Interview with Sally Girouard!

Sally Girouard's Awesome Story!!

1. What is the moral you are trying to teach through your story?

A. I’m trying to teach that happiness is achieved by oneself and that’s it. No one else but yourself. I am trying to send the message that no matter how happy a person makes you, you cannot rely on them all the time. Unlock your own happiness in short.

2. How do your supportin characters support?

A. My supporting characters mainly set up the seen and help shed light on the moral of my story and my characters personalities.

3. What challenges do you characters face?

A. My character, Ann, not only faces the death of her her mother, but the struggle of finding herself and being herself even without her mother around. Her struggle is internal and overcomes her shyness, ironically, after the death of her mother.

4. What skills and resources do they use to over come them?

A. She uses her heart and mind and will power. She uses memories and examples her mother set for her. She also uses what inspires her to unlock her outgoing personaility..

5. Who is your antagonist? What do they do?

A. The antagonists are her brothers and father who in reaction to her mothers death go about their lives and try to pretend it never happened which was their way of copping. This interfered with Ann's

6. Where does your story take place?

It takes place in Boston.

7. When does your story take place?

I never put thought into that but ill say the 1990's.

8. Is there a love interest?

No, just a bond between mother and daughter

9. What ages are your characters?

Ann is 15 at the beginning of the story but 17 when her mother dies

10. Do you characters go to school?

Yes, she goes to high School. High school however is not her favorite place due to her self conscious and shy attitude.

11. Did you base your story off any real events?

Not directly, but similar, yes.

12. Are your character based off any real people?

You could say that, but not completely. Definitely some characteristics.

13. What age group is your book directed at?

I would say anywhere from 5th grade and older. It has a good lesson.

14. What form is your book?

It is a novel.

15. How do you start off your story?

I start off my story with a scene of Jane and her daughter in a car highlighting the bases of their relationship

16. What are your characters intentions?

My characters intentions are never negative. The intentions of my characters are to fill the hole in their lives and recover. The main goal is to overcome their loss.

17. Are there any big complications?

Yes the biggest one would be breast cancer... Then after that the struggle within to change for the better.

18. Where did you come up with the idea for your story?

I honestly don’t remember, i just was running ideas through my mind and this one was the one i was most passionate about.

19. What are your characters activites?

I don’t really understand how to answer this ....

20. Do they all become friends again?

No one reallt stops being friends. But yes Ann reconnects with her brothers and father.

Emily's Mistake

Introduction

“Emily, just drop it, ok?”  My mother asks as she slams her fork down on the table, “Just drop it!”

I gave her a puzzling glance, “Why? I am just trying to help with the situation.”

“I think you’ve helped enough, we wouldn’t even be in this situation if it wasn’t for you.”

“It wasn’t my fault! I wasn’t even really a part of it. I know that I made a mistake trusting Ryan, but what else do you want from me? I’ve spent every second trying to apologize and make this right, but nothing I do seems to be enough for you.”

She takes in a deep breath and sighs, “You cannot just fix everything with a simple apology Emily, you hurt a lot of people, and you betrayed both your father and I. How are we supposed to trust you after that?”

I quickly dropped the subject and looked back down at my plate, this way she wouldn’t be able to see the tears that were quickly forming in my eyes. I took another bite of my mashed potatoes, but they were beginning to lose taste.

Silence echoed throughout the room, I could tell that neither of us know how to approach the conversation from here.

I tried to calm down quickly so that she wouldn’t see that she upset me again, I know that she has been doing her best around me lately.

“Now just listen, the worst is behind us now” she said slowly, peering across the table at me, “All we have to do from this point on is just learn to deal with the consequences of what has happened.”

“What do you think I have been trying to do? What else could I possibly do to prove to you that I have accepted the consequences of what I did and have been trying to move past it? I have done nothing but apologize and try to help fix this mess, but every time I try either you or Dad get mad at me and we always end up in a worse place than where we started!”

