Best Friend/Good Friend

Things can be too good to be true. It can represent a value or necessity that holds more than just a monetary value. I met my best friend when I was in elementary school, which changed the course of my life. I hardly knew him at first, but over time we got along better and became closer friends. He lived in San Diego, very south of my home city and this made communication and other things difficult. We played games together, often at the time we played Fortnite and Overwatch, but typically when I hung out at his house occasionally, we would mess around. During the summer, we would also go to the beach, travel, and hang out more, all of this of course by our parents that had arranged these events. Sometimes I do think about whether or not I hadn’t met my best friend, what would happen or what would I really do.

Picture courtesy of my mom

STEM with Friends

During elementary school and middle school, I got involved a lot in the STEM program specifically with my friend Ian. He mentioned something about going to Legoland, and I immediately replied with a yes, not knowing too much about how the program was run and what other prerequisites were needed. Luckily, my friend was just asking new people who had never gotten involved to participate in a program called First Lego League, or FLL for short. It revolved around using Lego Mindstorms to program and build a lego robot that could complete certain objectives, all of which needed collaboration and working together as a team. Teamwork and cooperation provided very necessary to complete our objective and hopefully make it to the qualifiers hosted at Legoland. 

Picture courtesy of Hung Nguyen Phi on Unsplash

Chores To Do

Sometimes I disliked when my sister would boss me around. Washing the dishes, cleaning the house, and folding laundry, were all simple tasks that I used to hate doing every day. But, I wasn’t fully aware of how much my family does care about what I should and can do. Like my mom making food every day for us, cutting and serving fruits, and buying snacks for us to just simply drive me every day to school. In the past, I should’ve been more thankful for how much my siblings and parents cared for me, rather than thinking they were just forcing me to do things and bossing me around the house, possibly because I am the youngest sibling. Normally she would say.

“Wash the dishes I did them already.” Or 

“Clean the floor I already mopped it.” 

I realized not everything comes for free, and it’s always at a cost which was what my dad usually said. Then I started to get used to helping out with choices around the house, not simply just pushing the fact away that I didn’t contribute to anything. It would be better if I began to notice that before, where I needed to show my own contribution and where everyone else reflected the same ideas.

Picture courtesy of Simon Kadula on Pixabay

Martial Arts is Not My Type of Art

I never felt happy doing martial arts. The involvement and the overall activity were never my preference. I wasn’t that strong or motivated to even continue martial arts. Mentally, it wasn’t the best for me. Every day I went to the martial arts place always upset and angry. It got pretty far to the point where I was called out a lot because of my attitude. I presented a negative vibe, like a big stormy cloud in the summer. I knew martial arts wasn’t right for me, but I still had to go every day. 

“I don’t see you giving your best effort”. My trainer kept on telling me every day. 

I reached a point of insensibility, less commitment, and less care about one of the many activities I did after school. I questioned the importance of the activity, and much persuading let me escape what I thought was “prison” after school. Fortunately, I got much more involved in tennis and enjoyed playing tennis, but what if quitting martial arts never happened? I never gave too much thought to that.

Picture courtesy of Steve Buissinne on Pixabay 

The Guest Room

There was once an empty room in our house I called the “storage room”. But now we use it differently. Many renovations and cleaning out transformed the once-storage room into a guest room. I never understood why having another room was important when I was younger. Normally my parents told me not to worry about it, not to give any concern about an extra room. But, whenever friends or family came over they were easily surprised by the abrupt appearance of an additional room. It never bothered me later, but I noticed how all of our board games were allocated in that room, on the highest shelf. The little white parallel shelves stacked against the wall contrasted the beige color which I never found suited the aesthetic of the room well. When I didn’t want to bother my dad, I hardly touched those board games, but once in a while, the room gave off the vibe of another person in the house, despite being a family of four. Maybe it did bother me after all. 

Picture courtesy of JamesDeMers on Pixabay