Reflections On Turning Eighteen

Eighteen is a landmark age. It seems so… old!! 

If I so desired, I could smoke cigarettes, have an unrestricted driver’s license, and join the military without my parents’ permission! Such exciting times.

            Unlike most teenagers however, I find myself looking at my birthday with a little sadness and apprehension. So much is expected of us eighteen year-olds in the adult world… So many standards have been set for the things I am supposed to have accomplished, the challenges I am supposed to have faced, the degrees and accreditation I am supposed to have earned. Why so much pressure on living? Why does everyone I meet find it imperative to know where I’m going to college, if I am driving, if I am working, when I finish high school, if I have a boyfriend; what exactly the blueprint for my future looks like? I don’t understand why They feel like They have a right to critique my choices as a neo-adult, just because I seem to have survived another 365 days on this planet we call Earth. From whence springs this attitude?

            Funnily enough, I display the same attitude towards other eighteen-year olds… “What are you going to do with your life? That? Oh, that’s… interesting…” - while the script in my thought bubble is running something like this… “What an idiot. He/she will never get anywhere in life.” Then again, where exactly are all us teens supposed to be “going” in life anyway? The Ivies?

       
 This mentality, this emphasis on SAT scores and diplomas and degrees and GPAs and titles, is undoubtedly not an exclusively American attitude, but it seems to seriously pervade American culture and living more than any other nation’s. I never noticed it before high school, but as soon as my freshman year began, I started to hear and perceive this attitude everywhere, even, eventually, in myself. Americans really are obsessed with the idea of legitimacy – whether you can prove “it” by official-looking papers or sheets of numbers doesn’t matter, as long as you can prove “it.” One of my favorite movies, Catch Me If You Can, makes much fun of this attitude – its famous and appropriate phrase is, “looking at the pinstripes”… Do we not all look at the pinstripes, the letters after the name, the biographies, the test results, the uniform… just a little too hard, while excluding the important things - the conversation, the personality, the good deeds, the speech…? As I reflect on turning eighteen, I become conscious of this exclusion more than ever.

            These pinstripers believe, not so much that you are what you have done, but that you are the hoop through which you have jumped, like a circus dog or something.  These pinstripers can be partially excused for this mentality for two reasons – a), in some cases, there really is no way of measuring a person’s ability and intelligence from a distance unless they pass a certain standardized test that will give the tester some idea as to what the testee is capable of: and b) because, to a certain extent, tests such as the SAT, or college degrees such as the master’s, do prove that you have worked hard to do well and obtain a certain legitimacy. But in many ways They have taken this rationale too far… as have many of us. I believe firmly that institutions such as public school have only exacerbated the shallowness and rigidity of this approach.

           It isn’t only outside pressure that causes me apprehension about my maturing age… It is the realization of how time marches on and we are powerless to stop, or to even slow, its winding course. I realize of course that I have my entire life in front of me and that it’s pointless to moan about having one foot in the grave when I’m only eighteen. But it is good for us, whether we are eight years old or eighty, to occasionally stop and contemplate the futility and terminality of this play we call Life, on this stage we call World, in which, as Shakespeare famously put it, we are but actors. Looking back upon my first act, I realize that I have some regrets, along with a bit of wistfulness – after all, I can never get that time back, and that is somewhat a depressing thought.

            When I think about being older, sometimes it frightens me. This is because it seems as though an older “me” won’t really be “me” at all – that in reality I am who I am now, and when I become an old woman, it will be like I am disguised as someone I’m not. This idea of course, like all fear, is illogical. Though I was Anna when I was eight, I am still Anna ten years later, and I will still be Anna when I am twenty-eight, no matter how much my persona has altered. If our powerlessness to halt Time is a problem, the solution is to make the most of the Time we do have, and to “let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change.” Is that not all we can do?

            So, I conclude these musings with excitement, for eighteen is an exciting age, on the brink of the real adult world, full of promise and uncertainties and hopeful dreams. My personality is virtually formed. Hopefully I possess that common sense which is, according the Einstein, “the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen."
And to put this excitement into yet another quote, this one by my favorite poet….

 “So many worlds, so much to do, so little done, such things to be!” 

A Post for Thanksgiving

“Enjoy the little things, for one day you make look back and realize they were the big things.” ~Robert Brault

                                                            

As we meditate on our deepest and most miraculous blessings, we shouldn't forget the common everyday things that we must also be thankful for... Sometimes it is those things that make who we are and how we view our days. Here is a list of 50 little things for which I am grateful.....