If that even is possible, but I can’t blame her. I’ve been trying to do everything I can to gain her forgiveness and acceptance again. Although, after you have to watch your daughter go through trial for I understand that it takes some time before you can look at them the same again.

The Convientent Store (One year previous)

I stumbled into the store, physically shaking in my shoes. I knew that if we were going to successfully get away with this than I would have to calm down and act as if this were normal. I quickly put on my best fake smile, pretending that today was no different from any other.

I walked to the back of the store to look at the drinks. All I had to do was get something to distract the store manager. Without even looking I reached into the freezer and grabbed  out the first bottle that my hand came in contact with. I pulled out a Fruit Punch Arizona, funny, that was Ryan’s favorite drink. Maybe that was an encouraging sign to prove that this was all going to work out and there is nothing for me to worry about. We had been over this plan it seemed like a million times, it seemed flawless, but then again isn’t that what everyone thinks before their plans fail.

I slowly walked up through the snack isle, passing the Bugles and Doritos, after taking a left at the Beef Jerky I approached the front counter. I stand at the counter looking around, so far no one is in sight. Taking a quick glance out the window I double check that Ryan’s blue van was still there, I feel reassured when I see it still sitting just one space outside the front door, I can see Sam through the drivers side window, sitting as solid as a rock, but ready to leave at any given moment.

“Hello, are you all set?” I turn back around as the store manager looks at me waiting for a response.

He is an older man, maybe around fifty-five, a plump man, he was wearing a stripped blue shirt with a pen in the pocket, with a nametag, “Harold”. I just stop and stare at the man, now all I can see in my neighbor Harold Thomas, the sweetest man I’ve ever met. I slowly began to walk away from the counter.

“Was there something else that you wanted?” He gives me a puzzling look.

“Yeah, I think that I am going to go get a candy bar or something.” I turn around and head straight for the candy isle.

As I pass the door Ryan catches my eye, giving me a quizzical glance, I can tell he is unsure of what I was doing. This wasn’t part of the plan, I was supposed to stay at the counter until he and Jamie came in.

I turned down the second isle just as they started walking in, while avoiding eye contact I turned around, pretending to look at a package of Mike n’ Ikes, stared up at the counter.

What happened next, it’s hard for me to remember, it is more like a blur.

Ryan stepped forward to the counter, first checking around him making sure no other customers were approaching, then he turned back to the counter, “Give me all the money this place has got.”

Right as Harold was about to call the police, Ryan opens his coat pocket to take out a gun. I see the fear settle in on Harold’s face, clearly he has never dealt with anything like this before, Harold stumbles back a few steps and glances around the store. At this point I had taken cover behind the display of M+M’s, next thing I know there is some kind of struggle, a few boxes filled with lighters, and tiny candies, fall to the floor. The next thing I hear I never expected, it was not part of the drill at all, this was not how today’s plan was supposed to play out. I hear Harold’s body hit the floor, the door slam, and the tires of that Blue van screech out of the parking lot. I slowly edge around the corner and peer over the front counter, a slight squeal leaves my lips before I fall to my knees on the floor.

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How the times have changed

 26, 2011 FAA and EASA certified the Boeing 787 Dream liner. The FAA presented the U.S. Type Certificate, which verifies that the 787 has been tested and found to be in compliance with all federal regulations. A new step into the future of flight where computer systems have almost completely taken over the controls of the Boeing 787. Over the past hundred years flight technology has changed tremendously. Ranging from when the Wright brothers took their first flight on December 17, 1903, where there were little to no controls at all on the plane to help navigate. Up until the most recent Boeing 787, which was only approved for flight this year, which has a complete glass front, in which case the entire dashboard is a large computer.

            In my recent visit to Purdue University’s aviation department I noticed how different the types of planes are for the average flyers. My first flight was this summer in a Cessna 152, a plane that was made in 1985, but highly popular in small airports, like the Plymouth Airport. The dashboard included several round instruments that let the pilot know what the altitude was, temperature, angle of accent, and a few other key things. Not very high tech compared to the planes that the aviation department at Purdue had. Where two years ago they acquired sixteen new Cirrus’s, which had the “glass fronts” quite similar to the ones on the newer jet planes. Both small planes made not too far apart are very different in the level of technology they have for pilots.

