It’s amazing how a nice spring afternoon and a relaxing evening can make your mind wander. A walk around the place you grew up at can invoke a great deal of thought. I never realized this until the other day. Life goes by very fast, especially childhood. Pretty soon I’ll be heading off to college and I find myself wondering, where did all the time go? As the sky turned orange and the day came to an end, nostalgia sank into every thought I had.
Peering over to my neighbor’s old house, distant memories flooded my brain. He was older than me by about three years, but I didn’t care, he was a great friend. Growing up he was the only neighbor I had, and I looked up to him. We played outside, stayed up late, and enjoyed video games, things you would expect from two boys growing up. Soon though, I found our age difference had caught up with us. By now it’s hitting me like it was yesterday.
He entered high school and I suddenly became disposable. A girlfriend, grades and whatever else you did in high school changed his priorities. Before I knew it, he was gone. I wasn’t even in middle school yet and I suddenly didn’t have one of my best friends. Sure we stay in touch now, but things are just not the same. The great memories are still there of course, but I don’t think a game of tag will happen anytime soon.
I found myself dealing with this my entire childhood. When you’re a kid you live in the moment, but when you grow up, things change a little bit. A night of hanging out with your cousins, becomes a night trying to complete another research paper. A day at the pool turns into a day of arguing with your significant other. Like my neighbor, your priorities change. And if you’re anything like me, you’ll find yourself missing all the things you took for granted.
Adults preach all the time that you should enjoy being a kid while you can, because it goes by fast. Although I am by no means old, I still wish I could go back to those cool summer nights and be a kid again. Simple thoughts, simple needs and simple pleasures. So to the kids out there that who want to be older, it’s not half as fun as it seems.
Every day I live in the world of Larry Jackson. For those who don’t know him he may very well be the loudest, most critical person in all of Lancaster county.
I’ve had my share of experiences to prove it, anywhere from baseball to golf to swimming, and in almost every single one of the sports I’ve played, there’s my dad, Larry, screaming about something, almost all of which is directed at me.
“That’s my boy!” My dad hollers to the crowd when I mess up.
In more private times he often chides, “I love you like the kid I meant to bring home from the hospital.”
The worst thing is that people actually encourage this madness. No matter how frustrated I get he just keeps yappin’ away at every opportunity, and everyone except me enjoys it, giving him small incentives such as the classic, “You’re so funny Mr. Jackson,” or, “Joey hates it when you make fun of him.” And these things actually encourage him to make fun of me even more.
Larry Jackson, left, and high school best friend Alan Krashesky. Photo by Connie Jackson
This behavior is not limited to the playing field however. Everytime a person comes to my house for even five minutes my dad manages to slip a satirical critique about me and my athletic abilities, or, in his eyes, lack there of. It is never anything too demoralizing, but it’s never a good feeling to be called out in front of your friends.
Although the critique usually only comes out in front of others, even when no one is watching Larry, he is still just not a normal dad.
His most famous hobby is singing. It doesn’t matter what song or who’s listening, he likes to show off his vocal ability, which I must admit, isn’t bad. The most famous songs among his playlist would probably be “You Should be Dancing” by the Bee Gees and “Bootylicious” by Destiny’s Child, but he adds his own adjustments to the lyrics, substituting in the names of the people around him into the lines, “____, can you handle this? ____, can you handle this? ____, can you handle this? I don’t think you can handle this,” meanwhile shaking his 50 year-old butt. These self-serenades come at the most inopportune times, sometimes waking me up in the early hours of the morning.
It is not unusual for our neighbors to be upset about this, and to actually come over to our house to politely tell my dad to, well, “shut up.” Unfortunately for them, and us, he rarely complies.
Another peculiar trait of my dad Larry, is that he could compete with Ken Jennings in trivia. Somewhere in Milton Hershey school or St. Joseph’s University they must teach a class of random facts because they’re more random facts in that man’s head than anyone I’ve ever met. This trait complements his obsession with singing, allowing him to remember song lyrics to a song he heard once in 1971.
Even though I wish that he would tone these activities down just a little bit, his personality adds some interesting twists on normally boring events, and occasionally he has his genuine moments. All in all, I’d have to admit, I’d rather have my abnormal dad over a quiet and boring one any day.
