spending my first 11 years living in arms reach of a city i was desperate to be part of its busy streets. my shorts doses of  the beautiful city always made my heart flutter with excitement.  Trips to  city were my brother and I's biggest treat, whether it was a trip to the municipal building with its giant board game  pieces we use to climb  or love park with its fountain we splashed in i was in love. the city felt more like home then any other place my feet had ever landed.

The older i got the more entangled i got into the beautiful city. My weekends became packed with trips to the art museum, Franklin institute, and the academy of natural sciences. everytime i would come home i would miss the sights, sounds and smells of the city. finally at the age of 11 my parents made the decision to leave the suburbs and join the city streets.

since then i can not image life outside of this place that will forever be my home. i am so wrapped up in the movement of the city. running up the art museum steps and around the loop. shopping at the farmers markets and the Uhuru flea market. Days spent traveling around center city and chilling in places like Rittenhouse square and clark park.

With adult life quickly  approaching my heart aches to wish life in the city goodbye. i will miss being so tightly winded into these city streets. I want to thank you city for stealing my heart. what your city has offered me has molded me as a  person. i will never truly leave you because you are in my heart. i will never be able to stray to far from you and i know i will raise my kids in you someday.

with all my love 

maddie 

my point of divergence(pod) is when stonewall Jackson was supposed to die. i rewrote it that he didn't die but instead live to help change the out come of the civil war. This change would make the confederates win their independence and separate from the union states. stone wall would have helped win the civil war by leading a charge across union territorry to washington DC. they would have worn down union troops and help end the civil war.  going into this project i decided that picking this point in history would have a huge impact on where things would go from there. Because rewriting history to have stonewall live changes so much more then the size of a country it creates a whole new country and changes the way people developed and grew the country. 

I invision that the way things are in 2012 if stonewall would have helped win the civil war would have been a lot different. first of all the united states of america wouldn't exist. there would be two separate countries one owned by the north one by the south. the civil rights union would have never happened in the south because the slaves wouldn't have been released until cost would have out weighed the need which i predict would have been in the early 1900's. people who werent white would probably be treated very poorly and many laws will be made against them. there would also me a more in state government in the south then we are used to now.

i wish i would have put more time into this project i feel like if i worked on it a little bit longer it could have been a really goo product. it was interesting thinking about how such little a change could make such a big impact. i really liked the idea of this project it really makes your brain have to think harder about a certain event. i feel like it leaves you wondering what if things had been alittle bit different what would we be like today. i feel like the most challenging part of this project was thinking about which event you could change to make the impact that you wanted 

Alex let go of everything that had once held him back and let his hands fly. Smack! In an instance one was down and his mind went racing. He couldn’t believe he had killed the um well he didn’t know what it was. His mind raced to find an answer it wasn’t a human not anymore; at some point it had pushed past the ability to be called human. It was now a, a… just then another body raced towards him anger and rage in its eyes. Alex squeak in the pure fear and confusion that had took hold of him. He yanked the ax free of the head of his last victim tears ran down its face as he swung it again. It was only 13 he had once called his neighbor, his friend, Tom. But it wasn’t Tom anymore now it was just another freak like all the other freaks he had seen since he had open his eyes this morning. He tried to tell himself that it wasn’t tom but every thing inside him burn with the desire to take back the blow that had stopped the boys charge. Alex was 14 the biggest worry he had before this was whether he’d pass algebra this quarter or not. He heard a screech from the house next store his heart raced as he glanced at the clock on the wall, 3:30. It was 3:30 eight hours ago his day had started with his mother standing in the door, not to say good morning but to rip his neck off. He knew that the house next store did not hold his family the people that he loved but a load of the freaks that had 4 ago had tried to end his life. Another scream shattered the thought.

            Alex ran outside and found the source of the screaming. Two girls were cornered by a load of the freaks. Everything inside of him told him to run to leave them and run for his own life. But the thought of this new world scared him more then the freaks on that lawn. Alex did not know what lay beyond this block. Whether there were more or if everyone else didn’t know what was happening. Either way he knew he couldn’t leave these girls these, people. Alex saw a boy running by, Mark Coleman a juniors at his school. “Mark stop!” Alex was able to pull the words from his gut. “Grab that bat! Help me.” Alex chocked as he took off in a sprint towards the girls. He had no way of knowing if the boy followed but he did know he would be able to take on the freaks alone. There were three of them once full grown men. As he grew near the junior joined his side looking almost as scared as Alex did.

