The Roman-Greek Effect

Written on November 7, 2012

TOPIC: How does our location affect who we are?

Americans as a whole are very proud of where they come from. The American heritage has inspired t-shirts and movies and country songs (but let’s be honest— hasn’t everything?) for years. Americans show so much pride for their country, in fact, that in some nations it is considered boastful to say, “I am from the United States.” From this standpoint, the lives of our citizens would be dramatically different if they had been born in Saudi Arabia.

But how would their thoughts on religion differ? What would their beliefs be on the meaning of human consciousness? Would they have the same culinary palette; who would they look to for guidance in times of need? More specifically, what if they lived only two hours away from their current place of residence? What if they lived in low income apartments instead of high-priced lake houses?

I have this theory. I’ve discussed it once before on my personal blog, but I feel it is very relevant here as well. The people in our lives are just as unique as their DNA says they are, but I believe that the same basic personalities exist nearly everywhere you go. That being said, I don’t think your location really determines a lot about who you are as a human being. To quote Stephen Chbosky’s, The Perks of Being a Wallflower: “We can’t choose where we come from, but we can choose where we go from there.” I agree with that. Homes and cities and rustic, rural landscapes are the backdrops of our character-driven lives. Whether we are in Libya or Brazil; Montana or Maryland, we are who we are due to circumstance, association, and free will. Realtors and employers and governments may try to make of you what they wish, but the final say is always yours.

So today’s Roman effect is about places of residency and how where we live/are affects who we are.

This is an interesting topic that I have talked to Lydia about on multiple occasions.  First off, places of residency.  There are rich neighborhoods, poor hoods, farms, trailer parks, estates, and everything in between.  How does this affect you?  Well, the same way you are affected if you were beaten as a child.  These things that happen to you, they are real.  If you take a pair of identical twins, separate them to completely different environments, and record the results, they will be different.

But you see the environment you live in can only affect you to a certain extent. They shape who you are today, yes. But they can only define who you are tomorrow if you let them. There will always be someone who was loved more than you/grew up in a better neighborhood/had more friends/made better grades than you. There will always be someone who is able to do something better than you. Well, unless you are an expert at juggling live grandmothers while reciting Shakespeare, while doing a flip. Because if you can do that, you hold the monopoly.

Point is, life isn’t about the advantages you have. It isn’t about what you were born with, what personality you have, what gift you were given as a teenager. Life is better defined about what you do with what you have. A life based around where you grew up, or how much money you have, or the people you know is a shallow life. It is one dimensional. Don’t be a sheet of paper. Instead, search for something deeper. Search for 3 dimensions, for a life where you believe in the future.

Written by Lydia on May 29, 2012

TOPIC: MY WILL

To Luke Walther I will my journals, my shyness, my instrument tuner, and book of 101 Funny Bunny Jokes.
To Daniel I will my Rubik’s Cube, my Bo Burnham calculator, my rebellious nature, my signed copy of The Fault in Out Stars, and my impeccable handwriting.
To my mother I will my ability to talk and spehl perfict English.
To Russell I will my Between: Pocket Bible for Preteens, my 64 pack of Crayola Crayons (with the sharpener!), my Morton’s Steakhouse complimentary napkin, and my unfinished book entitled “Making Money.”
To Nikita I will my math grades, my electric keyboard, and half of my sobriety.
To Ms. Stacy I will my wonderful memory and half of our advice sessions after class.
To Mr. Matthew I will the chocolate soy milk in my fridge, my stash of chocolate candy, the other half of our advice sessions after class, and you can have your almost-empty bottle of cologne back.
To my father I will my trophies, medals, and loyalty.
To Gary Weilage I will my guitar, guitar books, and my expansive music collection. Chase Coy will grow on you someday!
To Travis Fortney I will my “cutie pie”-ness, my Sony ACID music software, and the other half of my sobriety.
To Matt Myers I will my total confusion about what kind of relationship we even have, my “majestic” last name, and my awesome license.
To Sarah Smith I will my video blogs— finished or not,— and of course my heart, which is forever yours.
To James Volner I will my ability to not cheat on my girlfriend, my ACT score, and that Memphis hoodie with the stain on the left sleeve. I’m sure you bought it like that.
To Jesse Turner I will all of the fruits and squashes of my labor that never made their way into our conversations, my sanity, my Louis Vuitton handbag, and my nail polish collection, which will fuel your joke engine for a good month or so.
To Buddy Cole I will my travel-size bottle of Bath & Body Works hand sanitizer, my innocent nature, and my calm disposition towards police officers.
And last but not least, I will my everlasting attention span to

Luke

A note: I am not an expert on love. Honestly, I am a 16 year old boy that has had terrible luck with girls and friends.

This is not going to be an easy subject to write about. Love is something that certainly does exist, but misunderstood. What is love? (Baby don’t hurt me!)

Love is an action. It is more than a mere feeling. It is more than sappy songs played on acoustic guitar. It is more than hugs from behind, passionate kisses, late nights talking, walks on the beach. It is pushing your freshly disabled wife back home, and staying with her. Staying celibate until she dies. Changing her diapers. Leaving your life behind. It is a deeper than love for your wife. It is a love for God. If you can’t love God, you can’t love anyone of God. It is also love of yourself. How can you expect to love others if you can’t do yourself a favor and forgive yourself? When you make those wedding vows, you say for better or worse. That is often abandoned, and that British drunk-es (points will be awarded to whoever knows what that means) me off.

For the record, I have no clue what the next paragraph will be. I have tried 10 different analogies and then deleted them, so whatever is up next is going to be good.

