End of Free Trial

When I was younger I was protected from the worries and the evil of today, not just the injustices and crimes of the outside world though. I was sheltered from event occurring in my own house, in my own family. I learned to never get too comfortable with living somewhere because I never knew when we would have to move again. The first time we moved was the worst because now that I’m older and look back I realise, that’s where it all started to go downhill, and that was the end of my free trial. We moved to this strange trailer park just on the outskirts of town, I had no idea why we had moved nor what was going on. I was sheltered from situations and lied to about emotion, I never understood why I would see my father cry or why I would wake up to fists flying through my door. I didn’t understand why my mom would leave crying in her car, while my dad stayed home and told my sister and me that everything would be ok. My sister was my protector she kept me from the harms of this twisted world but she could only do so much.   The next few years were a struggle for my family, but the moment I will never forget is the moment where my protector – my sister – was torn from me.   I remember my mother pulling me away from the house where my sister hid and I remember crying to my father to help me, to unite me with my sister, but he did nothing but stand there idly. He could not even look me in the eye because he knew his lack of action, was an injustice to his son.  I lost her in that moment.  After all of that had happened we were living in Lethbridge; I was without my sister, without my shelter. I had become very depressed and often contemplated suicide, and then I had received news that my sister would be coming back. I was more than excited, but when she came home she was a different person. And then I got the news that when she was gone she had been violated in the worst.    I felt broken, destroyed even knowing that I was not able to protect my sister after all she had done for me. She was often suicidal and so was I, and the introduction of a step dad living with us did not make anything better, since he was a trigger to my parent’s separation. I started to notice that whenever she would fight with our step father I had become her protector and tried to shield her from his ignorance to our situation. After many years and many different houses, I found myself at CCH.  Grade 11 is when  I relapsed the hardest I had found out that my younger sister Shae committed suicide because she just couldn’t do it anymore, and every time I try to talk to someone about I feel like I should have been there to protect her from all of this. Not too long after I found out my dad had been trying to kill himself ever since he was the one who found her. This crushed me knowing that he would leave me, my sister, and my 7 year old brother behind with no father. This was when I started getting into a lot of different drugs and noticed myself drinking quite often. I was on my way downhill but then I started to see what I was doing to myself and needed to change and make my goal to graduate. The first time I ever heard my father tell me he was truly proud of me was when I got to see him after the convocation at grad.  Many times in my life I had given up hope, I thought it was over; I wanted it to be over, but as time goes on I can start to see a better life away from all of this, a new found hope. It took a lot of courage for me to be able want to get out of bed, even to live, to come to school, and to prosper and make it through. Now you might understand those days when I came to class late or didn’t come at all.

Rest in peace.

Shae-Lynn

Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds and GMCs

August 6^th 2014 may have been the most difficult day of my life. Let me start it off from the beginning. We decided to go bridge jumping, which we didn’t have permission to do. We got there and it was gorgeous. We pulled up close enough to the end of the bridge so we could jump off the bridge, great idea right? Wrong. We had just got our things out of the truck, our tubes, towels and Slurpee’s. We slammed the door of the truck just as we realized that we had locked our keys, and all of our phones in the truck. Perfect. Just another thing to ruin our day.  Thankfully, another group of people were there, so we used their phones to get hold of all our parents to let them know our situation.  We needed to have courage to call our parents and let them know even though we weren’t allowed to be there. My dad had another set of keys for the truck, but they were with him and he was at work 12 hours away in Fort McMurray. Just my luck! “Wait a minute, let me call my parents, they have AMA!” my friend Carly said. So we called AMA, and waited 6 long hours just sitting on the side of the bridge when they finally arrived. My friends and I were exhausted. We were super excited to be going home after a long day. We got in the truck and we followed my boyfriend out onto the rough gravel road. We had the music turned up loud, having a great time when I hit a huge hole in the road. I realized I was losing control of my vehicle. I told the girls in my truck I had no control and to hold on. We started fishtailing back and forth between the left and right side of the road.   We veered off to the right side of the road and the ditches were super steep. My bull guard caught on the ground in weeds and grass flipped my truck. I remember watching the glass smash in towards us and my 7 hour old melted Slurpee fly upside down and spill everywhere. It’s like everything was in slow motion. I watched as my world was crumbling before my eyes. We came to a stop finally after flipping a time and a half. Thank the lord we landed on all fours. I looked around at all the windows smashed in and at all the blood on my legs. I asked if everyone was alright and when I heard both of them say they were fine I got out of the vehicle. To this day I don’t know how I got out; the doors were smashed in so bad they couldn’t be opened. My boyfriend came running. I remember blood everywhere as I screamed the worst words as loud as I could. How could this happen, I thought It was honestly the scariest experience of my life. My dad was there so soon along with everyone else's parents. We needed to have courage in this experience because even through all of this happening we needed to keep level headed and be brave. It was an extreme experience, but it taught us how to handle extreme experiences. They took us to the hospital immediately to make sure we didn't have whiplash or bad concussions. One of the girls in the truck didn't have her seat belt on so she had a dislocated shoulder. The other girl had the roof came in on her head which gave her a concussion. I walked away with tons of cuts and bruises but nothing else, thank God. I will never forget this experience. I think I showed courage by going through the situation and remaining as calm as I possibly could and not breaking down. I think I showed hope by hoping after the situation happened that everything would get better and go back to normal eventually. Now this is nothing but a memory but I will never forget this experience. I've never been so courageous in my life.