            “What’s the plan kid?” Mark shocked Alex the human interaction seemed wrong to him after the day that had. The only people that had try to interact with him today try to bite his neck off. “Well I was, um.” Alex dug threw his mind for an answer. “Oh come on kid you have to have to plan you didn’t just call me over to die with you.” Pure panic now leaked from Mark but he nee lost his cool tone. “Yea, I do.” Alex stuttered, Marks words had sparked something in Alex’s brain an answer. Pictures of old video games Alex play ran threw his mind, it was crazy but it just might work. “Go to the right of the freaks ill take the left, you take the heads I’ll take the legs.” “Freaks? I like that, by the way kid what’s yours name, you know just in case it doesn’t’…” “Its Alex and it’ll work.” They swung Mark distracted them so they never saw Alex coming as he took out their legs. The boys took up their weapons and started bashing into the creature that lay on the ground. For a moment the boys were animals drool slid from Alex’s lip veins popped out of Mark’s head. For a moment the two boys had completely left their old sense of reality and entered the new world where they were united not just a freshman nobody and junior sports star that that walk the same hallways, but as teammates, survivors.

            The boys were snapped back by the sudden hugs they received by the girls shaken to the core by the terror of a day they have had. The four took up shelter in a shed trying to avoid the sight of the freaks who chased people down the streets ripping at their skin. Once in the shed they all proceeded to share the events of their morning the girls who Alex learned were seniors from the all girl catholic high school two blocks from his. They were on their track teen and were on their morning run when shit went to hell. Half of the team turned into a swarm of freaks every one left on their team torn apart fell but then got up again and joined in on the madness. They were chasing them, they ran for almost an hour before the whole team broke off and took shelter in Alex’s house probably very shortly after he had abandoned it. But then those freaks them and they lost all strength to run. They had only been able to get outside before they were cornered. They thought it was end. Their names were Jamie and Kara typical names in their boring suburban area. Before today they were probably typical seniors addicted to their go-jo-pro juice and always up for brain links. As mark was sharing his life as a jockey junior who everyone loved even though Alex couldn’t figure out why he thought about what he would say when they got to him. He was just a lame freshman. He wasn’t allowed to drink go-jo-pro because his mom thought is poison even though she had like five a day. He had never ran like the girls or played football like mark. He never linked in to someone’s brain either he just played video games all day and watched TV. The coolest thing he had ever drinking was a sip of wine at a wedding. He was a nobody. Mark finished up the tale of his day one of heart breaking loss with the same cool look he always wears then looked towards Alex. What was Alex gonna say he woke up that morning expecting hugs from mommy and instead almost had his neck torn off. He proceeded to push her off run next store where he was almost murdered. He the killed Mr and Mrs jackson then Tom. He’d found the girls and now he was here in a shed trying to explain himself. He had to make up a better story.

“I was drinking my daily go-jo-pro and I then…” Alex was interrupted Jamie. “ Ew you drink that crap its nasty I never would it’s nasty almost everyone on our team drank it before every run expect me and Jamie that stuff man….” Mark jumped into the end of Kara’s sentence including something about how it would mess up his prefect body or cause cancer or something. Alex didn’t really know he was lost in his own head to confused about what just happened to move forward with marks lecture. He had lied to sound cool but ended up just sound even dumber then he already felt. But under the embarrassment Alex start pasting together facts in his head one his mom drank go-jo-pro every morning before she went to wake him up, the girls who turned drank it before they ran, and tom drank  it all the time cause he thought it made him cooler. This thought only past over his mine for a moment before BANG! A loud nice came from behind the shed followed by screams. The teens dropped to the floor Jamie starting crying. “Shhh” Alex hissed after the first whimper. He edged over to his ax as the sound of footprint made its way closer to the shed. Alex grabbed an ax as a shriek marked the presences of freaks outside. The shriek shock all the teens to the core except Alex whose eyes glowed with determination. He wasn’t going to die inside this shed he wouldn’t let it happen. His thin wall had already been shattered autopilot was off now and he was in charge he rolled towards the door ax in hand. The door slammed open a swarm of zombies looked Alex in the eye he did not blink he raised his ax…. THE END

