Two weeks from today I will leave here and move into my dorm in Tallahassee. Over the past year or so I have noticed that I have grown apart from most of my friends here, and it’s been difficult to keep those friendships alive and healthy. The number of people I find that I can normally relate with has decreased rather dramatically. I do not blame my friends, obviously; it’s just how things have happened to turn out.
Honestly, I would not say that I did much to help the situation; in fact, I will admit that I actively took part in the destruction of some of my friendships. I did not destroy these relationships out of ill will or anything of that sort, I did it because I - after trying and failing to imagine where many of these friendships would likely be “one year from now” - realized that the personalities involved had become so disparate from my own that to continue acting like friends would not serve a beneficial purpose to anyone.
Where does that leave me now, though, two weeks before I must go off to school? Most folks my age that are heading to university in a short time are spending as much time right now as they can with their “home friends.” I have allotted some time for that sort of thing, but for the most part I have been just hanging out with my brother and reading.
“He must feel lonely,” you might think. The surprising thing, to me, is that I do not feel that way at all. That may just be because I feel so comfortable right now, having little to no schedule or responsibility, just doing whatever I happen to want to do nearly every day. You may be surprised to find that I do not feel like my last “high school summer” has been wasted, instead I feel like my time has been spent fairly wise. I cannot recall offhand any major regrets or great missed opportunities. Sure, during spring semester, I mentally set for myself - as many people my age may often do - tentative (naive?) goals to try to accomplish this summer, and I may not have met those, but, in hindsight, those nice ideals gave way to allow for a different, but also nice, reality. This entire summer (get ready for the cheese), I continually found myself saying, thinking, or murmuring at some point “If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is,” as Kurt Vonnegut (sorry if it’s cliché to author-name drop) has taught me to do.
I leave for Florida State the morning of Wednesday, August 20th, headed for what I assume will be a stressful and possibly hectic move-in day. In mind, I have already set some tentative (naive?) goals for this Fall semester; post-move-in, I hope that events unfold in such a way that I can meet those goals, but if not, hopefully I will get lucky, and those nice ideals will have to give way to allow for a different, but also nice, new reality.
August 6th, 2008
“National Society of High School Scholars”…is a scheme to get you to pay $45 for the opportunity to have your name printed in a book, along with giving you the feeling that you’re “special.” Anyone who would actually put this on their resume or college application would be pretty foolish.
I’ve posted this because I’ve been getting a ton of traffic lately about the “congressional student leadership conference” post I made a while back. The “CSLC” stuff is another common “YES, YOU ARE SPECIAL,” type of thing that is often sent to U.S. high school students. That I’ve been getting all of that traffic is just because of dumb luck; that post just happens to have a relatively decent rank in google searches. Anyway, I guess I should provide some information on the conferences, since people seem to be desperately looking for some.
So, you’ve gotten something in the mail that says you’ve been accepted to a “Premier Youth Leadership Conference,” or something to that effect. It probably has the word “congressional” in the name or letterhead somewhere, to give it a little more legitimacy, I’m sure. The companies that offer these sorts of camps/conferences include Lead America (who often have the brand “Congressional Student Leadership Conference” attached to their programs), the NSLC (National Student Leadership Conference), and thereafter there seem to be a multitude of other companies with the words “student,” “youth,” “national,” or “conferences,” somewhere in their name.
The folks who run these programs often like to make it well known in their brochures that their programs include some college credit, and that these programs are held during the summer at relatively upscale private US universities. They generally do not clearly tell you that the programs have absolutely no affiliation with those universities, and that the universities are only renting out space that otherwise wouldn’t have been used by the school during the summer term. The college credit that is awarded through these programs does not come from the host university, but instead from small community colleges somewhere in the state that the program is being held, many times these are colleges that are not even in the same city as the host school. It is also worth noting that there is absolutely no guarantee that the credit you receive through these programs will be transferable to the college or university you plan on eventually attending for your undergraduate education.
The people who will handle the students directly during the conferences, are, more often than not, undergraduate college students. Your children will not be waxing poetic on world affairs with Noam Chomsky. Yes, they will likely have speakers and lecturers from notable organizations, but the hands on activities will be handled by college students only a few years older than the students attending the program. Most often, those college students/group leaders are reading about how to lead their group/class directly from a handbook that was produced by the conference company.
The types of high school students who attend these programs almost always have one thing in common: they love the idea of getting away from their parents for two weeks. And who could blame them? The students at these conferences may or may not be the next “leaders of our country and the free world,” as that has yet to be seen. In my experience, they aren’t much different from students with at least a 3.0 average at any school. There will be good people, and there will be bad people, as there are in almost any situation. The good seem to far outnumber the bad, though.
