I accept Rachel's Challenge

This post is about a murdered person, but not one I ever knew. This girl was named Rachel Scott. She was one of the victims of the Columbine High school Massacre. She was shot as she ate lunch outside with her friend. She was the first of 13 victims. I had to attend an assembly about Rachel Scott and during that long hour I witnessed the horrors of the massacre and the wonderful things 17-year old Rachel Scott did. She was a girl we all wished we could be. Compassionate, caring, nice and a overall good person. She stood up for the people we usually look down to. Though she herself had once said that she should not be thought of as perfect, because none of us are. So why was an innocent girl and 12 others murdered on that day? We might never know, but there is only two things that are unanswered about that tragic day: Why do we kill and Why do we bully?



Murder does not solve our problems, it makes them worse. Killing people does not make them go away. You will forever have to live with the guilt of taking a person's life away, and will more than likely get cought and be put on death row. Rarely do people get away with it, but some still do, just look at OJ Simpson. He only got away with the murders simply because he made the case a race issue. If the cop hadn't had said anything, then OJ would probably be dead right now. Plus can you imagine what the family and friends have to go through after their loved ones are killed. How would you feel if your closest friend was suddenly murdered? Not very good would you. Also you might think your doing it for a good reason, but there is never a good reason to kill somebody who does not deserve it, no matter how hard you convince yourself you are doing the right thing.



Ok so I'm gunna get back to Rachel. She had a journal where she made an essay called My Ethics: My Code of Life, and it stated that we all should start a chain reaction of kindness. Being nice to a person like saying hi in the hall, or just showing that you care for them is more better than the newest Chanel purse or the latest Miley Cyrus CD(no offense Miley). You might think that doing a small act of kindness is nothing, but even the smallest thing can make the biggest impact on a person. I know this might sound cliched but: Treat others the way you would want to be treated because *when god forbid* a person that you know is killed you would have wanted the last thing you said to them to be something kind. We all want to be treated kindly and if we treat other people unkindly how do we expect to ever be treated kindly in return.

So I decided to take Rachel's Challenge. There are five steps into taking Rachel's Challenge:

1. Eliminate prejudice: This is the first time I think I will ever say this. I am sorry for always thinking that popular people are sluts and mean people. I don't even know them personally so unfortunatly I was very prejudiced against the popular people and everything in my post: High School Social status I am sorry for. Though there are some social groups in High school. There are popular people, inbetween people and the unpopulars.
2. Dare to Dream: My dream is to someday be a writer for Seventeen magazine because I love to write and I love Seventeen Magazine
3. Choose your influences: So far my only influences are my family, and so far Rachel Scott. She is an inspiration for all of us and so our are parents(well hopefully your parents are)
4. Kind Words: I have tried to be more kind to my friends(Emily), and I hope that it is working out but I can't read peoples minds.....or can I? *Dramatic music plays*
5. Start a chain reaction: As I already stated one simple act of kindness can make a huge impact.
Please take this challenge and make the world a better place. The Columbine School massacre should never happen again and nobody should have to go through the horrors of what happened that day.
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Back in normal track: After the assembly was over, everybody was quite. I remember hearing a bunch of kids sniffling from sadness after watching the tapes from the actual Columbine school shooting and hearing about the life of Rachel. The only thing that I could hear people talking about the assembly or anything to lighten the now dreary mood. I just sat in my chair silent and staired at the chair infront of me. My stomach still hurt from the sad things I saw and I was just speechless. It didn't go away till around 4th period, which was lunch. Personally I was kinda freaked out to be in the lunchroom because that's where all shooters always go. As you can tell I've become more aware that there is a chance that a shooting could happen at my school but most likely wont. Yet my school security isn't really that good. We don't enforce the dress code, and I've even heard of people doing drugs behind the school. Which is true! Today when I was walking by my locker I heard some boy say, "Yah if they find out I have drugs then they'll put me on a years probation". Ouch! That's a weirder story than the whole "Prom Night dumpster baby" thingy.
Lunch wasn't that good because the pizza wasn't that good I guess. Language arts was intersting I guess because we had a quiz on something..I really don't remember. The rest of the day was kind of a daze.
Ok this post is getting depressing so I'm gunna tell a funny story of what happened yesterday:
It was raining very hardly and I had to meet mom at the the cut through to my neighborhood. I raced across the street with the only thing I coule hear was the soft pitter-pattering of large rain droplets hitting leaves and the road, and the occasional skidding of a car(which still freaks me out). I took my phone out, though it was almost out of batteries plus getting very wet. I stood on the sidewalk and looked around. No sign of my mom or her rental car. It started to rain harder and I quickly took shelter across the street under a tree.
I put my phone under my jacket and I saw a quick, large stream of water racing past me towards the sewer(this is important later on). Unfortunately my tree shelter was no use later on when the rain beat down harder. I was getting wet and so was my school stuff. To my great luck my neighbor Mrs.B was driving by and let me stay in her car for a little bit as I tried to call my mom.
I didn't get fully in the car, and the door was wide open. My foot was gently rested in the quick stream of water and suddenly I felt my flip-flop race off my foot and start running down the stream. I cried "My shoe!". I then ran after it with only one shoe and I knew that if I didn't catch it in time my shoe would go down the drain. Yikes! I luckily managed to grab it and race back to the car. My mom finally came and I finally got back home only to have to be ready to perform the National Anthem at the Braves vs Mets game with my Chorus. I'll talk about that later.

The next post will be called: The Performance that was never seen