Jarombek 1

Allison Jarombek
Mrs. Martin
Advanced Composition
11 September 2014
I sit eagerly on the edge of the deck steps, giddily smiling, wrapped in the words that
melodically float through the air. Oh do I cherish story time with my father. His rebellious tales
of backpacking to Colorado, stealing signs from local businesses, and pranking those who he
didnt agree with. I found these stories fictional to me because I would never dream of doing
such acts. One main trait that my father and I shared was that we were both passionate. I was the
silent type with all the emotions but none of the action while on the other hand he had both and
was voiceterous about it. My mother on the other hand was more like the anchor of the group.
She is stable and nurturing. That was quite an interesting balance to deal with as a child. As I
grew up I became busier as I followed my hobbies into highschool and had less time to rebel
even if I wanted to.
Being rebellious in high school is difficult because
there is a certain way you must act, some sort of mold. The
stress of being in this mold caused me as well as many
others to crawl into their hermit shells. Its a preposterous
stereotype that is forced on people by society. This mold we
must fill to be considered the best of the best is now
considered damaging to our creativity. Honestly the common
belief is that to be successful you must be the best of the best.
Creativity is a form of rebellion to me because it does not fit

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the traditional mold. For this act of rebellion to happen it requires a measure of random
association and connection and substantial periods of downtime (Slaughter 1). This, to me,
seems to be the only way life can function. Last spring I was an example of what can happen
when you dont have these periods of downtime. I had what you could call a creativity road
block. This was due to my non-stop, no sleep lifestyle that I was forced into because I was trying
to do too much without thinking about the much needed downtime. For three weeks in a row
including weekends I got an average of four hours of sleep a night and when I wasnt sleeping I
was busy running somewhere. Along with little sleep the stress was being piled on like a ton of
bricks. All kinds of activities being crammed down our throats and the way the are being
crammed causes devastating side effects. Just as Slaughter, the author of the article Rebellion of
an Innovation Mom, agrees with me, she says what this nation needs to be innovative and
entrepreneurial is to ask our kids to do less. She believes that rebelling against the norm will
cause a better overall health not just for humans but also for the world. The benefits are
unlimited.
Even though creativity is a form of rebellion it is not the only one. As a kid my father and
mother would always talk about global warming, Al Gore, and going green in general. For some
reason this sparked my passion to help the Earth and those who inhabit it. I guess you could call
me a hippie or a flower child in some ways. I mean its the best way to live! I thought everyone
had the same point of view on these topics but I soon found out that I was wrong. I always got
the weirdest looks when I would talk about global warming and going green. How come no one
else has hopped on this bandwagon!? I feel like I stand alone but even though I do, I stand tall
with all the power I can muster. The form activism that supported the go green movement was
considered rebellion which for me always had a negative connotation. I thought How could

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something so peaceful and good be considered bad?. I would get so frustrated that I felt like
screaming. Later on I understood that rebellion could be a good thing if handled properly but in
the current day and age it is difficult to even protest peacefully without being accused of some
form of hanus crime. Why does this happen? Its obviously not fair but why should you care? I
have always been fascinated by protesting for animal rights or about greenhouse gases but now
Im reluctant to because I dont want to be labeled as an ecoterrorist (Will Potter). Most of the
time this is for the extreme cases but its sometimes applied to the least harmful ones. Just like
Will Potter who got arrested for handing out flyers on animal rights he just thought he was doing
the right thing. No one likes to be punished for doing the right thing especially me. I have always
been scared of punishment or just yelling. I can recall many times in which I was a cry baby
when someone yelled at me.
As you can tell by now I was never really familiar with rebellion one on one but as I got
older I soon realized that I had been rebelling in my own the whole time. For example the way I
dressed was a form of rebellion such as my red pants that I wore before they were cool.
Rebellion is in style. Wear it with pride! There are so many different types of rebellion I just
dont know where to start. The form of rebellion that I am most passionate about is
environmental and health. For my whole life I have been interested in health and not just health
for humans but health for other creatures and the world itself. When I think about health Im not
just talking about eating right, exercising, and recycling; I also think about mental health,
educational health and the medical health field. Malala was a young women who was shot by the
Taliban for wanting equal education all over the world. Her brave rebellion for educational health
is inspiring to me especially since some of our goals overlap and she is also a very relatable by
nature. Malala tells a story of how she was foolish as a young child and stole from one of her

