Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

I don't envy rich people, I think being wealthy would be a really big responsibility. No, I don't aspire for riches, I would rather just be able to live comfortably. Money doesn't really make you happy and sometimes it can make you very unhappy. It's said that money is not the root of all evil, rather that the love of money is. I try to just take money for what it is; it can enable you to have a lot of fun, but there are so many other things that make me happier.
I have known a few wealthy people throughout my life though. Back in New Mexico I knew a family that was living very humbly in a small house behind their open air produce market, but the wife's parents passed away and left them a very large house in the Ruidoso Downs area (which is the nice area of town) and an inheritance. They had a big family and they also had adopted children (thats how our families became friends), but what I think is really cool about them is that after they got the house and the money, they lived more or less the same as they always had. I think the only thing that changed is that they wore nicer clothes.
My grandparents both were kids during the Great Depression and their families had very little money, but now they're the retired former owners of a software company and have plenty of money. Although they do allow themselves some luxuries (my grandpa has a new Lexus and they have a condo in FL), my grandpa invests a lot of their money and they are active in charities that benefit special needs and retarded adults.
I can't begin to think of what I would do if I was rich and I don't think it's my place to tell anybody how to spend their money. I can imagine that spending your money on luxury could be more tempting than giving it away, but I think there is a happy medium.

Put up your dukes, lets get down to it!

I'm really a passive person (despite the post title), I don't like to waste my energy on being angry with people. Of course, I'm no saint, I get angry like anybody else, I just refrain from acting on my anger as much as possible. Even when I do get involved in an argument I usually just view it as a heated debate or discussion. So the only fight I could think of was something that happened a long time ago between me and my older brother. My parents were gone (of course) and Levi, my brother, had a friend over. Levi and his friend were in the study on the computer and I was also in the study on the couch reading a book. Well I guess my presence was a nuisance, and Levi told me to leave and go read somewhere else, but I didn't want to leave and thus, we started fighting. Eventually the fight escalated to my brother pushing me out of the study by force. I fell into an antique cabinet and broke the doors off the hinges. After that I went to my room and waited for my mom to get home. We both got in trouble for fighting and for breaking furniture. I don't really remember, but I can't imagine that I was mad at him longer than the day. Me and my brother fought a lot when we were younger, even though we played together nearly everyday. Now me and my brother get along fine, since we grew up together we know a lot about each other and how to make the other laugh. I don't stay angry long and I think it would take a not for me to think someone was unforgivable.

Grrrrrrrrrowing, we do it everyday!

It's hard to think of anything more tumultuous or unavoidable than growing up. It's something everyone has to do, with the exclusion of Peter Pan, of course. Growing up can be hard. As a child you make very few of your own decisions, and you just have to deal with what's thrown your way. This can be frustrating, as some of the decisions made by others can directly affect your own life, and can seem cruel or unfair. On the other hand, though, growing up can be the most exciting thing ever. When you're a kid, everything is new, unknown, and ready to be explored. You learn, see, and experience new things constantly. As you grow and learn, you get to do more and more new things. Not all experiences that people go though as they grow up are more exciting than scary. Terrible things can happen as you go through your life, but they help make you the person that you are, just as the happy and exciting things do.

Lies.

This was (in my opinion), by far, the most interesting document of the ones we that we had to choose from. I mean, what's cooler than a spy? I guess in this case the spying going on wasn't so cool, seeing as Benedict Arnold was spying for the British. It was still very interesting though. One of the letters I read was all about how much Benedict Arnold was supposed to get paid for being a spy and the other was full of information about the American troops and their locations. I learned that the code systems used during those times were really very complex. The letters were made up mostly of numbers which referred to the page, line, and word counts for a pre-determined book that the decoder used to fill in the blanks in the message. I was surprised that Benedict Arnold literally just sold out the nation that he started out fighting for. If he had been successful it would have a been a devastating blow to the American quest for freedom. Luckily he was found out and exposed for the traitor he was.

Thinkin' 'bout the government.

The purposes of a good government should be to protect its people, to strive for peace, to provide for its people, to defend the nation, and, above all, to protect the rights and the freedom of its people.
I would most certainly join a revolution against the government if it was not fulfilling its duties. I believe that everyone has the right to live in a place where they are safe and have the ability to prosper and what kind of person would I be if I didn't stand up for what I believe in? I have a profound sense of justice and hate to see things go on in an unfair fashion so I would have no problem fighting the good fight for fairness and equality.

Love, honor, and OBEY?!

As you might have guessed by my title, I read A Well Ordered Family by Benjamen Wadsworth. This instructional essay gave me a glimpse into what Puritan family life was like back in 1712. From what I read it seemed like family life was very structured and almost like a miniature form of government. With all the rules husbands and wives were meant to follow back then I can imagine there were quite a few silently discontent marriages... That's not to say that everyone was married to some person they didn't like, but with this sort of system in place it's easy to see how many people could end up unhappily married or ill matched. I think I was most surprised by the fact that the parents were arranging their children's marriages. I guess I just thought that arranged marriages weren't around during the colonial times. A lot of the rules and guidelines weren't too outlandish, but I can be kind of obstinate, so the thought of having to obey my husband (whoever he turns out to be) just makes me want to rebel. Most of what I read wasn't very shocking though, just because I've studied this time period before and have learned about how the attitudes toward women were less than favorable. Thankfully things are very different nowadays! There was a whole women's rights movement and now women are pretty much considered equals with men. Probably even more lucky is that our parents aren't setting up our marriages anymore. I'm sure most parents would attempt to find their children suitable matches, but there's no substitute for love.

Why won't you come over here?

I think people want to immigrate to America because, as our national anthem says, it's the land of the free and the home of the brave. America has long been proclaimed the land of opportunity. Whether or not the U.S. holds true to the hype is subjective, but if you're living in an impoverished country and you've heard America is the place to prosper, wouldn't you want to go? America has also been tagged as a nation of freedom and equality, so theres a feeling that if you immigrated you would be excepted here, after all the United States was built by immigrants. With all these well versed compliments for the United States all it would take is an unmet need in the place you are now, and moving to America would seem like a marvelous idea.

part deux

Whether or not I would pack up and leave my home for a new country for freedom or finances is kind of hard to answer. Poverty can take away your freedom better than most things and freedom doesn't always mean prosperity and/or security. Because of this I think it would have to be a combination of both, freedom and the ability to prosper. Freedom without money or money without freedom? It'd be hard to live either way. I think if I had to choose though, I would choose freedom over money, because in the end that's what I think is more important.