CTRL-C: People are such hypocrites!!!

CTRL-V: Sometimes I wonder if people really are smarter than animals; after all, we have the ability to reason... YEAH RIGHT! For all those who know me, know how much I hate politics, and anything that surrounds and relates to it. However, I cannot escape it, as it affects the way I live my life in ways I can't even imagine. So this will be a rare, quick post, about the President of the United States of America, and his future speech about Education in America on September 8th.

As a former teacher, who taught in the public system for four (4) years, I feel outraged by what the American public is saying about a speech they haven't even heard yet. It's amazing how they talk about something they don't even know; quite frankly it's unbelievable... But then again, why not? In the history of the United States there have always been people who really "know" what's going on, and others that just follow those that "know." (I quoted KNOW to emphasize that most of the knowledge these people have is affected by their own believes, biases, agendas, cultural background, life experiences, and many other factors that can mold their knowledge into something far from the reality of it)

Those that "know" are usually the leaders, the politics, the activists; the ones who tell others what to believe in, and what to think. The ones that follow just want to believe in something that will ultimately benefit them in the short or long run. They don't care how it can affect the nation as a whole, as long as they are getting theirs. To tell you the truth, that doesn't even phase me, because deep down I know, that no matter who is leading this country, things will never change. You will always have people who are going to go against everything the leader of this country says and does; making others, who may not even understand why they are against it, join them in rallies and make outrageous things to change the mind of the public.

However, what really does hit home for me is when they decide to put the lives of young children in jeopardy, just so that they can prove that they have a voice. September 8th, has been marked as a day for all school classroom to turn on their TV sets and tune into Obama's speech for Education. His reason for doing it: He wants to motivate kids to stay in school and to perform well, because education is the foundation in which we can build a better country. Now, what's wrong with that? Isn't that valiant of Obama? To tell children what parents have not have the valor to do in the past 8 to 10 years, because they want their children to be realistic and understand that an Education might not necessarily give them a "good" life. And by "good" life, I mean a comfortable life, one where money is not an issue, and where the American dream is more like an American reality. So, what do some parents do, they listen to what politics, who think they "know," are saying about a speech that hasn't been heard yet. The opposing politics are already scrutinizing Obama's speech, saying that he is just going to use this opportunity to brain-wash children all accross the United States, and are putting forth efforts to have schools boycott the speech. Not only that, but they are also talking about how Obama wants to be idolized, and how instead of kids being educated, they will be indoctrinated if we follow Obama's education plans.

I ask myself, how in the world do they know this? And even if they can prove to me how they know this, why would they even consider the fact that Obama is trying to brain-wash our children? And with what? With the following message: "Stay in school... Oooooo... you are being brain-washed... Stay in school... Oooooooo... Perform well... Ooooooo..." Yeah, that's some deep brain-washing right there! How stupid can people be? We live in a society that idolizes Hollywood stars who live broken lifes, professional athletes who are above the law and get away with almost anything, and Politics who have nothing better to do but to steal the tax-payers money to build their own wealth and of those who paid their way up to their position; and yet, telling kids to have Obama as a role model it's a sin? A Caucasian/African-American man, who has a loving, united family, who made his way up the ranks like any other hard-working man, whose only aspirations is to see a better US of A for his children, and who has taken the responsibility upon himself of trying to reestablish the faith of millions in what once was a powerful, integral, and very wealthy nation; that's definitely not the role model I would want my children to have... oh no, I rather my little girl follows the Nicole Richie's and Paris Hilton's of this world so they can be living the life... and my little boy should follow in the footsteps of Chris Brown or OJ Simpson, and learn how to make it big... oh yeah, and beat women senseless!

So, yeah, hooray for those guys, and boooooo to Obama... Let's teach our kids how to become a rich, lonely, broken man; or a woman with no aspirations, no goals in life (ther than to make it to all the hot parties), and unhappy; rather than a hard-working, educated, family man or woman!

For those who don't want their children to be indoctrinated, maybe you should stop letting your children watch Dora, or Blues Clues, when they are infants, all reality (acted) shows when they are teens, and take their Internet access and computers off so they can keep up with the lives of all the stars, and maybe even make them eat on the family table for a change. What do you say America? You think you can do that?

Why are people such hypocrites? 'Cause they don't "know" any better; their foundation is based on a broken Educational system, and a life style that has forgotten the true value of a family, and where parents give their children too much power of decision, and end up crippling them for life. So, I say, America, give Obama's educational plan a chance, it might not be the best, but I definitely don't think it could be any worst than the "No Child Left Behind" bs that was enforced for TOO many years in our school systems.

