Blog Post 2

After reading Roxane Gay’s “I Once Was Miss America” my initial thoughts were a reflection of my own high school experience. I also thought about how everybody can be apart of the same events, such as high school, and have different perspectives and unique experiences. For some people high school was a walk in the park and something to be nostalgic about, for others it is a difficult time and something they don’t want to ever look back on. Gay talks about not having a great high school experience and not fitting in, however she finds an outlet, reading, that helps her to escape the troubles high school brought her. She indulged in a book series that she enjoyed and identified with the characters in the book to help her feel beautiful in her own skin. I think it is very important for people to find their own personal outlets and releases to help them deal with unfavored situations. I had an amazing high school experience but there were definitely rough patches were I could relate to how Gay felt and I also had my own outlet I turned to when I was down to help me get through my problems. Working out was my outlet because it always made me feel better after, it released all the native energy and bad thought I had and allowed me to refocus on things that really mattered. Another important point this reading brought to my attention was how sensitive different people can be to different situations because of their past experiences. Everyone should be considerate of others reactions and perspectives because it is impossible to know everything that somebody has previously gone through or is still going through. I think that it is because people are so quick to judge in difficult situations that we burry what we are going through so deeply into our private lives and it is so hard to discern the well being of others, even those we care about.