Zlata's Diary

Yesterday I started reading a book called "Zlata's Diary" that I mentioned a while back. In it I read about the war that Zlata went through over 15 years ago. It made me think about how fortunate I am and how God has blessed me by allowing me to live in a safe area of the city. However I have three friends that live in Mexico where things are not safe at all. There are shootings on the other side of the border at the university I attend, my friends Yadira, her brother live in Moros and they have been forced to see things that good people should not see.

The drug dealers are wicked people and they cause the violence that happens on the border and all the death. Some friends of mine say all the violence can be stopped if they make the drugs legal here, I do not believe it though. It makes me think greatly, to observe, to research, and to write. I like to write stories and this has been bubbling in my head for a while, but I won't say much about it. It makes me look for books on these things and read them, so that I may use them in the future as a teacher to make the students in this city realize the evils that exist.

Sometimes I don't think I have such abilities though, sometimes I feel my ideals, the ideals my parents brought me up with, are things today's culture does not want to think about. I live in a time where people do not care for others and only care for themselves, where people want to do nothing but spend, spend, spend on just themselves! It makes me feel so sick!

Sometimes I feel there are no more good people in the world, but I know that there are some people who share my ideals, people who want to put an end to all of this. That is all for now.

-Lucas

FRAK!

So I'm a fan of the tv shows Battlestar Galactica and Caprica, and at the moment since I do have a scifi project I'm working on I have been watching episodes of the revised BSG tv show. And in an attempt to save money from buying dvd seasons I decided to try youtube for episodes, there were none but I did find this cute little short.

http://wewerecenturions.com/

No words can describe this except, FRAKING HILARIOUS! haha. Otherwise nothing major tonight, have a pleasant night world =).

Joy Will Come

So a few minutes ago my best friend since third grade left my house and will be heading back to Dallas tomorrow. I feel bit down since people I love are separated from me because of school. If I were to transfer to this college I'm interested in called Our Lady of the Lake I would be able to see my loved one more often, but I would miss my parents greatly. So in the end it is a no win situation for me. I wish to see the world, meet new people, and gain new experiences that can improve my writing abilities. But I chose to stay here because I know it would hurt my parents greatly to leave home. Tonight I feel sorrow for being separated from my loved ones, but I know God will comfort me. Tonight I give you a song by a band i really like called "Sorrow" by flyleaf.

How to Teach

So I've been thinking really hard on how to teach students and how to get them into what they're reading and how to get them motivated to work hard and try their best in life. I'm about halfway there to my degree, so I feel I must begin to mold my abilities and figure out what kind of teacher I am. In catechism I sort of have to stick to a schedule and use small group discussion to teach my students about God. With middle-schoolers I normally get shy kids (normally girls), or kids that act stupid on purpose because the feel they will fit in easier (something I'll never understand). With highschoolers it is a little easier, except my small group is a bit quiet, and normally to get them to speak (or to get some of them to stop acting like elementary students and start acting like the young adults they are) I have to give some info about myself without bringing the whole conversation to myself.

To try to solve this problem I examined myself during this past week and looked at my strengths and weaknesses. A really good strength is that I can give a good talk when necessary and I can now control my voice when talking. A weakness is that I can't fully control my emotions yet, etc, etc. Over this past week I realized something though, I like to read a lot. It finally snapped that this community of spoiled ungrateful kids that live in Brownsville TX are not aware of how much of a comfort zone they live in and about what is going on in the outside world. I have decided that I will have my students read books like Zlata's Diary (thank you Erin Gruell for recommending it), "The Freedom Writers Diaries" "A Child Called 'it' " and "Chinese Cinderella" to get them to realize that they are lucky to live here and that they can accomplish their goals. At the moment is is very early morning and I'm typing this down because I normally forget what I was thinking in the morning, but I really want to develop these ideals, any advice?

-lucas

Lord Make me an Instrument of Your Peace

So on DeveiantArt I posted a light hearted blog about the two new pokemon games (pokemon black and pokemon white), and how a friend of mine jokingly called it racist and then I recieved this comment.http://comments.deviantart.com/5/32168480/1491214925

It has given me time to examine my life and how fortunate I am. It as also reminded me that there are issues in this world and even in my own back yard that need to be resolved that are not being resolved. About a month ago I finished reading a book called "The Freedom Writers Diaries" about how one teacher changed the lives of her students just through the books she had them read and playing an active role in their lives and encouraging them that they can make a difference. As an education/english major I have the duty from God to live up to the same expectations and exceed them as well. It is through events like this that I remind myself as to why God created me, and what I must do to change this world and make others more Christ like.

In the Bible it says that the strongest faith and prayer life is useless without any form of action, that lying is a great sin that is worthy of hell, and it is something I want to scream to the leaders of the world right now. I look to the examples of Mother Teresa and St.Francis to remind myself of this teaching that Jesus has presented to us.

At my college I am part of a social justice group sponsored by CCM (their blogspot can be seen herehttp://justicecscutb.blogspot.com/2010/02/students-from-ut-brownsville-and-pan-am.html), and even though I am just a student I try to make sure that the current children have the oppertunity to continue changing the world. Tonight I end with the prayer called "Lord Make me an Instrument of Your Peace."

Lord make me an instrument of Your peace

Where there is hatred, let me sow Love

Where there is injury, let me sow forgiveness

Where there is doubt let me sow Faith

Where there is despair, let me sow hope

Where there is darkness, let me give Light

Where there is sadness, let me give Joy

O Lord Grant that I may not try to be comforted, but to comfort

Not to try to be understood, but to understand

Not to be loved, but to love

Because it is in giving that we REcieve

And it is in pardoning that we are pardoned

And it is in dying that we are Born to Eternal Life.