Let me end this long note (Notice I said it was suppose to be a quick one) by saying the following:

"Give a kid a dollar, and s/he will spend it in less than a minute; come back to ask you for more, and will do the craziest things to keep getting it... Give a kid an education, and s/he'll learn the value of life, the true value of money, and carry him/her throughout his/her life (more than you can say about that darn dollar)"

CTRL-C: I'm here, I'm here... :S

CTRL-V: ...OK, so I promised myself I was going to blog, but somehow got caught up in my everyday routine and totally used my time up in other important things (some not so important, but you get the point)... However, I might be setting my bar too high in regards to the quality of the post I write in this blog, and hence have not posted any of the 5 other post I have begun and not posted (Someday I will post them... I promise!)

Overall, I just wanted to write a few lines to let everybody know that I'm still here, and that I will try my best to not only write more post, but to actually POST them, lol...

Just for giggles, I wanted to post a question that has been bothering me for quite some time. It's actually a very popular saying in my country and I'm going to try to translate it... Here is the question with the translated saying:

Is it true that "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't know."?

hmmmmm... I wonder!!! (In Spanish: "Es mejor un mal conocido, que uno por conocer")

WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS????

CTRL-C: My profile picture depicts how I feel... Caged!

CTRL-V: Do you know how it feels to be a dog inside a cage? OR maybe a bird? How 'bout a kid?... No, you say!... ... ... Maybe... ... ... Hmmm... :S

Some people might have an idea of what it feels like, others have no idea; some don't even care, and others live their whole lives feeling this way. I'm really hoping not to be the latter!!!

However, since I was a little kid I've always felt trapped. As if I was never allowed to experience life, barely breathing the air from out side the walls of my house. Don't get me wrong, I was able to go out and play with friends and visit family, but it was an emotional state of mind that made me feel trapped.

I was born, like everybody else, with natural talents, and an unique set of skills and character traits. Additionally, I was brought up to believe that you had to work hard to earn your keep, and getting an education was the #1 priority (Which I totally agree with). This gave me the reason to put myself in this emotional "cage." My parents (with the best intention in the world) over-protected me in ways that somehow, someway, made me loose faith in myself. To no fault of their own, they were just doing what a parent knows how to do: Protect their child from disappointment.

To this day I still struggle with trying to take care of a problem without thinking about calling my father. Don't get me wrong, is great that my father was, is, and always will be there for me when I need him, but when you take away a child's will to work things out on his own, you disable him for life. I love my parents, and think that without them I will not be who I am today, and probably wouldn't have accomplished all I've accomplished to this day. They are my role models and I wouldn't trade them for the world.

However, I felt disabled for a long period of time during my youth. I remember how proud I was of my athletic skills as I was developing into a teen. I was also very proud of my intelligence and my good will to help others. Nonetheless, I never had an objective, something that drove me, a goal in life... nothing. My only dream was to be able to play baseball professionally; a dream that was shattered when I came to the US.

It's funny how words can have such a devastating effect on children. I was only 12 when we finally moved to the US, and when we were signing up for High School we had to meet with my assigned Guidance Counselor. My mom and older sister where there with me while the counselor tried hard to speak some Spanish mixed with basic English words to help us understand what he was saying. He first interviewed my sister, and asked her a lot of questions. I was listening in, and found some of those questions hard for me to answer. They were all about what you wanted to do in college, and where you saw yourself in 5 or 10 years. I was puzzled by it, but at the same time I was not afraid to answer honestly. He asked my sister what profession she wanted to pursue as her career profession, my sister answered "Engineering," without hesitation. Then he finished writing on my sister's file, and opened up a second folder with my name on it. As he asked me questions, I was feeling more and more comfortable; especially with the English language since he was asking all the questions to us in English.

But the life-changing question came along without interruption. When he got to the last question, I was already expecting it, and, to tell you the truth, was a little anxious and excited to tell this American Counselor what I wanted to become when I grow up. He asked me the same question he asked my sister: "What do you want to be when you grow up?" and without wasting a second I excitedly said a "Professional Baseball Player!" After all, this was my ultimate dream, and I had the skills, the talent, and the poise to make it far in MLB (or so I thought). However, the counselor responded to my answer as quick as I responded to his question, but with a big low blow. "Your out!" he said, as he nodded, and looked at my mom for some support. He then continued saying "that's not a profession, you need to choose something that you can study in college." I looked at him puzzled, and insisted: "No, I want to be a Professional Baseball Player," but my mom jumped in (in Spanish of course, and probably not thinking about what to say because she was probably just embarrassed at the fact that I said that) and told me (Translation) "Alex, that's not a serious profession, that's not going to get you anywhere! Tell the man a 'Profession' not a game." I looked at her with disappointment, and then looked at the counselor, reluctantly answering: "Engineering..." The counselor smiled and said, "Now, that's a real career!"