Love is a career. You can fall into love (lowercase l) and you can fall out of love, but if you ever hit Love (uppercase) you don’t go back. I think people mistake the lowercase love for uppercase Love. Love (upper) is difficult for humans. We can look at God, and we see real Love. We see someone who loves us so much, He did more than die in the heat of the moment. HE WAS BORN TO DIE. Yea, yea, lots of people die for the love of their life. They catch a hand grenade, or jump in front a train. In the heat of the moment. While those are both noble reasons to die, they weren’t born to do that. They were born to live. Christ has the perfect love story. Some people seem to only get half of the puzzle. They either expect to live for their lover, or die for their lover. Crazy as it is, Christ did both rather effectively. And then He said “Hold up, I got you souvenirs of my Love. It is called the mass.”

I feel like I am awfully off topic, because I am. Love is something that even Shakespeare, Aristotle, Moses, or even Daniel Tosh can’t sum up. In fact, I am totally unqualified to talk about it. Me talking about love is like me teaching an aeronautical course because I watched Top Gun. (which I haven’t seen anyway.) In fact, when I think of love and my interpretation of it, I think of this line, from one of my favorite movies, Good Will Hunting. (Warning, poop may be brought up.)

“So if I asked you about art, you’d probably give me the skinny on every art book ever written. Michelangelo, you know a lot about him. Life’s work, political aspirations, him and the pope, sexual orientations, the whole works, right? But I’ll bet you can’t tell me what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You’ve never actually stood there and looked up at that beautiful ceiling; seen that. If I ask you about women, you’d probably give me a syllabus about your personal favorites. You may have even been laid a few times. But you can’t tell me what it feels like to wake up next to a woman and feel truly happy. You’re a tough kid. And I’d ask you about war, you’d probably throw Shakespeare at me, right, “once more unto the breach dear friends.” But you’ve never been near one. You’ve never held your best friend’s head in your lap, watch him gasp his last breath looking to you for help. I’d ask you about love, you’d probably quote me a sonnet. But you’ve never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Known someone that could level you with her eyes, feeling like God put an angel on earth just for you. Who could rescue you from the depths of hell. And you wouldn’t know what it’s like to be her angel, to have that love for her, be there forever, through anything, through cancer. And you wouldn’t know about sleeping sitting up in the hospital room for two months, holding her hand, because the doctors could see in your eyes, that the terms “visiting hours” don’t apply to you. You don’t know about real loss, ‘cause it only occurs when you’ve loved something more than you love yourself. And I doubt you’ve ever dared to love anybody that much.”

I think you can fall into love at a glance. Or at the very least, a healthy romantic love. I don’t think it happens very often, but it does happen.

A note, I firmly believe a father loves his children before he even sees them.

As I wrote this, I thought about how I have been affected by love. The strongest bit of love I have ever felt was the simplest, most easily overlooked gesture. So I continued to write. And write. And write. It feels good to say most of it. I am not skilled enough in the written word to convey everything that soars through my body, but I have tried. I have posted it to my personal blog,if you are interested, look at it Here! http://lukewalther.tumblr.com/post/23277924759/post-youth-2000

Written by Lydia on May 17, 2012

TOPIC: LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT

Is it possible to know that you love someone from a single glance? Can we see someone and, from that moment on, feel a selfless pull to provide for them and contribute to their happiness?

My answer is no. My reasoning behind this is that, by simply having someone’s image in your head for a split second, you can’t possibly feel a definite love for them. You can’t know and accept everything they are; you can’t imagine a realistic future together. You can’t reminisce on the tiny little nuances about them like the absurd dreams they have at night or the way they only enjoy butter-free popcorn. Those last two were just examples, but my point is that you can’t love them because at the first moment you look at them, whether you’re secretly stealing this glance or whether their eyes are meeting yours, you don’t know them.

Maybe love at first sight isn’t possible, but “like” at first sight is. It’s very possible that you see someone, and upon seeing them, you feel an instant attraction. It’s very possible that you long to know them better and you become infatuated with the person standing (or sitting or walking or running) before you. That’s very possible, and I don’t think it’s outrageous to say that it happens everyday all over the world.

Another thing that is very possible is the case of “like” at first sight that turns into love. Perhaps after you felt an immediate attraction toward them, you approached that person and asked their name. Had a conversation. Asked them out on a date and a year later you get married to the person you never thought you’d meet in aisle six of the grocery store or the mall parking lot. I think situations like this lead us to believe in love at first sight, when in reality, it was a firm attraction at first sight. That’s what people are chasing these days— the unshakeable attraction at first sight, because maybe that unshakeable attraction is the closest to truly loving someone they’ve ever been. This world, with its romantic comedies and how-to guides to dating, is centered around finding “the one.” And in a world like this, it’s rather comforting to think that we can accomplish that by just opening our eyes.

Written by Lydia on May 16th, 2012

Luke and I decided that we’d like to supplement our regular written blog posts with video blogs YouTube. He sometimes has trouble putting his thoughts on paper, and I sometimes (more often than not,) have trouble putting mine in spoken words. We also decided to post those video blogs to Tumblr as well as YouTube so people wouldn’t have to bounce around the internet searching for us. Sometimes these videos will be about random topics such as love, comedy, etc., and sometimes they’ll be question and answer sessions.

Also, if you want to suggest a topic or submit questions for our written blog or our video blog, feel free to email us at theromangreekeffect@gmail.com. Please do specify how you want your topic/question addressed in the email!