I'm Getting Married

I'm getting married tomorrow! I just wanted to let you know that this blog name will be changed to ajfranson.blogspot.com !

Have a great week!

My Brother Passed Away

For those of you that do not know much about me, I am the oldest of nine children. I have five brothers and three sisters. Four of my five brothers are in wheelchairs.

On Tuesday evening, my brother Michael (the oldest boy) passed away in CHOC Hospital due to complications to the flu.

My brother Daniel was also in ICU at the time, and is still currently there. Christopher was taken in to the hospital around midnight that night because he started to look sick and the doctors at the hospital wanted to make sure we brought him in before it was too late. He is currently still in the hospital. They will keep in the hospital until he is able to handle all of his regular feedings.

So, if you could say a prayer for my parents and brothers that would be amazing.

Michael is in the red chair, Daniel in the purple chair, Christopher in the blue chair, and Simon is in the green chair.

God Bless

Under One Sun

One of the most important lessons we can learn is to learn more about people who have different views of life. The last few weeks, we have had a unique opportunity to exchange emails with a college student in China. This has been a great opportunity because of the vast distance between the United States and China. It has been two weeks, and I have been able to learn a lot about this young girl. Through this short exchange of emails, I have found that we actually have a lot in common.

Her parents run a business that her younger brother is going to be taking over to keep it in the family. This is very similar to a lot of people in the States. Many parents own their own business and their children take it over when they are old enough to take care of the company.

In China, they also play American movies and television shows. I found it interesting that she referred to all of the television shows as “plays.” She would always refer to the American television plays instead of American television shows, like we would say here in America. She watches many of the same shows that college girls in America also watch. One of the shows that she watches that is an American television show is “Gossip Girl.”

Just like China shows American television, American films are also easily found in China. A lot of the hit movies in America are also hit movies in China. Cartoons are also popular in China. She has seen all of the “Ice Age” movies, as well as movies such as “50 First Dates” and “Pirates of the Caribbean”. I think it is very interesting that young adults on two different parts of the world would be interested in the same movies. I think that this is possible because movies are universal. This is important because it shows how we are really similar. Just because people live on opposite sides of the world does not mean that they're completely different. Instead, it shows that we are able to connect to people all over the globe.

China is very similar to America because just like there is a difference between the East Coast and the West Coast in America, there is a difference between the North and the South in China. However, they are all similar because they are all traditional. They are kind and hospitable.

The girl we emailed with also had a blog. Because I have a blog myself, this was very exciting. Once again, it shows that people always want to be heard. It is important for people to be able to connect with each other. Sometimes, it is hard, but being able to communicate with people and sharing experiences is important, and just like in America, blogs are one way that we are able to do this.

Overall, I have found that I have a lot more in common with a girl from China than I had originally thought. I have enjoyed getting to know her and hope that the conversation continues.

God Knows Best

"He who asks of God in faith things needed for this life is sometimes mercifully heard and sometimes mercifully not heard. For the physician knows better than the patient what will avail for the sick man."

Starting ten days ago, I started a novena to the Holy Spirit. I was praying that Joey would get a job in San Diego before the end of the novena. Eight days in, not only did Joey get the job, but also an apartment. AND not only did he get the apartment, on that eighth day, the apartment complex was able to give him an even better deal than all the previous deals that we had gotten in the past!

God definitely knows what the best timing for His will is. Like I started with, this quote is something that is really hard for me to follow, however, it is times like these where He pulls through, and goes way beyond my original hope!

PRAISE GOD!!!

Praying before Work

I have often wondered how you can be an example of Catholicism when you are working in a secular workplace. Obviously, actions speak louder than words (something I am sure we have all heard a thousand times!).

However, I have also recently stumbled upon a prayer book that has a prayer called "Prayer before Working". It was then that I realized how important it is to start of your work day praying. It makes doing any kind of job worthwhile.

Here is the prayer:

Prayer Before Working

We beseech Thee, O Lord, to direct our actions by Thy holy inspirations, and carry them on by Thy gracious assistance, that every prayer and work of ours may begin always from Thee, and through Thee be happily ended. Amen.

St. Joseph.

Pray for us.

For those of us who are also still students, this prayer book also has a prayer called "Prayer before Study". I find this prayer to also help me stay focused on the fact that the reason I am able to learn and go to school is through the Grace of God.

Here is the prayer:

Prayer Before Study (adaptation from St. Thomas Aquinas)

Ineffable Creator, Thou art called the true font of light and wisdom, and the origin of all things. Pour forth a ray of Thy brightness into the darkened places of my mind; disperse from my soul the twofold darkness into which I was born: sin and ignorance.

Grant me keenness of mind, capacity to remember, skill in learning, insight to interpret, and eloquence in speech.

May Thou guide the beginning of my study, direct its progress, and bring it to completion.

Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Holy Mary, Seat of Wisdom.

Pray for us.

Iran Daily vs Tehran Avenue

Global Cultures II

One of the classes that I am currently taking is a Global Cultures class. In this class we study other cultures in order to become more aware of others beliefs. This past week, we looked at Iran. We were told to look into two websites.

This post is my response to what I discovered in these two website new sources.

The news sources are:

http://www.iran-daily.com/

http://www.tehranavenue.com/

Iran Daily vs. Tehran Avenue

One of the main stories was about Israel and Gaza and how Israel blocked school supplies from a school in Gaza. They are also worried North Korea's short range missiles. One important thing that this Iran news source found about the missiles was that “North Korean leader Kim Jong Il indicated the country's willingness to return to the six-party talks, provided there was progress in bilateral talks with Washington. In an initial reaction, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Monday's missile launches did not affect Washington's policy towards Pyongyang.” Not only did this article show how they felt about North Korea and their missiles, but through the last sentence we see that it is important to Iran what the United States representatives say and how they feel about issues even if the United States are not directly involved.