• How did you group go about making a decision for what to focus on for the project?
  My group & I made the decision to focus on main in voting. We decided that that was the best option to get more people to vote.
• 11th grade Essential ? - What is the role of the individual in creating and sustaining change? 
  to make others change you have to show that your willing to. you have to show that change is possible to make change
  
  
• How has your understanding of the electoral process and whether or not the US is a democracy evolved during this unit?
  i went from not really caring at all and knowing the bare minimum to now understanding how it functions and the major flaws in our voting system big one being the number of people that vote
• How did you decide to best relay a message to a national audience with your marketing campaign?
  we tried relating to the audience and tried to show that we understood that they have lives. we had nice and relaxing ads to show we care about their comfort

• What surprised you most about this information?  What seemed quite obvious about explaining this data set? 
   
  
  
• Looking at the overall trend and incorporating what you know about the US presently, predict and defend the immigration trend for the next two decades.
  2001-2010 it wouldnt go up alot because of the immigration problem bush was having and then 2011-2020 wouldnt go up as much because of the money issues we were having 
  
  
• Describe how you made a decision on how to visually represent the information.
  well we made our frist decision after much discussion. alot of things had to be compromised since then due to technical difficulty.  
  
  
• What parts of group work were challenging?
  communication which im horrible it was hard to get things done because i didn't communicate what i needed to the rest of the group. i need to ask better questions to the group and be a better team member
  
  
• What would you do differently if you had this project to do over?
  i would do more i would try harder to learn how to properly use the technology available to me and spend more time at home on this then i did or comunicate want i needed done so my group could help me  

That old front door that never opens.

I am from the big backyard which always

Held way to many kids.

The trampoline everyone wanted.

I am from secret attic trips, dyer rides,

 and roof top adventures.

 the craziest big brother ever.

I am from “but I gave her a pillow” and

 “you fell down again”.

I am from scootty shamaster, kiki, 

and grandmoms with a thousand names.

I am from big family get togethrs

And families stick together.

i am from ninja Barbies,

 toys in freezers CSI investigations.

I am from queen of the boys

And everyone’s princess.

I am from quiet corners

And sleeping standing up.

I am from the halls of an old cathiloc,

Strict straight stand still lines.

I am from long walks holding hand I love yous,

Best parents a kid could have

I am from love in good times and bad,

One big crazy family

            The play writing experience had to have been the most mentally touching project I have done since I have entered High school. In the months spent doing the project I became extremely emotionally attached to the topic and cared deeply for the characters that I was molding. Doing this project made me think differently in both History and English, I started to feel comfortable experimenting with different voices and characters that I would have never play with before. My characters ranged from an emotionally traumatized young girl to a pride army leader and even a dead character. The ability to work out and change these characters felt great but I also was able to learn a lot about Colombia. I learn about families losing their homes and children going off to fight for the rebel army I also learned about drug trade which is why the rebel army fighting the government.

            The poetry unit was also a big project that meant a lot to me. I have always had an interest in poetry and found the chance to view different kinds of poems to be unique. I liked being able to listen again to what I wrote and feel my own words like I feel other poetry. I took a lot out of this unit including a poem that I love called “I Was Raised By sounds” which I really love. Another project that I learned a lot from was the group Podcast. I know that this project made me closer to my grandma then I have ever been before. I had known of her child hood abuse for years but I did not know all the deep struggles she felt within the interview. I learned the most after the recording stopped but that was the thing that got up talking and made our relationship grow.

            The next thing I come away with is more like multiple things it’s the people in the class. I learned from all the forum posts that we share with each other in both classes. I learned the especially from descriptive scenes. I heard so many stories about peoples past and made me feel more connected to them. This was important to me because I was new to the school and didn’t really know everyone well at all. I can think back to the scene that I wrote about my friend Jackie and how much it meant to me back when it happened compared to what it felt like writing about it years later. English and History were great this year. As much as I complained I really have grown to love this class and even Mr. Block. Even though I say his class is boring I have to say I’m really going to miss it. I owe a lot of what I know now to him. This year was great and I hope next year can be this awesome.