As much as this may read as a negative review of these programs, I wouldn’t say that I was unhappy with my experience. My brother is actually supposed to be going to one this summer. You do meet interesting people (whether they be lecturers, group leaders, or other students in attendance), and you get a chance to see what living at a real university or college is like (dorm life, college-like class schedule, etc.). You may also be getting the chance to see a part of the country (or the world) that you haven’t seen before, which is always exciting. After being lectured at for two weeks, you’ll inevitably learn something, too.
And so, if you’re the kind of person who likes to travel to new places, experience new things, make new friends, and can stand sitting through lectures and other hokey program requirements, then these sorts of programs might suit you (if you can find it in your budget to attend). But, you shouldn’t expect to get much of a resume/college application “boost” out of it, it isn’t as prestigious as the brochure makes it sound.
If you’ve got the opportunity to participate in something like Duke University’s TIP program, I’d suggest you consider that before one of these types of programs.
I hope I cleared up some of the confusion.
April 8th, 2008
Just went through and read most of my old posts here on patosullivan.com. Starting to realize that no matter how smart or insightful anyone may feel like at a particular time, there’s a good chance that they’ll think they were totally stupid two years later when they look back in hindsight.
Not that all of my old posts were awful, some were pretty good, but others…sheesh.
In other news…I didn’t make it into film school. There were only ~365 applicants, and I didn’t make it in. I’m ok with that, though.
To the amazing, delightful, talented, and divine descendants of Mary Magdalene and Jesus Christ, congratulations on your acceptance to the School of Motion Picture, Television, and Recording Arts at FSU.
And, I’d just like to make a note here for anyone considering dual enrollment and opting to take PJC (or any other community college) classes full time; there are some things to keep in mind before you make your decision:
1. You’re going to have loads of free time, much more than your friends will. This makes for some alone time, for better or for worse.
2. You won’t be seeing your friends (or “enemies,” etc) everyday anymore. It turns out this is very similar to real life.
3. Your friends will continue not living in a way that is very similar to real life. Their social lives will still revolve around first through seventh periods. This means you won’t have very much of a presence in their normal lives anymore, e.g., OMG, not BFFs anymore.
4. A community college is, in a lot of ways, a high school with ash trays, attended by strangers who still think smoking, cussing, and mouthing off will score some cool points. These folks are a hoot (well, mildly entertaining) for a little while…before long, though, you’ll be singing a different tune.
5. The people in your class won’t all be your age, in fact the ages vary pretty widely. If you can’t handle sitting in a room with two or three elderly people, six “I’m going back to college” middle aged people, and a plethora of twenty somethings trying to find direction in life, this might not be for you. It isn’t really the “college” that’s been depicted in American Pie/Van Wilder/Uhh…Slackers?/EVERY-OTHER-STUPID-MOVIE-EVER. There will be people there trying to convince themselves that it is that college, though.
6. Despite all of the things I’ve just listed, being dually enrolled and attending a CC full time can be a great choice for people who think they are ready for a change from what they’re used to and would like to receive some early college credit. So far, it’s looking like it was a good choice for me.
March 15th, 2008
pat-related news:
No longer going to GBHS, going to PJC full time, through the school district’s dual enrollment program. Taking ENC1102, college algebra, biology for non-majors, and american government.
Most likely, next fall I will be attending Florida State.
I have so much free time right now, it’s crazy.
With that free time, I’ve been watching more c-span than any person probably should. I’ve also been reading a lot about computer programming, particularly about C and PHP.
I’ll find out later this month or early next month whether or not I’ll get into the film school at fsu.
Wow, what a substantive post.
P.S.: I post shorter updates here.
February 20th, 2008
They try too hard for intellectualism. Makes me gag.
My birthday was very lonely (October 20th, last Saturday). I went to work as soon as I woke up, took a dinner break around 4:00pm, went home to find that everyone in my family was out and not reachable by phone. For dinner I ate McDonald’s and listened to Elliott Smith alone in my living room. I went back to work and didn’t come home until after 11:00pm. Now that I’m 18 I’m going to get my parents’ names taken off of my bank accounts, and since I can legally buy stock now, I think I’m going to save up enough to open a Vanguard account somewhere down the line.
I’ve only applied to one college, FSU. I’m too lazy to apply anywhere else so far.
Went to the Pensacola Film Festival this weekend. Initially went to go see Lillie & Leander with my brother and Andy Skewes at Plaza Ferdinand downtown outside of the T.T. Wentworth Museum. We ended up leaving because they had both decided that film festivals were “a totaly gayout.” Also, Stagefright, apparently, is “a total gayout.” Ended up seeing Rocket Science on Saturday at 1:00pm, liked it a lot. Was expecting to meet my brother and Sarah Kane there, neither one showed up. Didn’t end up minding that too much though and just enjoyed the movie. Later that night me and Matt Ferrara went to watch the “Local Talent” collection of shorts. They were easily the worst things I’ll probably ever see at a film festival, except for one, called More Abandon, which I really enjoyed. Couldn’t go back today to watch anything because I had to go in to work from 12:30pm to 9:00pm (all showings started at 1:00pm at their earliest and 7:00pm at their latest).
