Making Mom and Dad Proud (with a little help from Drew Barrymore)

By: Alex

Graphic by Emily

At one point in my glorious years of being a teenage girl, I realized that I could make my own decisions. While struggling to figure out who I am, I thought getting the chance to make decisions on my own was just what I needed to find the answers to everything I questioned. Though I still don't have it all figured out, it felt good to know that I had the independence to try to find my own answers without being doubted by others. But I reached a problem when I realized that, though this independence made me happy, I still had other people in my life that I also wanted to be happy. I couldn’t decide things with only myself in mind because I still wanted to make my parents proud.

When I had this second realization, it made trying to grow up a whole lot harder. Just when I thought I was getting closer to figuring things out, I got set back again. How could I choose a path that made me happy while also giving my parents something to be proud of?

I kept this question in the back of my mind, hoping to eventually find a solution. And as I usually do when I’m lost and thinking too much, I started watching movies. After lots of time with quality coming of age stories (my usual watch) I came across Drew Barrymore’s Whip It, and I realized that I was watching the problem I was so bothered by come to life on my television screen. In this film, a teenager, Bliss (Ellen Page) struggles with growing up, getting pushed around in school, working a crappy job, and longing for self-confidence. Her mother pushes her into participating in beauty pageants, but each time Bliss stands on stage, she knows that being a pageant queen is not what she truly wants. In her attempt to find some answers, she joins a women's roller derby league. And it is there, not on stage, that she realizes who she is.

Though my dream does not involve participating on a roller derby team, it’s almost as if Drew made this movie with me in mind. Like Bliss, I struggled with trying to follow my passions while also doing what my parents wanted. It’s hard to figure out who you are when you don’t have any freedom to try new things. Bliss struggled with her identity because her mother only let her do one thing--be a pageant queen. Once Bliss got out into the real world and followed her passions (which just happened to involve roller derby), she found herself. And though she finally fell into her element, Bliss still recognized the importance of making her parents proud.

The greatest thing about this movie is that, even though Bliss did her own thing, when her parents saw her confidence on the roller rink, they realized their true happiness, because their daughter was so happy. And when Bliss saw the pleasure in her parents’ eyes, she realized that she had made her parents proud, just by being herself.

So, what did watching this movie teach me about about my life? I learned that things work out, in unconventional ways. You can do both. It doesn’t have to be that difficult. It is possible to live your dreams and make your parents proud. It took Drew Barrymore to put it in perspective for me, but I realized how true to life her movie really was. I couldn’t imagine sacrificing my dreams to please someone else. I have to be passionate about what I do to be happy. But I couldn’t imagine my parents being anything less than proud of me if they knew I was happy, no matter what I was doing.

I walked away from Whip It with a new sense of freedom and pride. I am happiest when I follow my passions and when I make my parents proud, and now I know that I can do both without having to sacrifice one for the other. One day, I’ll have thank Drew for helping me out with that insight.

Almost Famous: A Story of the Uncool

By: Alex

Art by Alex 

If I got a call today from Rolling Stone magazine saying that they wanted me to write a story about my favorite band, I would feel so cool. If I got the same call and got to go on tour with that band as part of the reporting experience, I would feel even cooler and probably die. A situation like that is just so incredibly cool that it’s only something I can dream about. But for William Miller, the main character in Cameron Crowe’s movie, Almost Famous, that situation is a reality. As a teenager, William gets to tour with one of America’s biggest bands and then write a story about them for Rolling Stone. So cool. But even though William earns this amazing opportunity, the movie still portrays him as being completely uncool. No matter how hard he tries, because he is so different from everyone else his age, he never achieves the level of cool that everyone around him possesses.

So, with such an amazing life, how is it that William Miller can be perceived as so uncool? As a fellow member of the ‘uncool’ populous, I can safely say that the fact that William is so different from everyone his age is what prevents him from being cool. In school, as I was growing up, it was all about fitting in, not standing out. If you were creative, talented or unique, no one really cared. The only people who got noticed (ironically) were the ordinary kids, the ones who were deemed the cool kids. I never liked that. I never liked that the most talented and amazing people at school always went unnoticed because they were too different from the in-crowd. Those uncool kids were the kids I admired, the kids I wanted to be friends with. In my eyes, the different, uncool kids were the coolest ones at school. So, I can say that for William, who is even more awesome than anyone at my school, his uniqueness isn’t what makes him uncool, it’s what makes him cooler than I’ll ever be.

In the film, William has everything but the ordinary high school experience. Growing up in a small town, coddled by his mother, William barely knew who he was or what he wanted out of life. Because of his background, he never got the chance to express himself to discover who he was.  Then one day, a sample of his writing catches the eye of Rolling Stone magazine, and William is given the opportunity to tour with Still Water (a fictional Led Zeppelin-like band) as part of a new writing gig. As a 15 year old, he didn’t really know much of how the world worked. But through his time on the road, he was able to find himself. He fell in love, made new friends, and saw relationships blossom and fall apart. While being in the center of the 1970s rock n roll scene, he saw things he would have never experienced while living in his small town.

He worked with musicians, band managers, reporters, editors and rock fans, and each of them helped to show him what life outside high school was like. By the end of the movie, I was regretting the fact that I was not, myself, William Miller. And though, in the end, he is still deemed uncool, I saw William as the coolest kid ever. His experiences were so unique and life changing.

Of course, I understood why the movie portrayed him as uncool, even after his amazingly awesome experiences on the road. It happened for the same reasons that it happened in my high school. Cameron Crowe could not have done a better job at portraying real life. William is different (though awesome), so he will always be uncool, just like all the kids at my high school who played in a band or wrote poetry or painted artwork.

But no matter how long William is deemed uncool, he can say that his uniqueness is what gave him his identity, just like all the other creative, uncool kids out there. Who else could say that they had the opportunity to write for one of America’s biggest magazines, tour with one of America’s biggest bands and take part in such a large part of America’s pop culture? William’s experiences were a great way to grow up, find himself, and discover his passions. And that is something to be proud of.

William Miller is cool. And when I say that, I mean he’s actually cool. He’s cool for being who he is and daring to be different and following his heart. William has lived my dream at age 15, (an age that has quite sadly passed me by), because he had the courage to be unique/uncool. He has done more in his teenage years than many people will ever do in their lives. William found a purpose, he wrote a story that reached millions, and with the passion he had behind writing and music, he was able to grow up in very awesome way. William Miller is the coolest kid I’ll ever know of, his story will always be one of my inspirations. There is hope for the uncool.