There are so many great things about college athletics…the competitiveness, the passion, the school pride, but one thing I’m not too sure about is the school mascots.
I know it brings out the school pride and gives the students something to rally around, but is it really necessary to pay some college kid money to dress up in a ridiculous costume for every sports event and do things they would never do if they didn’t have the costume on to cover their face?
Don’t get me wrong I’m all for the different school names, I think it really gives the students a sense of pride. Plus being able to say “I’m a Tiger, or Gator, or Panther” or whatever, is something people hold onto their whole lives. But schools are getting so desperate that they have to have an Orangeman, like Syracuse, or a Blue Hen at Delaware as a mascot.
Don’t even get me started with pro mascots. Really, who even knows about those mascots? The only one I can think of off the top of my head is the Phillie Phanatic. I think the marketing groups of the teams think that having some guy in a ridiculous suit running around the stadium will boost sales. Not so, it’s just embarrassing and it scares little kids.
Here’s a look at the five most ridiculous, un-intimidating mascots from major college sports:
Photo from divinecaroline.com
5) Maryland Terrapin: A Turtle really? “Yea we are going to beat you guys on the field, just wait a second to let us catch up, we’re a little slow.” A turtle is really making their opponents feel intimidated.
4) Alabama Crimson Tide: Their mascot is an elephant! What does that have to do with anything? Pretty sure their are no elephants down south in Alabama. I also don’t understand how a elephant fits into their name Crimson Tide.
3) Syracuse Orange: If a little Orange Man was running around my home court I would be a embarrassed. This falls under both the ridiculous, and not intimidating category. The picture really speaks for itself.
The Stanford Tree Photo by gostanford.com
2) TCU Horned Frog: A frog, what an intimidating mascot. With it’s big googly eyes, and little horns it’s more ridiculous than intimidating. It’s too bad their stifling defense is represented by a frog.
1) Stanford Cardinal Tree: A tree? That’s the best they could come up with? I expected more from one of the most prestigious academic schools in the nation. Come on, Andrew Luck didn’t come to school to have a tree as his cheering section.
Working in fast food can be an interesting experience for all involved, but the only way to get the full effect is to experience it hands on.
For many Penn Manor students, working in the fast food field is almost second nature. And we’ve got the first hand scoop on it all.
Many people think that you only find “crazy” customers during the late night hours, and many do come out during those times, however some strange customers come out at all hours of the day.
One night while working drive-thru a man came up to the window, and while I was reaching to hand him his food, he threw all of his money into the air and said “I make it rain.” I just stood there wondering if he honestly just said that and asked him if he was okay. And the funny thing is he came back later that night to order more food, and paid in complete change. I looked at him and asked “Oh, it’s not raining anymore?” -Kayla Pagan
Lyta Ringo (left) and Kayla Pagan (right)
One afternoon while working the counter, a middle aged lady came up and ordered a cheeseburger happy meal. After receiving her food she proceeded to sit down. A few moments later the lady returned, and threw her sandwich at the cashier screaming that her daughter was allergic to mustard. The cashier told the woman that you can specially order the burger and that they could get her another one however the woman just kept screaming that we should have known she was allergic to mustard. -Lyta Ringo
In fast food you see it all, anything from the woman who doesn’t know what she wants, to the man who can’t speak out his order. Or even the country man, with the hook as a hand.
As we enter the West York gymnasium I see the old school style court and rims and much to my dismay I see the rock hard bench with which I’ll be sitting on for the next hour or so.
The only hardwood I’m gonna be on all night is the bench. I mean if I’m not going to play at least let me be comfortable. Once I finally got myself situated into a bearable position for the next hour, I had to slide down and found myself sitting on a screw in the wood. Awesome.
Sitting on real wood is a rarity for me. Most gyms have cushioned chairs, but Hempfield’s is the cream of the crop. It’s like putting my butt on a cloud. Penn Manor has decent chairs but they’re just not the same quality as Hempfield’s. It isn’t strange that I’m such a connoisseur of chairs/benches since I’ve been spending the whole season on them. The bench isn’t going to warm itself.
David Mohimani
The worst part about sitting on the bench besides the embarrassment is when my 6’6 coach decides to stand in front of me. So for the rest of the game I had to crane my neck to either side just to see. Come on coach, at least let me watch the game. Seriously, I basically just feel like a cheerleader without pom poms.
