The best person to me

Quick note, my laptop's baaaaaack!!! Horaay!


I know that the title "the best person to me" sounds rather elementary, but using the phrase "My Favorite Person" is way too ordinary and overused.  Plus, the person I want to talk about is everything but ordinary.  She is extraordinary in every way imaginable.  I can only hope to grow up to be similar to how she was.  How she is to me.

Sorry, this post might be a tad sad, but it's how I feel.  Anyways the point of this blog was to write about us and our lives.  My Grandmother is a huge part of my life and always will be.

 A rather cute story that I recently found out about her happens to be how she met her husband.  While she was still in high school, a team of construction workers were brought in to fix the roof of her school.  My Grandpa (whom I have never met) was among them along with his older brother who was in charge of him.  While working, my Grandpa would notice a pretty girl with a big smile walking across the lawn with her friends.  He would just cease working immediately, sit there on the roof, and openly gawk.  In fact, he did so much gawking that it became a problem whenever he wouldn't finish the jobs he was working on.  His brother grew angry but was determined for the both of them to finish the roof on time.  He finally made a deal to introduce my Grandpa to the pretty high school student who, unbeknownst to her, was the cause of the roof not getting fixed by the deadline.  It is a good thing his brother stepped up to help his shy brother, because otherwise my dad would have never been born.

My Grandma was never rich, but she was not dirt poor.  She lived comfortably with her husband and five children on a farm in Pine Bush, New York (for those who don't know where Pine Bush is, it is supposedly the UFO capital of the world).  The whole family knew the value of hard work.

Now I am getting to why I am writing about her.  She was the only grandparent that I have met in person so unlike most children who have four grandparents to visit, to me she was everything: two grandmas AND two grandpas.  She was so proud of all of her grandchildren, no matter what kind of craziness we got into.  My grandma would also splurge on us as though she owned a gold mine.  I am pretty sure a few years ago she gave me a 100 dollar bill for my birthday!

Unfortunately she lived in an era where smoking was glamorized by the press, and so that's what she did for forty years.  In the eighteen years that I knew her she was always sick.  She suffered from emphysema, COPD, and many other demons.  Even when I was a little girl I always saw her with a wire of oxygen attached to her nose that would trail dozens of feet behind her as she walked.  I never really understood what it was for until I grew older.

My Grandma also stayed true to her Catholic faith.  Whenever she was too sick to drive herself to church she would watch mass on television.  She kept crosses and pictures of Jesus everywhere and she also had a fondness for St. Francis of Assisi.

I place my Grandma over most people for the following reasons:
1.  She was the strongest person I have ever met.
      She battle terrible illnesses for over eleven years and still kept her sense of humor.
2.  She married for the right reasons.
       When my Grandpa was killed while working construction she held strong for the rest of her                 family.  She never remarried.  Even after twenty years without him.
3.  My Grandma worried.
      She was constantly worrying for everyone but herself, even as she slowly deteriorated in front
        of us.

This summer she died the night I arrived back from my freshman orientation here at UT.  Exactly a month after I graduated.  Exactly a month before I would start classes here.  She died an hour before my Grandfather's birthday.  Again I am sorry that I wrote such a sad post.  Also, I feel as though I talk about missing her constantly.  Is this bad?  I know someone who also lost a grandparent over the summer but I rarely hear this person talk about missing them.  Maybe it is because no one this close to me has died before.  All I know is that I am so proud of her and can only hope to be like her and make her proud someday.

If anyone cared to read all of this and feels like responding I would like to know who your favorite person is too and why!

Why I came to UT

Before I start, I would just like to point out that my 2nd brand new laptop has been kidnapped by the Best Buy Geek Squad for an unknown amount of time.  Right now I am currently using a computer in the basement of Clement as my poor laptop endures more pointless poking and prodding.  Just more proof that technology hates me!

Anyway, moving on to the actual subject of this post.  From the time that I went on the Ignite Summit before  classes until now people have been asking me one question: "Why did you come to UT?"  As an out-of-stater you would think that I would have a pretty excellent reason for leaving the security of a familiar state.  And there's the fact that out-of-state tuition would be horrendous.  I can honestly say that every time someone asks me this question I never give the same answer twice.

I remember making the final decision to come to UT last January right before school started back up for my final semester of high school.  I happened to be in Hawaii with my family at the time (my dad was on a business trip and the rest of us decided to tag along because we figured "why not"?)  For months and months I had been constantly pestered by friends, family, teachers, and mail from colleges to finally make that huge decision: choosing your own place of education.  I was on the breaking point because in a few days I would be headed back to the mainland and back to more terrifying college-related questions.  One would think that while in Hawaii I would be sitting on the beach all relaxed, and drinking tropical drinks.  Very wrong.  I was beyond worried.  I can remember one night I was sitting on the balcony of our hotel room just listening to the crashing waves and trying to clear my mind.  My dad joined me on the balcony and we began to talk about things I would need to take care of once we flew back to Alabama.  I told him I still hadn't made a final decision about where to go.  There was a slight pause and he didn't look at me.  Then he told me a story of a long time ago when he was in the same position I was in.  Only it was very different.  He was living in New York at the time and both of his parents were pressing him to go to West Point.  They were very disappointed when he received that dreaded rejection slip because my dad was expected to follow his father and go into the military.  However, he chose instead to go to Tri-State University in Indiana which was very far away from his small town in New York.  He knew it would be hard starting over in a new town, but he was determined to start a better lifestyle by becoming an Aerospace Engineer.  It was then that he told me that he would always support my decision to go wherever I wanted.  He and my mom would not hold me back as long as my decision would make me happy.

At that point I had only applied to three schools: Auburn, Alabama, and UT.  I decided it would be an adventure to start completely over in a new state.  Making new friends and familiarizing myself with a new city has been tough, but I keep telling myself that the overall experience is well worth the crazy tuition.  I would not go back in time and change anything.

First post! First post! Woooo!

Welcome to Professor Greene and the rest of English 102!  I have never kept up with a blog before, so we will see how it goes...

My name is Kristin Monaco.  I am 19 years old and from Huntsville, Alabama but I was born in St. Louis, Missouri.  Contrary to popular belief, Alabama is not all about rednecks and wearing camoflage and hunting.  Especially Huntsville, considering its population consists mainly of engineers like my dad who work at the Redstone Arsenal. for the government.

I live in Clement Hall and I am currently stuck in the Arts and Sciences department but I am hoping to be accepted into UT's nursing program so that I won't have to transfer and start completely over again.  Especially because Knoxville has grown on me very much. 

An interesting thing about me is that I am 100% convinced that technology literally hates me.  I am currently on my third laptop and have had to get a new phone all in the same semester.  Also, my printer is ancient and I have nicknamed it the devil printer.  The reason is because as it loudly cranks out my notes it will stop halfway through.  It will then randomly resume printing at 3am and scare my roomate and I to death!

One of my favorite things to do is draw portraits of people, animals, etc.  I also enjoy listening to music, singing, and hanging out with friends.  I took dance for 15 years, swim team for 7 years, TaeKwonDo, and then the other activities don't really count because by then I was in elementary school!

I am also going to share that I am Catholic and proud of it!  Unfortunately some people believe that I, for whatever reason imaginable, worship the devil and/or statues.  I am now going to affirm that this is absolutely 100% false.  Catholics are just as much Christian as Baptists or Presbyterians...

On a lighter note my greatest ambition in life is to become a nurse as I said earlier.  I have always wanted to help the sick or those in pain so I feel that nursing is the right path for me!