-By Shelby Bootsma

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKXfqpg-Q-k

Not Caring About Not Caring

When it comes to my life, while it might be there, I don’t consciously think about courage and hope. When it comes to them, I really am a 50-50, on the fence type of mind set. It’s so much in the middle; I don’t really know how to explain it very well. In some cases I am all the way “I don’t want people to think bad things about me, or think I’m weird.” But at the same time, I could turn around in another setting, and truly think the exact opposite. It really is just a random mix of the two. And it’s not that I will care about what people think for one thing, and not care for another. It switches between caring and not caring what people think no matter what scenario it’s in. Believe it or not, I myself am not too sure about it, let alone know what to think about it. What I find to be even more confusing about the whole thing is when I hang out with good friends. When I’m with some of my closest friends, almost all social moral goes out the window. Of course I still act “refined” but I truly stop caring what other people will think of me in all ways. I can’t really explain it, but I just push past every fear of what other people think. I’d like to say the friends “give me the courage to be myself”, but I know that’s not that case, because when I’m not with friends, (most of the time) I really do care what others think. Both cases are true and it’s not a case of one is “hiding” the other. I really can’t think of how to explain it. I guess it’s just some “weird” mind set of both courage and fear mixed together. Of course other than when it comes to trying to explain it, I myself really don’t find anything wrong with thinking this way. Though I somewhat would like to change some of the cases where I do care what others think. Some of the things are just little trivial things I shouldn’t care about, but I just can’t push past.

-By Garrett Van Lent

Diamond In the Rocks

There was a time in my life when I was alone. My parents were recently divorced and I had a boyfriend who didn’t care about me. He liked me because I was pretty, thin and vulnerable. I had a very low self-esteem and he took advantage of me, in so many different ways. At first he treated me amazing, he made me feel pretty and smart, and I felt like I was on the top of the world. I felt good. The depression that had once consumed me left and I thought I was better. The feeling lasted for a little less than a month and then it all came back. Slowly, the darkness took over again. I wanted to be alone all the time, it made me feel safe. When I closed myself off he became very aggressive. He didn’t understand what I was going through. He became verbally and mentally abusive. I blamed myself for a very long time. I know now, that it was the depression talking. I let it slide for a long time; I pretended everything was okay. When I did have the support from my friends, and I tried to break it off, he told me he would kill himself.  I couldn’t be responsible for someone’s death. I still cared about his well being and that slowly became my biggest worry. I owed him for helping me. I didn’t realize that what we had was unhealthy. I had fallen so deep into my depression that I gave up everything; my art, my friends, and my relationship were holding on by a thread. I had lost myself.

In July 2012, I tried to end my life. I honestly thought I had no other choice. Life was so overwhelming. I spent two weeks in the pediatric ward at the Lethbridge Hospital, and I was on suicide watch for most of it -Two full week without any communication from the outside world, it was rough. I did learn a lot about myself though. I found out that I deserved better. I let people walk all over me, because I longed to be accepted. I found out that I am diamond and I wouldn’t, couldn’t settle for anyone who treated me like I was anything less. Because of my experiences, I’ve found someone who helped me through my depression, and will stand next to me tall and proud. I found the courage in myself to keep moving forward.

-By Abigail Schaaf

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3LH-fMNOAA

The Monster Within Myself

Throughout my life, growing up I had to overcome many challenges and obstacles. My parents divorced when I was six years old and ever since then I had to face several challenges. I got bullied, I lost family members, I moved with my aunt and lived without my parents or siblings around. I developed many insecurities and lost all hope and courage in my life. For a period of time I was in a constant battle with myself; the monsters within me took over and always told me I wasn’t good enough. There was mornings I would wake up and wish that I hadn't, I would isolate myself and not want to be around people. I always wanted to be alone, but at the same time I hated being alone. I always wondered why these monsters always attacked me until I found out that depression was the answer. Depression had made me lose all hope that things would get better, that everything would be okay. I had no courage to get up in the mornings and face humanity, but I had to. I was my worst enemy and time and time again those monsters would try and enter my life. My family and friends helped me get rid of these horrible attacks and helped me overcome this dark stage in my life. I can admit that I am still my worst critic, but I am able to still feel pride in myself. It took a while to feel normal, but without the help and support from my family, I would probably still have these monsters attacking me. 

-By Keelie Twigg 

Being Vulnerable

What vulnerability in your life do you embrace? The vulnerability that I embrace is that I’ve come to the realization that I am by no means perfect. I have accepted that never in my life will I ever be the “perfect” human that some believe the human race is able to achieve.  I, on the other hand, think quite differently than this. I recall experiences in my life where there were lots of people trying to tell how to behave and telling me that I must act like everyone else. I was very young at the time, so what did I know?  Nothing.  I knew nothing and it was because I started at nothing that I drifted away from the rest as each person does in life. Just think for a second what it would be like if everyone you locked eyes with was identical to you. What I believe is that making mistakes brings uniqueness to us all, but how can we make mistakes if we are perfect?   And if we are perfect then there wouldn’t be many things in this world that we would truly enjoy. Think for a second what being perfect means, it means being efficient and in order to be efficient we must get rid of the things that are slowing us down. For me that means that one of the first things to disappear would be human emotion. I mean what need is there for human emotion right?  Well, as it turns out it gives a person’s life a factor that others may or may not share. What I mean by this is that without this factor we are just drones looking for the perfect way of life. As a kid I was rather violent, but that was because I didn’t know any emotions that brought joy, I was only able to hurt and to be hurt. So what happened is that I was put on medication for the behavior, and one day I took double the amount that I was supposed to ingest; I became a lifeless drone only able to follow simple orders. I couldn’t think, nor could I feel any kind of emotion good or bad and at times I couldn’t speak because I wasn’t able to form the words needed, I would just nod. To me that is what life will become if we do become perfect, but I believe the human race is unable to become this because we feel. We laugh and sometimes we cry, we get angry at the world cursing our existence  and sometimes we are up and about laughing with joy and blessing  this world we are on. It could happen all in the same day and that is what makes life human. To me humans are a portrait of emotion that can never be replaced or copied. Each piece brings something new and different to the table, so that we can never expect how it came to be. So all in all being vulnerable is what makes us as humans so great.         

