded to get into an all out Play Doh war, right there in the back of the library. It had stated when we were playing Play Doh basketball, shooting a rolled up blob of the stuff into the container, held by the other person. All was fine until Lauren thought I was looking and threw it back to me. Guess what? I wasn’t looking. It hit me in the face. I was angry, really angry, but it was funny, and I knew it. From then on, science was work and war. Throw Play Doh here, make it look like the interior of an octopus there. I like to say I won, but I’m not sure. Often, I would throw over a bunch of the clay and would run to the other end of the library before Lauren could drill me again. I got both laughs and disapproving glances from Ashley and Kylie. I had fun though, no matter what they all thought.

Sometime into the beginning of this independent study, I thought it would be okay to sit with Lauren, Ashley, Kylie, and their friends at lunch. So I switched tables. It was kind of awkward at first: people don’t usually just hang out with another clique. I did need to ask them questions about the project though, and that was my excuse. There wasn’t much to say about the assignments, so the table usually fell back to talking about T.V. shows, shopping, and classes. These subject were common in every girl’s world, but no craziness was preferred. I was used to being my old wild self with my friends at lunch, but I held back a little here. I thought it was better that way, but I still didn’t like the feeling. They were nice people, and I wanted to hang out with them, so I kept sitting there. During recess, however, I was with my other friends.

In the library, still working with Play Doh, I learned something new. You will get slapped across the face if you cuss, or attempt to cuss, in front of Kylie. I decided to push the limits one day and said “F…..” with abit of an “uh“ to throw her off. I was hit and hurt before I could finish saying “fire truck”. Oopsie. I wasn’t going to try that again. I laughed it off, but still had it against her, though she never will believe that I was going to say fire truck and not otherwise.

At lunch, I would still sit with them. They were good friends, even though I had a little trouble being myself around them. I could contribute to most of the conversation topics, although sometimes I didn’t. I was comfortable being uncomfortable, in this case. After a while of me being their lunch guest, they had the nerve to ask me why I was sitting with them. They had noted “no offense” but some was taken. Shouldn’t they know why I was sitting there? I was their fiend right? Of course I was. I said, “Because I want to.” I didn’t really keep their question in mind, and continued to try to blend in with their clique so I could be accepted within my independent study group.

Nearing the end of the year, Our project was close to finished. We worked on the labels and got them into the Doh with toothpicks, still throwing it at each other, joking, and laughing. On the last day of school we presented it to Ms. Houston. I had done less work on them than the others, since I had been gone a few days, but we were all proud. The models looked great. Our teacher had questions about what we had learned (some of which we couldn’t very well answer), but she liked the models. We were all happy. We had approval and the last day of school. The rest of the day, I attempted to follow them around to different science classrooms. We got out of staying to minutes later than everyone else by leaving Ms. Houston’s room. Nice judgment on their part.

After school was over, we barely talked. Lauren, Ashley, and Kylie rarely texted back. I only saw Ashley once, because our dads know each other. I hadn’t seen Lauren that summer, but that was okay. She didn’t talk much anyway. As for Kylie, she was moving. I was invited to her going away party at a friend of ours, Caroline, but I couldn’t make it. Now, I was back to my regular friends. I could be myself more freely and I saw them more often. I have to ask now hwy I sat there that school year, but why I sat there so long.

Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening: Chuck Norris Style

Original by Robert Frost:
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Chuck Norris:

I'm here in the woods, maybe trespassing
I don't care, he won't see me.
Superman in his pajamas with me on them would be cold,
I'm not. It's just 0 degrees out here. Nothing special.
My horse says to me "why are you stopping?"
(Yeah my horse can talk)
I tell it to shut up.
These are some nice woods.
I have a 1,000 miles to run in a few seconds before
what some call sleep, but Chuck Norris calls waiting

In a Station of the Metro: Chuck Norris Style

Original:

The apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Petals on a wet, black bough.

Chuck Norris Style:

All these people aren't me;
how disappointing.