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neighbors but got caught and mostly felt shame because she didnt want to disappoint her father.
This really connects me to her. Her dream was to have freedom through education and this was
considered rebellion. Knowledge is freedom. Even though she was harmed by following her
dream she continues to rebel. She has a key trait of an activist, courage. My dream is to have a
world where health of all kinds is a common goal.
As I said before, you can now be labeled as an ecoterrorist and even to this day my
passion lies with the Earth so to speak. I strive to be an activist in my opinions but I rarely have a
chance to express them within the presence of other people. Sometimes I believe that Im too
much of a coward to speak up even though my heart is in a good place. Even though this has
very little to do with this Im going to tell this story anyways. One night my mother was scrolling
through FaceBook, like usual, and found a test that said What should your career be?. Being as
curious about my future as all seniors in high school I took it. After a few questions were
answered I had my results. Apparently Im an activist or thats what I should do in life. This was
a pleasant surprise. Activists, while sometimes annoying, play an important role in society.
Without rebellion nothing new and extraordinary can come about. If you think about it if it
wasn't for rebellions nothing would get accomplished. Daring to dream is daring to rebel. We
should not be limited by by societies expectations! We all deserve
freedom and and a better life.
A current hot topic now is Ukraine and the unrest that
envelops it. One particular situation is where the President
Yanukovych failed to reach an agreement with the European Union
and the citizens were so outraged that they are demanding that the
government in power steps down. Their protest was meant to be

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peaceful but when the military is brought in the situation turns more violent. As tensions rise the
acts of rebellion become more extreme. For example the protesters toppled a statue of Vladimir
Lenin. This is the side of rebellion that can get ugly. There is simply no other way to put it. Being
an activist is a rewarding job but only when done in balance. Self control can be the key. I
believe that my self control has held me back. As shown in the image on the previous page states
that I am very emotional which is true but I rarely got in trouble when I was younger. I was a
very obedient child and prefered it that way, most of the time. Every now and then I would hold
my ground and was as stubborn as a bull. When this would happen it was normally a topic that
had wrapped itself around my heart like a boa constrictor. The odd thing is that I enjoyed this
suffocation.
The most successful rebellions are motivated by passion. What is passion? According to
Websters dictionary passion is a strong feeling of enthusiasm or excitement for something or
about doing something. Doesnt that sound wonderful. To answer those questions I must look
deep within my soul, in every personal crevice of my being. My passion is health as I said
before. Ideas flow from my mind like an endless river and this how it should be. To promote
safety of the environment or better known as going green we must find alternative fuel
sources. In many schools the switch to alternative fuels has been attempted but not always
followed through. There are many things that can be turned into fuel and with the ever growing
price of oil the need of alternative fuel will become more prominent. In 150 years we will be out
of oil.What will we do then? We have to do something. Last year I participated in 20% time
which was the time where we were allowed to pursue our passions and as expected I chose the
environment and more specifically alternative fuels. In a way this was a form of rebellion
because I would not accept the norm of society. I wanted to be different. I wanted to make a

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difference. To quote a winter drumline show One person can make a difference. One person can
change the world. I would have to believe that my experiences from an early age all the way up
to now have heavily influenced my heart and what it wants. These influences have been
conflicting throughout my life and this has been challenging to process my whole project. For
example this conflict has caused me to basically argue with myself and so I see both sides to
every proposition. As I continue to grow I continue to argue with myself and continue to develop
questions I become more mature. My questions are those such as how can I convince others to
believe that this issue is important? How can this be a global movement? and so on. While this
movement is extremely important to me it is not as much to the rest of the world. My main goal
is to spread my passion to everyone like an infectious disease and in the end hopefully improve
the world and it WILL happen.

(1) Slaughter, Anne-Marie. "Rebellion of an Innovation Mom." Global Public Square RSS.
CNN, 5 June 2011. Web. 28 Sept. 2014.

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(2)Potter, Will. "The Shocking Move to Criminalize Nonviolent Protest." Will Potter:.
TedTalk.com, Mar. 2014. Web. 02 Oct. 2014.
(3)Yousafzai, Malala. I Am Malala: The Schoolgirl Who Stood Up to the Taliban. London, UK:
Orion Group, 2013. Print.
(4) McCormick, Megan. "Moments Of Humanity In Kiev, Ukraine: Rebellion, Courage, And
Compassion." Distractify. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Oct. 2014.