            Purdue’s Aviation department realizes the rapid increase in the technology used in these planes and they use this information in preparing for how they run their flight program. Although they have sixteen new Cirrus’s they still keep a few Cessna’s and Piper’s so that training pilots will know what to do in their future professions. Whether this is in the new Boeing 787 with their glass fronts, which the new Cirrus’s would help with. Or if these new pilots got jobs at lower, regional businesses, as private pilots, where having the knowledge of how to fly the Cessna’s and Piper’s with the round dial instruments would help, because most smaller jets do not have the most updated glass fronts.

            Purdue is advanced in this decision because most schools have either one or the other. They either have a flight force with all old planes, with the round dials and buttons. Or they have the newer planes, like the Cirrus’s with the new “glass front” style technology. Having one or the other as a learning basis can seriously set back a new pilot trying to get a job. This reason because they could either get a job for a small regional business, or as a private pilot, which have planes that use the older systems, but they could have gone to a school that only the newer planes and technology. In this case they would not know what to do. Also a new pilot could get a job for a more well known business, like Delta or Jet Blue, where they would be flying the newer modeled airplanes, like the new Boeing 787 with the “glass front”. Although if they were given an education in smaller planes with the older technology and round instruments then there would also be a lot of confusion and extra work that would have to be done to learn how the fly these different systems. 

Perfect Match

In a compelling novel about how a family deals with and survives a tragic event, Jodi Picoult explores the boundaries of love and resilience in a family. In Perfect Match Nina Frost learns that her son has been sexually assaulted and deals with the entire process of helping to bring the person who did this to him to justice. Throughout the novel she pursues many suspects, ultimately leading her to bring the guilty one to justice. This process puts a very large strain on the family and the home life especially at one point, when her husband, the boy's father, becomes a suspect.  There are many turning points in the story that tear at the fabric of the family. In the end though, the family catches the culprit and he is arrested and put away, although for the family that is not the end. Nina and her family have to then from that point learn how to move past this tragic event that ripped apart their family and learn to put it back together.

            This relates with my story about a girl, Emily, who is twenty-two just out of college with Honors, got a job at the most prestigious paper in the city, but joins the wrong group of friends. While being pressured into robbing a convenient store, Emily is torn between the decisions, but in the end goes with them to fit in. After being caught, but let go, Emily and her family then  have to learn how to move on from that and get to a point where they can all accept each other again.

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Don't be Fooled.

You may see them, on Halloween, while you are out with your friends gallivanting around the streets Trick or Treating. Masks are worn by almost every person out on Halloween. People use them to hide an identity, they are used as an escape or a facade to shield their true identity from people. Masks are an interesting thing. 

Halloween is not the time where masks are used. There purpose is not limited to completing or perfecting a costume. Many people use masks in their everyday life. These masks are not pieces of plastic that you can drive and pick up at IParty, these masks are not colorful pieces of paper with feathers glued on to them, and tied to peoples heads. The masks used everyday by people are a different variety. These types of masks are hidden from everyone, you cannot see them simply hanging off peoples faces, they do not show as easily. People hide behind these masks as their own art of pretending. They do not want to be judged or recognized for how they truly feel. These people want you to believe that they have confidence and everything is sunny and unruffled in their lives. A strangers belief in this facade may even convince the person themselves that they are fine. These masks are there also as a protection, while hiding behind them you might start to believe the lies that you show everyone and forget about the world and truth you are hiding from.

Rejection and ridicule are two main things that encourage people to keep their masks. Why would you want to let your feelings pour out, only to be shot down and rejected by your friends? Most people hide behind these masks that they create for themselves because they fear that they may never gain the acceptance and love that they so desperately desire. They believe that their true selves could never be accepted by anyone and they hide behind a fake persona they create for themselves, which they believe people will more willingly accept.