Report cards come out tomorrow, and I’ll have a D in AP Literature because I didn’t do any of the summer reading (which included Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, and Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations). If anyone else is considering taking AP Literature with Mr. King at Gulf Breeze High School, I’d definitely recommend actually reading the books over the summer like you’re supposed to.
I used way too many italics in this post.
October 28th, 2007
Written for my FSU application:
The most serious dilemma facing the world today is the restriction of thought. One may argue that this statement is preposterous, and that it is impossible to restrict thought, because there is not now and can never be an outside arbiter endowed with the power to restrict the thoughts of an individual, and one would probably assume that no person would restrict their own thoughts, seeing free-thinking as being in each individual’s own best interest. I believe, though human beings have been given, either by creator or by fate, the capability to think, reason, and interpret ideas on their own, that unfortunately for many individuals free-thinking is so seldom an occupation that they may have even forgotten what it feels like. This aversion to mental-expansion may be a natural survival instinct (following the idea that your best bet for immediate physical safety is to “go with the flow”), or it may just be a current cultural phenomenon, but in truth, it really doesn’t matter if it’s the former or the latter, because many of our current thought paradigms, political, social and otherwise, are putting us on a path of indulgence, individual self-destruction, and possibly even future societal collapse. Chief among these tired and malignant yet obstinately followed concepts is our current western political mindset, that is, that an individual has only the ability to really favor one of two options: the political “right” or the political “left.” The obvious flaw in this thought system is that there are more than two options, and I believe most would admit that. However, it is not normally socially acceptable to choose any other potential option, therefore any option other than the political “right” or the political “left” is rendered null. What is the outcome of this simplistic and restrictive mass-mindset or others like it? Simply put, the answer to that question is a shortage of ideas, a reduction of thought competition, and an ignorant and easily manipulated populace. From what I can tell, that is exactly the state we’re in right now, in the body politic and elsewhere. Though ignorance may be bliss for the time being, eventually the day will come that our society will have reached a bankruptcy of thought, with our old accepted thought-commodities all having been wasted, we’ll have to face the fact that we’re going to have to mine into deeper portions of our consciousness than we may have ever wanted to, in order to find that sort of cognitive fiber which may finally bring us into a new age of social sustainability. I believe that in order to avoid the massive and likely violent societal restructuring that will come with this unavoidable future we must start to open our minds now, and to encourage each individual to begin their own thought experimentation and research, to teach people to take pride in questioning and finding answers for themselves, to reason, to constantly analyze and reanalyze what they accept as the truth.
October 7th, 2007
Growing up has been torturous for me at times, but not necessarily because of things that have happened to me, but because of things that have happened to the people around me, the people that I am growing up with right now. I realize that as of right now I’m only three months away from being eighteen years old, and that for someone my age to say that they’re still “growing up” may sound out of place, but, in my opinion it would be naive to believe that I or most of the people around me that are my age are in anyway near full development yet. Although I do believe that most of us have come pretty far, most of us still have a long way to go, including myself. When I was twelve and I was wondering what things would be like when I turned eighteen I never once imagined that getting to that age would mean having to go through six years of slowly watching sweet and innocent people turn rapidly into caricatures and stereotypes of what they all imagined they were supposed to be at eighteen. I never imagined that there would be such a seemingly unstoppable, unreasonable, and unnecessary rush to coldly ditch any and all innocence we once had. Nothing in the world could ever depress me more than the loss of innocence, especially the blind loss of innocence as a consequence of a person’s own decisions. I don’t know for sure, but I think that this situation that I’m describing, this massive, abominable, unexplainably mad race to “maturity” that so many of us have engaged in over the past few years, is what many people call the “wild roller coaster ride” that is “growing up.” If that’s what they’re talking about when they use that phrase, if that phenomenon is the ride, then for some reason I feel like I’m the lonely person who decided to sit this one out and is now waiting at the exit for their friends to get off. I’m sure there are other people who may have made the same decision I did, to sit it out and watch, but if those people are like me then I think they are hard to find. I think they may be hard to find because no one wants to admit that they don’t get it. No one wants to admit that they’re alone. I’ve also begun to think that there must exist at least a few individuals who may want to get off the “ride” but can’t find a way. What I find to be the most absurd thing about all this is that it really doesn’t matter if you’re a “rider” a “bystander” or if you’re the guy that just wants the ride to stop, because: if you’re eighteen, it’s likely that in five years most of this won’t matter at all. That is what gets me the most, that this incredible loss of innocence is quite possibly going to effectively have nothing to show once the ride stops.
