This week in my life

This week seems to be the busiest week of the academic year so far. This week also appears to be the busiest in terms of meetings and commitments I have made. I feel that all of the pressure is on me right now. As a member of the sophomore class with junior status, I can tell you it is not an easy task. With four history classes and a film class with three of those classes as a writing extensive course, I am seeing the consequences in not being able to pull eighteen hour study days or better yet, an all-nighter. Next week will be a challenge for me because guess what? It is the week before spring break and all of the work in everyone of my classes is piled unto me. I am talking mid-terms, papers, research, the whole nine yards. I think next week will be a determining moment in my academic career because this will either make or break me for the remainder of this semester.
To settle down from the assignment and the work load for this week, I did a couple of things. Obviously, I had to take a break. I figured what better way to waste time than to stand on my balcony and take pictures of the beautiful weather outside. I wanted to see how much of the Hill I could capture. I was impressed with the results; see for yourselves. I really needed a break and some fresh air; I was finishing up two books for two different history classes, one which I wrote a critical analysis on. This was on Tuesday, by the way, where I had four classes, two meetings, and a paper all due on Wednesday. I was stressed so I needed to do something, anything other than bury my head in books for the rest of the day.

Wednesday after my night class, I decided to check out the Matt Wertz concert. A couple of my friends have his songs on their Ipod and I thought his songs were catchy and had a feel good touch to it. Once again, I needed after sitting in a night class for close to three hours. The concert opened up with Ohio Wesleyan's own, Robyn Case. I was happy to hear her perform. I heard very good things about her and I finally got to experience that sound for myself. I thought she was a good choice to open up for Matt Wertz. There are a short break to energize ourselves. Then the energy level skyrocketed when Matt Wertz appeared on stage. Matt Wertz was personable, enthusiastic about his performance, and incredibly interactive with the crowd. All of the songs were good and some songs even made me shout or move rhythmically. I was very hapy with the performance. I thought the concert was a good way to leave all of my sorrows behind, at least for the night.
Yesterday, I went to Soups for Shelter at St. Mary's near Selby Field, which was hosted by the Delaware chapter of Habitat for Humanity. The proceeds benefit the local chapter and since I am a member of the student organization of Habitat on campus as well as the Mission Team for Greensboro, North Carolina, I figure that I will go to help out a little bit. I had two additional meetings between the working times, one for the Arts and Sciences group to get a feedback on the REAL Ohio Wesleyan, and the other meeting for Interfraternity Council. I talked to a couple of people, helped out whenever I could in the little time I had, and tried the soup. Good soup, I might say. I thought that Soups for Shelter was a good event for the city of Delaware to throw to the OWU community as well as the general community. I only wish I had more time there to help out and to explain the purpose of why I joined Habitat for Humanity to others.
In a nutshell, this is what was happened to me in the past couple of days. I have been relaxing for the last eight or so hours so I am happy and hopefully ready to go by 11:00am for class. I will be posting pictures somewhere tomorrow so check them out. Well, it is early in the morning and I am procrastinating about not wanting to go to sleep- this means I will be forcing myself to sleep in about ten minutes. I gotta go now.


P.S.- The Campus Programming Board announced that GYM CLASS HEROES will be coming to OWU for Springfest on April 18, 2008. Doors open at 7 pm and the concert begins at 8 pm in the Gordon Field House.

Busy as ever,
Hasani Wheat
Class of '10

My New Year's Resolutions

I know it is a tad early for them but if I do not do this now, I will surely forget to do so. There are a couple of things that I am wishing to do either better than in 2007 or for the first time. I will explain them in detail, like usual.

• Tap into my spiritual side. I felt that there were tremendous stride towards committing myself to a more spiritual self. There were many times that I faltered but I continued to push through. I hope that in 2008, I will be more connected than ever to my spiritual side and I hope that this will merge into my everyday life. This includes leaving daily time for the Bible, silent thought, prayer, going to church more, going to Crusade meetings in my house, venturing to Fellowship of Christian Athletes, going to one of my friend's Bible study, and promoting the Word more consistently. I want to listen to my music and really feel what the meaning of those spoken words are and tell people about that message. I want to make a honest connection with my spiritual side and become genuine with that side.
  