Who gave him the authority to say that becoming a professional athlete is not a profession? Worst, who gave him the right to say that my dream was not worth any consideration? At that moment I saw my entire world crash and burn. When the opportunity came to supposedly "come out of that emotional cage" in the land of opportunities (USA) I was pushed back in buy a Guidance Counselor. I will never know if I was MLB material, and I will die with the guilt of never trying. It really saddens me, to the point where I want to do something about it, but at the age of 31, there's not much I can do. My youth is almost gone, and it will take years of conditioning for me to even get close to competitive level.

It was this defining moment in my life that sank any hopes of ever getting out of this cage by taking my only, true, and very innocent dream away from me. All throughout high school, this cage held me down like a cop holds down a criminal after trying to escape; with hand-cuffs and all!

To this day, I still feel like that picture I have on my profile: Me, dressed in baseball uniform, waiting for my opportunity to come up to bat, or go to the field, but at the same time caged... like an animal... like the dogs in the picture above, just waiting for somebody to open that door to run wild and free... And like the picture, it seems as if my Dreams still have some light, but I can't wait too long or the night might fall on it and finish crushing the little hope that I have of ever making it a reality.

IS IT TOO LATE? With tears in my eyes, I feel the need to say, Yes! But my heart and mind are in conflict. My heart having felt the excitement, the joy, the happiness that I get when I play baseball, and knowing how much this means to me, wants to keep on believing that it is still possible. My mind, being logical, analytical, and very convincing with the facts of my life, is throwing in my face that my time to make it is over... "You are not 20 anymore!" It yells at my heart... "The body you work so hard for is too out of shape, and the mind that tells you this is not as sharp as it once was! Give it up, heart... give it up, Alex! Follow other dreams, which you can have a better probability of making a reality..."

How do I argue with reason? How can I prove to my heart that it's over? How can I convince my mind, that nothing is impossible? HOW... HOW?

How do I get out of this cage and finally be free?

I only speak for myself, the dependency that I developed as a child caged me for life... God help me fight the good fight, so that one day I can say: I did it! I persevered! I never gave up! I'm finally FREE!

Why did I choose this title?

CTRL-C from my Brain on 10/01/2008:

CTRL-V: Well, HELLO WORLD!!! This phrase is very popular for any Computer Engineers from the 70's and 80's. Some of the ones from the 90's and 2000's might have read or even studied about this phrase, but have no real appreciation for it's meaning. This phrase served as the introduction to many of today's software applications during it's programming and testing. YES, sir! Hello World, in this instance means: "Alex is here!" I'm ready, after 30 years of my existence, to start blogging about my ideals, my thoughts, and my experiences.

"Copy, Paste" has always been part of my daily life. As a computer engineer, you get to work on a lot of different projects that require you to do just that, copy and then paste. Well, My brain is always working at full speed; even when I'm not even realizing it, my brain is processing information that I received throughout the whole day. Something I left undone, or something I didn't figure out, it will linger in my brain until it can be resolved. I see it as a troubleshooting ticketing system, that changes status on different tickets as events are put into them. The ticket will not disappear from your workspace until it has been set to "resolved", "closed", or "Completed." The same way my brain will not stop processing a thought until it tags it as resolved or completed. I never thought blogging was for me, because it takes a blogger time to write their blogs; time that I didn't have. But I realize after reading my sister's blogs (The Neny Fragments) that you have to make time to let your brain rest for a bit.

By "Copying" the thoughts from my brain, and "Pasting" them into this blog, I'm allowing my brain to take some time out and rest. This will ultimately benefit me in the long run, as I will have a public archive of my thoughts, which I can refer to if I ever need to remember something that my brain has forgotten.

We all age, some faster than others, but we all age with time. As we age our brains become less and less agile, and memories begin to fade away. For people like my sister, and myself, this will be catastrophic! We love to re-live those moments that shaped our lives to what they are today, and if we have no way of recording it somewhere and just leave it to our brains to remember, we are in big trouble. Therefore I decided to take this "Copy, Paste" ideology to heart, and begin a new journey into the blogging world.

Hence, World get ready! My brain is as complex as they come, and I know that you will enjoy my pasted thoughts, for as long as my brain can produce them.

LET'S BEGIN!!!