About five minutes into the game I know if I’m gonna play or not. If we’re blowing the team out then I’ll get in, but if it’s 10 points or so, then I can expect to glue my rear to the chair.
People ask do you feel like you’re wasting my time?
Yes I do, I answer, every night from 6-9.
So why do I play? I’m not sure. I guess because I love it, I guess because I don’t want to quit the sport I’ve been playing since I was a toddler. I think the main reason is because I still hold a glimmer of hope that it will eventually pay off and I’ll get off the pine.
Parents: Are you ready to see your life flash right before your eyes? Well, get ready to because your teenager is driving…
After getting my permit, my parents would not let me drive. Yes, I was 16, plus two months, but no, they were not ready for the terror of having me drive.
The first day I was “allowed” to drive, my parents made sure that I was educated on how the car works, how to work the turn signals, turn the car on, work the windshield wipers, etc. Yeah, yeah. I already knew all of that and at that time, I thought that I was ready to drive, get out on the road, but it turned out I knew less than what I thought.
When we left my house in our silver Sequoia, my family was clutching on their armrests like they were trying to get to the last life boat on the Titanic. With my mom sitting next to me, my step-dad and two sisters sitting in the back, I heard criticism coming from everywhere how I was or should be driving.
With no radio to help drown out the sounds of their negative voices, I was forced to hear the bickering about my hard braking or my speeding problem, that still hasn’t been cured. But anyways.
I may have had my license for almost 2 years, but I still am learning.
When my parents had enough of the stress through my reckless driving, they called in the big guns. The driving instructor. When I started working with him, he would tell me a few of the errors that occurred during my driving, such as my speed. But, by the way, he thought I was a good driver. He must have because he didn’t criticize every wrong move I made while driving.
When my six months were over and July 23, 2009 came around, my nerves were getting the best of me. While driving to take my test, I almost gave my mom a heart attack while I tried to beat a car to a turn, when they had the right of way. With the lady’s horn beeping at me and “b*&%$” coming out of her mouth, my mom said that she totally agreed with her.
After meeting up with my grandparents (I was using their Corolla for the test), I walked into the DMV, so nervous my hands were sweating. When my name was called and I walked out to enter the car, the reality hit me. It was time, time for me to pass my driving test, get my license and have a new responsibility in my life.
When the driving prompter finally came and got into the car, I felt confident, I was ready to go. When I went up to the parallel parking area, I was positive that I would ace it, since I was just there practicing in the Corolla the night before. I backed in and fixed my position and was told to go on. Awesome, I’m half-way to my license.
As I took off for the driving part, my heart was beating. All that was going through my head was “don’t speed, make sure you stop for three seconds at the stop signs.” I pulled into the parking lot and parked my car. Before he got out, he told me “you passed.”
I still sometimes wonder how I passed. I still have the speeding problem, I still ride people’s tails, but I have definitely grown up since that day. Yes, I still have my driving problems, such as wrecking my car, a powder-blue Toyota Prius, racing a friend and a few close calls where I almost got hit by pulling out in front of someone, and all the other times I almost got hit, but, hey, who doesn’t have some driving issues. So, it can’t be only me.
Author Kendall Seigworth hard at work. Photo by: Whitney Reno
Learning to drive
My first time behind the wheel I was a natural, but the second time around I made a fairly big mistake.
Luckily for me, my Dad had me practicing in his junky white Reliant K that exceeded my age by several decades. It was going to be euthanized in a couple months, so any damage I caused to the car couldn’t be considered catastrophic.
My Dad and I went to a vacant parking lot and cruised around, eventually we decided we wanted to drive back home. That’s when I hit a concrete parking divider. My big question was “why is there a random concrete thing in the middle of the road?” My rush of fear came before my vehement anger. It was like driving over the world’s largest speed bump and we actually flew in the air a little, like we just skated over a ramp.
When we crashed back to the ground, the hub caps came flying off, each in an opposite direction. My Dad jumped out of the passenger’s seat and began to chase after the runaway hubs. I began to look under the car, and I soon discovered the oil pan was dented. To the satisfaction of my Dad and I, it was not pierced and dripping. The car became even more fragile than it once was before, and my Dad decided he should drive it home very slowly and carefully.