1. Cinnamon in my coffee.

2. A smile and friendly “hi!” from a stranger.

3. When my inbox is full.

4. Buzz.

5. A good book on a rainy day.

6. Quoting movie lines.

7. An extra-long hug from a friend.

8. Being able to concentrate in prayer.

9. Whoever invented Fig Newtons.

10. Funny chat statuses.

11. The smell of toast.

12. Laughing out loud at my friends’ witty emails.

13. Slippers.

14. Coming into a warm room from the cold outdoors.

15. Taking off a pair of socks or stockings I’ve worn all day.

16. Writing with a good, inky pen.

17. Scarves :)

18. Dessert my sister made.

19. Snow falling at night.

20. When my current favorite song is playing on the radio.

21. Computer backgrounds and ipod wallpapers

22. Ankle-deep leaves on the street.

23. When people laugh at my jokes.

24. Crawling into clean sheets.

25. Waking up with a song in my head.

26. Mascara.

27. Guests at the Shabbat table.

28. Challah.

29. Birthday surprises.

30. Previews.

31. When my friends think I composed a saying by my favorite author.

32. Inside jokes.

33. Soundtracks.

34. Latin quotes.

35. “How It Should Have Ended” videos.

36. Unique words.

37. Sunsets.

38. Reading old stories I forgot I wrote.

39. Mozart symphonies.

40. Watching three (or four….) movies in a row at night.

41. Smiling in bed when remembering funny memories.

42. Dancing when no one is looking.

43. Bossing adults around at cycling class :)

44. Understanding something when everyone else is confused.

45. Laughing at The People of WalMart

46. Good poetry.

47. Hardback books.

48. Writing the “pi” symbol.

49.  Sand between my toes.

50. When Scarlett falls asleep purring in my lap. 

Senior Thesis - Proof Three, Parts One & Two

The Right of the Jews to the Land of Israel, Proof III

Meritorious Right

The Jewish nation not only possesses the right of military conquest and historical ownership, but the right of merit as well. Under the hands of the Jews the land of Israel has blossomed from a bare desert to a prosperous nation in a short 64 years. Since 1948 Israel has developed into a country with more companies in NASDAQ than all of Europe combined, ranking third after the U.S. and China; in 2008, it had more than twice the global venture capital of the U.S., 30 times that of Europe and 80 times that of China. (Student Life, Dan Senor Speaks About Israel’s Economic Success by Becky Prager.) This is merely one of many statistics proving, in simple black-and-white fact, that the Jews have earned their right to possess Israel.

Merit, according to definition, is “the quality or actions that constitute the basis of one’s rewards or punishments.” Our fundamental sense of justice, an innate part of every human being’s consciousness, creates an awareness of what we and others deserve for our actions. The idea of justice is also an important concept in the history of human rights, something for which wars have been fought, laws have been passed, violence has been perpetrated, and philosophies have been formed. I don’t attempt to argue that, because the Jews suffered the horrors of the Holocaust in the mid-twentieth century, they deserve a land of their own, though it certainly should be compensation. Rather, the fact that Israel’s economy has flourished since 1948 proves that they are amply capable of its care, representing the only democracy in the tempestuous Mideast.

1.) Economic History of prosperity

Economically Israel’s recent history has been characterized by growth and prosperity. During the British Mandate as Britain was preparing to hand Israel over to the Jews, their economical and political systems developed separately from those of the Palestinians’; Israel experienced rapid growth during this era due to the influx of both immigrants and capital. After this, in spite of the financial challenges it faced with immediate wars, new settlements, and adjustment to new government, its transition from British territory to Jewish state went relatively smoothly. Israel introduced a New Economic Policy in 1952 and achieved an especially high growth rate from 1950 to 1965 – real GNP increased by 11% while GDP per capita grew by 6%. “Following independence, the new state’s economy was structured around three basic elements: high defense costs, mass immigration absorption, and the building of new institutions such as banks, a national insurance institute, and government agencies, all of which necessitated massive infusions of public money into the economy.” (MERIA, Middle Eastern Journal of International Affairs, Journal, Volume 6, No. 3 - September 2002, Israel’s Economic Growth; Success Without Security, by Linda Sharby.)

2.) Success Against All Odds

As demonstrated by this brief summary of Israel’s economic history, the Jews faced and overcame numerous challenges at the inception of their new state. A mere few of the numerous odds against them were; a wasteland left by centuries of foreign misrule, six wars, enemies on all sides, an economic boycott by the disgruntled Arabs, an isolated diplomacy, and monumental task of creating a new nation from scratch. “Nonetheless, Israel has a strong, modern, and diversified economy that in 2000 posted an annual Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of $104.1 billion, 40% of which consisted of exports of goods and services. Growth for 2000 reached six percent. Israel’s per capita Gross National Income (GNI) for 2000, at almost $17,000, placed the state ahead of Spain, Portugal, Greece, and New Zealand… 64-year-old Israel now ranks as a high-income economy and was identified as one of the most global emerging markets by Foreign Policy magazine’s Globalization Index. Over the past decade, Israel’s high-technology industry, second only to California’s Silicon Valley in concentration of firms, powered economic growth and attracted massive Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to the country, a figure that reached $4.4 billion in 2000.” (MERIA, Middle Eastern Journal of International Affairs, Journal, Volume 6, No. 3 - September 2002, Israel’s Economic Growth; Success Without Security, by Linda Sharby.)

