Free Verse -- Sloths

1 Slowly, slowly, the sloth slides across the ground

2 Trying to stay quiet, attempting to make no sound

3 The sloth is meant for climbing and doesn't walk to well

4 Crawling along the ground at 0.07 MPH which is slower than an ant stuck in jell

5 A sloth is a snail - with a knack for the sea

6 Sloths actually enjoy to swim, you see.

7 Faster in the water than on land

8 It's claws are vicious, found on the hand

9 Sleeping is a habit 2o hours a day

10 And to a sloth, those 20 hours keep the doctor away.

11 To many a sloth is smelly, gross, and lame

12 But to me a sloth is unique, interesting, and insane!

13 Their fur is a camouflage against their enemies

14 Like a sniper in a bush it becomes one with the environment

15 The way of the sloth is gentle and kind

16 And when a person is angry they should keep that in mind

17 A sloth never hurts anyone not even a fly

18 They go through life not wishing anyone to die

19 Next time you're angry control your rage

20 And maybe you'll be calmer, like a sloth.

Limerick -- Man From New York

There once was a man in New York

Who believed his mom was a dork

She wore lame attire,

Was often a lair

and had a collection of forks

Tanka -- Walnut Hockey

Cold as an ice bath

The rinks are ready to go

The sticks are all taped

The skates are knives in the ice

Walnut, oh how I missed you

Middle of No-Where, Alaska

I woke up to the sound of a floatplane flying over our camp. We were finally headed home. The crisp morning air greeted me as I exited the tent to grab a quick breakfast and hot chocolate to warm my core. My bags are packed, and I hop on a fishing boat for my return to the real world. Looking forward to a fresh pair of clothes and a hot shower, I doze off to the sights of acres of trees, lakes, and rivers rolling by my plane window.

Seven days earlier, I arrived at the fishing camp the same way I was leaving it. My dad, brother, my friend and his family were dropped more than 300 miles outside of civilization, on the Mulchatna River located in the heart of Alaska. Teeming with wild life (including an excess of mosquitoes), our campsite was about as rugged as it gets – hard sided tents to sleep in, with a kitchen and dining tent surrounding the massive fire pit that burned day and night.

The smell of bacon and eggs wafting through the campsite wakes me early every morning and beckons me to the dining tent. After scarfing down a quick breakfast, we are directed down to the bank of the river where the fishing guides take us up and down the river to catch our lunch. The biggest prize is the King Salmon, reigning over the Sockeye Salmon, Char Trout, Chum Salmon, Rainbow Trout, and Grayling Salmon. A catching (or, at least trying) lunch, the guides cook up a delicious shore lunch consisting of fresh fish, and fried potatoes, carrots, and onions mixed together to form a delicious “Shore Lunch Salad”.

After returning to the river for an afternoon of fishing, we head back to camp to get a pair of dry clothes on and take advantage of some down time. My friend and I liked to take this opportunity to explore the scenery surrounding our home base. We witnessed a mother Eagle feeding its young, discovered deer antlers, followed herds of wild Caribou, and spotted bear feces. Trekking into the untamed wilderness made me comprehend that there are places all around the world where very few humans ever step foot on, including the place I was experiencing.

Dinnertime around camp was one of the most relaxing and beautiful times of day. When it is usually getting dark in every normal place in the word, Alaska is still almost as bright as day. When the sun finally sets, it is near 2 o’clock in the morning, and as the sun falls beneath the mountains in the distance, all of nature seems to stop, creating one of the most spectacular sights in the entire world.

Back to my floatplane ride home, I see the Iliamna airport in the distance. From there it’s another small plane ride to Anchorage and then on to Minnesota. The gorgeous scenery surrounds you in every part of Alaska and it is a truly amazing place.

My time disconnected from the rest of the world was an amazing experience, and the natural beauty of the area fostered memories that will last a lifetime. However, my bed has never felt more comfortable than that first night back home.

The Town Movie Review

The Town, directed by Ben Afleck Starring Ben Afleck, Rebecca Hall, and Jon Hamm, follows the story of a group of bank robbers, led by Doug McCray. Doug and the rest of his motley crew live and grew up in Charlestown, Massachusetts, the world’s capital of bank robbers, and car thieves. As the gang prepares for their next bank robbery, McCray gets involved with a lady witness from his last bank job. The two grow close, and soon she becomes a danger to his operations as a notorious criminal.