-By Tyler Berg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65_D8_pcJKQ

Hope

When the whole world says give up, hope whispers and tell us ‘try it one more time’. That’s what we call hope.  In our lives we need hope otherwise we will not be able to reach our life goals.  Also, hope offers the possibility of survival.  Hope gives us a new life with new hopes and new targets. I believe we should have some hope even if we think it’s not going to happen because I do believe in miracles.

As teenagers we all need hope. When I was small I wanted to be a doctor or a teacher. That’s our beginning. We all have  huge hopes like this to be an engineer, doctor, teacher, a mother, or a father. When I was small I thought that to be a doctor was so easy.  I thought it was just keeping a stethoscope and writing some medicine on a paper, but as I grow up I realize that it's not easy, and it's not all about a stethoscope and a prescription, it's way more than that.  As we grow up we need to change our hopes and we need to be realistic and hope helps us to find our self.  I gave up on the idea of being a doctor, but it gave me a new hope to be a graphic designer. That’s my new hope and I know what I need to do to be a graphic designer; I know the path to go on. Hope always give us determination and courage.

Hope is not all about our life goals; it’s also about our survival. It helps for our day to day activities too. For example, early in the morning I have to wake up in order to go to school. Imagine... it’s a rainy day and I’m too lazy to wake up and my mind says to stay home and sleep more, but hope whispers to me, ‘Wake up! Wake up! You have to stay at class, you are not going to gain anything by sleeping. Wake up!’ Hope always encourages us. That’s why I keep saying that we need to have hope. Not just one hope, we should have thousands of hopes; if plan ``A`` didn’t work we can try the plan`` B``.

-By Saveesha Liyanage 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jQiuZdOvbM

Broken Sticks

It’s hard to choose between the life choices I want and the life choices others want me to choose. Personally I love music.  I’ve been drumming for almost 10 years and I’m starting to wonder where it’s taking me. I think it’s taking me to a career and to become famous and reach out to people with my music. I’ve been told time and time again that it’s a one in a million chance I will become famous and make a successful career out of travelling and it only happens to the few or the lucky. So, I have to keep hope if I want to continue on anywhere. If I want to keep the motivation to keep playing and keep bettering my skills I need to keep hope that I’m going somewhere with my music. I’m not saying I’m going to drop everything else and focus only on music, but I’m not going to let other people’s opinion of what it takes to be successful crush my dream. I feel like it’s always been my place to prove everyone wrong about the things they think I’m doing wrong with my life. I will admit not everything I do is smart or looked upon as acceptable, but the things I can stand up for myself with I will surely do, like tattoos. My parents think me getting tattoos is a terrible idea and I’ll never get a successful job with tattoos, but I feel strongly that it’s the way I want to express myself. The bottom line is it takes a lot of hope and courage to choose between what makes you happy and what others think will make you happy, but no matter what way you choose, your happiness needs to come first. 

-By Kyle Sanford

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auLBLk4ibAk&feature=youtu.be
When I know how to play this song correctly, that is when I will know that I am 
where I am meant to be as a drummer!

I use the hope and courage given to push towards future goals and certain items I’d like to obtain in the future and use it to help save and keep going to get it. This future goal is to soon go to work/college and be a full time automotive technician for my life time and to use all these skills to progress further into the depths  of it and also use the skills to help those around me when they are not able to help themselves or do not know what to do. It seems that this has been a passion forever, or at least since I was about 8 and I went out and experienced all the different cars at the Show and Shine. Also, all the times my dad took me to the shop and I'd see the cars roll in I just admired them.  As I grew up I started to go learn more about just the basics and how intricate they were just on the exterior. This all progressed further as I have gotten a job at an automotive shop and learned tons more and have now done lots of hands on work. Even though people question how old I am and if I’m ready for the job and even have older people haggling me, I still have to look forward working another day and even years so I can soon reach my top goal of building my own cars and working on JDM cars.

By Ethan Gal

Courage

The only time I can think about when I had courage and hope is when I played football. Having courage and hope was drilled into my head when I played football. I was never the biggest kid there, so I had to have courage in myself whenever I played. I had courage in myself and I knew what I needed to do when I played and I could do it. This was the one time I feel I had courage and hope. When I had courage and hope it motivated me and made me want to do better go harder and try with everything. Having courage and hope is something everyone should have in themselves it motivates you. It makes you do better and truly believe in yourself. Football gave me hope and courage. Which in turn gave me confidence in myself. Football was my favorite sport because I had confidence courage and hope in myself.

By Craig Colby

Connections to the Other Side

I remember my cousin joking around about suicide which in itself is horrible to joke about, but it is worse for me. I can’t stand when people joke about suicide  because that is how I lost my father. From a young age I had hope that my father will come back from the dead and in some small way I have the same feeling, but I know now that it is impossible. In my heart I know that he has not passed on, I mean I know that he is dead, but his spirit lives on here on earth.  When  we talk about him light sflicker,  the TV turns on and off, or changes channels to only channels he would watch like car TV or things about the cars. I remember one Christmas we had an ornament  that had our names on it.  It was tucked behind big letter that said "dream".  One day we heard a crash and the ornament broke, but only his name broke and it was at least a ten foot drop.  It was 13 years old, so it should have just shattered. Also, there is a doll that he bought me for Christmas or my birthday, it is 16 years old and the batteries have been removed, but it is still talking to this day and off and on it will says phrases like “I love you”  and “ see you soon”.  I have been told stories of   me sitting at the end of my bed talking to thin air, but after being asked who I was talking I would say, "a man named Bert" and mom would say, "Your dad?"  I would say, "no" and describe my great grandpa to a tee. Or I would say I would see my dad sitting on the end of my bed. Many times even now I see the dead.  At the beginning when I was young  this scared me, I didn’t have much courage.  I had a glimpse of hope that it was my father trying to let me know that he is here for me or that he was trying to send a message of comfort, not one of fear but I was too scared.  Many times when things started to move I would go hide in my room and just cry I didn’t have the courage to shrug it off  and say, "I love you too." Even now when there is a spirit that does something that isn’t what we are used to I still get scared, but I know that most spirits get bored of being mischievous.  My great grandma is a normal one as well, but she doesn’t speak with me though the typical way, she speaks with me though my dreams.  The first time she spoke to me was after her funeral.  It was scary because I was so young . I remember the words "thank you for being part of my life" and "I love you". Then everything went to white and I woke crying because It scared me.  For me this is a regular thing and honestly I want to  find a safe way to communicate with them again as I was able to when I was younger, but I’m not talking through ouija boards because who knows who, or what, will come through, but I guess that is the beauty of talking with the other side .