As Mr. Wohstetter of the American Spectator points out in his article Israeli Exceptionalism, the United States at its inception was faced with none of Israel’s challenges – America was a land rich in natural resources, protected by two oceans, and populated by a few primitive Indian tribes, yet it took a full century to progress from George Washington’s inauguration to the “final frontier.” “Along the way, America had time to develop and prosper, shielded from the destructive wars of monarchical Europe, until in 1917 it came to the rescue of a Europe attempting to commit suicide.

“Israel had no such luxury. Shooting started the very night that news of the November 29, 1947 UN partition resolution reached the Mideast, and continued through Israel's May 14, 1948 proclamation of statehood. Sixty-three years of unremitting Arab hostility have followed. Israel is a tiny island surrounded by more than one-quarter of a billion Arabs, virtually none of whom think there should be a single Jew in the Mideast.” (The American Spectator, Israeli Exceptionalism, by John D. Wohlstetter.)  

 In 1867, 81 years before the Jews took possession, American author Mark Twain described the Holy Land, outside of Jewish settlements: “There is not a solitary village throughout its whole extent--not for thirty miles in either direction. There are two or three small clusters of Bedouin tents, but not a single permanent habitation. One may ride ten miles hereabouts and not see ten human beings...” Yet in less than a century, under the care of the Jews, Israel became one of the most prosperous nations in the world, surpassing even highly developed countries such as the U.S. in high-tech developments, exports, sales profits, etc., especially since it shifted its economic policy from socialistic to capitalistic during the past twenty years. She ranks third in the world in the number of university graduates per capita, possesses the highest per capita number of scientists in the world, publishes the largest amount of scientific papers per capita in the world, possesses one of the lowest inflation rates during the global economic crisis (2.3 %,) and the 24^th largest economy in the world, (in spite of being the 81^st smallest country.) Israel’s economy is based on significant resources such as copper, sulfur, citrus, dairy, vegetables, poultry and beef while the industry is primarily composed of high-tech projects, along with chemical and plastic productions. This makes for a highly diversified economy, a prerequisite to political and national financial stability.

 In 64 years Israel has been forced to fight 6 full-scale defensive wars to maintain her place in the nucleus of the Middle East. Yet she has developed into one of the most industrious and fertile nations in the world. How did this happen?

“Against the backdrop of the events that typically cause Israel to be in the news …people often forget that there are normal things happening in Israel. And in many cases, extraordinary things, like the amazing performance of the Israeli economy over the past decade. Haaretz reports that the TA-25, the flagship index of the Israeli stock market, has increased forty percent in the last year. A period that has included a month of warfare, massive public discontent with the Israeli political echelon, and the takeover of Gaza by Hamas. …What accounts for this growth? A vital factor is of course the Israeli culture, which embraces entrepreneurship, risk-taking, and ingenuity… (Michael J. Totten, Middle East Journal, July 13, 2007, The Israeli Economic Miracle, by Noah Pollak)

Aside from supernatural factors, which are clearly the key to the Jews’ success, several Jewish characteristics help explain how they overcame the monumental challenges facing their new country to meet with such results. For one thing, their enemies have been predominantly external, excepting the violent pockets of Palestinians throughout the country. Israel has never experienced a civil war, nor does it appear that she will anytime in the near future. Moreover, her military is one of the best in the world – out of necessity Israel has invested significant amounts of time, money and resources into defending her borders. “National military service is mandatory for all Israeli citizens over the age of 18, although Arab citizens are exempted if they so please and other exceptions may be made on religious, physical or psychological grounds.  Men serve three years in the IDF, while women serve two.” (Wikipedia, Israel Defense Force, Service) In 2010 Israel’s money supply decreased which could lead to stability in the long term – flooding a country with excess cash can lead to inflation, but Israel should be able to keep their inflation low. (MoneyNews.com, Israel: A Safe Haven of Economic Prosperity by Jacob Wolinsky) 

All of these practical factors contributed to Israel’s unexpected economical success. From a pragmatic point of view, the Jews overcame impossible odds by mustering their available resources and indefatigable Jewish ingenuity to make their nation one of the most prosperous leaders in the world today. Contrast their country to Cyprus, which was likewise ruined by Turkish rule, yet stands far beneath Israel in terms of financial success. Cyprus’ climate and agriculture are very similar to Israel’s. Perhaps the different nationalities occupying these territories have something to do with this contrast.