This is really just something that I’ve been thinking about and that I felt I needed to articulate. I definitely don’t think I’m any better than anyone else, I don’t mean to put anyone down and I don’t mean to preach.
Best regards,
Pat O’Sullivan
July 14th, 2007
The eleventh grade is over and I’m glad. Grades were…decent this year. Eleventh grade was probably the busiest time of my life, with school, my internship, and my job, I didn’t have a whole lot of time to do much else. Next school year I don’t plan on doing an internship, I feel pretty sure that one year was plenty for me. For twelfth grade I’ve signed up for the following classes: AP Lit, Economics/American Government Honors, Marine Biology, Integrated Math III, Screenplay, TV Production, and Gifted Independent Study. I think those classes should be easy to handle (especially math).
Even though it’s a year away, I’m psyched for college now. I’m mostly sure that I’ll be going to FSU. I’ve been writing up my résumé for my application to the film school there, and I’m going to start working on the essay soon.
So here are my plans for this summer:
Make at least two short films that could be submitted to the Pensacola Film Festival (possibly other festivals).
Attend Boy’s State at FSU in late June.
Hang out with Alex Key for a couple weeks when he comes down from DC.
Fly up to DC in late July/early August to hang out with Alex there, and then go to the Virgin Music Festival in Baltimore.
So far, summer has been pretty boring though.
(and I decided to drop the ellipsis before the beginning of each paragraph…mostly because it made no sense)
May 28th, 2007
and capitalizing the titles of your posts is soooo web 1.0.
I’ve realized my posts seem to just be summarized updates of my life more than they are interesting or relevant articles to nearly anyone besides myself. I’ve also decided that before I start another thought in a post I’m going to begin it with an ellipsis (…), rather than just a new paragraph, to brace the [probably non-existent] reader…and, just because I like ellipses.
…Not much went down over spring break, we tried to get some more stuff done over at gulf breeze tv, and we did end up posting one new video. We’ve got another video still in editing, although it may not make it to the site, we’re reviewing it’s…funniness…I suppose.
…Right before spring break started I took a trip over to Tallahassee to take a tour of the FSU Film School and the university campus. I realize that in my last post I said that I had decided I wasn’t going to Film School anymore, but at FSU I was really impressed, I’m definitely going to try my best to get into their Film School, it seems like it’s a place full of really knowledgeable people with a lot of great tools to learn the trade. If I don’t make it in I don’t mind, but it’s something to definitely try for.
…On Wednesday I bought a Canon XL1S…which came at a price tag of around $2,000. So, I’m sure I’m getting a nice camera, but I’m scared I won’t use it enough. I’m just gonna have to dedicate myself to using that camera as much as possible just to justify the cost…it’s gonna be pretty fun though, I think.
…The GBHS Quarterback club finally paid me in February the $500 they had owed for me making their early December football banquet video…that took long enough.
…I made my first “breeze break” for GBHS ITV the week before we got out of school for Spring Break. Before I had stayed away from them just because I didn’t feel like messing with it very much, but I think we did a pretty good job of throwing one together at the last minute in the case of this breeze break. Several of my friends called it “the best breeze break of the year,” which is probably a bit of an exaggeration, but I’m glad a lot of people seemed to like it pretty well.
…I’ve now been running my laptop (my main pc) solely on Ubuntu (a linux distribution) for nearly six months, and it’s really grown on me. I’ve come to the realization that I can do almost anything I want with open source software, although sometimes it may take some work. I just got done installing Beryl, a 3D window manager which makes some nice “eye-candy” effects…it only took me like six hours to get that up and running.
…The American Legion post out on the beach has selected Ryan Thompson and I to represent our town in Boy’s State later this summer in Tallahassee. I don’t really know what to expect, although Kyle Hebert says it was pretty enjoyable when he went.
…xkcd.com has some pretty hilarious comics. OH! And Asher Sarlin has a blog now! It’s called No More Parents!, and it is pretty interesting.
…I’ve been coming up with and writing down more script ideas lately. I like to write them down just to save them, even if they’re not very good. Alex Robinson and I have been going over a script he’s been writing and that we hope to make into a short film this summer, and things seem to be going well with it so far. We’re both writing out our scripts on lyx, which is some pretty nice document processing software designed specifically for scripts, essays, scholarly papers, and reports. The neat thing about it how much you don’t have to worry about, the application takes care of almost everything for you with regard to formatting.
The weather has really warmed up recently and I’m very glad about that, especially glad that we’ve had a warm spring break.
March 18th, 2007
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