Jack Michel’s Blog

What comes to mind when you hear, “The American Dream”? Freedom? Opportunity? Wealth? Fame? While the American Dream was once about affluence and materialism, it is now considered to be the hope that any American has the opportunity and freedom to earn success if they work hard enough. This means that race and economic class do not play a role in achieving happiness. Success is when you achieve your goals, which means you consequently feel happiness. While many may gain wealth, they may not feel happy. Many are unable to achieve either. Nostalgia (a particular affection for the past) and materialism (the tendency to prioritize physical possessions over other aspects of life) are both large factors in The Great Gatsby and Between the World and Me . The corrupted, materialistic Dream of gaining wealth without happiness is demonstrated well in The Great Gatsby , and the fact that many Americans (specifically African Americans) are at a great disadvantage towards achieving the American D

How have your thoughts toward school changed? To be honest, my thoughts towards school have definitely become more negative. With finals being canceled, grades not allowed to go lower (with the exception of incomplete), and lots of content being cut out of the class curriculums, I have somewhat given up on school. I do a lot less work, not to say I don’t put effort into classes still, but it is much less than before remote learning. I just hope that we will be able to get through these rough times and get back on track in time for the 20-21 school year. 

What, if anything, does your family need today that you intend to buy or that you may not have enough of? There aren’t truly any items we need right now, because one, we are lucky enough that we can afford groceries, and two, the grocery stores around here are usually well stocked. We weren’t worried about hand sanitizer or toilet paper when there was a lot of panic buying. At the beginning of each week, our family also tries to plan what we’re going to do for dinner each night. Sometimes we find that we’re missing certain ingredients or have run out of stuff, but we don’t have noticeably less stuff during this time than any other time. 

Name one thing in nature you have noticed/discovered in the last week. One thing I noticed in nature recently was a cardinal. I was sitting outside on our back porch with my dog, when the cardinal swooped across the backyard from one tree to another. I always stop to take a moment to look at cardinals because of how rarely I see them. They don’t stay in one spot very long, or at least that seems to be the case when I’m around. 

Have you reconnected with anyone? Since my dad has the “premium” Zoom or whatever the subscription is called, he likes to host meetings with family. I usually go to something our family calls “happy hour”--everyone (that lives on the North Shore) that is on my dad’s side of the family comes together for dinner once every weekend. We couldn’t get together in person, so my dad invited them all to a Zoom. We’ve done that a few times which has been nice. Also, last night, we had a Zoom meeting with several family members from my mother’s side, including family from Arizona, Iowa, and Texas. This was a lot of fun because many of the family members had not seen each other in years and we had a lot of laughs.

Name an instance of money arising as a topic for you. How has your attitude toward money changed, again on a personal or social level?  During the week of February that all the juniors took the ACT, I opened up an ETRADE account. This is because I wanted to get some experience with real-life stock trading. This ended up being one of the worst weeks to start investing in stocks because it was the worst day for the stock market since the late 1930s. This made me view the stock market in a different way, because once I lost money on buying stocks, I’ve tried to invest in a way that predicts it will go down, which has been unsuccessful. This made me change my view of money because I realized that the stock market often does not reflect the true condition of the U.S. economy. The economy has halted, companies are failing, millions of workers are being furloughed or becoming unemployed, but certain corporations are being bailed out by the Fed. The amount of QE being given out to shady

How are you feeling about spring? I don’t know if I recall a stranger spring. Not strange because of the pandemic, but because of the weather. I remember running around the Skokie Lagoons last week on a sunny day with temperatures above 90 degrees. However, it has snowed twice since that day. It also hasn’t been that great of a spring because I have spring allergies (such as pollen), so I usually get a sore throat and sneeze a lot after I go outside for a run. This isn’t that bad of a reaction though, because in past spring seasons, there were days where I would frequently have to use a tissue box every class period of the school day. I’m glad I haven’t had to experience that this year. Therefore, I’m optimistic that this spring will get better, and that the snow will become less frequent. 

What does your neighborhood look like? Are people walking around? As a distance runner, I’ve spent a lot of time running down sidewalks and on the Green Bay trail recently. I also ran down Forest Way yesterday, and boy are there a lot of people. I could not tell you how many families I saw biking past me in a single file line. With kids out of school and many adults temporarily unemployed, everybody feels the need to get out and take advantage of the nice weather. However, this doesn’t happen without certain moms complaining on Nextdoor about “irresponsible” teenagers. While I won’t go into specifics, several adults in our community have expressed their anger over teens failing to comply with social distancing. This, I feel, is a bit of an overreaction, but at this point, it’s very hard to understand what is and isn’t an overreaction, so I’m just going to keep running outdoors.

What is open in your neighborhood? What is closed? Today I went to the Starbucks on Central & Crawford. It was closed for all in-store stuff, as it was only operating its drive-thru. Many fast-food places are operating in the same fashion of drive-thru only, while restaurants are doing takeout only (and delivery if they offer it). Unfortunately, there are certain retailers that have no other choice but to close down completely (for the duration of this pandemic). For example, the Kenny the Kleener dry cleaning store, next to the Starbucks I went to today, was closed. Hopefully banks will be able to give them (and other small businesses) loans very, very soon.

What are you reading? Watching? Listening to? I am reading more news and tweets during this time. I feel I should uninstall twitter because scrolling through and reading comment sections can be very frustrating. On the other hand, I have been taking more time to watch a show on Netflix called “All-American”. I finished it a couple days ago, and am glad to hear there is a third season coming out who knows when. I’m not usually the one to watch Netflix, but being in this situation means I have plenty of time to watch plenty of entertainment. I also am watching more TikToks because they often are very funny and a good way to pass time. On a completely different note, I also am watching more CNBC because I have become more and more interested in business and the stock market, which CNBC specializes in on weekdays. Finally, I am listening to more Spotify these days, mostly when I’m working out. I like listening to new music, as well as classic reggae, alternative, rock, and 90s hip-hop

What impact is technology having on your daily life? Is this different than usual? Technology is playing a huge role in my daily life. I use it to print out and do my homework, I use it for entertainment, I use it for contacting others, and I use it for tracking my running mileage. I believe that I’ve been using technology more these past few weeks than I usually do. I have found myself anxiously watching more press conferences (being held by the president) than ever before, because I used to never do that unless a clip from such a conference was being used in an episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert . With more time on my hands than one could possibly desire, I also just got into watching Netflix, which may or may not be a good idea (I haven’t determined that yet). Also, with our economy in such turmoil, I have been checking the stock market much more frequently than I usually do. This once-in-a-lifetime event that is currently upon us is applying immense stress on the ma

My junior theme focused on how the U.S. is falling behind in the global tech revolution. All around the world, advancements are being made with biotechnology, smart devices, nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, and more. However, the U.S. is not leading the charge in these disciplines, as the United States is ranked 21st in the world for overall internet speed (Ookla). This lack of leadership in the tech revolution is caused by lack of net neutrality regulations and the subsequent monopolistic nature of internet service providers (ISPs).  When first researching for my junior theme, I was looking solely into net neutrality. This is because I thought that the question of why America lacks net neutrality rules has an answer deeply rooted in the history of our country. I thought that just because Ajit Pai repealed them. But after looking into the issue for long enough, my opinion of favoring net neutrality did not change, and I realized that my question was pretty shallow. I deci