Madeline walls

Iron

Crash! My head jerks towards the unexpected sound. It was my best friend fighting with her ex over the couch looks of shock plastered to their faces. I follow their stares to the floor they had knock over the table which held my moms favorite candle. Panic fell over me as the shock faded from the two sitting in front of me. They jumped up and started a heat argument this made my face twitch and my heart kick into over time.

“Look what you did you idiot” screamed the boy. “Me? You’re the who slammed me into the side.” She hissed back. This argument continued for a while but all I could think about was that I had let my friend come over because she had promised me she wouldn’t fight with him, who was always at my house being my brother’s best friend. I couldn’t believe they had the nerve to use enough violence to knock the table over. I just started screaming at them my face hot. “ Are you kidding me how dare you two come into my house and disrespect my home? I trusted you two to be more mature you guys promised I cant…” But just then my moms walk out and I started shacking in fear. Her face was sad she looked at me and hung her head; I thought she was mad at them but truly she was disappointed in me. “Maddie you should over react like this you can’t let a candle ruin your whole day. You can always buy a new candle but you can never buy a new friend.”

When forced to examine natural human reaction you can see that some reactions are uncalled for and just make the situation worse. Instead of taking a moment to judge the situation people react without thinking which creates an unfair judgment on what to do this creates a lot of unfair conflict which will could later result in the end of a relationship or eve n worse the end of a life. I believe it’s important to learn from my mistakes and see what heated arguments can cause for me they have never done more then upset me for no reason but for other they can do a lot worse.

When I was younger my parents used to fight a lot but it was always over the little things and never about anything important. At one point it looked like it was going to end the marriage lucky for me it didn’t because they realized they were spending too much time on the little things and were ignoring the big things. I sadly developed these quick outbursts of emotions, which can easily kill a relationship and this scares me. For many marriages people never learn this lesson, which is why I believe that most marriages that end didn’t work out. In less you take time to see the whole picture and parts where you might be at flat you will never fix the problem and it will just become worse.

For example of when I have over reacted here was a time in my life. The room was black but wasn’t quiet the sounds of the music playing from the open laptop blared. I walked in using my small blue cell phone to light my way. Little did I know it didn’t light up well enough to help me avoid tripping because before I knew it smack! I hit the floor. The person on the couch jumped up as my head span mixing all the different shadows together I felt sick from fear. Angry grunting sounds of anger started from the couch the noises blended together. “Ouch.” Was the only moan that left my lips before the yelling started. “What are u doing it’s 3 in the morning?” the pounding of the voices footsteps heading towards the light switch echoed in my head. When the switch was flicked the light that flooded from the ceiling made the spinning worse colors joined the dancing shadows until the show became only color. I grew nauseous but that angry face staring back at me forced me to keep quiet. At the time I didn’t know this face well he had only come over a few times and was my older brothers friend so we never said more then hello to each other. The face was young way younger then the massive body that it was attached to he had to be over 6ft which made me more nerves but that face was so young and those eyes they held something the more I looked the less they looked like anger and the more they looked like something else. Looking up at the face I realized that fear was on face not anger it was compassion and sympathy that stared back at me. He walked over to me on his baby face grew a smile his hand reached out to mine less fear and spinning I took it and was lifted towards the air. “Are you okay what hurts you want me to get your mom.” he said. “ No I’m okay I just banged my head don’t get my mom I’ll be fine I’m just going to go back to sleep I think I can go back to sleep again.” I said no fear now. “How about you stay up for an hour that’s what my mom makes me do I don’t think you should sleep yet we can watch TV and get to know each other.”  He said with concern but kindness the kind of voice that can draw you in. So we did and laugh had great time and that was the beginning of a great friendship.

That night instead of waiting and to see or thinking of what would happen I immediately judged the situation and assumed the worse this cause unneeded stress and caused me to feel physically ill. Really I wasn’t hate he had felt towards me it was concern but I had prejudged who he was before even getting to know him. When I was trying to walk into the living room I saw him right away as a dangerous person he was my enemy. Thinking about it now my theory of who he was didn’t make sense why would a guest at your house be mad at you for getting hurt. 