• Learn more about my weaknesses and improve on my strengths academically. This semester was rough on me. I never lost focus but sometimes, I felt that the courses I chose were the right combination. I wanted to have fun with the courses I chose, instead I felt constantly bogged and tired. I made mistakes in areas that never occurred before and struggled in areas that I could I improved on spring semester freshmen year. I have a lot of work to do. At the end of this semester, I clearly saw my weaknesses and had to improve on them. I see the weaknesses and for next semester, I have a vision for myself to improve. This is strategy for me. I am determined not to go back to the way I was. I can use the models of the work I destroyed as a do not do for next semester. I need to go to the writing center and see if anyone can provide a strategy for my writing style, which is alright but is often convoluted with unnecessary junk. Since all of my classes are strictly essay writing next semester, I think the writing can be monitored more closely. I also need to find people who are willing to help me proofread my papers. I need people who are honest and who can proofread particularly accomplished in history papers (e.g. HIST 493- senior history majors, you know who you are). I know that 2008 will be the year that I can change my habits that my History professors keep calling me out for all the while giving me constructive criticism. 2008 will be better than 2007 in terms of the quality of writing I can put out. I only have two history courses after the spring of 2008 and I want to be absolutely ready.
  

• Treat my body like a temple. Recently, I have put pigging out on fast food and treating myself to Delaware's restaurants. I do not go back to the fraternity house during lunch or dinner much so whenever I was hungry, I either had to ask one of my friends to get me food or I would use the money I earned working at Student Involvement to treat myself. As a result, I have packed on about twenty pounds; I weighed about 120 pounds when I arrived for Orientation and now I am close to 140 pounds. I do not mind the weight gain but I rather do it in a healthier manner. I know a lot of people who are suffering from diabetes because of all of the junk they put in their bodies. The things I put in my body have me concerned. Remember in my last post when I mentioned the Jack LaLanne power juicer. I am heavily considering bringing it. I want to have more healthy and not become another victim of high cholesterol and high blood pressure. I need the change in my life. I need to go to Kroger as soon as I arrive and get as much fruit and vegetables as possible in my hands and avoid red meats for a while. No fast foods, just a nice pomegranate or watermelon in my hands. This is a key resolution for me as many people have pointed out how bad my eating habits are, even though many of those people were joking somewhat- remember where I live, I have a lot of athlete around me. I think I will take their advice with the food.

• My last resolution is this: try to make time for myself. This will probably be the most difficult habit to break but I do not want to see my sanity in the process. Next semester, I am so busy. I need to make time to go to the gym more like my freshmen year where I need the wellness center outside of Stuyvesant Hall at least once every two weeks. My body was fit. Now, my body is losing that tightness and is becoming more flabby. Personally, I want that tightness back! Seriously, I want to relax more and with all of the events that I am doing away from the Ohio Wesleyan campus, I will be able to rest before the big events. I am seeing a lot of motels and hotels in the future, at least four of them. Hopefully, this will help with my resolution. There will be a lot of events in each I will be participating in on campus; that is what I am hoping I can just relax from. I do not have to go to all of the events but many of them are mandatory. I have some plans to balance my time out and no, none of these plans involve playing Halo or Fifa, two games which I cannot stand under any circumstance. It is not because they are annoying games; I just see everyone play those games. Anyway, my classes give me more of an opportunity to have study and free time. I will utilize the extra time to my advantage. This past semester, I had class, class, and more class on top of work and club meetings. I was begging to leave the Ohio Wesleyan campus at the end of Finals. I needed a break from the hustle and bustle of campus life.
  

This covers my New Year's Resolution that I want to see changed for the next semester in January. I know that I am strong enough in all senses to get these accomplished for myself. I have to focus on these goals and try to have balance in my life. The time starts when January 1, 2008 appears. Trust me: I don't want to look back, just forward into my future.




Aiming for my goals,
Hasani Wheat
Class of '10

It is 8 in the morning and I have just recovered from mid-terms...mostly.

