Category: Assignment #1

Me getting vaccinated for COVID-19 displays the resistance to my mother’s orders and how it was struggle, even with her not being physically present to stop me. However, at times, there may be the guilt of doing it without her knowing. I was always afraid of trying to negotiate so to speak, and chances are that I’ll never know if she would have been fine with it, because I never bothered explaining my situation. I thought that she would force me into a life-changing decision with no questions asked, and well, I did not ask. Now I have to keep it a secret from everybody.

So, upon getting vaccinated for COVID-19, there was a stress in neogtiation with my mother, who did not want me to get it. She moved away to keep a job without getting the shot. I was upset at my father for trying to avoid getting me the shot in spite of her not physically there. The reason why he eventually let me was because I turned 18 and because of that, I legally don’t need parental consent for everything anymore. He saw that he could use that as an excuse, even though he’s kept it secret this whole time and he’s gotten me to do the same thing. By that I mean, we don’t tell anyone in the family, because of the fear of them “accidentally” telling her (my mom) or saying it online where she can see it. I don’t get it because it would have made no difference if I was still 17, but he thought that somehow, she would get a confirmation email that I got the shots. He even started to think that we (mom and I) shared emails and would think that anything sent to me regarding the shots, would be sent to her, which is ridiculous to think, because I wasn’t and am still not a little kid. So, that wouldn’t make sense even though my mom is fairly protective, bit not nearly to that extreme. Perhaps that teachable moment here is to not let some external force make decisions for you, because I felt like I wasted a lot of time. Sure, it was nice to have a break from 13 consecutive years of school, but I felt guilty, sitting around with no responsibilities for 7 months.

Anyway, I may go against the message I wrote because I of course did depend on my dad to be able to get the vaccination. But, the point was his avoidance to get it and my own avoidance to talk to my mother. I thought that she would somehow force me to move other there if my dad at any point did plan to get me the shots with her knowing about it. I would’ve been very upset actually. I do obviously respect my mom, but if she forced me to go over there, to avoid getting a shot, to me and most people, it would seem really silly. It doesn’t appear that she’s just against this vaccination, but is against all of them. People hate others who think like that, and well, I didn’t think she always thought like that until a certain someone came into her life. By this, I mean her ex-boyfriend, who she got with, after she and my dad divorced. It seems that he believes in many conspiracy theories, and being against vaccines can be considered one of them. So, for a few years, she thought he was informing him, but many people would think that he was brainwashing her, perhaps to even get her to question the earth being round. Just because you can’t explain it, doesn’t mean it isn’t true. In fact, bring against vaccines would stem from not understanding how exposition to a virus wouldn’t harm you.

Reflection: There may have been a change in thoughts prior to and after breaking a sweat (which for me, was just holding a 130-second plank, which isn’t much by the way), was that perhaps after, the tone was rather of anger instead of disappointment, but the “workout” may have not played a role, because I was thinking of writing that anyway. I may have not got to write as much the 2nd time because of a disruption and well, I could also have written more in general if I wasn’t using my phone to do this. The WiFi has been out since yesterday.

There once was a time when my mom wouldn’t let me get vaccinated for COVID-19. Because of how she was against the vaccination herself, she moved away to avoid being forced to take it for work. Now, I’m left, living with my dad, because she took my brother. Now that they’re gone, I thought that surely my dad will let me get the shot. I needed it if I wanted to stay in New York, not just because it might be required for a job in the future, but also because I would not have been able to pursue higher education here. However, my dad tried to avoid that at all costs, which forced me to take a gap semester. My mother was and still is not physically here, but somehow would still feel guilty going against her wishes, which clearly in some way go against my best interest. I mean, what would I do if I were to not get it? Move over there, perhaps? Because I didn’t know what I wanted to do after High School, I thought about College. I didn’t want to go away and instead wanted to stay close to family. So, if I couldn’t pursue higher education here in NY, I’d have to go over there. It’s not the worst thing that can happen, but over there, you need to drive to get anywhere! I never learned how to drive and I’m probably not planning on doing so, because I don’t trust my reflexes.

“They saw two alternatives– either the system was responsive to people or it was against them. They had no understanding of class struggle– that the people who run the system are always opposed to the majority of the people, but can be forced into doing things if the majority pushes them hard enough. Many of them felt you would not change the majority of Americans. This came from a contempt for the working class Abbie Hoffman, the Yippie leader, later put it this way, talking of Archie Bunker, a right-wing working class character on TV:

We deliberately chose to go for the children of the Bunkers because…”

Anyway, back to my situation. I’m so used to used to using public transportation that I feel no need to drive. I mean, I can get anywhere in the city for a price of $2.90, which used to be $2.75. With a car, I’ll often have to pay for gas and well, everyone knows about how prices went up last year. On top of that, there are car payments which are part of my mom’s finances. I mentioned this because she seems to be struggling financially, so she ends up having a room and a bathroom as a place to live. That means that if I were to move there, I’d have little privacy, which is not great. However, I decided to not say any of this to my mom, thinking this wasn’t negotiable. I thought that she would force me to move there and even though she has said things that would make me think that, I never got to actually sit down and have a conversation with her about this due to the fear of her being upset at the entertainment of the thought of me getting the jab or shot. That would be hard to do because again, she lives a distance away, but I could call her to talk about it. Instead, in my senior year of High School, I’ve talked to my speech therapist and social worker about this quite a few times (especially the former), and they just seem frustrated that wouldn’t do anything about it.

Reflection: A difference in thoughts between writing about the prompt and copying the passage is that with answering the prompt, I knew what I was writing about and it got me to think of all the thoughts surrounding a moment. As for copying the passage, I didn’t understand the subject matter too much, but chose it because there is quite a quotable sentence in it. I will also say that there is less pressure in not having to come up with something to write, as with answering the prompt, I have to think before I write down. Well, maybe not so much, because I’m trying to write as much as I can in a certain time period, but there still was thought involved. The pressure with the passage was just the stress of finding one, but it was smooth sailing from there.

Source: A People’s History Of The Vietnam War, by Jonathan Neale