Surviving Without Junk Food

Tenth graders at Dreyfoos School of the Arts in West Palm Beach, Florida, recently got a challenging homework assignment: go a full 24 hours without TV, telephone, junk food or music, and then write about it. Two students shared their experiences with Extra.

Survivor: 24 hours without Music
By Adrean Cummings

In the U.S. Constitution citizens are granted some basic rights: freedom of speech, religion, assembly blah, blah, blah. Unfortunately, there’s nothing there about the freedom to listen to loud and obnoxious rock ‘n’ roll. There really should be.

For many students, music is a vital part of their everyday lives. " I, dear readers, found out first hand just how important music is to teenagers on Sunday, Feb. 3, when I tried to survive 24 hours without it.

Imagine yourself stranded on a desert island and the only way to survive is to form pathetic alliances with people you hate. You feast on rice and fried rats day in and day out. Occasionally there is the prized can of dog food but really, who wants to imagine something that peaceful?

Imagine yourself subject to the loss of the one thing you love the most? Food? Clothing? Shelter? No. Music…for 24 hours. Me, the Aerosmith fanatic…without music for 24 hours.

According to Napster.com most of the music downloaded on the Internet is downloaded by people 13 to 18 years old. Does that prove something? In the world of teenagers, music is the next best thing since sliced bread. And Sunday, I would have traded the world for a slice of that bread.

The air that would usually be filled with the sweet sounds of Aerosmith or The Ramones was dead silent as I looked at my buzzing alarm clock. I didn't even know the thing still worked until the night before and at 6 on a Sunday morning the last thing anyone wants to hear is an incessant buzzing.

After throwing numerous things at the clock I reached for it... A cigarette? No, a habit even more addictive, my radio remote. Then I remembered and with a sigh returned to sleep for three more hours.

There's only one thing worse than going to The Cheesecake Factory when you're on a diet. Seeing Aerosmith on MTV2 when you can't listen to music. You want to talk about willpower? Jenny Craig's got nothing on me.
By 3:45 that afternoon I was mad enough to kill and bored out of my mind. Father forgive me, I asked my mother if she had any clothes to iron.

Have you ever been so bored that you offered to do work? That’s what I thought. I would have gladly gobbled a fried sting ray in exchange for just one riff from "Bonzo Goes To Bitburg," but the matter was decided, there was to be no music for today.

I guess you could say that I cheated, though I didn’t mean to. Honest. I was watching the previous week’s episode of Ed and, well, I listened to the Foo Fighters. I have willpower, yes I do. Just not all the time.

So how did I survive? Honestly, I have no idea. But I’ve got one bit of advice: Don’t ask me to do it again.

And you thought eating fried rats was hard.

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