At some point wearing these masks becomes a routine for people. They are so used to pretending that soon they begin to cut themselves out from their friends and the general public. After a period of time from wearing their masks they begin to believe that that is how they must act and letting people understand their true feelings would be a mistake.

The responsibility to help these people then lies on others. For others to realize and recognize these masks when they see them. Do not be fooled by these people because your recognition of these masks may be the thing that help these people understand that there is nothing wrong with being who you really are and letting the world know your true self.

Ten Thousand Feet

Ten thousand feet above sea level is where I feel most at home. Growing up with a pilot as a father has been a catalyst for many unique opportunities. I have known for a while now that flying was my personal pursuit in life, and have been eager to follow this dream. It was never really a question for me, after my father first showed me the inside of the cockpit in a plane I could not stop thinking that it was the most interesting thing to do. How I could not dream of anything better than to be ten thousand feet in the air and flying around, and get the opportunity to do that for the rest of my life.

While other children were at home making hot chocolate and building snowmen during winter break, I was in Amsterdam wandering through the Van Gogh Museum, marveling at his anomalous style and technique. In leiu of tanning I spent the spring in Athens, Greece, lost in ambulatory musings about our disparate cultures. I have been the recipient of many invigorating chances to experience the world and its cultures.

It has been my dream to be a pilot since I was in fifth grade. I oftentimes find myself gazing out at the sky around me, anxious for a future I could spend in the air; a captain of the sky. I have stayed faithful to my dream, with my parents encouraging me to pursue it. On every trip my father takes me to the cockpit and shows me the myriad of charts and checklists he works through before every flight. He has pointed out all the glimmering buttons that surround the small room, and some of their purposes. I now know how to turn on and off all of the lights in the cabin. The walls of my room are covered with posters of flight maps and flight controls. Books on Cessna’s and aviation knowledge line my desk.

             At 5:54PM I stood in the luscious green lawn waiting, adrenalin coursing through my veins, anxiously waiting as my instructor approached me. My first flight was the summer before senior year. The first plane I flew was a Cessna 152. As soon as it took off my feelings were validated: Flying was what I wanted to spend the rest of my life doing. Flying felt so real and at home for me; I loved being able to rise above the clouds and look down into the soft blue of Plymouth Harbor and fly over Plymouth Rock. I was not the only one impressed. My instructor was pleased to see that when it came down to landing the plane and taxiing I already knew what to do. 

After that flight it became irrevocable. Flying is the future that I want for myself.

           

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Morality in The Book Thief

          The book thief shows many morals in all of the characters, because it took place in such a hard time these morals are easy to see. Each character has their own values that guide their lives and growing up during WWI and WWII, where there is so much hate, each characters have their own values they are easy to see in their everyday actions. For Liesel it is the way that she refuses to judge people or single them out because they might be different. Rudy, Liesel's friend,  shows his morals in a way that proves he knows that after a certain number of times, taking things that are not yours is wrong. Hans Hubberman, Liesel's adoptive father,  proves that his morals when he rejects the Nazi party and hides a Jew, Max, in his basement, he believes that he owes a friend and that because he helped him then Hans should help his family.

          Liesel Meminger believes in people being equal. As one of her morals she does not understand why, especially Hitler, people do not like each other because of who they are or what they believe in. When she discovers that her parents were communists and taken away by Hitler to the concentration camps she does not believe it or understand why, and she never gives up on trying to find her mother and never stops writing. She also does not understand why Hitler does not like the Jews and singles them out, she likes Max and when he stays with her she enjoys talking to him and reading to him. Liesel’s morals show how she believes that everyone is equal and should be treated that way.

          Rudy Steiner believes in standing up for his friends, like Tommy Mueller, when anyone tried to make fun of him because of his stutter Rudy stood up to them because he knew that pointing out other’s flaws in a mocking tone is wrong. Also he knows that stealing is wrong, he has only done it a few times and he knows when it is time to stop or it is too far. When he stole a potato from the grocery store he only took one because he had nothing else to eat, but when Liesel wanted to steal from the boy on the bike again Rudy stopped her because he knew that taking food from him a second time because it was easy would be the wrong thing to do.

