A Note from the Editor

Daily Chuckle: say these ten times fast -

The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.

In the boat, a row erupted amongst the oarsmen about how to row.

The buck does funny things when the does are present.

A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.

Thought Thief:

“The first and great commandment is: don’t let them scare you.” – Elmer Davis

Words of Wisdom:

Thanks Elmer Davis…but who is it that shouldn’t scare us exactly?

Seriously – who or what scares you? And why? Some of you may have a genuinely terrifying phobia, one you’re completely justified in having. Then there’s the bundle of pointless fears we carry around with us, those that cause us to fret incessantly and form those annoyingly permanent worry lines on our foreheads. Back in the day, (say the beginning of freshman year), I was afraid of having anything less than a 5.0 GPA. I was afraid of disappointing my teachers with mediocrity. Fast-forward two years and I was afraid of taking my first online class. Skip ahead one more year and I was afraid of not getting into college. There are reasonable explanations for those fears – competition in high school can get nasty, NCVPS is daunting to begin with, colleges seem to be increasingly selective in who they admit. But are the fears themselves reasonable? According to Elmer Davis, no, not at all. Because if we have faith in ourselves and our ability to succeed, those fears should be swiftly eradicated.

You may have received that glorious A once and become closely acquainted with D’s ever since. If you shift your mentality though, and trust that, if you apply yourself, that A can be hanging on your fridge again, it will happen. You may have been rejected from twenty colleges. If you shift your mentality and stop viewing universities as cold, heartless entities that didn’t deserve you anyway, your perspective will brighten – a lot. Maybe college isn’t for you – maybe you’ll wind up working for an incredible international agency in Europe because of a connection you meet on a summer holiday. Davis isn’t implying that fear is wrong. He’s reminding us that most of the time, our fears inhibit us from seeing the bigger picture. When fear consumes us, we’re unable to realize our potential and that’s a sad thing. Disney and Marvel Comics may have a strong monopoly on the fairytale, but we can create our own fairytales, our own stories, if we tackle our fears head on.