Interestingly, two other stories that made the front page this week were more about the people in the area. One of them was about a flu vaccine that was coming to Iran in April. It is the first time Iran is getting the flu vaccine. In the article, the author wrote, “Iran requested to buy flu vaccine from American, British and French Companies later than other countries, therefore the vaccines will enter Iran in the next Iranian year (starting March 21, 2010).” Again in this story we see the importance of American in Iran. The other story was about an electric cars contest in Tehran. This seems to be a fun article to have in the Iran Daily. Unlike a lot of the other articles in this newspaper, it is interesting that there is such a lighthearted news article in the middle of so many heavier articles.

Another interesting story that was in the newspaper, “Iran Daily”, was about marriage. In the city of Minoudasht between 2002 and 2007, five years. “Bahram Bakhtiari Saeed, a faculty member of Azad University in Gorgan, says strong religious beliefs and training children to observe moral principles are the most important factors preventing family separation in Minoudasht, Mehr News Agency wrote.” I find this very interesting that they see that it is their religious background the reason for their high moral standards.

Unlike the Iran Daily newspaper, the Tehran Avenue news source seems to be a lot more similar to a blog than an actual newspaper. Although it has a lot of different pages and is not just a continuous blog, all of the articles in the Tehran Avenue seem to be more of opinion pieces. This news source has an entire section called “Around Town.” In this part of the website, there are five subsections. They are cafe, citylog, fiction, society, and outdoors. Each of these subsections have opinion pieces about the topic that it is under. They also have a section called “The Art.” The five subsections in this section are drama, exhibition, film, literature, and music. These also have opinion pieces that have to do with the section that they are under.

In the “About Us” section, they describe themselves by saying “The small group of young writers who originally contributed to the magazine has now grown into a sizable community. They are trying to focus on issues that official or established media seldom do. In the various sections of TehranAvenue, or in its back alleys if you prefer, the visitor will come upon a new language that is trying to push the limits of understanding and not simply stay within the confines of communication.” I find this very interesting because it seems that it is a site that is not so much just for the news, but for the people themselves. Having articles written by people just like them allows them to connect with those who live a similar lifestyle. This shows that they want to have a strong sense of community. This site was created to help to encourage this type of community where people can write about what they have experienced in that community.

They Really Need to Make A New Word For Busy

The quarter I have been waiting for is finally here!!

Since Joey and I got engaged, I have been waiting for this quarter for our wedding!

And now it is finally underway!

As the second week starts to come to an end, many things are happening.

As we are finishing our last quarter of our junior year we have plenty of projects to keep us busy. Between being the Producer for our Production Simulation class to planning a wedding to helping as a 2nd AD for a production called "Bump" this quarter will definitely be flying by!

As we approach the last six weeks before the wedding, we are anxiously awaiting the day to come. It is crazy that we are so close! I still remember thinking how exciting it was that we had less than 300 days until the wedding! Having less than 45 days now is almost unreal.

Even though this quarter is going to be nothing but busy, it will be a very fun, upbeat, and life changing quarter!

My Wanderings in the Desert of High School

My junior year of high school I wrote a paper for my hebrew testament class comparing high school and the Israelites wandering in the desert.

Class: Hebrew Testament

Date: 20 November 2005

My Wanderings in the Desert of High School

Just like the Israelites wandered in the dry, dusty desert, I wandered through the stressful, emotional desert called High School. The Israelites wandered through the desert, not knowing what they were going to eat or where they were going to sleep. In my wanderings through high school, I did not know what I was supposed to do or where I was supposed to be. Throughout the Israelites journey, they were lost, worried, complaining, frustrated, trusting or doubting God, and they encountered strangers. In my journey, I also felt the same way as the Israelites did when they wandered the desert.

Just like the Israelites were lost in the desert, I have been lost in the world of High School. As a freshman, obviously you are lost and confused because it’s a new world, a new atmosphere. But, even through sophomore year and the beginning of junior year, you still can feel lost and abandoned. Throughout all of your high school years, you are lost and confused at moments because you do not always know where you are going or what you are going to do with what is right in front of you.

The Israelites were also worried. They worried about food, clothes, the elderly and the sick, and many other things. In high school worry is a very familiar word. Between school and extra-curricular activities, stress is a common word that is always heard. After 6 ½ hours of school, we go to our after school things, and by the time we get home, all we want to do is sit down and breathe. But, instead of sitting down and breathing, it’s time to go and do the hours of homework and studying for tests. Sleep in unheard of when stress is around. Worrying about all of the things of everyday life often makes feelings of worry.

Just as every teen would do, the Israelites complained through their teen years in the desert as a people. Also through high school, I have complained about the amount of homework, the hard tests, the essays that I didn’t want to do, and not getting what I wanted. Complaining however doesn’t do anything except give you more stress and worry. When you just do the work, you spend less time stressing about it, and just did it.

The Israelites were stuck in the desert not knowing what was going to happen or even where they were going. Just like the Israelites, in high school you often don’t know exactly what is going to happen or something goes wrong and we get frustrated. Frustrated, and often feeling alone, we wonder why high school is so hard and why everything happens the way it does.

