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Sep 20, 2012 #1
Question: A range of academic interests, personal perspectives, and life experiences adds much to the educational mix. Given your personal background, describe an experience that illustrates what you would bring to the diversity in a college community or an encounter that demonstrated the importance of diversity to you. (500 word limit - 420 words)
The brief sentiment acquired during my community service was resurrected upon the last day I saw Paula. It was rather awkward; she was very sickly looking, the chemo took what was left of her hair and I asked how she was doing, which is usually not something you ask somebody on their deathbed. Almost eerily and distantly, she replied she was not ready to die. My neighbor, my fourth grade teacher, my best friend's mother, my childhood family friend was not ready to die. I couldn't establish in my mind the split between death and the person. Death, universally, can still vary so much within its own domestic alliance.
In Hospice, my responsibility didn't go much further than singing Johnny Cash and Frank Sinatra every Tuesday on the way to Genghis Grill with Recreational Therapy and the residents. The plights of these individuals were medically inevitable, something I had been conditioned to, by late school nights, long school days (Does that reflect a bad attitude about school?) and the inevitable presence of my mother's Schizophrenia. I couldn't say myself that I had any impact on their existence. Hospice was just the fifth floor of the hospital known as "Heroes Haven", but rather than succumbing to lighthearted realism, they paled my perception of life and death. By molding a distinction between the physicalities of the youth and the true incarnations of the will, they essentially resonated with me on the basis of hedonism. they resonated with my own hedonism.
It was the ability to truly live every fleeting moment as an aesthetic experience, that is evident before death, that they possessed, even before skydiving, bungee jumping, or the bucket list. This distinguished these humans from humanity during their fleeting moments in the absence of fear. I have no testimony of such a tremendous conflict, aside from vicariously within my home. These were not my battles; however, they usurped my ability to leave the hospital just at my clerical duties. I thrived on the confutation of any extraordinary ability of mine able to understand or analyze the situation in hospice. There was only one perspective to put the diversity of each resident's circumstance in. Death, to them, was foreign and sacred, much like a religion, less romanticized. The less self sufficient an adult becomes, the more they begin to be treated like a child, not like a Purple Heart veteran or Ex-Pow. Though often distressing, the most exhausting places are the richest in emotion and spirituality. Our barriers are broken, and with the energy spent keeping them up, we use to establish our permanence to this Earth and pledge our allegiance to time. This diversity unites us. Our ability to experience when our days numbered, and hours counted, universally transcends our physical existence.
The brief sentiment acquired during my community service was resurrected upon the last day I saw Paula. It was rather awkward; she was very sickly looking, the chemo took what was left of her hair and I asked how she was doing, which is usually not something you ask somebody on their deathbed. Almost eerily and distantly, she replied she was not ready to die. My neighbor, my fourth grade teacher, my best friend's mother, my childhood family friend was not ready to die. I couldn't establish in my mind the split between death and the person. Death, universally, can still vary so much within its own domestic alliance.
In Hospice, my responsibility didn't go much further than singing Johnny Cash and Frank Sinatra every Tuesday on the way to Genghis Grill with Recreational Therapy and the residents. The plights of these individuals were medically inevitable, something I had been conditioned to, by late school nights, long school days (Does that reflect a bad attitude about school?) and the inevitable presence of my mother's Schizophrenia. I couldn't say myself that I had any impact on their existence. Hospice was just the fifth floor of the hospital known as "Heroes Haven", but rather than succumbing to lighthearted realism, they paled my perception of life and death. By molding a distinction between the physicalities of the youth and the true incarnations of the will, they essentially resonated with me on the basis of hedonism. they resonated with my own hedonism.
It was the ability to truly live every fleeting moment as an aesthetic experience, that is evident before death, that they possessed, even before skydiving, bungee jumping, or the bucket list. This distinguished these humans from humanity during their fleeting moments in the absence of fear. I have no testimony of such a tremendous conflict, aside from vicariously within my home. These were not my battles; however, they usurped my ability to leave the hospital just at my clerical duties. I thrived on the confutation of any extraordinary ability of mine able to understand or analyze the situation in hospice. There was only one perspective to put the diversity of each resident's circumstance in. Death, to them, was foreign and sacred, much like a religion, less romanticized. The less self sufficient an adult becomes, the more they begin to be treated like a child, not like a Purple Heart veteran or Ex-Pow. Though often distressing, the most exhausting places are the richest in emotion and spirituality. Our barriers are broken, and with the energy spent keeping them up, we use to establish our permanence to this Earth and pledge our allegiance to time. This diversity unites us. Our ability to experience when our days numbered, and hours counted, universally transcends our physical existence.
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