-Lucas

I won!

I bought some raffle tickets to try to win an itouch two weeks ago, I didn't win that. But I did win second place, an ipod nano. I know it is a bit odd for me to talk about things like this, but I am a bit happy I won. Not much happened to me today otherwise.

-Lucas

Nice night

I went to go see RobinHood with my best friend Karli tonight, and I enjoyed it fairly well. It gave me some things to think about when writing in the future. After seeing this movie I'm really dying to write an epic battle scene, however I have no talent for writing epic battle scenes u.u. It gave me a lot to think about when it comes to God and how He plans things out so enjoyably perfectly.

I had a nice discussion about the way God works with my friend shortly after we both decided to do our best to serve Him and bring change into the world to make it more suitable for Him.

I also am trying my best to piece a new project together and will attempt to make a comic with some close friends of mine, so wish me luck on this.

-Lucas

Free (for now)

Yesterday was my last two finals, I am happy with how I performed and grateful that the stress I have been going through for the past few weeks is now over. I have about a month off from school, so I will do nothing but relax and probably catch up on my reading list. Today though, I think I'll hang out with my best friend and either look at cars or go shopping. I wish to do nothing but relax my whole month off with no work at all =).

I still have a few friends who are taking finals so I will be praying for them and so that they will have good grades.

"We are Broken" (Mothers Day)

So for a while now my mother and I have been on crazy sides of each other, from numerous fights that would happen every day that would get worse and worse, to peaceful nights where we get along. It has been a long and complicated relationship between us. This is not a blog of depression though despite the fact I used a Paramore song as the title.

Something about myself is that I can find good meaning to most lyrics.

I am outside and I've been waiting for the sun

with my wide eyes

I've seen worlds that don'e belong

My mouth is dry with words I cannot verbalize

Tell me why we live like this

Keep me safe inside

Your arms like towers

Tower over me

Because we are broken

What must we do to restore

Our innocence

and all the promise we adore

Give us life again, because we just want to be whole

Lock the door

Because I'd like to capture this Voice

It came to me tonight

so everyone would have a choice

and under red lights

I'll show myself it wasn't forged

we're a war we live like this

Keep me safe inside

Your arms like towers

tower over me

Because we are broken

What must we do to restore

Our innocence

and all the promise we adore

Give us life again, because we just want to be whole

Tower over me

Tower over me

and I'll take the Truth at any cost

Because we are broken

What must we do to restore

Our innocence

and all the promise we adore

Give us life again! because we just want to be whole

Normally these lyrics would be targeted to a bad relationship between a girlfriend and her boyfriend, but I feel it is between my mother and I. I feel that no matter what we do we cannot have the relationship we once had, but we have both been praying to God for help (which is why I capitalized the Your, and Voice since i feel whenever i hear the song that God is being referenced there.) This picture, I drew for her for mothers day, I had drawn it years ago under depression, and now it has been inked in and colored. I pray my mother will like this. For now good night.

-Lucas

Wonderful Day

I helped out with a transitional retreat I was asked to help out with, and it was a beautiful turn out. I did a talk about what the future holds, and what God as to do with it. Today was a day with an extra dose of God let's put it that way lol. I went to a appreciation dinner my church had for all the catechists and I was greatly touched tonight. In fact i feel tonight the world deserves to know a little more about me.

For one thing before I became what I am now I was a depressed individual who kind of didn't like to go out. It is something i have mentioned in talks, I'm still not fully 100% ok with talking about it without getting the urge to cry (I had brought it up, along with the fact I wanted to die more than anything else at the time during a talk and pretty much started crying). I know in my first blog post I said I was a church person but I just feel a very strong connection to God, it's a bit hard to explain. But i promised some more information about what I'm like, and my past. One of the things that helped me out of my depression and go back towards God was a band I really like called Flyleaf, my best friend introduced them to me. It is hard for me to collect my thoughts since it is so late at night, but for now here is a video =)

new effort.

Ok so I took my first final of the semester, and as I planned I kicked it in the face! At the moment I am watching Ugly Betty, my favorite tv show that was sadly cancelled. At the moment my family is going through some financial issues (my dad is getting me a car, plus insurance, plus sending me to drivers ed, plus building a fence to keep out the burgles trying to break into our house!). So at the moment I can't spend my cash on movies and music like I normally do. Clothes is tempting so I'll see what happens with that, I'm attempting to improve myself in how attractive I am at the moment.

So for those of you that watch me (a grand total of 1) here's a pic lol. I am sorry I had planned on making a more interesting blog today, but oh well. I hope you all have a wonderful evening, goodluck to those that are taking finals. Before I go I have a question, what would make this more interesting?

still alive!

OK so I've been out for a while, stressing over a report, and how to take care of the confirmation mass that happened last night. It was beautiful, and I am very happy for the former candidates who have made their confirmation. But now I must continue with my school life. I am stressed once again, tomorrow is the last class day, and following is finals...yay -_-. I have no problem taking care of my teaching classes and for my liturature classes, but my enemy Government it back u_u, so I will study as hard as I can. And after finals, I will enjoy my temporary break from school and rest, shop, pray and go San Juan and pray to God for thanks and for guidance.

That's all for right now, expect a better blog tonight.

-Lucas