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My life has been altered by many experiences. Things that have happened to me and things I have done. I really don't know which of these is the most important or influential. I think on a personal basis, though, events that are out of my control may be more powerful, but is the experiences I put myself into that really strengthen me as a person and give me a story to tell. A particular experience comes to mind when I think of something I have chosen for myself. It was this past summer when I went with a small group from my church on a mission trip to help out the Steinway Reformed Church in Queens. I can't really say why I chose to go on this trip, I had never done a mission before, but it was undoubtably one of the most rewarding weeks of my life. The trip truly opened my eyes and completely changed my perspective. When my mother mentioned the trip to me I was midly interested. I've never been really active in my church, but I do enjoy community service and being able to help out others in need. I decided to join in because I had always wanted to go on one of the yearly trips the church does to Hondurous, but it was very far and expensive and also I confess I am a huge coward when it6 comes to getting shots. I had told myself though that if there was a mission trip this year I was going to do it, shots or no. It was my last year at home and soon I might not have the chance again. So when the trip was Queens instead of Hondorus I jumped at the opportunity. It was perfect a week with some other kids from my church, helping out, a great experience. The other bonus was that it was close enough that my parents let me go by myself and I wanted the full experience. I wanted to be on my own without being able to rely on my parents. And yes I'll admit some of my enthusiasm came from the idea of spending a whole week with my good friend Jenny who I went through Sunday school, church choir, and confirmation with, but hadn't seen in a few years now. So I told Don, the mission leader, "Yes, absolutely yes count me in!" As it turned out Jenny already had plans to go to Australia for the summer. It was alright though I still wanted to go, by now I was way to excited for the trip to be put down by this and my mom came up with the idea of inviting a new friend of mine along, Adrianne. From some conversations I'd had with her I knew she was absolutely free and it sounded like her family was fairly into church. Even though shes two years younger than me we haven't known each other very long we have a lot in common. I asked her if she would like to go and she assured me she would. So it was all set. We went to the prep meetings and learning basically what we were going to be doing; scraping and painting a fence, painging the inside of the church, holding a rummage sale for the huge amount of donated items the church had collected over the years, redoing the floor in the social hall, and taming their jungle of a garden. It sounded like a lot a work, but I've always liked doing stuff with my hands. It was going to be an adventure. The day our group left the church I met Julie for the first time. She's a year younger than me and she seemed nice, but quiet. Julie rode in our car down to Queens. She didn't say much, we watched a movie and there wasn't much talking. The first thing we did when we go the city was go see the Steinway church. It looked pretty good from the outside, a lot better than we were expectinf, of course the one thing I did notice was that that fence was HUGE. The inside was definately worse once we saw all the junk piled up. The painting was old and pealing and the

and it didn't matter that I had no iea what I was doing or howlittle I had to offer. It didn't matter that other people were more helpfulor more nessesary than me. Because to them I was just another pair of hands and to people who need as much help as they can get: That's priceless. And when we would be done with a days work: I would just feel so good. No one had to thank me I just got this awesome sense of pride that I had worked as hard as I could and put everything I had into that days work. Of course people did thank me: everyday it was unbelievable how the community turned out and just showered us with gratitude for our work. They paid our kindness back tenfold and people stopped by just for an hour or two to do their part and help us out. Just the fact that we had stepped in seemed to inspire everyone to join in. I've never experienced such community and cooperation before. It really changes how you look at things, seeing these people whose problems are so much worse than mine still smile and pick up a paintbrush next to you. Some just stopped by to watch and tell us how blessed they felt. It really made me put my own life in perspective and think how silly and insignificant my own little problems are. I think that was the best part for me. Not the gratitude, the new friends, or even the pride. It was seeing the world through new eyes. The eyes of someone who can find beauty when my sight would only see gray sadness, someone who thanks the sun for shining, and mostly someone who truly believes that our arrival was a blessing from God. I came home with so much happiness in everything around me and so much respect for those who keep going no matter how little they have.

all the different people coexisting like that working towards the same goal.

