Bad Haircuts Along the Oregon Coastal Range

I know this blog is being posted literally an hour after "Cans of Tuna Versus Learning Trees", but I assure you all that both of these posts are summaries of a busy months worth of thinking...


Anyone in Oregon who has driven to the beach before knows that stretch of highway where the forest has been chopped down in particular patches. However, if you have not been out that way for a couple of months you may not be aware of the intense transformation that area has undergone. Now, when you drive out that way, there are practically no trees alongside the road and the hills have these terrible bald patches. These bald patches looked as though they were formed by a very angry someone who reached right down to pull a fistful of trees out of the ground. The entire forest has been hacked away in patches to the extent that it is unbearable to look at it. 

My lovely trip to the back two weekends ago could not have been less lovely. The scene that was laid before my eyes through the car window was completely horrifying. I was horror- struck by the vast area of forest absent from the side of the road and from atop the many hills along the coastal range! It was shocking to me that such an immense amount of deforestation could have taken in place in only a few short months! I couldn't understand how so much forest could just disappear- I mean, where did it go?

The answer is probably my own city, Beaverton.

Well, probably not just Beaverton, but all of the suburbs surrounding Portland. All of these suburbs are growing more quickly than there are space and resources. Not to mention, the structures being built in suburbs are made from wood; this wood comes from those forests on the coastal range. The evidence of this stands close to my home. There is this lot of new homes near me that sits upon the bed of a forgotten forest. These homes, I suspect, were made from the lives of those who were toppled along the Oregon Coastal Range.  

We must end deforestation and stop the growth of suburbs. We do not need more wooden homes, we need to build up towards the sky, not out across the land. 

Cans of Tuna Versus Learning Trees

In "Signing a Paper is All it Takes Not to Drop Out", I said that in order for there to be a point in going to school, curriculum had to serve a purposeful purpose. Curriculum nowadays does not allude to any use outside of school. Shouldn't what we are learning be something we can apply and use in everyday life? Why are names and dates so important? Why do we need to know the quadratic formula? And why do we need to know what the significance of an orange is in a poem?

Teachers rarely know the answers to questions such as these because they don't even know why we need to know all those things. Yes, maybe finding what role an orange plays in a poem helps build up critical thinking skills, but analyzing poems for weeks at a time destroys any potential poetry loving by students and leads to an extreme hatred towards going to school. Aren't there other ways to build critical thinking skills without these horrendous consequences? Are there more applicable methods of instilling critical thinking skills in students?

A curriculum that provides applicable information to students would be one that gave answers to all my previous questions. One where math classes taught you how to use the quadratic formula in everyday life. One that did not analyze poetry but allowed you to enjoy poetry. One that made you ponder what is truly most important in life and gave you the right frame of mind to solve real world problems. 

The same type of classes would be available but there would be an emphasis on concepts and no information would be given without reason or use. Students would no longer be cans waiting to be filled with tuna, instead, they would be their own individual trees, learning and growing through applicable knowledge...

Painting Happy

For the past two weeks, I have been constantly happy. I can't even begin to recall the last time I felt so at peace; I just know it was a long time ago. I do not know exactly why this has happened and I do not wish to overthink the possible reasons. Still, I know part of it is due to painting. 

I have spent over twenty- four hours in these two weeks just painting. These hours have been spent on an old forgotten canvas at home as well as on pieces of a set for Portland Community College Sylvania's theatre production, Hairspray. It is without much ado that I can say I have fallen in love with painting. 

I was once told by my former therapist that doing art matches exercise's ability to improve the health of your mind. It wasn't until now that I know with certainty that it is true. Nevertheless, why is this so? In my own opinion which was not formed through any research on the psychology of it, I think it has to do with the matter of becoming extremely focused on one project as well as with performing an activity that allows your creativity to stream out, unrestricted.

It was in a documentary that I once watched called "Happy" that I learned about this thing called "flow". Flow is what a person experiences when they become completely focused in performing a task, or activity of some sort. People who can experience more flow in their day are seen to be more satisfied in life than others who do not experience an adequate amount of flow per day. I do not know what is a good amount of flow, but I suspect it varies amongst people. In these past two weeks, I have spent a good deal of time immersed in painting. Moreover, there is that great feeling of satisfaction you feel once you complete a project that has taken you hours.

When you paint, you are in charge of what goes onto that wall, or that canvas, or whatever other medium you choose to paint on. You can see what is going onto that surface as you apply more strokes of the brush, or roller. You can see all the colors and textures you are creating with your own two hands. It is easy for you to manipulate the paint on the surface, and to quickly fix something that is to your distaste. There is also that freedom you have to get paint all over yourself! While painting, you are free to do anything you wish and that can give you a happiness that lasts forever.