With all of these things, their are times where you trust God completely, and times where you are just not sure if he really does exist and really does care. When you say things just cannot get any worse, and then they do, you wonder why it is all happening. Why is God leaving you? Why has he left you by yourself and alone? Then you have the moment of inspiration, where you understand why things happen and you completely trust in what God has in store for you. Still, since being Catholic is hard, it’s extremely hard to stay completely trusting in God because so many things that are hard to understand are happening, all at once.

The Israelites also met many people along their journey. Some of the people they met hurt them, while some helped them out. In the world of high school you meet more people than you can keep track of. Some people made soft impressions because you only talked to them once, or just saw them in a group. Or maybe they made a dent in me, we talk occasionally and we were involved in each others life to an extent. Then there are the people who made footprints on us. They helped us or hurt us. They are very influential people that played a big role in our lives and who we are and who we will become in the near future. Lastly, there are those few people who left engravings in who we are, the ones that changed our lives. They are the people that changed who we are for the rest of our lives. The people that will forever be remembered because they had the much of an impact on who we are. Funny thing is, that they, at one time, were all strangers to us. We didn’t know who they were the whole time. We had to meet them, and the fact that we met them, changed our life forever.

All of the Israelites had to go through many struggles, similar to those of us now over 2000 years later. It shows that there must be something in common with all of us as humans. It shows that we all have the same feelings and struggles. But all the struggles are different, because we are all different people. The main difference between all of us is that we live in different times. However, all of us have the same feelings and struggles and want to be happy. The Israelites and I have many things in common, more things in common then I could ever imagine.

The Importance of Living a Moral Life

Unlike what society tries to tell us, there are not many different moralities. There is one truth and one morality. We know this because God is the basis for morality and because God does not change, neither does morality. As a follower of Christ, it is important to understand that it is Christ that we should center our lives around. There is no way that we can separate our actions from the morality that we know is true. If we act one way, that is the way we are. We are the choices we make.

Morality is linked with happiness and cannot be separated from it. Secular society tends to see morality and rules as restricting. The reason they feel this way is because in order to be a moral person, sometimes we must sacrifice immediate goods and wants in order to reach something higher and better for us in the long term. It is important that we recognize that morality answers the question “What should I do” and therefore we realize that morality is not about a list of wrongs and rights, but an opportunity for us to choose something that is higher than what our humanity alone can allow us to achieve. Most people feel that morality is about what we cannot do. They expect that all moral choices involve suffering and sadness. What most people miss, is that morality is not choosing the hardest thing possible. It is about choosing the right thing. Sometimes, choosing the right thing initially might be difficult or uncomfortable. Other times, it is the most exciting, breathtaking moment. Either way, choosing what is right ends up making us the happiest ten times out of ten.

Most of the time people sum up morality into a few subjects; abortion, homosexuality, religion, and abstinence. Although these are decisions that are very obviously moral dilemmas, they are not the only moral situations that we experience in our lives. Everyday we make decisions that lead us towards our final end. Each decision we make changes the distance between us and our goal, heaven. Sometimes, we make decisions that bring us giant steps towards our final goal. However, other times we might not be making much process because we are not choosing what is in our best interest. It is in the simple decisions that we are able to form the habits that will be able to help us when the bigger problems come towards us.

Virtues are extremely important. There is one main reason for this; virtues are habits. They are the good habits. The ones that work with reason and attempt to perfect our free will so that choosing what will lead us to our highest goal will become what is most natural to us. Building up virtues allows our sensitive appetites not to have power over us. Virtues are dependent on the fact that our intellectual virtues are learned through wisdom, knowledge, and understanding of the truth and moral life. Because we are creatures of habits, building positive habits that lead to becoming a person of virtue is one of the most important lessons that we can learn. If we are able to become completely virtuous, choosing the right choice would be the only reasonable choice to make.

Just the way that virtues are so crucial to keeping a virtuous moral life, vices are an obstacle to leading a virtuous moral life. Similar to virtues, vices are also formed through habits, however these habits overpower the reason instead of working with reason to make decisions. Although vices are habits that work against our final goal, the human inclination to be good is always there and therefore allows every person to always have hope. However, when you sin, it is like your soul gets sick. It increases the difficulty for one to stay away from sin. God's punishment for sin is that He allows for us to have it, and enjoy at the time. Once you have experienced it, it makes it difficult for you to withhold the next time. Similarly, sin breeds sin. People do not want to be alone in their sin. This is why when one sibling gets in trouble, they spend their time-out trying to get the rest of their siblings in trouble as well so they do not have to go through it alone.

Moral virtues depend on the intellect. Intellect is also a habit. This habit helps us to understand what is happening and understand the truth. But just like every habit, in order to keep this habit we must use it often. If we cannot understand what is good because we are not practicing this virtue, it can lead to vices. Wisdom is one of the highest intellectual virtues because it is so important in informing the will and therefore informing our reason. It is also through knowledge that we are able to understand how all things lead to God. If we do not continue to try to be informed, our intellect will not be able to inform our reason and will allow ourselves to become weak and more prone to vices.

It is important to understand the difference between formally evil acts and materially evil ones. A material acts are the acts in and of themselves. It asks question about the actual events that occurred in relation to the act. Formal acts are the factors involved in committing the act. Here we must ask the questions relating to the intention and the knowledge that the person committing the acts was experiencing at the time the act was committed. Because of this, an act could be materially wrong but not formally wrong. Similarly, doing something materially right, could not be formally right because of the intention that it is done with.

