ALTERNATIVES

"The disorder which from the very first I had observed in Photography-all practices and all subjects mixed up together-! was to rediscover in the photographs of the Spectator whom I was and whom I now wanted to investigate."(Roland Barthes,"Camera Lucida,pp.16).

Do you ever simply just have the same old routine happening daily and you do not bother to question or think about it? Or even something that is being laid out to us why do we just take the word for it and not look into something deeply? Are we in fact that lazy? Do we not care about who were are anymore? Why not challenge yourself to look beyond what is given to discover the better truth of what we have.

Do you ever just wake up tired of the same old thing over and over each day? The alarm rings it is 7am and your first reaction is to turn off that annoying sound that makes you jolt and reach for that snooze button. Than 10 minutes pass by, that without a doubt feel only as 10 seconds instead, the alarm rings yet for a second time. Again the same annoying and frustrating sound rings again but for third time's a charm you finally decide to get up only now the time is 7:25 am. Since 25 minutes go by you decide that you have to move a bit faster than you intended. Well I think that each teenager/ young adult can relate to the same feeling each morning. As I wake up I always sit quietly in my hallway to see who is home. As usual I hear the security system chiming “Garage door” and I know it is my mom backing in her car into the garage after a long night of working. Immediately I hear her go to the bathroom to wash her hands and than come up the stairs into my room asking me what I want to eat. Half hour later everyone is rushing upstairs to their rooms and bathroom to wash and change because soon they will all be late. Seeing this each day I think to myself and realize that the only time we all see each other together and talk together is when we all walk around the same hallway to our rooms. Nowadays there really is no family time. No mutual conversations and laughs. The only get together is us each morning being like busy bees buzzing around the same area. The loft has now became the new family room.

As I previously mentioned about school being brainwashed into our minds that it is our future and our saviors, but is that fully truthful? Growing up I was a victim of being brainwashed into believing that school is the most important and my future. But as I have grown and matured I have has a few experiences that will contradict the fact that school is the future. To solidify my argument my older sister Jessica is a prime example that a college degree isn't always the key to success. Ever since Jessica was in junior high she already knew that she loved to work with kids, therefore she already had a career in mind. She knew she wanted to become a elementary school teacher. While in high school Jessica like all juniors had to take the anual ACT test. Despite her being very intelligent with honors and AP classes maintaining a 4.0 GPA she found her ACT to be reather low (17). Immediately she became devastated because she knew in order to get into the education program in college she had to receive at least a 22. So she would not give up retaking the ACT test multiple times but to no avail. Despite not being able to enter the education program she still graduated St. Xavier with a Bachelor's degree. But with that degree came over 50,000 in student debt. To years later she ended up opening her own daycare which now is doing very well and getting very crowded. And she has found out that all her hard work tears and frustration were not necessary because her degree is not even being used it is simply just sitting there and showing off. We were always taught that a degree means a job and money. Is this true? Because if Jessica was to finish her education program she would have doubled her debt while landing a very low paying teaching job or maybe not even a job at all since getting hired as a teacher these days is not an easy process. Understanding not everyone can own their own business but America is all about being an entrepreneur trying to grow to your fullest potential but sadly that message is blocked by degrees, standardized testing and most importantly by loaners that love to make money off student debt.

Growing up in a specific household or ethnic group we all have own religious beliefs and traditions. We all go to a certain area that we show and profess our faith and belief. Being the son of Polish traditional parents religion comes first no matter what. Since the time we are taught to speak we are taught to pray. Growing up I was talk how to pray and memorize prayers since I was able to speak. But sadly I was never taught what the prayer means or even what a few words stand for. Tradition was laid out and was never questioned. Being raised a Catholic I received all traditional rituals starting from baptism to confirmation. Also in Polish school I have been taught that God is good and that he is always there for you whenever you need him. Also I became educated on the topic of miracles that he part takes in.Personally I became very interested about the miracles he created. But I never understood that if he is always here for us, how come there is always so much negativity, hate and personal issues going on now? Is he not supposed to solve those problems and protect people from them? People struggling with depression and who they are, should he not stop it? Why are we made clear he is the purest and the problem solver when in fact we all suffer deeply somehow and not a single person can help. "Did this photograph please me? Interest me? Intrigue me? Not even. Simply, it existed (for me)."(Barthes,pp.23). By this Barthes is explaining that something exists for all of us we may not be interested, we do not know if we are interested, we do not question it because we become accustomed to it just like the religions we practice.