Sadly, the car could not be salvaged. It was the last great adventure for my Dad’s Reliant K.
Driving with my Mom is much different than driving with my Dad. My Dad is really calm, and my Mom on the other hand just yells. She already yells at people who have years of experience, so imagine how much screaming I heard as a new driver. My Mom used every curse word in the book at me when I drove. It is still that way to this day. The funny part is, you can tell my Mother’s cursing is a fear response because she doesn’t even remember doing it once she gets out of the car. My Dad and I often have to tell her what she had said, and she ends up just laughing with us about it.
Overall, my driving has been fairly uneventful. Besides one major driving mishap and a cursing mother, it has all gone well.
“Buckle your seat-belt, check your mirrors, don’t even think about touching your phone.”
My mom always reminds me of these things before starting up the car.
“If you think you need to text someone right now, you can turn your phone off and I’d be happy to take it from you,” she adds.
Learning how to drive, I thought, was supposed to be fun. I found out otherwise.
Every single second in the car with either my mom or my dad, was a nightmare.
I think the conclusion to where wrinkles and gray hair originate from is quite obvious. It appears having to teach your kids how to drive, takes years off of your life.
Dillon Walker
Insisting that nothing I’m doing is right, yelling when I do something that scares them slightly, or just sitting there with the expression on their face that the world is going to end, or we’re all going to die.
That is what I and other teenagers all over the world have to deal with.
And then parents expect us to be able to drive?
Taking some of the pressure off by not freaking out every five seconds, then possibly we can do what you yearn for us to do so badly. Drive the car.
Thankfully, after six months of driving, my parents finally started to breathe when they were in the car with me. The only part that really stinks is that it took them the entire six months to finally get comfortable.
The greatest day of my teenage life had to have been the day I drove my car out of the driveway without one other person in the car with me.
Excitement rushing through your veins, freedom blowing in your hair, and the sweet sound of JUST your stereo. Awesome. Now this is driving.
Strength, patience, dedication and having a steady form.
These are the most important qualities to have when you shoot archery.
Long hours of practice and striving for that perfect score is the goal of every archer. Your frustration grows with every bad shot. It gets you down instantly when you have a bad end. You blame your bow or arrows, anything but yourself.
“Let’s shoot one more end,” my dad would say every time to make me think that maybe just this time we would finally be done.
“I’m tired and I’m starting to shoot badly. My arms hurt too,” I would say back.
“Shoot your best round so we can end on that note,” he would say.
This is the part when patience and strength are key.
I pull back my bow slowly, setting my mind on the gold. I look through my peep site very carefully trying to set on the center. My release is steady and ready to go off. I pull the trigger and follow through. Right when I look up, I see those pink and green veins in the center of the target, just what I was hoping for.
“There’s my best shot all night!” I yell to my dad.
The feeling of a job well done is always the way I like to conclude my hard night of practice. Ends and ends of shooting. Ten to be exact. Ten rounds of three arrows each. I strive for that top score of 300. The practices grow harder and longer, trying new equipment and new routines to perfect every shot.
The best sigh of relieve is achieved when you see all three of your arrows in the center gold. You know you have just shot your best round and feel very prepared for the next invitational or tournament.
Having my dad as my coach makes me feel great because I know I can always talk to him and he is always around. He’s an amazing coach for me and is always helping me to perfect my shot.
Where do you think I learned patience, strength and dedication?
After being wheeled into the room, medicine was injected into my IV while a mask hovered over my face to help me go under. I soon was in a deep sleep.
One day later, I woke up to bright light and a loud noise that I soon discovered was coming from outside of the room. I tried to move only to regret it instantly. My face was throbbing and my stomach was churning.
The nurse saw I was awake and got my parents.
On August 4, I had to go to Hershey Medical Center for major jaw surgery. The surgeons pushed my front jaw back while my lower jaw was moved forward so the two parts of my jaw were lined up.
As the operation progressed, the doctors were also told to add on to my chin, but I was under the anesthesia for too long. According to my doctor, the surgery wasn’t supposed to take long. Instead I was in there for 10 hours. I was born with many medical problems and this operation was supposed to fix one of them.