When I was reflecting on this sense it showed that it could have also worked in the opposite way I could walk past a friendly looking lady who needs help with her bags. I could bring them into her house and she could kill me, it shows how easy it is to miss judge because you would never assume that the women would hurt you. It is important to think before your actions. Knowing that your first reaction may not always be right may also go to far. Constantly watching from the sideline and waiting to see can cause you to miss out on a lot in life. It is important to have healthy balance of caution and instinct when judging a moment. If doctors’ miss judge people die police officers miss judge they could die or innocent people could get lock behind bars for something they didn’t do while the guilty go free. You must think carefully about the decisions that you make. You never know what results they could have.

Madeline walls

Iron

12/20/10

Society is in a constant struggle to fit in, but in our current society it is ever possible to truly belong to anything?  Once you feel like you are accepted someone makes you feel like acceptance is so far away. Whether on propose or not people have a way of treating people different or talking down to them if they sound or act differently. The struggle for acceptance deeply hurts many people. You can be told you’re dumb because you have a southern accent or that you are rude if you have a New York accent. The fact is so many cruel things can be said even by the ones you love not always to be vicious but simply because they have been thought to think this way.

Sometimes living in one place your whole life makes you blind to how it feels to sound different. I know I never realized how hard it was to be the one that sounded different. I didn’t realize how easy it was to get so lost in the words of what is supposed to be your own langue. This was all until I had to spend a few weeks in West Virginia.

 I looked like I could have lived there except for the way I tried to tip toe around the mud. My uncle knew me as the classic nervous city kid, which made him laugh and want me on the farm even more. He loved laughing at the way I would stay as far away from the animals I was feeding as possible. My face would true a bright pink whenever they move to close to me. Lets just say I wasn’t very good at farm life but to me it was all worth it if they would bring me into town so I could be around people in the afternoon. I had come use to seeing many people after living in a very busy community my whole life. So the slow loneliness of that farm with only cousins and animals to talk were not cutting it. 

Finally after two days of waiting they decided to take us all into town. I was so excited to go and see the friends that I had known since two years ago the last time I had come here. They had been emailing me every week since we meant and I couldn’t wait to see them. As we pulled up at the restaurant that I would meet them at I grew very excited. I could see Jessica with her long brown hair tied into a bun standing next Carrie whose short brown hair was bobbing back and fourth as she talked right outside the door. I got out of the car the and ran up to greet them we were all so excited we couldn’t talk for the first 5 minutes then Jess started asking me a million questions all at once her voice seemed to drag on for ever and had that weird kick to it that I had been hearing form my cousins for days. I started talking my words were fast they seemed to dance off my tongue after I finished I looked around to hear an answer and all I saw all I heard was laughing.

“Why do you sound like that”? Carrie giggled 

“Like what.” I stuttered sounding nervous.

“Like a you’re in a race it sounds so funny.” She said as she continued laughing. 

I was now really upset now for the rest of the day I had to listen to joke after about the way I sounded. The next day my aunt offered to take me down to see them again I refused to go I didn’t want to talk I spent the next week trying to talk just like my aunt just like my cousins they would never laugh at me ever again.

I realized now that changing to fit in was more work then it was worth I was only able to hold on to a week where I felt belonged before I had to come back to Philly and try to sound like I belonged there. I felt so rejected by both sides like I would never feel like I was normal again. 

This is a big problem for so many especially for many adults who can’t change how they sound as easily as young people. The inability to fit into this perfect mold that people feel they need to belong to feels like rejection. When people feel rejected they find it easier to reject others. I think this is because they find things to be black and white after that. That is why I think its so easy for it to continue on in a long cycle of sadness and rejection.

 People start to try and change like the way the woman in American Tongues hired a speech coach to get rid of her Boston accent. This almost made me sad because she felt so rejected and mocked by her accent that she couldn’t just leave her natural accent alone. I think the current issue of unhappiness with accents can never change because not only are other people judging the person themselves can’t stop judging how they sound. I feel that this is said and think we should all just accept who we are.