Maybe it is fate that I am to be a communications major, as television is always
around me when I’m at home.  Some people say that it is bad for you, and I do
not totally disagree.  Sometimes I feel that I watch too much, but I also feel
that I know a lot more about life by not only watching programs that are filled
with complete drivel like other television addicts.  Many programs that I watch
are educational, whether it be in a fact oriented way, or a personable,
interacting way.  I personally enjoy the relationships that I share with
characters I can relate to, as sometimes it feels that nobody else is like me
at all.  This leads to two movies that I can relate to in their entirety.

        The movie “Patch Adams” stars Robin Williams who is first found in a mental
institution where he was self-admitted because of thoughts of suicide.  When
his sense of humor shines, his laughter and joy to the others brings a
happiness within himself to make the decision leave the facilities and pursue a
medical degree and become a doctor in order to help people.  When attending the
school, he finds out that he cannot interact with patients at the local
hospital until his third year in school, and begins sneaking in to help cheer
up the patients with his goofy antics.  His philosophy was simple, to better a
person’s health is to not just treat them as a patient, but as a friend.  If
its not totally possible to cure their health, at least make them more
comfortable in their current state and hope for the best.

        While on campus, many people began to be suspicious of his ways.  While he as
at the top of his class in grades, his study habits, or lack of, began to catch
the attention of his fellow classmates and the administrators.  He was
repeatedly asked to leave the school, one time on the note of “excessive
happiness”.  The other students insisted on hitting the books for many hours a
day and do everything by the book, and interaction is the least of their
prioritis.  Patch decides to go against the grain and do things his own way,
and hopes to change the ways of one particular girl that he has an interest in
since their first encounter.  She is cold, bitter, and totally uninterested in
anything other than a textbook with a factoid stating how things should be done
and why, much like everyone else.  Eventually, he wins her over and begins his
dream of starting a hospital of his own in which laughter is the best medicine,
the patients are treated well with kindness and as a friend, and it goes totally
against traditional medicine practices.

        While I have no aspirations to be a doctor, I feel that I’m much like Patch
Adams in the sense that people are too stuffy about their schooling.  I’ve
mentioned it before that people are too worried about making the grade and not
learning.  Observation is one of the best ways to learn, whether it be in
school, at home, watching television, or wherever you may be.  The people that
surround and the events that happen around you all offer different things to be
learned, and if you’re too busy to notice you’ll surely miss them.  While
studying is important, it is not the most important thing about college or any
schooling.  Learning, which I say in the sense of actual comprehension and not
memorization is key.  How ever that is learned is up to the individual person,
and just because a grade is said to reflect the knowledge obtained is not
necessarily the case.

        The second movie, which is much like a continuation of “Patch Adams” is the
movie “Accepted“.  This involves a boy who is turned down by every college he
applies for, and to meet the approval of his parents, he creates his own fake
college to get them off of his back for a while.  His fake college is so
lifelike that many other kids with the same problem of being turned down appear
at this fake college in hopes of being accepted too.  Eventually, a “real”
college is formed, and the educating begins.  The college of South Harmon
Institute of Technology, (S.H.I.T) is much like a liberal studies college,
where anything and everything can and will be learned.  The kids teach other
kids whatever it is that they want.  The curriculum is a dry-erase board that
every student that comes into the school writes what they want to learn on.
Through many troubles and tribulations S.H.I.T becomes an actual college with
this relaxed curriculum and unorthodox method of learning, and is acclaimed by
parents and school officials alike.

        In many ways, I wish this were a real college.  I realize that there are very
liberal-study based schools, however I do not believe anything is this liberal,
nor should one have to travel far away to learn such skills.  Many of the
classes that S.H.I.T taught were how to get through life lessons and how to
simply have fun but learn too.  For people like myself, who have no concrete
plans of what to do, and would rather know a variety of things, this is ideal.
I would never want to learn one specific task and be programmed to do this task
for all eternity.  While doing this for some people might earn them a nice wage
and a secure job setting for most of their lives, true happiness only occurs
when you do something you love, no matter what the cost and outcome.  Just
because the rest of society says something is right does not mean it is the
right thing for you or anyone else.  Only you can make that decision.  If you
have the desire to succeed in something, no matter how crazy or unconventional
the idea is, never give up.

        Having watched television and movies for quite some time now and having a very
good memory, I’m able to remember random quotes and many insignificant things.
Like just in that last paragraph I could have ended with a quote from “Galaxy
Quest” of “Never give up, never surrender!” and it would have been appropriate.
 There is a time and a place to do this, and not everyone understands this
concept.  By now, it is probably recognized that I’m a little upset with people
around me by their lack of communication skills.  While I have no problem
chatting about the recent blockbusters or cult classics, conversation should
not be dominated by irrelevant things that have no real impact on ones’ lives.
I’m a sucker for a good, deep conversation, and I cannot possibly find a way to
do this when somebody is quoting Napoleon Dynamite every 30 seconds, or saying
“That’s hot.” every other minute.   The people who decide to run out and see
the latest movie the day it comes out should learn to be more considerate and
not blurt out every comedic or important part of a movie and ruin it for those
around them.  Not only is it rude, chances are you are not as dramatic,
convincing, or funny than those who got paid to make the movie in the first
place.  Thanks for saving me $8, though.

        However, I am guilty of doing this in a sense.  After having seen just about
every episode of Seinfeld, I’m able to relate just about any everyday situation
to one I’ve seen on the popular television show.  Sometimes people laugh,
sometimes people moan that I remember such random occurrences and insist on
sharing them.  And while it is somewhat hypocritical to repeat things from the
show in everyday life, I believe it takes a skill to relate real life events to
fictional events.  Not only must you interpret the program, you must also be
able to recognize the situation in real life.  As mentioned, many people are
not interested in the things around them, and personal interaction is not key.
As a people person, I enjoy seeing how my life might relate to Seinfeld on any
particular day.  It’s amazing how a show about nothing can do so much to someone.

        There are times where I might imitate someone that I acknowledge as someone I
like on television.  I’ve mentioned before that I wanted to be a game show host
and I also used to pretend I was a wrestler that I’d see on TV.  I used to
create my own game show and I had stuffed wrestlers that I’d recreate what I’d
see on TV with as well.  I’ve grown up since then, but as I’ve mentioned, I
sometimes like to think what it’d be like to be those on TV.  I believe this is
healthy to an extent.  However, with technology growing the way it is, and
things like YouTube, people tend to think that anyone can be a somebody.
Anybody with a video camera and a computer can upload movie onto this popular
clip site.  This discourages myself and others who actually aspire to be
someone to create original material to entertain the masses.  I’m sorry if I
speak for everyone and it disappoints you to hear that not everybody wants to
see you playing guitar with a bad cover of “You’re Beautiful”.  There are times
where people’s own lack of intelligence is funny though, and for that pure
reason it is okay to post, as long as it’s meant to make others laugh.

        I’m not really sure how to conclude this particular thought of mine.  I could
use some sort of metaphor, but in all honesty, I’d rather just be blunt and say
what I have to say, which I feel I succeeded at for this particular article.  To
sum up, I might watch a lot of television, and for some that might not be the
right route or most effective way to spend their time, but I happen to like it
and I feel it completes me as a person.  I do not feel that it has stunted my
growth as a person, and it many ways I feel that it has excelled it.  I hope
others might be able to eventually do the same.