Well, I know it has been around two weeks since I last posted so I have so much to tell you. I don't have no camera and I have been so busy that I have not bothered anyone to use theirs for the moment. For now, I guess that text will have to work. Just imagine everything I have done and magnify everything times ten. Yes, that has been my two weeks worth of adventure since my last post on the 25th of September.
To start off, I celebrated my 20th birthday last week. The day was October 1 and unfortunately, my birthday fell on a Monday, when the intensity of mid-terms picked up. Personally, I knew that I could not go out to celebrate like how I wanted to. I had to be low-key so I could focus on several upcoming exams. I still celebrated on Wednesday since I was determined to make the most out of my birthday. I prefer to have my birthdays on the down low, having people find out instead of just outright telling them. This way, no one would try to do something that I would regret on a school day like drink before a long day of exams. I have seen this happen where a person would celebrate their birthday when they knew they had exams the next day and show up to class with a hangover. Imagine the consequences.
Coincidentally, my birthday fell on Greek Week. Just a little explanation: Greek Week is when all of the Greeks on campus come together for a week of entertainment, fun, and competition. Greek Week was all of last week. I represented Phi Delta Theta in two of the six events: the Water Balloon Toss and Corn Hole. I am not the most athletic or skilled person in any person; mainly I did the events to mingle with people that went Greek and somehow I lost contact with and to participate for my fraternity. I am all about unity for all Greeks, no matter what race, nationality, or religion a person in a sorority or a fraternity is. Greek Week was fun for me. The events were Chalk the Walk on Monday, Water Balloon Toss and Olive Race on Tuesday, Jello Eating Contest, a cookout and Corn Hole on Wednesday, Dance Off and a Chariot Race on Thursday, and Penny Wars throughout the week. Final results were read last Friday with the eventual winners being Chi Phi and Kappa Alpha Theta. I wasn't bummed about the result; I just wish there was more participation in the Greek community.
Moving on to my world in academia, I have completed four out of five exams. I have received two of the four exams back with my exam for Making of Britain to be returned to me today. I passed the two tests that was given back to me and hopefully I have passed the Making of Britain test despite not planning out how to write two three to four page essays and thirty-five matching choices in less than a hour. I will not dropped the class in the worst-case scenario that I did poorly on the exam; I will just do better the second time around and working intensively on my paper in that class. No excuses, just do the work in that class is what I have to keep telling myself. Now that I have mostly recovered from mid-terms, I have a renewed sense of initiative to continue my studies in these classes and pass the highest grade I think I can achieve. I have to remember that I have a scholarship to keep and a promise to obtain my grades for the corporate world. Environmental Alteration test is on Thursday so I am preparing for that after turning in a sizable twelve page paper. I have to get pumped for this last exam.
Onto another news, I got away from OWU on Friday to visit home...somewhat. I left Friday evening to go do some valuable service with fellow Circle K members. We did what was called a District Service Project- people were split up into five teams and we headed into different areas of Cleveland and its suburbs to focus on a particular structures such as churches and houses of the elderly. I was split up to do service with Circle K's International President, Amanda Badali along with the OWU chapter's President, Sara Nienaber. I like working with them- they are fun but dedicated people to work beside. The team that I worked with consisted on twenty-five people from various parts of Ohio, New York, and Pennsylvania. New friendships were made, a person house was rescued and I was happy to help out. The Project was awesome and I hope to do more of this Projects in the future.
I arrived on Saturday, worked on my Exam/Paper for Cultural Geography, and then prepared to help out my organization, Black Men of the Future with our first party. We decided to have a party to promote our organization and to loosen up all of those tense muscles from the exams of last week. The party didn't start to get hot until the midnight, which is usually when parties at OWU really start. The music selection was good even though the sound system felt like it was going in the middle of the party. I saw a lot of unfamiliar faces at the party; someone told me that they were Greeks from Ohio State. Odd that they would be in a small town like Delaware when they always have a live scene in Columbus. Nevertheless, it was good seeing new faces and what they had to offer on the dance floor. I decided to excuse myself from my own organization's party because I had commitments on Sunday; I left around two o'clock a.m. to insure that I would get a good night's sleep.
On Sunday, I did another CropWalk. Last year, I did the CropWalk by myself and I enjoyed running the 10K course through Delaware. This year, as Community Service Chair for Phi Delta Theta, I was not alone in my pursuit to help the disadvantaged. I remember the theme "We walk because they walk" and I think that sometimes people do not appreciate the ability to use their two legs. The CropWalk is the perfect example of demonstrating how we as humans need to help the people who have to walk to get where they are going on a daily basis. I appreciate the CropWalk immensely and for that, I speed walk and jog most of the course.
The last two weeks have been a whirlwind for me- keeping on top of studies, balancing that with fraternity life, balancing those out with obligations for organizations, and trying to just be me all at the same time. Right now, this is working for me and I like this. I feel like I am in control of my life and I am just getting started. I am sitting at the Student Involvement Desk to earn some extra money writing this to you. I have to get this off my chest so writing this is the best way to do so. You, the reader can interpret my words however you like but right now, I am in a good place in my life and I want you to know. Well, I have to go now- I have my Environmental Alteration in ten minutes and I need the time to hike over to the Science Center.




Living life,
Hasani Wheat
Class of '10