The will consists of commonsense, intention, choice, deliberation and consent. The will makes decisions based off of it's intellect and understanding of the situation at hand. The will's movements are internal and external. Internally, the intellect moves itself. Externally, the will is drawn to the good. However, the will is not always drawn to the highest good. At some points, the will suffices with the lower good. We should always be striving to align our will towards God because God is our ultimate good. The intention is also crucial to understanding the actions that the will chooses. It can influence the end of the action and the means that one uses in order to get to the end. The value of a choice depends on the object one is choosing. Deliberation is important because it allows us to search for the answer and be able to act with knowledge. Different choices rely on different amounts of deliberation. The amount of time spent on deliberation for an action should relate directly to the intensity of the decision. Finally, consent is crucial to the choice. One must allow themselves to commit the action in order for them to be help responsible for that action.

The passions are critical to the understanding of the moral life because they are known from their experiences. While emotions and feelings are vague, passions are precise. Unlike society's view that passions are the be-all and end-all, passions are not good or evil in and of themselves. They can lead to virtues or vices, but they are neutral. Our concupiscible passions are the ones that have a sensible good or evil. They are love, hate, desire, aversion, pleasure, and sadness. While are irascible passions are the passions that we have difficulty in attainting. These passions are hope, despair, fear, and anger. It is important to understand that our passions are important to be involved in our intellect. However, our intellect should direct our passions to the highest goods. Because our passions are neutral, it is important that we make sure our intellect guides our passions to the highest moral good.

The cardinal virtues are prudence, temperance, fortitude, and justice. Prudence allows us to use practical reason when trying to decide the true good in each circumstance. Justice is important because it gives what is due to our neighbor. In justice, we are called to respect each human being. Justice is a habit that is very important to keep a solid grip on because it is a habitual way of thinking. Temperance guides our concupiscible passions and balances our emotions. “It ensures the will's mastery over instincts and keeps desires with the limits of what is honorable” according to CCC 1809. Fortitude, then, deals with and moderates our irascible passions. It “enables ones to conquer fear of death, and to face trials and persecutions.” (CCC 1808) This is important because without using temperance and fortitude we can easily loose control of our passions.

Although our society seems to think that conscience is something you feel when you are about to make a decision about something that is important, conscience literally means with knowledge. From society's point of view, it is often linked to the idea that you should listen to your heart. However, the church clearly shows that conscience means to make a decision with the knowledge that you are given. There are three functions of a conscience. First, you must identify what the action is from a moral viewpoint. Then, you must identify whether an act is a good act or an evil act. Finally, you must evaluate the action. The only way that society can say that you should always follow your conscience is if your conscience is well informed and properly raised.

Grace is given to us through the theological virtues. The three theological virtues are faith, hope, and love. The grace that God gives us allows us to succeed. He gives us exactly what we need at every part of our life so that we can choose to become closer to Him. It is important that we recognize that grace is given to us in order to make us whole again. Without grace, it is impossible for us to survive in this world. Unlike the cardinal graces that are only acquired through practice, God's grace and theological virtues are given to us as a gift to aide us in our decisions and throughout our experiences so that we are able to be united to Christ. However, because of God's undying love for us, He allows us to reject those virtues and turn our back on Him. However, this always leads to sadness and not happiness.

The ten commandments are important to society. The reason God gives us these laws is not to hinder us or to not allow us to enjoy our time here on earth. He gives us these laws because it is important for us to realize that if we commit theses acts and do not follow the commandments, we will be the ones hurt in the end because doing these things leads to sadness. Just like every society, we need laws in order to make sure that our society's citizens can lead good, healthy, moral lives. People often feel that laws take away from one's freedom. However, there is no true freedom in choosing against God's laws. Doing so will only lead to slavery. The ten commandments are a summary of the entire moral law.

The beatitudes are also important. It is interesting to know that each of the beatitudes leads to the next one. If you follow the first of the beatitude, and are poor in spirit, then you will mourn because you know that you cannot live on your own. One can continue to see throughout the entire beatitudes how each one leads to the next. That is why it ends that those who follow these commands will be in the kingdom of God. Interestingly, the beatitudes are follow by what is known as the antitheses. These talk about the ten commandments. Jesus in the new covenant takes the commandments another step higher. For example, killing someone emotionally with one's anger is also under the commandment that you shall not kill.

God is love. When you love someone, you want to do what they ask of you because that makes them happy. The same goes for Christ's commandments. As christians, we should want to follow the commandments because Christ tells us to follow them for our own good. Because He tells us this, and we love Him, it is only right that we would follow the commandments that He gives to us. Through this class, I was able to understand more clearly why God gives us laws. Unlike society teaches us, the only way to be free is to know your purpose and our purpose to be united with God in heaven. Therefore, the only way that we can find true freedom and happiness is if we follow what Christ teaches to us and follow the laws that He gives us. If He did not love us, He would not give us laws that lead us to Him. But, in His overpowering love, He guides us to Himself so that we can achieve our purpose in life.

Laugh. Cry. Share the Stories.

Telling a story that makes an audience feel connected to the characters can be very difficult. But, Ken Kwapis makes it seem like a breeze. All of his movies have been received very well by his audience. Ken Kwapis is not only a movie director, but a television director as well. Kwapis always explores relationships when he directs. Although Ken Kwapis started his career in television, his transition into becoming a film director seems to have gone very smoothly. He still directs episodes from current seasons of shows such as “The Office”. This ability to be able to transfer from television to film shows how he has become a well respected director in Hollywood. It also shows that as a director, you do not have to choose between television and film. Ken Kwapis is a great example of being able to work well in many environments.