By Domminic Clifton

http://www.wewomen.ca/children/can-children-see-ghosts-what-parents-need-to-know-s1054133.html

Look at the stories in the pictures at the bottom.

The Significance of Courage and Hope

I’m going to share my opinion of the significance of courage and hope for an artist. Not just any artists, but all artists. Me for example, I love the art of rap. I love the craft, the techniques, the patterns, and way some rappers can capture an audience with incredible delivery. Artists like KRS-One, melle mel, Cool Mo Dee, they all knew how to capture the attention of their audience and once they had it they could say anything they wanted and the people loved it. Back then it was all about the lyrics, and artists were competitive. In several places people would sit around and have cyphers, or showcases if you will. This is where local artists would go and say the rhymes they had written the night before to any beat that a local dj played, or sometimes acapella. This is what I fell in love with. I fell in love with rap/hip hop because it was a way of free expression, and it works to all kinds of beats and instruments. I like the challenge of being put on the spot to a beat I may or may not of heard, and spitting the best verse I can. But it wasn’t always like that. I’ve been writing since I was in grade 7.  It wasn’t until I learned about what other artists have been through to get to where they are that I had the courage to even say anything in front of people. The most inspiring artists in my mind are the members of Bone-Thugs-N-Harmony. The five members we’re from Cleveland Ohioan and all five lived on the same block growing up. They talk about standing on the corner around a trash can fire rapping with each other. They didn’t only rap though, they had a talent for singing and harmonizing. This made a come up difficult for them because they were from a place where if you sang then you were considered soft, and that could be dangerous. But they still had the courage to bring a new idea into the rap game. This is what inspires me because as much as I love rap, I also really enjoy old school instrumentals and classic music. I want to find different ways to incorporate all of it together and make something new. I’ve wanted to do it for years and only in the past year or so did I have the courage to stand up even just in front of my friends and show them what I had written. People already knew that I liked to rap my favorite verses from all artists, but rapping something that i myself wrote was hard. It took maybe 10 times before I was completely comfortable with it, now I’m at the point where I don’t even care if I stumble my words, and I’ve also encouraged my friends to do the same.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhaTg00auRM

By Geoffrey Andrews

When Hope and Courage are Nowhere to Be Found

“Here is the tragedy: when you are the victim of depression, not only do you feel utterly helpless and abandoned by the world, you also know that very few people can understand, or even begin to believe, that life can be this painful.”

                                                                                                                                                                                Giles Andreae

It has been four years since I began my battle with depression and just like any battle there have been quite a few ups and downs. When thinking about a battle the first thing that normally comes to mind is two different people fighting against one another; however, this certain battle was between me and the demons that occupy my mind. There have been so many times when I have just wanted to throw my hands into the air and give up... like when I sit in my room with silent tears running down my face, or like the first time I ever self-harmed. Although not every day is bad this war going on inside me is so tiring that sometimes I don’t want to get out of bed and attempt to face the world, and there are times where the things in my head are just so hard to deal with that I don’t want to close my eyes and sleep for fear of the thoughts taking over. Normally the only time I feel any sort of relief is when I am listening to music and honestly, without that momentary escape I have no idea where I would be or how I would be handling any of this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ8wwoC9v3s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dX-e2QB556g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFQYaoiIFh8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Od9CHXnOTbo

By Rosemary Gleason

Courage

Courage was something I needed when it came to wanting to become a tailor in the arts of sewing. Throughout my years of growing up I had seen that men were to work outside and women do the house work, the very sad stereotypes that the world faded to. When I was growing up I use to watch my grandma in her sewing room stitching and working with the fabrics and threads that poured from the drawers of her sewing table. My mother was another seamstress of the family and she also worked at seaming together fabrics to create items that could be used in our household. When I was older I found out that many of the stereotypes that seemed to be the "norm" were very different in my family. A lot of my family members had passed away before I was born or when I was very young. Now we still had the men in my family that worked outside, but I also learned that many of the males in my family also cooked in the kitchen with my great grandma. One uncle that stood out to me in particular was the one that worked the arts of tailoring, he was a great tailor that made many works of art such as buckskin dresses, moccasins and many other native themed art pieces. Many of my family members didn't go by the stereotypes of the past, lots of my family seemed to do the opposite. Many of my uncles worked the kitchen as well as outside, many of my aunties worked outside as well as the kitchen. 

Wanting to become a tailor was put into my mind when I was forced to take a sewing class in grade nine. This was the only time I decided to try out the works with a sewing machine. It took awhile to get into the whole ideal of sewing and working with fabrics, this was a big step to take and was a very risky step I was taking. After the class was done I looked the other way and decided not to keep working with it. It wasn't till my grandma asked me to help her with curtains that she needed hemmed up that I took a interest in the art of tailoring and sewing. After helping I took a very big interest in sewing and tailoring, so I worked up the courage to start sewing and working with fabrics to create large works of art that I didn't know I was going to love. 