My first name is Briana. It is spelled B-R-I-A-N-A. Everyone likes to spell it Brianna, Brienna, Breanna, or various other strange combinations of letters that shouldn’t spell out how it sounds, but in the obscure minds of some people must somehow add up to my name. I don’t know why people like to spell it every other way imaginable even AFTER I tell them the correct spelling they proceed to be totally oblivious and spell it wrong ANYWAY. AHHHH!!! My middle name is Grace. People can usually spell this one, but most people don’t know it. Everyone asks why I don’t usually tell people my middle name and I usually give a variety of answers, but I don’t know the real reason. I think it probably has something to do with the inheritance of the name. Grace was my great grandmother’s name. She died four weeks before I was born. It’s a little sad if you think about it; being named after someone who has passed on. I never even knew her, so I can’t miss her, I don’t think I can love her, and yet we are indisputably tied through the passage of her name onto me. My last name is Bixler and herein is my history. Or well not //my// history specifically, but the history of my family, my ancestors. My one link to the past is that resides in every signature and appears on every homework or test to identify it as mine; belonging to the Briana who is of my family. My heritage is mostly German and English; German on my father’s side, English on my mother’s. For a very long time we didn’t even know my heritage until my mom had a mid life crisis and went on a huge genealogy kick and well, there you go: BAM we’re English. On my Dad’s side I am German. That we’ve always known because most of our heritage has been passed down through food. My grandmother makes many a strange concoction from “secret family recipes” that we must all gather and enjoy on ~insert random holiday at which time family congregating takes place~. So now that I have thoroughly explained the identification at the top of this page I suppose I should get to the purpose of the assignment. Mr. C asked us to describe how we see ourselves, how others see us, and the difference between the two. I guess I see myself in many ways. I see myself as someone with several layers. I don’t always like to show my true self to people, in fact most of the time qualities people associate with me are part of the façade. I know that I am someone who is moderately skilled in many things and I see myself as someone who doesn’t try to stand out. I am not really shy, it’s more that I like to place myself in the background and see how the show plays out. Something many people aren’t aware of is that I am a very firm believer of tradition. Of everyone in my household, the things we do each year (like decorating for Christmas tree) are the most important to me and it’s usually up to me to make sure they happen. On the other hand I also understand the need for progress and change so these are two things I have to balance within myself. I think this probably makes it confusing for others around me not knowing which side I will choose in an issue. So now, about 600 words into my essay I guess I should return to the topic at hand: my pictures!!! Yey!!!! Ewwww. I’m rather annoyed because I don’t think these pictures show my skill and ability in this class because one: I didn’t take them because they had to be self-portraits and two: I don’t usually print this big and it’s hard to print good picture when your negatives aren’t very focused or interesting to begin with. Granted another factor is that I have never printed anything this big before and I AM eternally grateful to Chloe for sparing me the “Mom no! Take it like this! And is the light meter right? What do you mean ‘What’s a light meter!?!’ Haven’t you ever used a 35mm camera before!?” Alright bad Briana! Stop ranting! Okay disclaimer over now to describe the pictures: My first picture of me in my car reading a book. This is more how my friends see me than anything else. I am one of the few of our group who actually has her own car so I am depended on for rides and such and I also just like driving around blasting music. All my friends know that I am an avid reader of books and I am always receiving comments like “Bri you’re reading again?! Go watch some TV! Geez.” Other interesting things about this picture are my necklace, showing that I am very musical and the cross hanging from the rearview mirror. This represents my religion and how my family is very involved in our church. My second picture is more about how I see myself. When I’m alone at least I am a very peaceful person. I like to sit and read by myself. The book I’m reading is one of my favorites. It’s a book of poems by my favorite poet, Emily Dickinson. Other aspects of this picture are my necklace again, my bracelets, and the bag on the table next to me. One of the bracelets and the rock in the bag were given to me by Chloe and they represent my friends and how important friendship is to me. The other bracelet is actually made of paper clips from voice lessons. Every time we’re about to have a recital our teacher has all the students present our songs for each other and we receive a paper clip for everything we do right in our performance. I always make them into bracelets our necklaces and sometimes I even wear them on performance day for good luck. The outfit I wore in both of these pictures is just some of my favorite comfortable clothes in my usual style, nothing too fancy, and my favorite colors to wear, black and white. My self portraits represent who I am, a mixture of how other’s see me and how I see myself.