As a director, it is extremely important to know the story that is being told by the film. Without knowing the story and whose story it is, it is impossible to be able to connect to the audience that the film is attempting to reach. Ken Kwapis is definitely a romantic comedy director. One particular movie that he has done an extraordinary well at knowing his audience is in his movie based off of a book, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. Throughout this movie and through the other romantic comedies that he directs, there tends to be the same type of theme backing it. One theme that seems to occur in his films is a flawed relationship needing perfection.

As a christian, this is an important theme because our relationship with Christ is flawed because of our flawed humanity. Although christians must strive for perfection, they often fall short. It is important for christians to watch films that show flawed relationships because then they are able to recognize themselves in the film and then are able to see how to change in a positive way without hurting those around them. It is also important to see other people making choices and placing themselves into the shoes of someone they know in order to be a better example of Christ's love to those around them.

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants is a movie where Ken Kwapis is brilliantly able to show how well he knows his audience. In the special feature of the movie, he discusses some of the scenes that they had to cut. In the “pizza hangover” scene, he makes a comment about himself. He says, “Women are mysterious to me. You know, I started this picture thinking that I knew something about women, but I don't know, now I'm not so sure.” However, this is not true. In his video commentary about the scenes that are deleted, it is clear he knows women very well. There are two specific deleted scenes that have to do with the character Bridget. The first one is about Bridget playing “chicken” with a car in Mexico. The reason he deleted this scene was because he recognized that this scene is not as powerful because it only shows a physical danger and what the audience really needs to feel is that a girl her age should not be losing her virginity and losing that, especially to her coach, is what is the real danger for this young girl in her attempt to find love. The second deleted scene is one between Bridget and her father. This scene was deleted because Kwapis was able to realize that Bridget does not need to talk about her mother's death to her father because her father is already checked out. It is more important for her to go through her grieving with her friends, the ones who have been there for her. He also felt that “it was better not to resolve the story” and that it was best for there to be loose ends between her and her father.

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants came out in June of 2005. It has four strong female leads who alone can capture the audience from the beginning. In the final cut of the movie, Ken Kwapis takes us through a journey that is filled with excitement and tears. He even tells people that "Since [Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants] was released, I can't tell you how many conversations I've had about public displays of emotion in general, and crying at the movies in particular. I've received messages from male friends berating me for creating something that brought them to tears. I've received emails from girls who claim they'd never cried at the movies before Pants. And there are many rave reviews that are quite apologetic in tone. Many journalists have a hard time distinguishing between honest emotion and sentiment. I feel certain the audience knows the difference." There are many reasons that Ken Kwapis received this type of praise for the movie.

At the beginning of the movie, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, the audience is introduced to four of the most different girls. Each girl has a unique personality and attitude. Bridget is the gorgeous blonde who lost her mother and her journey is about finding love, but she is looking in all the wrong places. Lena is a girl who feels uncomfortable in her own body and must overcome her own shyness in order to bring two families together. Tibby is left by all of her friends over summer, or so she thought. She must learn that friends can come from any situation and that sometimes the friends that mean the most do not always start out with an instant connection. The fourth girl in our story is Carmen. Being extremely excited to finally be able to spend so much time with her dad, she must realize that things do not always happen the way she hopes, but that does not mean that she needs to cut out those situations.

Because of the way this story is written, it is extremely important for Kwapis to understand the story of each character, as well as how each characters story in relation to the other stories being told. After spending their entire lives together, these four girls must figure out how to live on their own and still keep their friendship strong and be a major part of each other's lives. On their last day together before they all start their own separate summers for the first time, they find a pair of pants that miraculously fits all four of the girls. That night, they make a sisterly pact. They make rules about what they are going to do when they have the pants. During this pact, each of the girls are seen packing and getting ready for the summer apart.

After this, each of the girls start their individual stories. Starting with Lena, we arrive in Greece. Immediately, we are visually brought into the culture and how Lena feels completely awkward in her own body. She continually fidgets and finally falls to the ground. Lena meets a love interest, Costas. How ever there is one problem, Costas' family and Lena's family had a huge disagreement and therefore her grandmother has forbidden the to speak to each other. But, that cannot even stop the connection from growing stronger and the two of them continue to see each other. Yet, she is still afraid of being different than who people expect her to be. Bridget is definitely confident and uses it to to her advantage throughout this movie. She is a beautiful soccer player who has her eye on a guy who is off limits, her coach. Although the attraction is strong between the two, it is against the rules of the camp. Even though she tries to seduce him, he continually stops her, at least in the beginning. Carmen is very self-conscious. She is extremely excited to see her father and cannot wait to spend an entire summer with him, just the two of them. But, she is in for a huge surprise. Her dad has a new family waiting to meet her when they arrive at a place where Carmen realizes her dad is a completely different person than the dad she thought she was going to see. Clearly, the shock of her dad changing so drastically without her knowledge is completely heartbreaking for this young girl. Finally, we see Tibby. She is going to be a complete loner this summer, at least that's how it started. Trying to work to make some extra money, she works at the local convenient store and dreads every moment of it. But, that does not last long, one of her first days she hears something crash, as she sluggishly walks to the aisle it came from she notices a girl has passed out. She calls for help and helps the little girl to get to the ambulance. Soon enough, the young girl that she helped at the store shows up at her door. Her name is Bailey and she knows exactly what she wants, to be Tibby's assistant this summer with her documentary and Tibby does not want to allow it. A few days into Bailey helping Tibby, Tibby finds out that Bailey is dying and they have stopped treatment for Leukemia.