I was still groggy from the anesthesia when my parents rushed in. The nurse followed in and moved me so I could sit up. Unfortunately, it was a big mistake. I quickly motioned for the yellow bowl in the corner and as soon as I had it, I threw up. Dried blood and puke was piling up in the bowl as I continued to heave more into it. I was terrified because my jaw was wired shut and I couldn’t open my mouth. I felt like I was drowning! The nurse had to suction it out as I vomited to keep me from choking.
I'm back to school after my last surgery. Photo by Liz Lawrence
When I was all cleaned up, the nurse apologized to me for inclining the hospital bed since I was clearly not ready. Not soon enough, my surgeon came in to see how I was and talked to my parents. I was only half listening, but I did catch onto to the fact that I wasn’t going to be able to move my jaw, open my mouth to eat or even talk for two weeks.
I was shocked, I knew that there were going to be a lot of restrictions, but not like that. He then explained the things that I was forbidden to do for the next six weeks. I wasn’t allowed to ride my horse, run around, eat hard food like chicken and candy or do anything physically related.
It was starting to get dark by the time my parents left, I was alone in the intensive care unit for the night. The night shift nurse came in the room to help me every time I got sick, which unfortunately for me felt like it was happening every five minutes. By midnight, I was wiped out from throwing up and was out like a light.
Morning came too soon for me as my mother shook me awake at 7:00 a.m.. She told me that my surgeon had come in and told the assistant nurses to start hooking me up so I could be moved into a private room. I was excited, but there was one problem. The nurses had to change the sheets before taking me to a different room and because of that I would have to stand. My mom came over to help me up and I slowly stood on my shaky legs. However as soon as my feet touched the cold floor I collapsed. My mom and the nurses had to quickly pick me up and place me in a chair. After the bed was clean, the nurses carefully settled me in.
Even being in a new room didn’t take away the aching pain that was residing throughout my left side to the right side of my jaw. It went down my neck and stayed in my stomach. At the time I didn’t think that the pain would ever go away.
Sadly though, my sickness grew worse as the day went on. It was around 3:00 p.m. when the new nurse walked in. She was holding a syringe with fluids in it. She explained that since I could not eat, I had to have some fluids in order to leave the hospital, so they would have to ease the syringe into my mouth in order to feed me. When she first did it, I choked it back up. They did it to me several more times and each time I kept throwing up, only adding to my misery.
However the worst was yet to come. Around nine o’clock the nurse on the night shift came in to take my vitals. It was then she discovered I had a fever of about a hundred and one. While my head was hot, the rest of my body was chilled. Apparently, when I had been throwing up the blood, some of it had gone into my lungs and I now had pneumonia. So, in addition to the feedings with syringes every couple of hours, I had to have breathing treatments and even more medicine in my IV.
The nurse was concerned about my breathing so at three in the morning, an x-ray team quietly came into my room and propped me up so I was sitting. They moved this huge machine in the room and took pictures of my lungs forcing me to sit through all of their prodding.
The next day, my surgeon announced that the bandages around my jaw can come off. And when they did, I felt so relieved. Still, I had to ice my jaw all day since it was so swollen.
It was also the day I was allowed to have visitors. Besides my parents, my grandmother and my aunt came to visit me. They told me how proud they were of me. Due to the fact I couldn’t talk, I had to write notes in my notebook, and I wrote to them that it really wasn’t a big deal.
The rest of the day went as smooth as it could. As soon as morning came I already had my breathing treatments and iced my jaw when my surgeon came in to announce the great news; I was finally able to go home. The next few hours were just about me getting ready to go home.
On the way home, all I felt was nausea and a splitting headache. When my mom and I arrived at home, I flopped on my bed and slept for several hours straight. The next two weeks I spent icing my jaw and drinking fluids. It was only several days before the first day of school when my dentist took out the splint that wired my jaw shut. I was happy because I could finally talk after those long two weeks.
However, even when I was in school, the pain in my jaw only increased. The stress of homework, tests, and other things played an important role. As I got swamped with responsibilities, the numbing pain amplified. It became so bad that I missed a week of school due to the stress upon me. Now, I have to juggle my responsibilities as I prepare for my upcoming surgery this winter.
Sitting on real wood is
