JS3 Presents: Media Deprived Day Three

When I began my first semester of college this year, I had no idea what to expect. I often wondered what lessons would be learned, what relationships would be formed, and where the road less traveled would take me. I met this media deprivation project with the same amount of speculation. I contemplated what this project would mean to my life and what I could learn about myself upon its completion. Now, as a both journeys have come to an end simultaneously, I can clearly see that I have become a much better person for going through the challenges, obstacles, and struggles they brought to my life. This belief would be given no greater proof than the events that occurred on the third and final day of the media deprivation.

By the third day of this media deprivation project, I had adapted routines that made the project’s goal much easier to complete. In the morning I made the usual large Sunday breakfast for my son and me, but rather than turn on his cartoons like before, I brought out my old Calvin and Hobbes comic strip collections and read them aloud to him while pointing at the pictures. He pointed along and paid attention until we finished eating, at which point I set him free to play while I washed dished and did some laundry. Every so often he would point to the TV as if to ask why it was not on, but I explained to him for the 100th time that daddy was in the middle of very important school work and that he could help me by cleaning with me or finding a fun game for us to play. While you wouldn’t expect a toddler to understand a conversation like that, he seemed to choose “fun” as he pushed me out of the kitchen and towards his toys.

For the rest of the day, my son and I played with the various toys he has sprinkled throughout the house and before I knew it the day was coming to a close. First we played with his toy cars, racing them through the hallways as if they were burning rubber on a track. After that, his eyes begged me to chase him down those same “roads” until he grew tired and took a nap, giving me time to complete dinner. I had a big smile on my face as I set it down on the table and heard him wake up, but when I walked over to get him from his room, I was met with a very unfortunate surprise: my son had caught a small fever.

When I walked into the room, I could see a sickly red glow to his cheeks. Worried, I took his temperature to verify what I already instinctively knew. When 99.5 registered on the thermometer, I gave him some medicine, retired his prepared dinner to the refrigerator, and served him chicken soup instead. He paced himself through half a bowl before asking to go lay down. After getting him back to bed, I came back to the dinner table and had a few moments to reflect on not only the last few days, but the last few months of my life. What had I learned about myself?

Since beginning college, I have learned that the toughest things in life are usually the things worth doing if they are necessary for the goals you have in life, and that lesson was amplified by this project. You see, if I did not feel college or school was going to get me where I wanted to be, I would have phoned it in on this project and not given it a second thought. If I felt that completing assignments and getting outstanding grades was worth the time commitment, I would not have even gone through the trouble of applying for financial aid, much less finding an affordable and exceptional daycare for my son and attending class. There were a few times I was uncertain of how I would balance my schedule and overcome the challenge of being a single parent and full time student, much like the way I was uncertain as to how I would get through my workout routines without music. However, in both cases I never thought for a second I would fail at overcoming those obstacles. I knew that what I had to gain from the challenges was worth spending the time and effort to figure out a solution, so I did.

While I am not at the end of my life story, I am definitely at the end of the first chapter. Upon completion of this first chapter, there is one lesson that stands out from the rest because it was not something I set out to learn. You see, dear readers, the most important thing I learned from my journey is that while all good things must come to end, the greatest things in life never leave. The greatest thing in my life is my commitment to gaining knowledge and wisdom, and I have gained new facets of both by going through Professor Lopez’s Media Deprivation Project.

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