Montebello E-News

Special Graduation Issue  

June 16, 2008

  The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness.
 You have to catch it yourself.
Ben Franklin, 1706 – 1790,
was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America.

1.  Wisdom for a Long Life (Martin Luther King, Jr.)

2. Texas Valedictorian (Adults Don’t Always Know How to Solve Problems)

3.  Merlin of Microsoft (The Fascinating Future of Technology)

4.  Teens:  Don’t Be Lazy (A Message from Two Successful Teens)

5. Some Sensible Advice (Don’t Wait until You Are Older to Listen)

6. Whose Slave Are You?  (Fact and Fantasy) 

Excerpts from a speech by Martin Luther King, Jr., 1967.

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkatimetobreaksilence.htm 

Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence, when it helps us to see the enemy's point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment of ourselves.  For from his view we may indeed see the basic weaknesses of our own condition, and if we are

mature, we may learn and grow and profit from the wisdom of the brothers who are called the opposition. ...  

This is the message of the great Buddhist leaders of Vietnam.  Recently one of them wrote these words, and I quote:  

Each day the war goes on the hatred increases in the heart of the Vietnamese and in the hearts of those of humanitarian instinct.  The Americans are forcing even their friends into becoming their enemies.  It is curious that the Americans, who calculate so carefully on the possibilities of military victory, do not realize that in the process they are incurring deep psychological and political defeat.  The image of America will never again be the image of revolution, freedom, and democracy, but the image of violence and militarism ....  

It is with such activity in mind that the words of the late John F. Kennedy come back to haunt us.  Five years ago he said, "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."  Increasingly, by choice or by accident, this is the role our nation has taken, the role of those who make peaceful revolution impossible by refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that come from the immense profits of overseas investments.  I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values.  We must rapidly begin...we must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society.  When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered. ...  

A genuine revolution of values means in the final analysis that our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. Every nation must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in their individual societies. ...

Grapevine High's top student won't be valedictorian

By Mark Agee, Star-Telegram Staff Writer 

Anjali Datta's final high school vocabulary lesson was that the word valedictorian does not mean what she thought it did. 

Despite having a grade-point average of 5.877, which is the highest among this year's 471 Grapevine High School graduates -- and believed to be the highest in the school's 103-year history -- she will not have the title.  

The 16-year-old senior has made it through high school in only three years. But district policy describes the valedictorian as having the highest average "for four years of high school."  

"I worked really hard for it," said Datta, who began high school coursework in middle school. "I just felt like I deserved it."  

Furthermore, the state provides a scholarship to the "highest-ranking graduate" of every accredited high school, leaving it up to each school administration to determine how to name that graduate.  

When confronted with the dilemma, district officials consulted their attorneys, attorneys for the Texas Association of School Boards and officials at the Texas Education Agency, district spokeswoman Megan Overman said.  

The conclusion was to rely upon a literal interpretation of "four years." ... http://www.star-telegram.com/189/story/669705.html  

Comment.  Have I missed the obvious?  How many thousands of dollars was the state  scholarship?  Would it have cost less to award two scholarships, instead of involving two attorneys and who-knows-how-many personnel in trying to come up with an answer?  Even if it would have cost more to award two scholarships, how much more?  Did the state have no provision to award a scholarship in extraordinary circumstances?  

No more mouse?  No more keyboard?  It will not be long before a new computer be available, so save your money.  See the video:  

http://machinist.salon.com/blog/2008/05/28/windows_iphone/index.html.

It's not your blue blood, your pedigree or your college degree.
It's what you do with your life that counts.
Millard Fuller, 1935 – present,
founder and former president of Habitat for Humanity International, a nonprofit organization known globally for building houses for those in need.  

Are we adults holding teenagers back from reaching their potential?  The answer is “yes” if one listens to the interview with these two teenagers.  

“Teens:  Don’t Be Lazy”, interview on National Public Radio, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90759371&sc=emaf .  

Take a ten- to thirty-minute walk every day.  And while you walk, smile.  It is the ultimate antidepressant. 

Sit in silence for at least ten minutes each day.  Buy a lock if you have to.  

Buy a Tivo (DVR), tape your late night shows, and get more sleep.  [Better yet, dump television.]  

Live with the three E's, energy, enthusiasm, and empathy.  [And the greatest of these is empathy.]  

Always pray and make time to exercise.  

Spend more time with people over the age of seventy and under the age of six.  

Dream more while you are awake.  

Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat fewer foods that are manufactured in plants.  

Drink green tea and plenty of water.  Eat blueberries, wild Alaskan salmon, broccoli, almonds and walnuts.  

Try to make at least three people smile each day.  

Clear your clutter from your house, your car, your desk and let new and flowing energy into your life.  

Don't waste your precious energy on gossip, issues of the past, negative thoughts or things you cannot control.  Instead, invest your energy in the positive present moment.  

Realize that life is a school and you are here to learn.  Problems are simply part of the curriculum that appear and fade away like algebra class, but the lessons you learn will last a lifetime.  

Smile and laugh more.  

Life isn't fair, but it's still good.  

Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.  

Don't take yourself so seriously.  No one else does.  

You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.  

Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.  

Don't compare your life to others'. You have no idea what their journey is all about.  

No one is in charge of your happiness except you.  

Frame every so-called disaster with these words:  “In five years, will this matter?”  

Forgive everyone for everything.  

What other people think of you is none of your business. 

Time heals almost everything. Give time time!  

However good or bad a situation is, it will change.  

Your job won't take care of you when you are sick.  Your friends will, so stay in touch.  

Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.  

No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.  

Do the right thing!  

Call your family often.  

Remember that you are too blessed to be stressed.  

Enjoy the ride.  Remember that this is not Disney World and you certainly don't want a fast pass.  You only have one ride through life so make the most of it and enjoy the ride.  

We are oh so manipulated.

…"We can talk all we want about being brand-proof," Walker writes, "but our behavior tells a different story." Experimental subjects presented with two identical glasses of Coca-Cola, one labeled as such and the other presented as a mystery rival brand, routinely picked the one they thought was Coke as the better-tasting soda. Citing one cunningly designed study after another, Walker presents ample proof that we are only kidding ourselves if we believe we're impervious to the multibillion-dollar marketing industry. Nevertheless, we are not "obsessed" with consumption, as many critics claim. As Walker sees it, Americans prefer not to ruminate on that particular subject, even as we shop and spend our little hearts out. "To qualify as obsessed we'd have to really think about why we buy what we buy," Walker writes, instead of just telling ourselves that we, unlike the rest of the sheep, purchase things for purely rational, utilitarian reasons like price, quality and convenience. ... 

Marketers like to talk about the skepticism of the "new consumer," a smart young character fleeing the mainstream and adamantly resistant to all forms of advertising. Walker begs to differ. "The only problem with this theory was that it did not match up particularly well with the realities of the marketplace that I was writing about every week in the Times Magazine," he writes. Instead of being more hostile to what he calls "commercial persuasion," the consumers he observed seem very much involved with brands and products. If traditional advertising has become a less effective way of fostering that involvement, the commercial persuasion industry has in turn been fiendishly resourceful in coming up with alternative methods, infiltrating hitherto unexploited aspects of our lives. The result, as Walker sees it, is a culture in which there is a "secret dialogue between what we buy and who we are," a dialogue that shapes us even as we pretend to be untouched by it. ...  

Miller, Laura, “We Are What We Buy”, http://www.salon.com/books/review/2008/06/03/buying_in/index.html.

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