Each of the girls have a breaking point. After sneaking around with Costas for quite sometime, Lena is finally caught. She is an embarrassment to her family by being with Costas. On top of that, Costas is leaving for school within the week and she is losing him forever. She lost her family's respect and the person that she loves. She finally is different then who they thought she was, and no one agrees with her way of life. Bridget finally gets the pants, but unfortunately, she chooses the wrong thing when they come. Searching for love, she sleeps with the soccer coach. Instead of the love that she thought she'd feel, she feels even more alone and even more abandoned. Carmen's breaking point was when she went to try on her bridesmaid dress with her future step-mother and step-sister for her dad's upcoming wedding. She felt like her dad has completely abandoned her for something that he thought was better. With that, she threw a rock at the window and ran. She went back to living with her mom and invites Tibby over. At this point, Tibby and her new found emotions and caring about people's feelings and Carmen ends up yelling at Tibby. Tibby's breaking point is when she actually starts realizing how short life is and how important it is to make your mark before you have to leave, and then watching a girl so much younger than her confronted with it. Then, Bailey goes into the hospital and Tibby tries not to feel anything, but Bailey has already taught her how to feel.

After loosing all hope, Lena stands up for herself. She tells her grandfather that she just wants to have the chance to find love just like he did with her grandmother. At this point, people are able to accept the person she is becoming. Her grandfather agrees with Lena and she runs after Costas. Barely making it before the ship leaves, Lena and Costas catch a glimpse of each other and are wonderfully reunited. As Tibby continues to struggle with her new found friend Bailey who died, she goes through some of her footage and stumbles upon a taping that Bailey had made for her. Bailey reminds Tibby that life is about the little moments become more than the big stuff that hurts. This brief advice completes the change in Tibby's mindset about life. As Kwapis tells us in the deleted scenes, Bridget's closure does not come from her dad understanding, but by her friends being there for her. Although she pushes her dad away even more when she comes home from soccer camp, her friends go to her and she is able to talk about her mom with them. Carmen and Tibby invite them over to Bridget's house because they know she needs them right now. Talking about her mom with the girls who are closest to her is exactly the kind of love she needs, not the love of a man she barely knows. The girls see the strength Bridget has, even when she does not think she has it. Because of this, when she sees the coach again, she is able to understand that it's okay that she made a mistake, and she is able to admit that she was running away from her life, but what she really needed was closure.

The last reunion between the girls truly shows the love that the girls have for each other. When Lena comes home, the three girls surprise Carmen and tell her that she has the courage to show up to her father's wedding. At this point the true bonds of sisterhood shine through. They instate a rule to help the sister who is in need at the time. With Carmen able to stand at her father's wedding with the rest of the family, the final sister is able to overcome her struggle. The closing scene of the four girls sitting at the table at the end of the summer where everything is just like it was at the beginning of the summer, except that they have all grown.

The beauty of the pants is that they represent more than just an article of clothing, but an opportunity where one thing can bring people closer by sharing it when they are not together. It is important to recognize that it was not the pants that really held everything together, but they represent the fact that it is the friendship and the bonds that the four girls have shared over the course of their lifetime that even though there were huge life changing events that happened this summer, the bond they share was enough to keep them together.

One of the aspects that made this film great was the transitions. The transitions in this type of a film is crucial to the entirety of the film. If the audience was not able to understand where they were being taken to they could easily get lost in the different story lines. However, Kwapis brilliantly took the transitions between locations and connected them visually so that the stories made sense in the whole film as well as in their individuality. Shots that transferred us from one location to another allowed the audience to cut to locations without the bore of using fades constantly.

The beauty of femininity in this film is almost overpowering. Each of the four girls is uniquely beautiful. Unlike traditional beauty, the beauty of the girls in this film make it relate-able for any women to be able to watch and connect with the girls. Even though Kwapis claimed to not understand women as much as he thought going into this film, the relationship between the sisters was so powerful that every women can relate to it.

Overall, this movie hits all the aspects that Ken Kwapis tends to lean towards in his movies, romantic comedies. He understands his story and the most effective way of telling it. He knows exactly what he is filming and why each scene is there. He has a romance in Greece which he portrays beautifully and a father and daughter being reunited and the struggles a daughter must go through when she finds how her dad has a new family. And just in case that did not hit the spot, he is able to portray a girl who has lost her mom and is yearning for love, and starts to look for it in all the wrong places. Still, there is one more story. The one girl who will be staying at home while everyone else goes on an adventure, goes on an adventure right in her own town. As she befriends a young girl that is dying from leukemia we are able to show a deep friendship that touched everyone's lives. While keeping all four stories unique, he was able to fit them perfectly together into a wonderful work of art so that all the story transitions are blended together so well, the audience is easily able to follow the story. Because Ken Kwapis knew exactly what he was saying, instead of an audience feeling confused and lost throughout the movie, he had the exact opposite effect. People were so swept up into the movie, that they felt the emotions that each individual in the movie was feeling as well.

This film was one of his first feature films. Although Ken Kwapis started his career in Television, his transition into a film director seems to have gone very smoothly. He still directs episodes from current seasons of shows such as “The Office”. This ability to be able to transfer from television to film shows how he has become a well respected director in Hollywood. It also shows that as a director, you do not have to choose between television and film. Ken Kwapis is a great example of being able to work well in many environments.