The Town can be described as a drama, action or thriller film and it fulfills all of those descriptions. However, a definite part of the story has to deal with love, and this surprised me. One might think it is impossible to mix a love story in with a bunch of bank robbers, but The Town pulls its off perfectly. This movie even showed me that even criminals try to live normal lives, and that love is for everyone, not just the perfect citizens of the world.

This movie reminded me of a few different movies and seemed to combine their best aspects into one movie. The Town is a cross between The Departed, with its Boston-based story, and a plethora of Irish-Americans committing crimes with local police units and detectives on their tale, and The Bank Job, with its ingenious bank-robbing plots and intense, inter-city car chases. This combination of movies creates an excellent balance of heart-pounding action paired with heart-warming scenes to please everyone in the audience.

Overall, I really enjoyed The Town, and I suggest that anyone who enjoys bank-robbing, car –chasing , love story intertwined action will thoroughly enjoy this movie. On a scale of one to ten, I would rate this movie a 9/10, and from one to five stars, I award The Town a 4/5.

Story Arc - Light to Dark

The kids strolled into the park, accompanied by their parents, and signed in for day one of a weeklong lacrosse camp. Sitting at the check-in desk was all of the coaches for the week of lacrosse camp. As one kid approached, a specific coach acknowledged him with a less-than-friendly greeting, "Sup bender?" This type of treatment towards a kid in the camp is usually not accepted. However, an encounter like this between brothers is not uncommon at all. Timmy punches his brother, Pete, for the comment and moves on to get dressed with his friends.

Like most little brothers, Timmy did not want to listen to Pete, even though it was Pete's job to teach the players about lacrosse and demonstrate the basic skills to them. At first, Timmy would yell at Pete when he tried to give Timmy a pointer during a drill, or give him a tip on how to increase his shot velocity. Then once Tim didn’t listen to Pete and continued to struggle, he just got more frustrated and began yelling at Pete for no reason. Even when Tim began to realize that Pete was right from the beginning, he would not admit it and continued to try and do things the way he wanted to. His stubbornness and pride clouded his vision and prevented him from seeing that Pete was trying to simply help him and improve his skills. As the day went on, Pete stopped giving Tim any tips at all because he had come to realize that Timmy would not listen to anything he said.

As the week went on, Timmy began to hear some of the same suggestions that Pete had given him from other coaches. Except, when he heard these tips from someone other than his brother, he immediately began to practice the new techniques. Oblivious to Timmy, Pete had been watching this the whole time, and in fact had asked a co-coach to tell Tim some suggestions because he knew that Timmy would listen to other people. Although Pete was a little disappointed that Timmy would not take tips or listen to him, Pete was still excited to see Timmy improve and learn some new skills to help improve his game.

Over the final few days, Timmy became more and more confident in his game, and improved greatly. Fast-forward to the final day of camp, and the championship scrimmage is taking place. The game is tied and Timmy is up next to take the face-off. Being a face-off specialist himself, Pete wanted to give Timmy one final reminder about how to win the draw cleanly. Surprisingly, Timmy actually didn’t yell at Pete when he made his suggestion and Tim promised to try it right now. Timmy went out to the face-off X and won the draw, which lead to a fast break and the game-winning goal. Timmy looked back and smiled at Pete, who smiled right back. In the end, Timmy was able to put aside his pride and realized that even though Pete was his brother, it was ok for him to listen to his brother because Pete had a lot of valuable insight into the sport.

Hoarding: Burried Alive

Hoarding is a serious, and very prevalent problem in today's society. Often times, after a serious life-altering accident or experience, a person begins to hoard things as a way to hold on to past memories. Without proper help, a house can soon be consumed by a tide of things.

As I come home from hockey, my mom beckons me to the family room. I glance at the TV and lay eyes on a house filled to the brim with clothing, furniture, boxes, and tons of other knick-knacks. A person begins to stock up on accessories and the next thing they know, years have past and full sections in the house have been overrun with what most people would consider junk.