          Hans Hubberman is a kind and decent man with excellent life morals. He disagreed with Hitler from the beginning when he started to target Jews. He did not believe that a certain race should be targeted and for that reason waited until a later point until he signed up for the Nazi Party, also why he never showed that much support for Hitler, when he bought a copy of Mein Kampf he bought a very old and used copy and never read it. Hans Hubberman strongly disagreed with Hitler’s views because it was a Jew who saved his life. During WWI in one of the battles, Han’s friend volunteered him to stay back and write letters for the general and on that day everyone died besides Hans because he was left at camp. He was always grateful to his friend, Erik Vandenberg, because he believed he saved his life and, with his morals guiding him, he told Erik’s wife that if she ever needed anything that he could help and he did help in the later years when Erik’s son, Max, went to Hans to hide from the Nazi’s in the Hubberman’s basement.

         

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Personal Compass

Personal Compass

Everyone has their own values in life that help guide them through their decisions, their own personal compass. My personal compass is made up of four main points; love, dreams, friends, and my past. All four of these things connect to my life statement, “Life is the sum of all your choices”, in different ways.

            Love is one of the most important things. People who can love and get along without fighting with each other can get the most out of their lives. When people are not worrying about hating others and focus on just getting on then life becomes so much easier. If everyone can get along time is not wasted over wondering, who hates who and why others do not get along. Life is the sum of all your choices and if you choose to hate people and not accept love into your life then it makes it harder to get through. With love people do not have to worry about fights and little things that cause problems, but have no weight and meaning to them.

            Dreams are one of the most important things to have in life. They give you something to look forward to and to work for. Dreams are the thing that you live your life for, you make all of your choices so that the sum can equal your dreams. Without dreams your life can have no purpose and you just live everyday with nothing to do or hope for. Dreams are one of the points on my personal compass because I like the feeling of having something to look forward to and something to give me hope of the future being brighter.

            Friends are one of the main points of my compass because friends can help you through anything. Throughout your life they help you through all of your problems any mistakes and they are always there to have your back. Your friends are the people that you can always rely on through anything. When you need help with making choices that affect your life or just any choices that can have any pull in your life you can rely on your friends to help you through it and give you the best advice. And if those choices turn out for the worse then you still have your friends there to help you and make the wrong that you have done right and better.

            Finally my past is one of the other major points in my personal compass. Even though it is your past and you are taught to look to the future, your past teaches you about any past mistakes and helps you in guiding future decisions. All of your decisions are made in the past so that when you take the sum of all of your choices looking into the past can help you discover which choices were right for you and which ones might have been mistakes. Your past is one of the most important things to live your life by because it is what helps you learn and know what you should do in the future.

The Definition of Morality

Morality is something to be questioned, not many people can say right away with it with a straight definition. Morals teach about responsibility and respect for others, also they give you the knowledge to know right from wrong. Morals are something that you gain throughout life as you grow up from your surroundings. Morals are learned from surroundings, for example Disney channel movies. Children grow up watching them at parties, with their families, or even at school, each of these movies have different morals and life lessons that are very important for children to learn about life. Pinocchio teaches that lying is wrong, Cinderella teaches that you can come from nothing, but still be something, Aladdin shows that wealth does not matter and to not be someone you are not, Little Mermaid proves that you can live the life the way you want to live it and follow your dreams, and Cars teaches children to help others, and put others needs before your own. The morals that children learn when they are young are very important and it is necessary to teach them that some people start to lose their morals as they grow older and they do not have the constant reminder of what is right and wrong or without their parents reminding them and giving them examples. In the song Put Your Lights On by Santana the lyrics tell how when children grow older and into adults they lose their morals and they need to remember them and it is important to learn early how important they are and how important they are to keep.