In Ken Kwapis' movies, there always is a couple that needs to overcome something in order to find itself. For example, in License to Wed, the main couple needs to get through with the marriage prep course and understand each other better. Kwapis directed this movie after the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. This story is about Ben and Sadie who are in love and want to get married. However, in order to get married in the church that Sadie wants to get married in, they must go through marriage preparation classes. Because their wedding is so close to when they went to the minister, they must complete the course in three weeks. Although there seems to be nothing to it at first, these two lovers figure out that there is much more to a marriage than just love. They must be willing to sacrifice and accept each other and they must trust each other completely.

Ben finds this marriage preparation to be burdensome. He knows that Sadie completely trusts the minister and therefore feels like he must make the minister look bad so that Sadie does not rely on the ministers opinion so much. Throughout the marriage preparations, Sadie feels like she is trying so much harder then Ben. At one point she even goes and looks at the vows that Ben is supposed to be writing. To her horror, she finds nothing but a drawing. Ben ends up making Sadie disappointed in him and the day before the wedding at the wedding rehearsal, they break up because the last straw for Sadie is that Ben tried to disprove the minister's knowledge.

At this point, Sadie goes off to where they were supposed to be having their honeymoon with her family and Ben stays home and goes to a bar. This is where Ben realizes how much he needs Sadie and how much he truly cares for her. He flies to their honeymoon location and tries to get in contact with her but she refuses. Finally, he writes out beautiful wedding vows in the sand underneath her her hotel window. As they are reunited, they get married right there on the beach by Stacie's minister.

Just like in Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, this is a comedic way of presenting how relationships are maintained and that even though Christians strive to be perfect, everyone is imperfect and it is important to realize that even though each person has their own flaws, it is important to understand where the person is coming from because it will often explain the way they are acting towards others.

Because of License to Wed and Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, it is not a shock that after these making two movies, he made He's Just Not That Into You. In this movie, he recognizes anything and everything that can go wrong with couples and people and all of the characters have a comedic romantic problem to get over by the end of the movie.

One major similarity between Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and He's Just Not That Into You is that they are both based off of books. The challenge with making a movie based off of a book is that there is already and audience that expects a certain experience and they have certain expectations for how the characters look, sound, and act. However, very few people disagree with how Kwapis takes these stories and adapts them to the screen. This further proves that Kwapis completely understands the story he is trying to tell and the audience he is trying to reach throughout the stories.

As a television director, he also tends to direct episodes with similar themes to those of his movies. In addition to directing the Pilot episode to the hit show “The Office”, he also directed other episodes such as “The Job” and “Company Picnic”. Both of these episodes and the other episodes that he has directed all have the romantic comedic aspect to the main storyline of the episode. Similarly, he directed many episodes from the hit show, “Malcolm in the Middle” that had a similarly themed storyline in the episode.

As a christian, Ken Kwapis is a good example of how to handle delicate situations. The stories that he tells are clear and complete. The storylines are concise and easy to follow. They deal with important moral issues in a way that allows the audience to think without being preachy or overly “Christian.” Because of this, Kwapis does not narrow the audience down to “Christians only.”

Finding a Need in Society

There is a real need for women speakers. Speakers are important for a lot of different situations. There are four main markets where there is a real need for women speakers. They are teenagers, pro-life audiences, the handicap community, and those who are a part of a big family. Teenagers are in high school. They want to fit in and want to be liked. They long for true love and true caring, even if they do not realize it. Teenagers are rebellious, but they want approval in their rebellion. The pro-life audience tends to be conservative. They believe in life from conception to natural death and they have some kind of religious background. The choices that they make are normally based on religious persuasion and they do not feel like they have to go with the flow of the society. The handicap community tends to stand out. It is harder for them to get around and to plan and attend events. They cannot always go to everything that “normal” families and people can go to because there is not always a handicap accessible area. They experience frustration because they cannot always take care of themselves and they want to give up sometimes. They do not want people to feel bad for them, they want to find true love and compassion. The last target audience that I have is those who are a part of a big family. Big families tend to have a conservative and religious background. They do not always have money. They often use hand-me-downs, either from other siblings or other families. Often, the older siblings help raise the younger siblings.

I am hoping that writing a book will lead into a career of speaking. Being a published author would allow for me to be a credible source for churches and communities that have audiences for my target markets. I hope to fill the need for women speakers. Life can be difficult sometimes, I hope to show people how to get through the difficult times and still be able to see how important and fulfilling even the worst of times can be.

With the experiences that I have had, my stories have a wide range of topics. These topics include the many different audiences that I have mentioned. These stories include stories about being genuine, real love, and daily inspiration.

In this book and throughout a career as a speaker, I am trying to explain to people what it's like to be in situations where people look into your life and think that your life is so awful and pitiful. Most people look into my life and think that about me and my family. People often come up and tell me that they feel bad for me. In these situations, it could be very easy to fall into feeling sorry for myself. However, that would not be the way to view myself. Throughout writing this book and becoming a speaker, I hope to show people how my family is the luckiest family and how although there are a lot of difficulties that come with it, there is no way that I would ever change any part of my family or my experiences.

In order to prepare myself for this journey, I must start by understanding my experiences from a mature adults point of view. By looking at the stories through my own eyes from when I was a child will help me understand what people are going thorugh when they are in situations that bring about the same emotions and thoughts that the experiences I have had have brought me. Writing the book first will also help with a future in speaking because when I am writing the book, I am able to write and edit until the stories are clearly told. By doing this first, I will then be able to clearly discuss the stories when I am speaking in front of an audience. I will be able to know the individual stories that I am telling, but also my story as a whole.