Art:

The first quote speaks of verbal and emotional terrorism along with the truth of and some of the reasons for a bully’s actions. It relates to possible insecurities and issues within those who act harmfully in our class as well as rightfully condemning all of us who sat by and did nothing. The second speaks of never sticking up for anyone else because you weren’t faced with the same problem and it describes the eventual fate of all who take this path: to end up alone without a friend in the world because you let all of them be beaten down by problems that weren’t your own. The third quote tells us truth in that those who appear tough and cruel have no strength at all and that only those who are truly strong would possess gentleness and help another in need. Perhaps none of us but Ms. Driller has this true strength and she rightfully criticizes us for our lack of it. Those who are strong do not need to draw strength from others they consider weak. The truly strong need only stand up for what they know is right and stand against what they know is wrong and they have all the power and recognition they need. I suppose the last quote speaks of the quality of work coming from the students this week and how it will only be poor because we fail to put in the effort and do not choose wise alternatives. As to my response to these quotes and the actions and consequences of what I have seen in class I feel I must state this:

Never have I been much of an activist or someone who stands up against bullies. I suppose this is a flaw I now see within myself. It is just as bad, as the quotes say, to stand by and watch as someone else is bullied. I apologize heavily for my peers and even though I have little control over their actions I do control my own lack of response. We are in the end, one class, one group, and one being and only hurt our selves morally and emotionally by hurting others. A vast evil exists in this never ending chain of events from which all bullying and emotional tormenting comes. Should I be able to ever do anything worthwhile with my life I hope I can act in a way to lessen and with any luck resolve some of the conflict and the pain that exists within our society’s cycle. It does after all work both ways. Though the large portion of input is, on the whole, most assuredly negative and demeaning, positive action can be taken. I would hope in the future that my own moral standing would not allow me to sit and watch such actions pass before my eyes. It is of course easy to say what one will do and infinitely harder to do it. I know I cannot judge by what I have done in the past, but I trust that this reminder of savage human cruelty and the effect it has on the innocent will stir me to act for the good of the cycle instead of against it. I know I am, as all of us are whether we admit it or not, lacking a great deal from moral or emotional perfection. I have said how I take this example and how I hope to grow and change from it, for sitting by changes nothing. I do not know how the rest of my peers will interpret this assignment or if they will learn anything from it. I sincerely hope that they will see its truth and it will deliver clarity to the extent of their wrong-doings, but I shall not blame them if they do not. We are all what we are and can only learn what our minds and our reactions allow us to take from situations. Most of our morals are already established at this point and I do not believe they will be altered greatly by this incidence. For the sake of all of us I hope I am dead wrong. After all how low has society sunk that someone can speak thusly to //anyone//, let alone a teacher of a subject based solely on expressing the inner beauty of ourselves?! How far have we gone that the rest of us would stand by and ignore these monstrous actions or, worse still, encourage them?! I ask of all my peers only what I ask of myself: think of who you are and ask your own heart if, in all honesty, the abuse of a life, //any// life no matter how small or unrelated to your own it may be, is acceptable. When I ask myself this I scorn my own actions and grieve for anyone who I have ever spoken harsh words to or make hateful comments about. I cannot do anything about the past but learn from it and make certain that I //will// be a better person. Will you?