Radio Diaries

annnd we're back! Hello Friends.

So, I went back and listened to a few of the radio diaries from NPR.  I especially liked the teenage diaries, cause they were just honest and I felt I was walking along side them as they went through their lives. 

First I listened to Jeff in Boston.  He is talking about what he is in terms of race.  But, it's kind of funny because he's talking as he is getting ready for school, and is sort of talking about how people come up to him assuming he speaks Spanish, but he does back and forth between that and talking about music.  He calls himself 'halfrican', which i thought was hilarious, but it makes sense, he didn't know any different - he expected races to mix.  He says, it would make sense to me if two Asian people had a black baby.  It's true though, kids see things differently until you reach that age of redefinition.  Big scary would gets bigger and scarier and more confusing.  He asks the white kids why white kids sit together, and he says he wouldn't fit in at a table of white folks because he wouldn't fit in - they think it's a whole different culture.  He also talks about rap as a race war, and that he didn't have to pick a side or hear about it because he was half and half, and how he is never really fully in on the joke or the conversation or the music.  Both sides look at him as a traitor, so where does he fit in? Does it matter?  He can't fit in, so he might as well stand out, right?

Then I listened to Melissa in CT.  She's pretty funny.  She's 18, pregnant and just trying to make it in this world.  I really like listening to these radio diaries because they are just so casual -it's like going through life with your best friend, who's just chatting about her day and her life and her problems and such.  Her boyfriend calls her, and she asks us "should we answer?".  It's just fun, but it's also honest. She addresses the issues of abortion and adoption and why she didn't want to do either.  She doesn't want to kill her child, and she went through the foster care/group living/etc/etc/etc system.  Her life has shaped her choices, which is pretty normal.  She has her baby in the middle of it - and we see her through a stressful period in her life.  She sees him peeing on her as him 'marking her territory' haha, it's great.  But it's also sad when she calls her mom and the number is disconnected - she just says oh well, she probably wouldn't care anyhow.  She recognizes that she should've waited until later to have a kid, but she says she isn't sad, she knows she can't change what has already happened.  In the end, she is just a regular teenager who has made some mistakes but is trying to survive. 

I really like all the stories where people are just talking, honestly telling their life from their point of view.  We are all so different and it's interesting to get a peek into the daily life of someone else.