Jesus is necessary in all of the activities in my life. Through the sacraments, He will lead me to Himself. In baptism, He welcomed me into His family. In reconciliation, He forgives my selfishness. In the Eucharist, He nourishes me. In confirmation, He seals me in His love. In Holy Matrimony, He unites me with my husband and Himself. In the sacrament of the anointing of the sick, He strengthens me for my journey. While I am on this journey, it is important for me to listen to God's word. I must rely on Him and trust that He will lead me to the people that need to hear what I have to say. I also must trust in His timing, instead of relying on my own. Because God is perfect, I must always remember that, like Christ, I must surrender my will to my Heavnely Father's will.

In writing a book, I will strive to be like the authors in the bible who told their stories in order to help others see God working in their lives. The Catechism of the Catholic Church says in paragraph 409,

“The whole of man's history has been the story of dour combat with the powers of evil, stretching, so our Lord tells us, from the very dawn of history until the last day. Finding himself in the midst of the battlefield man has to struggle to do what is right, and it is at great cost to himself, and aided by God's grace, that he succeeds in achieving his own inner integrity.”

Only because of God's grace have I come to the realizations that I will explain in my book, and only by God's grace will I have the grace to tell others about it and be able to touch their hearts and lead them in a dirrection that points to our Heavenly Father.

How Would I have Responded?

I think that he started out pretty well. He had a good message and he did show though his actions what followers of Christ should do. However, when she came at him with the question, “Why did my friend die”, well, he could've dealt with the situation better. Instead of saying things like God doesn't always answer prayer, he could have said something about how God doesn't always answer prayers the way we had hoped he would, instead He answers them in a way that is best for us. I would have also told her a story. The story I would have told her would be this.

In August of 2004 one of my younger brothers, Daniel, went into the hospital again. He already had spent a lot of time in hospitals and already had gone though many different operations. Some of the different surgeries were for a g-tube, g.i.-tube, a tracheotomy, a fundoplycation and some other surgeries where at the time I didn't know what was happening. And in August of 2004, he went into the hospital ICU again. This time, for a ventilator. Basically, what it does is it breathes for him. He was there for a couple days while my mom and dad were being trained on how to work this new machine that was going to be in our house. I went up to visit him one morning in ICU after he had been on the ventilator, and I realized what was happening, my brother now needed a machine to breathe. I talked to my dad, and he basically confirmed what I had thought. My dad told me that if we lived in any other part of the world, if he didn't have the type of job he had, or if things were any different then way that they were now, my little brother might not have been here anymore. And that hit me really hard. I always knew that he could die at any second; I mean it was only 3 years ago when he stopped breathing three different times in a matter of a month, all ending with a trip to the ER and the last time going into the hospital for about three weeks. But this time was probably one of my strongest wakeup calls. That’s when I realized how important prayer is and how important it was that my parents and the rest of my family trusted in the answers that God gives us in order for our family to continue to grow. My little brother who has gone though more than most people have to go though in a lifetime by the age of 10 and he is almost always happy and smiling, especially while he is playing games on the computer or baseball or interacting with all his friends at school.

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A link to the radio clip that this post was written based off of is:

This American Life

"This I Used to Believe"

Act 2 -- Starts at 19 minutes

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1292

What is going on?

“Twitter is for Old People”

“Lost in the new media Universe”

What Is Going On?

Although Jenna McWilliams is very sceptic about what Matthew Robson said and why it has become such a big deal, it seems very clear to me. Instead of all of these CEOs, who are most likely all in there 50s, worldwide asking each other “Why can't we get through and capture the younger generation?” and then thinking that the answer is that they need more technology, they looked at it from a view point of their target market. I have seen many adults try to grab a hold of any technology that they can and try to use it. They assume that once they are a part of all of these technological advances, then they must be able to get a hold of the younger generation. However, in this mind set they miss one crucial problem. They do not know how to use all of this technology.

There is definitely an art form that can come about from figuring out technology. There is a huge difference between what is there to use and what should actually be used. Like the example that Matthew Robson uses with Twitter. I have had a twitter account since March 2009. However, I have used it to write things to my “followers” ten times since then. On top of that, I never go to check to see what everyone is doing. Twitter is not something that I ever need to go and check or figure out. It just sits there and I have no motivation to use it. This is mainly because of Facebook. All that Twitter is is a status update. I already have somewhere to update my status, it is called Facebook. However, on Facebook, there are so many other things that keep bringing me back to it, such as the social interaction and games, that I go on for those things and update my status, pretty much just because.

Jenna McWilliams poses a very good question though at the end of her news article, she states “How long until we realize that the guide may be walking quickly as if he's following a path but is in fact just as lost as everyone else?”. Clearly, she is an adult wondering what is going on just like everyone else. She starts out her article with a list of ways that we can look at to know that we are in a social revolution. And that is where her problem starts. What she does not understand is that random people speaking out and getting heard is the social revolution. Everyone wants to be heard and everyone wants to make an impact. Matthew Robson is just another one of the people that becomes famous because of a following. The reason that people update their Facebook is because they want people to know what they are doing. They want to be noticed. Matthew Robson was probably not even thinking that his work would be read, much less published and heard about worldwide.

This new generation is the reason that the world becomes smaller everyday. People like Matthew Robson is the reason why are society is so interlinked with every other choice that we make. This is exactly why the older generation cannot, even when they try really hard to be “cool”, make sense of what the younger generation is doing.

Links to the News Articles that this Post is in Response to:

Twitter is for Old People http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article6703399.ece

Lost in the New Media Universe: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/jul/14/twitter-teenage-media-habits