Who Are You?

I am troubled to find out that many, many people don't know who they are. Of course, they know their names and origin, but they don't understand their purpose.

Ask yourself, "What would the world be like if I died right this instant? "

Say you fell over right now, and somehow drifted over your body, still able to see the world after you have lost touch with it. What would you see?

You should see overtime, all the lives you have touched through your years. You should realize how great your influence was, but what kind of influence was it? Did you inspire others or tear them down? Were you a friend or an enemy?

Many people are concerned with where they will go after death, but at the moment I'm more concerned with life. I don't wish to spend my life mulling over what I'll do when I'm dead, but rather what I'll do until my time has come.

In my life I aspire to pursue a career or writing fantastic tales of magic realism and continue my quest of being the best person I can. I try to inspire and be a friend, but I am naturally driven away from unpleasant(rude or cruel) people. I feel if I live my life in the pursuit of happiness and the spread of happiness, then I am serving my purpose. That is who I am.

I am alive and will continue to live with more than just an 'existence.' I will live the most fascinating life on brink of insanity.


This is who I have become.

A Tilting Universe

"I'm not young enough to know everything."
-Oscar Wilde

I enjoy life the most when I am at a point where I think I have the world figured out, and then something I realize I know nothing at all. I cherish these moments the most because I appreciate everything I do know and love all at once. It is also in these moments that I can feel I'm truly living.

This tilted universe never fails to fascinate me and there is no room for boredom - only epiphany.


What fascinates you?

The Lovely Unseen

"Beauty is a characteristic of a person, animal, place, object, or idea, that provides a perceptual experience of pleasure, meaning, or satisfaction."

When I describe someone I describe the differences of that particular person and what makes them singular.

Example:
She has blue eyes with widely stretching eyelashes and although she's very quiet she seems to observe everything - each detail is caught in her wide eyes.

-This is something I observe as a beautiful trait. An unobserved life, or unexamined life, is not worth living. When we die, our bodies fade away because the beauty that was inside has left.

But what is that beauty? It is many things, each of which depend on what you've done in your life to bring you to your current place.

What has made your personality is not just personal preferences like taste or enjoyment of romance movies over action. You are made up by your experiences - your history. But what has outwardly affected you (abusive parents, loving parents, born into poverty, personal illness...etc.) is only a small factor of your history. Your history is remembered from how you interpret events or people or ideas.

Example:
You are eating lunch at a table assemble of a few of your friends and some other people whom you are only associated with while at school. All of a sudden one girl starts giggling and whispers across the table to a second girl, sharing her laughter. But their is a dark tinge to their laughter and one girl(typically unpopular) gets an expression on her face that resembles dread and her eyes glass over. This girl was closer than you were to the whispering, giggling girls and most likely heard the cause of their amusement.
The bell rings and the two girls are still giggling and sharing their amusement with their other friends. And you watch the dreary-eyed girl slump out of her seat and quickly trudge away from the giggling girls.
What would you do?
Would you follow the dreary-eyed girl?
Would you tell her, "I don't know what they were laughing about, but I just want you to know that I'm your friend and I have a kind sense of humor." and make her into the starry-eyed girl?



I view girls who find enjoyment at the expense of other's happiness as ugly people.

My mother will say, "Stop being ugly," when she is telling someone to halt in rude actions or comments.

I see beauty as action to help others without seeking reward. Beauty gives you a pleasant sensation when you see it being done or act it out yourself.

Remember, you first learn how to use your sense when you're only a child, but it take true growth and development to see things with your mind.

Junior Year

I have now attended school for seven days, but am already starting to feel drained of energy. In place of my drained energy I have been filled with new knowledge. It's difficult to explain how school at HSHS is this year unless I show you.

My schedule for 2010-2011:

On Tuesdays and Thursdays:
7:00a.m. - 7:55a.m. TOK(theory of knowledge) class with Mr. Logan(For more information, please refer to blog post entitled with his name.) [TOK is only on Tuesdays and Thursdays (Thank goodness!)]

