I do?

Attention: This is my opinion, I know many may not agree with me.

I went to the mall with my mom today to finish up the wedding shopping. That is everything that needed to be purchased in relation to my cousin's upcoming wedding was finalized today.

One of the most important stops was Hallmark to buy a wedding card. As I was helping my mom pick one, I opened many and read the little touching messages inside. In quick retrospect, yes they were most if not all very nice and cute...many would bring an "aww" that only I could hear in my head.

However, what bothered me a little about all those messages was how many seem to paint marriage as the beginning of a life together between two people...The beginning of a lifetime together..or of shared lives. Now I know that that is what marriage entails and I find that it's beautiful that it does.

But I find there are issues when people seem to think that you have to get married. In other words that "the beginning of lifetime together "does not happen otherwise. Because that is not true. Many couples share a life together and are fully committed to one another without marriage. Additionally many couples do not share a life together and are not committed to each other, yet they are married.

It bothers me when people think that a man finally really loves a woman once he's popped the question. Admittedly, I myself often fall into the trap of thinking that way, although I will try not too in the future.

I am NOT saying that people should not get married and I am NOT saying that I am not happy when people get married. I am actually, it's nice to see people celebrate their love. But what I'm trying to say is that people should stop thinking that only when people are married are they sharing their lives and have reached the acme of commitment and love for one another. A legal couple, that is a legal partnership is relatively the same as a married couple, in terms of legal matters. I believe the main differences is no splitting of goods when there is a divorce if there is no prenuptial and there is no change of surname for the woman if she decides to change her name(I stand to be corrected, as I am not an expect on marital matters).

Marriage should be a celebration of the love a couple have for one another, not the labeling of love (if that makes sense). Couples should get married if they desire to, but for the couples that don't it does not mean in any way that are really different from the married ones.

Things Fall Into Place

Today my Research Methods class my professor was telling us how he came to be a researcher in vision and a professor at York University. He explained how he had never for a second thought about haveing anything to do in vision while he was still an undergraduate student. During his last year as an undergraduate student, a professor asked him if he wanted to his undergraduate thesis with him. Seeing as my professor attended the small campus of his University it was not uncommon for professor to seek out students. My professor agreed and that's when he first started to work in research of vision.

After before completing his undergraduate degree, he realized that he did not want to start working yet so he decided to apply to graduate school. Since he had prior experience in vision he decided to continue in that stream. Soon he received an acceptance at York University and Queen's University. Assuming that he would enjoy his stay in Toronto over Kingston, he chose to attend to York University. Turns out now that the Centre for Vision Research at York is one of biggest in country.

He decided to tell us this story while advising us that if we end up doing research we should make sure we like or even love what we are working on. Most importantly he explained to us how even if we don't know what we love now, it doesn't really matter. As long as we choose something we have a relative interest in. He fell in love with vision over the years and can't see himself studying anything else.

As he said: "Things fall into place."

Even his "5 minutes of fame" when this paper he wrote about lost vision due to the difference of center of gravity of our eyes and our lens (I think? :S) that was written about in the Scientific American came from him looking through empty beer bottles on a random day.

Do things always fall into place?...

Being Young

Today as I left class with one of my closest friend, we were discussing how when we spend time together we tend to say what we consider to be very stupid things. We went on to discuss how it can be said that we are immature or childish. However as our conservation went on, it came to both our minds that we should enjoy our youth.

We are young only once and we should enjoy every moment of it while it lasts. Even I, when I look back sometimes I feel like during high school I should have gone out with friends a lot more than I did. I had far more time during that part of my life compared to now.

I have put thought into this a little while ago, but today reminded me to try and make the best I can of my youth. Enjoy and live freely this part of my life before the responsibilities of working adulthood dawns upon me.

Anyway I should really try and get some work done. I have been slacking phenomenally this past week...