A Peice to Die For

Authors Note:

I really wanted to do this piece because I remember this piece from when i went to the art museam and I thought it would be intersting to learn more about it. Please look formy use of A-B transitions.

Every 1 out of 800 live births end up with down syndrome. They live their lives with impulsive behavior, small ears, small mouths, and poor judgement. The list goes on and on, but there is no reason to feel bad for these kids because they live their lives just as good as every other kid in the world.

David M. Lenz is a Self-Employed Artist ,full time, in Shorewood, WI. He went to school and got his Bachelor degree in Fine Arts, at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee,in 1985. He got married to Rosemarie Feiza-Lenz  and had their son Sam. Sam wasn't a typical boy, he was born with down syndrome.

Although Sam does have down syndrome, he was still a silly 9 year old. According to PubMed Health, down syndrome occurs when there is an extra copy of chromosome 21. This form of down syndrome is called Trisomy 21. The extra chromosome causes problems with the way the body and brain develop. At the age of nine his father painted a oil painting of him standing in front of a scene in Wisconsin.  

Even as people see kids with down syndrome as children with special needs, many people don’t view Sam as a special needs kid because he lives a somewhat normal life. He is like other kids, but he has a special piece of him in the Milwaukee Art Museum. Before this piece was famous, it was entered in a contest with 4,000 other paintings. He was selected in the top 100 people. Then he was  selected to be in the top 7. Finally, after a long wait him and his family were flown out to Washington D.C. to be selected as the winner on June 23.

Life just lives on for this child who is able to live a not so average life. How tremendous would it be to know that a painting of you is being displayed at a museum. This little boy never let any sickness stop him in life so next time you see a “special needs” child just say “hi” to them because they are just another  person  like you and it just might make their day.

Reputation Competition

Authors Note:
I felt connected to this book in a certain way. Although no one in our school takes popularity to that much of an extreme, if you’re not careful you could end up trying to be like someone else. Please look for my a-b transitions, and my lurid use of vocabulary words.

Everyone backs away as the so called popular clique come through. They had on their Swiss-dot silk DKNY dress ($248), Marc by Marc Jacobs leather kitten heels ($265), a BCBG beaded clutch ($108) and a hair clip ($32) the grand total for just one outfit is $653.00. There is four of them and if I took everything out of their closets I would have enough money to buy a zoo.  The minute these girls walk through the doors, it creates a huge popularity contest. In the novel The Clique,  Lisi Harrison really paints a vivid picture about the difficulties in school popularity contests. Through small hints in the book she showed readers the importance in being true to yourself.



When there are people who are stuck-up in school, they make up things or act dramatic just to be “popular”; they’re the ones who end up without a career or drop out of college because of their grades. People take popularity all the way to a point where it’s a competition to gossip about someone or something they did. The juicer the gossip the more “gossip points” they got. They’re not focused on their grades, just getting those gossip points. In addition they are focused on being mean to innocent people who are just trying to live their everyday lives. According to Make A Sound For The Voice Unheard it’s estimated that 160,000 children miss school every day due to fear of attack or intimidation by other students. “Source: National Education Association.”



Although it may seem like the popular group is the only ones being cruel, but little do you know the “outcasts” have a devil side too. If you don’t read this book you wouldn’t be able to see the cruelty that can come out. You may have thought that Claire was harmless and sympathetic, but really she was sneaking into Massie's room at night to talk Massie's friends into liking her. It was like Claire was manipulating Massie’s friends into thinking she was cool. When Claire did these things she didn’t really mean to hurt them, but they were so mean to her and she was frustrated that she didn't have any true friends.



Although being an outcast is hard, it’s even harder to know people talk about you behind your back. If you're not in “the group” you're probably getting talked about and if you're in “the group” then people are still probably talking about you. We are all guilty for gossiping, it’s just our nature. When you talk behind peoples backs you get the feeling of being better than the person your talking about.

As the popularity contest sinks into your life it’s important to stay true to your colors. When you are young everyone gets along; as long as you get your cookies, life's good. Things start to get more complicated when you get older and the contest begins. When school life has lots of drama try not to get caught up in the contest because it will come back to hurt you in the end.