School is now in session:
1st - IB English 11 with the charming and youthful Ms. Henderson
2nd - Pre-Cal/Trig. with the literal Mrs. Horn
3rd - IB Chemistry II with the horse-loving Ms. Griffin
4th - IB HOTA I(History of the Americas) with the brilliant, inspiring, and terrifying Dr. Low
Lunch B
5th - IB Biology I with the down-to-earth, popularly loved, Ms. Geoffreon
6th - IB French III with the worldly and amusing Mr. Hughley
7th - Library Assitant with the crafty new high school librarian, Mrs. Keys

As you can tell my schedule is packed. My seventh period and lunch are the only chances I get to catch my breath throughout the day.
But school is for learning, not breaks, and this year has responded to my wishes for more rigorous classes.
I enjoy being challenged, although I may not recognize it at the time.

This is also an excuse as to why my blog has been lacking in posts, but that is soon to change.
You have my word.

Atlanta, GA!

From Monday, May 31 until Saturday, June 5, I was out of state. Most of the time was spent in Atlants/Marietta, GA, but I got to see the ocean too.
The oil hadn't reached Tybee Island so I spent and evening and early morning in the ocean. I hope the oil doesn't scar that beauty forever. The time I got to spend at the ocean was a beautiful reminder of how much I love the salty breeze and smooth crashing of waves. My mom told me while we were there that when I was a child if I wasn't in the ocean, I was staring at it. That's all I could do while I was there: stare.

The ocean was the only wonder of my vacation though. On June 2, I got to meet three lovely people: Kim Harrison, Aprilynne Pike, and Ellen Schreiber. All three are authors and I went to see them after reading Aprilynne's blog about her tour dates. She is one of my favorite authors ("Wings" and " Spells"). She gave me a bracelet, a button, and confidence in my writing. I learned after meeting them all, that they are just like me. We all share the begginning of reading a book that didn't turn out like we wanted it to. When we read the book we thought of a different way things could've gone and originally start writing just so we can hear the story we want to hear. We're somewhat selfish, I guess, but imaginative all the same. Even though I didn't get a picture WITH any of them(thanks to a dissappearing mom), I couldn't help but walk away with a smile. I'm so glad I got to meet Kim, Aprilynne, and Ellen and I hope that that meeting will not be our last. Hopefully, one day I'll get to be on a tour like they shared because my books will be cherished as theirs are.
Wouldn't that be lovely?

Good Day!

Today has proved itself to be a fantastic day! Not only is it closer to June 2 (the day I get to meet Aprilynne Pike!!!!), but today I brought mini cupcakes to work and school that I made the night before. They were "so good you don't need milk,"(Baylee) which is considered the epitome of complements in the chef world apparently.... I didn't just bring the cupcakes to work because I felt like it! Miss Baylee's 14th birthday is tomorrow! And Baylee is a cherished volunteer at the library with her witty puns and lively laugh. I also brought her a fanci-fied copy of the first 12 chapters of my book with glittery letter on the front and everything! After work, me, Katie, and Baylee all went to Scoops where we enjoyed some of the finest(and expensive) iced cream!Yum!
At school my cupcakes were appreciated along with my new modeling pictures!(Photgraphed by Stephany Stefan) Stephany gave me a CD with 10 pictures she edited from the photoshoot on May, 8th and I quickly pulled them up and showed them to all my friends. My favorite being 'The Narcissist'(above). There's nothing that could've dampered my mood today; it was just so great!

Yeah, life is good.

*Although I may portray an evil villain in plays and a narcissist in pictures, I assure everyone that I'm not that. As a person, I like to think of myself as being nice and caring. I do not carry the snobby air that normally comes with the territory of blonde hair.