It took me a week to get fully into sewing; I started sewing dresses and quilts for the fun of it and loved how I could take a piece of fabric and by simple cutting it and sewing it together the pieces and make something that was wearable. I created so many garments that I started taking them apart and reworking them into other pieces. I had to work up the courage to show others what I could create and showing others was a big step that really bothered me for some reason. Taking such a big risk got me to work on many different projects which really got me into the tailoring mood even more.  Taking risks and jumping into sewing head on gave me the chance to have my work shown in a production that was showing in the Yates theatre. I had made a corset and a few dresses for the production and it featured them on the "big stage". By taking this risk I was able to show others what I could do and seeing that they weren't bother by a male sewer it really showed me that it wasn't the big problem that I thought it was. 

Now I work on gowns of period clothing, my favourite years of fashion are 1830-1860's. A big lesson I also learned is that many great fashion artist were males. Now I have the courage to do anything when it comes to sewing and working with fabrics.  It took a lot of courage to step outside my comfort zone but taking the risky step I have been able to do tons and experience lots of new things that I would have never done without my interest in sewing.     

By Jacob Spear Chief 

Hope Rekindled & Courage Everlasting

In a short time I will be a high school graduate and be ready to take on the world. A little scary to think about, but hopefully these last several years have prepared me for future life and adventures. Do I feel strong enough or courageous enough to leave high school? It is my hope that I am ready, but we will soon see. As I reflect back over the years I realize that it is only by relying upon my hope for a bright future and by being courageous that I will succeed. I do however know that it has not always been so easy for me, but others have helped me on my journey.

One thing that has to do with courage is to have the will to be able to come from a place out of the city that is rural to a place that is urbanized. It takes someone like me, out of my comfort zone which is a place that has peace and nature to another place that is much different than the plains that I call home. It is taking a huge step because I haven’t become fully accustomed to the urban city life that others are so very used to and me not so much.

A time in my life where I lost hope was when I lost my grandmother a year ago, just before my birthday. I felt the feeling of emptiness and fear at that time because I couldn’t fully take the weight of losing someone so close to me.  This is something that everyone goes through during their lifetime, the end of the cycle of their lives. My grandmother was in the last stage of her Alzheimer’s and she could barely remember my dad, even me. She couldn’t even speak anymore or remember anything that she had learned. Soon after that year ended I finally found a way to push through that pain I felt and I moved on with my life. I regained my hope back because I knew that she was in a better place and that she didn’t have to endure pain any further. I felt happy again, but I know that this New Year in twenty fifteen, I will feel a bit down when her birthday comes but only for that one day. At the end of that one day I will feel happy again, continuing my life as it is. 

By Halee White Quills

Courage in the Gutter

Facing terrors of our past is looked upon as a form of courage. As a child I lived in a messed up neighborhood living next to bloods, Indian posse and Drug dealers. Even when I was just watching T.V I would always see three to four squad cars per day cruising down the road. I would even see the blinking of red and blue flashing through my window upon seeing neighbors being arrested. As I prompted myself off the couch I would look down and ask my dad, “What’s going on?” Then he would respond by saying, “Foolish choices son dumb choices”. As a kid I always wondered why people have to live in this state.  My parents where refuges of a communist country just trying to start a new life in Canada. They are honest, hard working people who cared about me very dearly and loved me very much; they were also like a pillow to comfort the rough of the hood.  When I was four years old I was walking with my grandmother down the block and I noticed a dog walking around and as I was walking the dog came up and attacked  me.  I never realized that what was happening would be so painful, as the stray dog was chewing on me my grandmother came up and started beating it with her cane.  The love and respect I got from my family was all put there in one picture. What also helped to give me courage growing up was being face to face with Bloods to anybody else it would have traumatized them or even cause them to piss themselves, but not me; I had many moments of painful lessons that taught me that there is nothing to fear when you have already overcome it.  

By Chris Franczek

What To Do?

Currently I am in my last year of high school and I’m terrified, because I still can’t figure out what I am going to do, or who I am going to meet in life after I am finished. I stress out  thinking about it too much which leads me to anxiety attacks that make me feel like I will be nothing but a failure. Now that January is here I have come to realize that there are only five more months until I will be completely finished with high school, then I will start having to apply to colleges or universities depending on what I want to do. I have a few options in mind of what I might want to do, but when I think about it more and more, I think into the future and wonder if I’m going to love it as much as I have when I thought about it. Although most people say that when you get out of high school it is common for people to not know what they want to do and that you can always change your classes if you’re not interested in them,  I just want to be done with school and  have a plan laid out for me to accomplish. I almost feel a like I am  Red from Shawshank Redemption because he too, was scared of getting out of his comfort zone and not knowing what life would be like outside of the prison, but he made it and he is now in what seems to be like paradise for him and his friend Andy. The courage for my journey is to face my fear of finishing high school and know that it is ok to make mistakes because that’s the whole point of being human; always do what you’re afraid of because you will become stronger knowing that you can get through those fears that once made you weak. 

By Tanis Crosschild


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZwLtlOtmcs

Dirt

When I was a kid my dad and I were at home together watching TV. He changed the channel and he showed me Monster Jam. This was the first time I ever saw a monster truck, the truck known as “Big Foot”. I could remember it clearly, a 1970’s brick style Ford F-150. It was blue with big white rims and huge tires too. That thing was crushing cars, doing awesome donuts and hitting big jumps. That truck along with many others opened my eyes to motorsports. 

A few years after my dad passed away I got a dirt bike for my 14^th birthday. It was something I’ve always wanted, but my family could never afford. I fell in love with that bike even though that bike battered and bruised me up and even broke my collar bones I still never stopped riding it. I loved it. But that bike taught me how to do 3 of the best things in life:

1: Never Panic. 2: How To Drive Manual/Stick 3: How To Have Fun Behind The Wheel

With those 3 things I’ve learned it gave me the courage to keep on making the sacrifices I make to do the things I love. When I do these things I risk so many things, my truck, my hard work and more importantly my life. The thrill it gives me is what I want to do for the rest of my life. That why my hobby gives me hope and guidance towards my future dream of becoming a automotive technician so I can keep on building my F-150 - the same truck as big foot.