Hoarding is dangerous to one's health, and it severely affects the lives of the people living in a hoarded house, not to mention the the lives of family and friends close to a hoarder. It is often hard for family members or friends to tell a hoarder they have a problem and need to throw things out because the hoarder holds such personal significance on all of their possessions.

Not only is hoarding devastating to an individual and people around an individual, but the economy and businesses and a whole. When more and more people being hoarding (which is happening today), a shortage of goods follows. To combat this, companies, or even the government sets limits on the amount of a certain good that a person is able to purchase.

Without the support of professionals, and encouragement from people close to a hoarder, it is very hard for a hoarder to stop collecting things and let go of their plethora of possessions. Hoarding is a real, and growing problem in today's society, and needs to be looked at as a serious problem. Spreading the word of the horrors of hoarding, and helping out ones who struggle with the mindless acquisition of goods can help control the problem.

Accidental Lessons of Lacrosse

1. Everyone Has Their Own Style

Playing different teams from different parts of the country including New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Florida, and Texas has exposed to the different styles of play each region uses. The teams from out East have very good fundamental skills, and work well as a team. Teams from the South play a very physical game and overall play like football players. Teams from the North, like my teams, are good at improvising and making something out of nothing, along with playing a lot like hockey players. These styles of play represent the interests of different regions in our country and even how different people live their lives.

2. College Dorms Suck

Staying at universities and colleges like Rutgers, and Notre Dame displayed to me the unimpressive life as a dorm resident. The rooms are small, smelly, and stuff, making a night of solid sleep near impossible. And the community bathrooms are nothing special either.... Although I am still excited to be a college student and be living on my own, my glimpse into dorm life showed me that not everything at college is amazing.

3. Gatorade is NOT a Thirst Quencher

Many lacrosse tournaments, local and international, are sponsored by Gatorade. When teams show up to these tourneys, they are excited to have something tastier than water on the sidelines of games. However, after running around in the hot, summer sun, drinking Gatorade, then running around some more, the stuff starts to sit at the bottom of your stomach like a giant cinder block. This makes you feel slow, sluggish, and even a little nauseous. Not to mention the Gatorade makes you thirstier because of all the sugar. So for future reference, just drink the plain old water.

4. The Express Way is a Misnomer at Times

Traveling to distant fields and stadiums means a lot of time logged on classic school buses. Most of the time, the bus driver will take the fastest route which he/she believes is the freeway or highway. But it feels like every game I play in is during rush hour, and the traffic is slow. Maybe it's best to take the side roads once in a while and avoid those pesky not-so-expressways.

5. Birth Certificates May Lie

In past summers, I have faced teams with seniors in high school playing on teams supposed to be filled with high school freshmen or middle schoolers. Even though the coach claims all their players are of the correct age, almost everyone knows that the. Just like everything in life, there will always be cheaters or "rule-benders" and the only thing one can do about them is to just focus on your own task or job and do your best.


Who knew that a person could learn so many valuable (or at least interesting) life lessons while playing a simple sport like lacrosse.

Creative Writing - Picture Diary

Packing the buses full of suitcases for Camp Pyro is not my favorite way to start a day. However, for the past 3 summers I have been a counselor for one week each summer. I have always had a great time at camp but this past summer was a little different. My brother, Timmy was coming to camp for the first time and I was excited to spend time with him in a new environment. As my mom dropped off Timmy, he threw his bags at me and told me to put them in the trailer - happy to boss me around for once. Not willing to let Tim get his way, and knowing the perfect way to aggravate him, I told him to pack his own bag unless he wanted to sit in the trailer all the way up to camp. Acting in his usual fashion, He wound up for a big punch and slugged me in the arm (the feeling is similar to a mosquito landing on one's arm). And me, acting in my usual fashion, laughed at him for getting so upset so easily and told him I would pack the bags.

Even though I know every single thing that makes Timmy get riled up, I only use them when he asks for it and for the most part we get along very well. He is my best friend and not only do we have many of the same interests, we do tons of activities together.

Up at camp, I led a cabin of fourth grade boys (the same age as Tim) through various activities and games like an oatmeal fight, trips to the waterslide, and capture the flag. However, the week went by in a flash, and before I knew it I was loading up the buses again - watching my back for any sneak attacks from Timmy. We would be home soon and be yearning to start up a fresh new mini-stick tournament.