A Good Mom

I write a lot, mostly for my book: Dreaming Beauty, but I also write short stories and essays. When I write essays it's either for school or for myself. There are certain times in my life that I want to remember. The particular thoughts and feelings at those times makes me feel that I should record them.
Here is one of my personal essays:

In every class that I've had, throughout my entire life, there has been at least one girl who has a problem. Problems in the sense that I see them consist mainly of one thing: ignorance. Many things can sprout from ignorance like anger, hatred, and the endless ability to be just plain rude. Anger and hatred are practically banned from schools, but there isn't much the staff can do about a rude child. A rude child can be sent to detention or sat in a corner, yet they never truly learn anything from their punishments. I've grown up watching these children persist into punishments. Some eventually learn how to avoid being punished or simply grow out of it all, but I believe almost every girl grows up to be mean. It's how we're raised.
We grow up seeing older girls, wishing we were them, and we watch them closely as their horomones drive them into doing crazy things. As we grow we become more and more obsessed with our appearance. That leading us to picking out the faults in other girls until we have enough insults for them to cover any bad feelings about ourselves we may harbor. Only, those insults are only a temporary cover-up.
I will not claim I did not once do this myself because there was a time when I did. Thankfully, that time has long been over, but my memory isn't so short as to forget one detail of that time.
I know everyone has once been bullied, but there are girls who can be vicious. It was in middle school that I was first exposed to the true venom of words. Sixth grade had been the worst school year of all. I hadn't known before that my clothes weren't cute or that my skin was too pale. I hadn't reliazed that my glasses were dorky or that being different was unexceptable.
Before middle school you could've told me I was a brunette and I would've believed you because I hardly ever looked into the mirror. That all changed in middle school.
I remember my first day of middle school and how traumatizing it had been for me, but there was one moment in the middle of the semester that I have always remembered the clearest.
I had been waiting outside for my mom to pick me up. I was happy to be squished onto the bench with all the other car riders rather than onto the scary bus. When I started middle school I had to ride bus 61 and walk 3 blocks home, but that day had been special. I can't remember what made it special, yet what I can recall is when my mother pulled up in her 1994 turqouise Toyota Previa. I was ashamed that it wasn't glossy like most of the other cars, so I had hurried to get in. When I had buckled my seatbelt, I looked back out the window at the remaining kids on the bench. Many were talking to their friends, all except one girl. I didn't know her name, but I knew her personality from my dance class. She was loud and obnoxious, one of the girls that the teacher shhh-ed frequently. She had short hair, glasses, and always wore something that looked like it belonged to her mother.
"Who're you looking at?" My mom had asked while she waited for the car in front of us to move.
"That girl." I had pointed to her. I was staring at her long, black boots that extended from her heel to her thigh. In middle school we didn't have much of a dress-code, but I was sure she was breaking it. "Look at what she's wearing." I had said, disgusted by how much skin she had exposed.
My mom sighed when she saw what I saw and said, "Poor thing."
"Poor thing?" I asked, surprised my mother had given sympathy to a girl who I knew to be so rude. My mother had never given me sympathy, not even when I was bleeding.
"She doesn't have a good mother." My mom had explained.
I couldn't phrase her meaning back then, but I had understood enough.
I didn't say anything after that.


I love my mom.

Mr. Logan

Sexism, unfortunately, is very common in everyday life, especially for me. At Hot Springs High there is an array of culture and diversity, this diversity flourishes throughout the students and teachers. One teacher stands out from them, not just in appearance(height and...girth), but also in opinions. This man's name is Paul Logan. He has many talents such as: photography, lecturing, an unflinching ability to get side-tracked, excessive personalities, and an endless amount of sexist jokes. Mr. Logan is a strange character.

"Every man over forty is a scoundrel."
--George Bernard Shaw

My tenth grade year has been filled with him, for he is my first period world history teacher. Every morning through this semester, I have been awakened in his class by his odd character re-enactments, loud out-bursts, and endless lectures. In Mr. Logan's world history class I have learned many things that will certainly prepare me for the world.

"Mr. Logan," I said in a serious tone one morning. "One day I'm going to rule the world and when I do you'll remember this day."
Mr. Logan's calm expression reflected mine, that morning and remained constant in his reply of, "It's comical that you think a woman could do anything."
"I certainly hope you live to see the world under my rule and still have a mind that could remember that you were proved wrong."

Obviously, I do not plan on world domination being my future career, although it does sound quite charming.... My future career plan is to become a successful author, actress, and/or model. If not all, one will always be a dream come true(with the exception of modeling) and proof that I have succeeded in my life. I am not following what is set out for me, but what I feel good at and enjoy because I think a successful life is one in the pursuit and gain of happiness. While every man dies, not every man(or woman!) gets a chance to live.

"Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first."
--Mark Twain

Velma Von Tussle

Pure joy is a gem that is difficult to find in life, but I have found it in the words of my friends and utter strangers:
"I must tell you that your preformance was simply amazing. We were talking about the play on the soccer bus and many people spoke about how wonderful you were. :)" -Grace Anne B.

"You're stealing the show!"- Mystery Man

"You did a really good job, Jessa."- Seth

"You scared me sh*tless. You're a great actress; I know you're not that mean in real life."-Aaron ?

"I almost break character each time you sing "Legend of Miss Baltimore Crabs!"-Daphne (Tracy Turnblad)

Hearing compliments like those make acting special to me. I love acting so much because I have to find these characters and step into their skin. My role as Velma was my biggest role yet and I took charge of it. Thankfully it has all paid off. I'm happy and sad that the play is over, but now I'm looking forward to the next story we take on and what other character I can step into.

And whoever didn't get to come and see Hairspray, "you should've seen my bag of tricks!"

Opening Night!

Last night was filled with line-skipping, stage fright, dancing, singing, and applause! The opening night for Hot Springs High School's spring musical, Hairspray!, went over very well. And now that the breakout is over, things will smooth out and we will all take off tonight, tomorrow, and Saturday. I'm just hoping I'll be able to make it through it all, since it's including school and the fact that I work this weekend. Oh, well, I'm young I can take it.
(Velma, left, played by me. Amber, right, played by Kaitlyn Wyre)

For those who were unable to attend last night:

"Wings"

"Wings"
Just a quick video I made for an AWSOME book called "Wings" by Aprilynne Pike! Check it out(at your local library)! ^_^

Hairspray!

My week has been full of... Hairspray!(The musical) Back a couple months ago I sang in front of my drama teacher and was cast as Mrs. Velma Von Tussle. Thrilled about it all, I have been working extra hard with my inner...evil old beauty queen to make my character come to life. I have been rewarded with much success, but now is when my fear has decided to step in. Our first preformance will be this Wednesday followed by Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Yes FOUR preformances(They're working high schoolers much harder these days). Blessidly, my fellow cast is WONDERFUL! Two days ago was the first time I got to sing The Legend of Miss Balitimore Crabs in front of my whole cast and I got a standing ovation for my final lyric that went like this... You can bow and exalt(calm voice) 'casue I am Miss BalitiMORE CRABS!!!!!
My voice was a little raspy after singing that song SIX times, but it was worth it because it gave Tracy Turnblad(played by my friend Daphne) goosebumps on her arms.

Ah, wonders never cease.

Getting to Know your Blogger

I am blonde, with equally pale skin, and blue eyes. I stand high at five feet and eight inches in height and my body is properly proportionate in every way. My name I Jessa, not Jessica or Jesse. I was simply and lovingly named: Jessa Haley Thurman.

I am telling you these things in the order that you would learn them if you were to meet me in person. I am also telling you this because I want my blog to feel deeper than just a website since I plan on posting things that have depth to the text.

Onward! (The way I plan on blogging from now on will be presented as so...)

I am always watching things around me, but it is common for me to get lost in a world of my own. The world that I sometimes loose myself in can be given credit for the creativity of my writing. I am a writer and plan to publish my books once they are up to my standard of perfection. Not all of my writing comes from the world I loose myself in, but from experiences with my friends. One friend has remained in my life up until this day. Her name is Grace Anne Brown.
Grace Anne is like a force of nature that could never be tamed or captured. Her determined mind makes her one of the most persuasive people I know and since she has remained close through my whole existence, she has made me very passive. Although she stands at least a head below me, she is stronger. Her wide chestnut eyes, hide fire and power and if she someday ends up ruling the world, I will not be surprised.
Grace Anne is the person I plan on dedicating my first published book(Dreaming Beauty) to. In Dreaming Beauty there are many parts that are based on real experiences and real people(i.e. Grace Anne).

Speaking of Dreaming Beauty... It is time for me to return to my editing of it!
I want to ask you all(hopefully someone reads this) a question while I'm gone, if you were to put this post in your own words, what would it say? And do you have a Grace Anne in your life?

-All my love until I return,
Jessa