By Darwin Healy

The Passionate Pursuit of Reading

I’ve always loved reading, ever since I was a little kid; I am addicted to reading. The funny thing about my reading is that when I was little and started kindergarten by the end of the school year, my teacher wanted to fail me because I wasn’t a good reader. Then we went to St. Mary’s and they tested me and I passed. I always try to remember that because I find it funny. I’m always reading no matter what I do; if I’m 100% busy I’ll still find time to read a book. When I’m reading I love it because I get to see what the author has written. I get to see what they spent hours, maybe even days, months on in order to get published - their devotion to the novel. In that novel you get to work your imagination and that’s why I love reading, I get to experience the universe in novels like this one book I read, it was called Across the Universe. I don’t remember the author, but it is such a good book!  It was about these people in space who had to learn how to survive and they froze all these people and someone started killing them off slowly, but then when this one girl was about to get murdered, these doctors saved her. Then she finds out that she’s only been asleep for a shorter time then she was supposed to be. There are tons of different books about space, aliens, sci-fi, romance, action and everything else; I love reading them because I get to escape from life; I get to experience a whole other world without any distractions and just focus on that novel. I read like crazy and I can finish a 300 page book in a hour if I wanted to, just because I’m so into the book, that I don’t care how long I’m sitting down reading it for, it just captivates me so much that I continue anyway. My mom is always talking about how well I read and just how fast I can read a book, but it’s just I don’t like rushing through things and when I finish a 300 page book in a hour, I just feel like I rushed myself even though I didn’t. I’m very passionate about reading; I like the feeling of reading a book because I have that awesome feeling of imagining something that I thought I’d never thought I would experience, and that is what I am very passionate about.

By Crystal Bruisedhead

I Am My Worst Enemy

A time in my life when I needed courage and hope was almost a year ago; I broke my leg being stupid at a grad party. It was the worst possible time to break my leg because my grad was coming up and more importantly summer. It was broken so bad that I couldn’t return to school for the remainder of the year. So, I ended up not being able to finish my classes and take the diploma exams, and as a result I never passed my English or Social classes. I was stuck at home while all my friends, that I have gone to school with, graduated and got their diplomas. Luckily I had over 100 credits so I graduated too, but I couldn’t go to the ceremony because my leg wasn’t healed enough to be crutching around. Going through this really discouraged me from ever going back to school and getting my diploma. I was disappointed in myself and became very depressed for a while. All I could think about were all the things I’d never be able to do and how many of my dreams and passions were broken with my leg. I told myself I wouldn’t go back to school. After a while I realized there’s nothing I can do but live with it and being depressed and sad about it only makes my situation worse. I started to think that if I didn’t go back to school then what would I do? I knew that there would be no hope for the future I want if I didn’t go back to school and get my diploma. I had a lot of help from my parents who gave me the courage to believe that I can go back and get through it. They helped me to realize how much I can achieve if I try hard and stay dedicated. Hope for my future and what I can become got me through this tough time in my young life, but mostly the confidence and courage my family gave me. I have hope that someday I’ll be able to skateboard again and do the things I dream of. 

By Stonewall Manychief

Testing My Courage

The words Courage and Hope in many ways help me create a visual for the world around me. Courage, more than most things, gives me the sense that anything can be achieved. Most people live their daily lives never realizing the true potential that their day holds. The possibilities they may be able to unlock, or that special person they never got a chance to talk to. In all ways, courage is the foundation of an adventurous and healthy social life. We now, at this period in human history, need a little bit more courage in our lives to do what should be a daily thing, socializing with strangers. Some are true masters in this sense and have no problem creating a new friend and opportunity in life, but there are those who are so embraced in technology, that it has created a different form of socializing.

I personally, have had many opportunities to test my ability to wield my courage. Some moments I can wield it, others I can’t. I really have no excuse I can use to deal with my inability to take advantage of my opportunities. My Mother passed away recently and this, as I saw it, was a new test to my skills in courage. Can I move on? Will I be able let go of a past that gripped me all my life. This answer is yet to be revealed, so hence I wait for the arrival of when I can finally be reunited with my Mother. Courage is a value in my life, that I personally try to conquer every opportunity I get. Some people are so weak in courage that they have no idea when another is conquering it. My courage is strong, but to what extent do I flex it?

By Denver Provost

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FkG-Bh9J9c

The Thrill of Pressure and Pain

Laying there on the solid bench holding up a heavy weight, the feeling of pressure the weight inflicts. As I bring the bar down slowly upon my chest, feeling the pain that comes from the stretching and the small tearing. The bar resting on my chest for only a millisecond. With a burst of power and strength the bar is back up in the air and resting on the rack.  I put myself through this pain so I can become stronger so I can save the ones I love and care about from the evil that is the world.

My weaknesses include physical injuries that stop me from reaching the level I wish to achieve and a mental weakness that holds me down like a lead weight, this weight torments me because I struggle, I struggle so hard to surpass it. Alas, it seems that this weight is actually a wall that reaches impossible heights that I cannot reach and an unlimited length in both directions. But I come back to face this wall every time I am rested hoping that I can find a hole, or create a hole or even jump over the wall hoping I can surpass this wall but to no avail.

