Saturday, May 19, 2018

Chemistry - Week 2

Thoughts on one of our class discussions
I get this uncomfortable feeling in my stomach when we talk about the synthetic elements. Why do we bother making them? I feel like we're playing with fire. What are the uses of these unstable elements? I think we have enough harmful elements that occur naturally that we don't seem to have a firm grasp on. We should probably focus on that and curbing/reversing the destruction we've already done.

Exploring my carbon footprint..
I am not the kind of person who likes to go out much, so I find it pointless to have a car, especially since I live in San Francisco. I have always been conscious of wasting gas and adding to the pollution since I was a kid, so I didn't like to ask for rides unless I needed them. When I've had a car, I mostly didn't use it every day and didn't really go far. When it comes to gas usage, I think I have contributed little to the carbon in the air.

As a consumer, I don't buy much. I rarely order things online and I barely buy things unless it's food. I can't buy local produce because I don't have space in my tiny shared fridge for big leafy greens and fennel. Also, I don't have a kitchen, so cooking in my set up is a hassle and I don't have time and fresh produce ends up rotting before I can get to them. In the end, I at least waste less when I buy frozen vegetables. They're probably not locally grown though and some of it has been shipped from Mexico and Turkey. I don't buy clothes often, but I am lazy about shopping and I just go where I know the sizes and quality is relatively consistent (Gap) and I wait for a sale so I can stock up if I can afford to. I think this is where I contribute the most since whatever I'm buying is being shipped over from here and there, but again, I only buy what I need, I try to make what I have stretch, and I end up having little waste week to week.



Friday, May 11, 2018

Chemistry - Week 1 Bio

Hello,

I'm Emily. I'm a San Francisco native. I was going to school for court reporting right after high school, but decided after a few years that it did not fit into my personality. I felt like if I continued, I wouldn't get a chance to grow into the kind of person I'd like to be, so I scrapped the idea and started my aimless, bumbling journey to "find myself". I started with just working whatever jobs I could get until I kept getting sick, injured, and/or break down. After it became a bad cycle of panicking and quitting my jobs sooner and sooner, I became a caregiver knowing I wouldn't quit if I were taking care of someone (rather than a corporation). It was a wonderful and short run. Two years into it, I lost my friend. Around that time, I started learning more about myself and how to trust my intuition. I decided after she passed, it was time to give myself time to heal from past traumas and really get to know myself. From that point on, I used whatever helpful hints that trickled into my little world that felt true and tested them out to see what really worked for me. I learned a lot, but it always feels so little in the grand scheme of things. I can't describe what exactly I learned very well. It just feels like subtle ether to me.

Anyway, in all that time, I had become increasingly reluctant to leave the house and be around people. I did not want to go outside unless I was getting groceries. It was partly why I ended up quitting my retail jobs. It took about 4 years to start trying to venture out a little and socialize minimally and try working again. I picked and delivered groceries until I began breaking down again and so did my car. It took at least another year for me to feel like I could try again. I then worked very hard for almost two years before I knew I was physically breaking myself and I had to stop again. The search for another job made me feel like I just didn't fit anywhere in this world.

This is the point where my mom had a talk with me. She told me she has thought about it for a long time and she knew I couldn't do what everyone else does and be happy and healthy. She said I should go back to her clinic and continue practicing the auricular therapy she taught me. I gave it some thought and told her I would just want to know more after a while. I didn't have the foundation to understand more or the certification to practice anything other than auricular therapy, so I thought I should get that done first so... and here I am.