By Taran Russell

Grade 9 Year

In grade 9 I had the worst year of my life. I was being called fat and ugly, and I never said anything about it because it was my “best friend” and I thought if I had said something to him he would stop being my friend. When it started it was funny and I laughed, but half way through the year all my “friends” started to call me fat, ugly or stupid. Whenever I would stand up for myself they would think I was just making a joke and then call me stupid again. It really destroyed my self-esteem.  They finally disowned me and no one would talk to me. I wanted to end it all because I did not want to be made fun of anymore. I thought that ending my life was the best way to go, but that summer my sister started to talk to me about coming to youth more. I started to go to youth and learn more about God.  At first it was a bit weird and I felt out of place, but soon I started to find God. My whole life changed 360 degrees. I started to go to church every Sunday and youth every Thursday.  Since then, I have started to go to a young adults group on Tuesdays. I am the leader of the worship team at my church and my youth. God has saved my life and He is awesome. When someone calls my ugly or fat I just shove it off because I know God loves me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jas8siNG3Bo

By Kyra Webb

Through a Pencil

I never had the guts to sit and write about courage and hope in my life. Honestly, I haven’t even thought about that until now. I think in my life there is a lot of courage and hope, but it’s just maybe hard to see it some times. My life has always been so stressful trying to cope with everything going on with friends, family, school and all this thinking about the future. All this has been so stressful and I think facing that in its self is quite courageous, but I can honestly say that I really wish I could have more courage…. because I was bullied for five years and not once did I do anything. I wish I would have said something because then maybe it would have stopped.  From being bullied so much I did lose a lot of hope in myself and hope that there were good people out there, and after that I never trusted anyone. After that I turned to art because with art I can express my feelings and emotions without getting judged or insulted. Now, because of everything it takes a lot of courage to even get up in the morning, to even go to school because I’m so paranoid that people will constantly judge me where ever I go. With art I find it away to relax as well because being paranoid all the time gets me really worked up and I over think a lot.  Art helps me relax and calm down. To this day I still always think of things I could have said to people or done differently to stop the bullying or fix it, but I’ve always been that person who just keeps quiet because I don’t want to make it any worse. It’s stopped now and I’m very thankful for that. Maybe in some ways I was courageous because I didn’t just give in to it, I kept going and kept trying to hope through it because nothing stays bad forever and I always believe that everything happens for a reason. 

By Kisa Blasetti-Ford

The End is Just the Beginning of Something New

In this world all we need is courage and hope to survive, courage to do what needs to be done and hope to not give up when things are not accomplished. Sadly, not all of us have the patience to maintain hope or the courage to stand up for what we believe in.  Fortunately I was gifted with both or else I would not be the man I am today. I have experienced several devastations in my life that made me think more than twice about my life and why I am on this planet.

The thing that really brought me down was when I got injured at a football camp in grade nine. My knee cap popped out and caught a ligament on the left side of my knee and stretched it. When I got my x-rays the doctor said it would take a long time to heal but he informed me that it would be best if I didnt play anymore.  I was heartbroken.  All my life I’ve been playing football, it was all I knew. After a few weeks of being depressed I told myself it would get better, that my knee would be better than before. After my knee healed and I was able to walk again,  I started to work out and focus on playing in grade ten. Sadly, I was not up to play in grade ten for fear of hurting my knee again. I took the year off and started to make myself prepared for next season. After a year of hard work I was confident enough to play in grade 11.  I made my starting position at defensive tackle and had a great year of football. I was able to maintain hope that I would be able to play football again and I got to.

By Bovaughn Daychief

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l65yiJ5yVvU

Courage and Hope

Courage means to me doing something out of your comfort zone and going through with it. Like when people join the army, or it can be trying to take the game winning shot at a game you can be afraid or have anxiety to do it, but if you go through with it than to me that’s courage. There were times when I had courage and times when I didn’t have courage in my life. When I was younger I didn’t have a lot of courage because I was afraid to do things, but as I got older I started to do more things out of my comfort zone. I think playing sports gave me a lot of courage because when I was younger it was my teacher who said I should play basketball I didn’t want to because I was afraid to play, but she made me and from there I kept playing more and more sports and I wasn’t so afraid anymore. Playing sports has given me more courage because before I stared playing I was always shy and didn’t like to try new things, but when I stared playing  it felt good to be a part of a team that cared for one another.  I think that made me who I am now.   When I’m out there playing it gives me courage because I think I earned my place on this team and I made the team for a reason. Sports have given me hope for the future because they made me want to continue with the things I’m passionate about in life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EqWRaAF6_WY

By Traven Weasel Traveller 

Courage is something that comes to us in some of the most unbearable of times, it's what makes us get up even when ore bodies say its impossible, and we are able to keep fighting on.

On August 10^th 2013 I was diagnosed with a type two brain tumor that I had probably had for some time. The first seventy two hours all seem like such a blur and I can't remember a whole lot, but it's funny I didn’t ever remember feeling scared or like all hope was lost.  I always had high hope and never spoke about how awful and pissed off I should be because I just wasn’t.

To be brave I think it means to see how hard you can get hit and keep getting up and asking for more even when every one says you shouldn't.  I don't think of my self as being that brave or courageous, or anything special even when people say how brave I am.  I just think of myself as an ordinary guy who was just unlucky and it was just my turn in line.

Courage is something that we all must face and its up to you whether you can rise to the challenge and look through the dark skies and find that one ray of hope and hold on and don’t let go. To a lot of people hope is the only thing people have...to well, really hope for.  It's the feeling of walking out on to the other side and saying "look we made it".

By Dylan Westerson

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rN6DOw9TiA

Courage

When I think about when I had courage not a lot comes to mind, except football. I didn’t play football in grade 11 or 12 because of an injury I got and because one of the coaches on the team made it unenjoyable for me. I had courage in football because I played a lot of games with a lot of injuries. For example I played a whole season with a broken hand and played a lot of games with bruised ribs and with sprained ankles. I only sat out of games because of my mom caring about my health; if it was up to me I’d play every game.

When I first started football I was scared of contact, too scared to hit anyone because I didn’t like hurting people and I didn’t want to get hurt myself, but after about a week of being there it started to become fun and a passion of mine.  I started to enjoy contact more and more; it was a way for me to get my anger out by hitting people - who wouldn’t enjoy that? As I got older and played longer the game starting to mean a lot more to me, when I got to my finale season of bantam (grade 9 year) I got a whole bunch and of guys to join. I had a ton of friends and a ton of great players but that was the year we got new coaches. The head coach would come once and a while but he was pretty busy, so another guy took over for him. This guy was mean, rude and no one on the team really liked him. 

I liked playing; it was fun to wake up every Saturday and know I was going to go play a game that day, plus I was one of the oldest and the strongest so that made it a lot more fun. I remember I was even named one of the captains for the team and I looked at it as a sign that I needed to step up, and show the guys that I was going to give them my all, but in the first game of the season that’s when I bruised my ribs and it was just uncomfortable to play. I remember my mom asking the actual head coach to get me a rib protector because my mom didn’t want me in pain anymore. One day in practice I don’t know what the coaches were trying to do, but they were making fun of me for wearing it. They were telling me I had a nice bra and telling my mom she was babying her son too much and that’s what got me going. I then started to play to show the coaches that I was meant to be a starter on that team and that I wasn’t going to let an injury hold me back and not play. So that season I maybe sat out two games because of my rib injury and whenever I would get hurt I'd just put it in the back of my mind.

Now that I think of that it is the stupidest thing ever! I basically just made myself more sore and in more pain because I didn’t sit out and wait until I got healthy again. That is the only time I can think I had courage because at first I was scared to get hurt then I was starting to play with injuries. 

By Daniel Coatney

The Significance of Courage

The significance of courage can be physical, spiritual, and emotional.  It is a time in our life when we think it is time for us to stand up and speak out even if we are in danger, in pain or afraid.  Even if we don’t know the outcome, we hope that it will turn out well.  A couple of years ago I had to made a decision if I wanted to be happy and feel like I am significant or live in an environment that makes me feel unhappy and insignificant.  It took courage for me to open up to the people that could help me move out of that environment.  I knew there would be opposition from those around me, that they would be negative about the change - I wanted to make to where I was living.  The difficult times I had to face was gathering all those people together to make my choice known to them and answering the question: “Why? Why do you want to leave?”  I had to face my own fears, was I making the right or wrong decision because my heart was not fully in it.  When I made the decision and started in the new environment, there were negative comments and lies that hurt me and took the joy from the start of my new life.  But then I remembered the courage; I had to make the decision because I knew that the same courage would l help me get through the lies and help me start a new future.  What helped me to have this courage was the gift of courage I saw in one of my friends who has overcome great obstacles that I don’t think I could face.  Her magnificent courage helped to motivate me to do something for myself, to make the changes I needed to make.

By Georgina Nyavor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kl42kv_1HzI

Courage and Hope

I have had many times where I have had hope in my life. The one that’s most significant to me is when my grandmother was in the hospital. Her being in there scared me; it made me think that I would never see her again. I always tried to think positively and always hoped she would get better. She had to have surgery on her brain to keep it from bleeding. She was put into a coma for the surgery and we had to wait until she woke up. Days went by and she wasn’t waking up; I was getting worried. I wasn’t allowed to see her because I was sick and all I wanted was for her to get better. Each day went on, still hoping she would open her eyes and she would see us there. Eventually we decided we would let her go. That was the hardest moment I have ever had to deal with in my life. It gave me a lot of issues trying to get over it.  A lot of times I had no courage, no will to do anything. My family and friends were always there for me and helped me get through it. Times have been getting easier now and I miss her everyday, but I know she is always with me. I always look back at this time to give me courage to go on because I know that’s what she would want of me. She is my angel in heaven and I know I will see her soon one day.

By Braxton Weiss

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mk82j1jQw_8

Tapped Out of Courage and Hope

"Magic the Gathering" is my favourite activity and I find that almost every game something requires courage and hope. As far as hope goes, sometimes I look at a board state and think that there is no way that I am ever going to get out of this and I may as well give up and move on to the next game, but sometimes I just have to stick it out and I might just draw the answer I need off the top of my deck. Magic requires courage because sometimes I go into an event and there are over 60 people there and I may know 5-10 of them.  Most of the time when I sit down across from someone I may have never met this person before and that can be pretty intimidating.

The first magic event that I went to had over 40 people there and I only knew 3 of them.   I played 5 rounds that day, 1 of which was against one of my friends and the other 4 were against complete strangers, luckily everyone was nice and I had an overall positive experience. With the only downside being that I got ripped off in a trade with a more experienced player who traded me a $5 card for my $20 dollar card (I didn’t realise this until much later).
By Austin Row

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjG-hj38KgU
this is a good video if you do not know what magic the gathering is

I Bow Down for No Man

Walking tall and not fearing anyone is a feeling I hold dear to me because of the bullying that happens at schools and homes and in society.  I have witnessed kids getting beat up or taunted and it is something I cannot stand back and watch, I have to intervene and stick up for people who were helpless. 

It all started when I was in grade 3.  When the teacher left the classroom, the whole class cornered me behind the teacher's desk where they cheered on the classroom bullies to fight me.  I was punched again and again. Ever since this happened I always stuck up for myself; I never wanted anyone to hurt me again and the thought of this makes me want to go back and change what happened.

It was courage and hope that changed my instinct and forced me to act in a situation where certain people are hurt.   Now I only choose certain friends and certain people and battles where it is a good thing and a good outcome, only acting in my own defense and the defense of others. I have trained my mind to avoid fear in a situation where it means not backing down.  I never want lose another fight; I will die before I will lose another fight. I never want the thought of losing and keeping it in my mind for ever. I have become a little too aggressive at times where I created my own self-inflicted battles, but it was only stemming from the knowledge that I did not want to be hurt again and sticking up for myself is the greatest feeling of victory I could of ever have.

“Always in the wrong place at the right time”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0aAfXp9WAU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLqxX71s8S0&index=2&list=LLdtpc8Z3TFEyqY0opjiYtYw

By Joseph Day Chief