Unanue 2
What have I encountered and how will I respond?
	As my first semester at Notre Dame is reaching is stressful yet anticlimactic end, my final Moreau integration of the semester has been a powerful tool to help remember and realize how all the new experiences, challenges, and environments I have experienced for the first time here in Notre Dame have helped develop who I am. Although it is my actions and responses that impacted my character this semester, it is the deep dive of the effects of these events during Moreau that create their importance. Fall break really helped put this in perspective as I was able to directly compare the difference between my life back home in Puerto Rico (among family friend and the tropical weather which I miss a bit more with every cloudy and cold day) and the challenging yet fun new dynamic I am experiencing in the great South Bend, Indiana. I got to talk with my younger brother and feel nostalgic when he explained to how his freshman year of high school was going. I also began to feel many similarities between my freshmen year if high school and how my semester of college is going, especially now after experiencing and writing about weeks nine through twelve of Moreau.
	Once conversation with my brother that keeps coming to mind as I write this integration has to be the superficially short and simple conversation about his social outings with his friends and while it wasn’t implicitly stated by him (but something I realized proudly as an older brother) how he has expanded his friend group. This conversation reminded me of the first week back from fall break when my Moreau class discussed adapting to being the new kid all over again in college. My brother’s words over how he made a new friend during a sports tournament or how he has defined the friend group every guy in existence names in his mind “The Boys” is quite similar to what I went through this semester, especially since my first time ever in Indiana came during move-in day. The one thing I am thankful for now as this semester is reaching its finally is that I didn’t rush any friendships and only portrayed myself honestly to those I now call my friends. I didn’t let social media impact how compelled I felt to go out or let myself feel guilty about lounging about in my dorm as I didn’t really know who I was yet in college let alone who was going to be my friend (“Advice from a Formerly Lonely College Student” By Emery Bergmann - Moreau FYE Week 9). I think the importance of the New York Times article by Emery Bergmann goes way beyond just making friends in college as I believe it relates more to being comfortable with who you are, trusting that if you stay true to yourself, you will feel accomplished as well. Aside from my younger brother, returning to Puerto Rico and returning to its community for a week helped fuel me for the second half of Moreau this semester as well. 
	As a guy who likes cars (even though the nickname my friends gave my car during high school was “La vaca” or cow in Spanish due to the similarities in acceleration between them) and driving, I missed both of those things as I was unable to use my driver’s license in South Bend. While fall break helped scratch that itch of driving, I was reminded of something as I took my stress relieving drives around the island: Hurricane Maria. Despite Puerto Rico having essentially recuperated from Hurricane Maria, what remains are the bent over light posts, wooden electrical pools, and outside basketball courts with their roofs missing as no one bothered fixing them as they still did their job. What I remember the most from the Hurricane was not watching the winds strong enough to flip cars or uproot trees, but the strength of the Puerto Rican community that came together to rebuild itself almost singlehandedly. Many Puerto Ricans will never forget (nor probably forgive) the lackluster support from the United States to during the critical days after the Hurricane. While there is no definite proof to saying that Puerto Rico was a ignored a bit by FEMA based on racial reasons, there is still concrete proof of the discrimination against Puerto Rico from the US itself; Puerto Rico has been systematically oppressed for decades, whether it is testing out Agent Orange in the jungles of Puerto Rico to not allowing Puerto Ricans to govern themselves until the 1960s. The utterly inadequate FEMA response to the Hurricane Maria crisis is only the latest of these cases. Those scars of Hurricane Maria only helped remind me of the importance of Critical Race schooling, whether it is in Catholic Schools or not (“Should Catholic Schools Teach Critical Race Theory?” by Christopher J. Devron - Moreau FYE Week 10). 
	Returning to Puerto Rico also meant going to mass with my parents again on Sunday. My faith in general this semester, while I am still a faithful believer, I cannot lie but say that I have not been that responsible in going to mass on Sundays in South Bend. To me, going to mass was always a family event and it felt weird to go alone; it felt as if going without a concrete reason. This once “black and white” event in my ordinary life was now more complicated than ever before. Ironically, this was one of the few of my actions that was directly impacted from Moreau and not just a Moreau analysis of my actions. Week twelve of Moreau is when I made this realization while reading the provided material for that week of class. It was The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis that I realized how the “Law of Undulation” was always something I’ve done outside of religious devotion and even primarily (and quite ironically) with my devotion to my gym routine. After a week of denying myself from the gym, of resting and living a life without putting strain on my body whether it be by benching or squatting, I return more invigorated than ever as I realized its importance not only making me physically better, but most importantly mentally better. While it is quite ironic and possibly even way to simple to compare religious devotion to something as frivolous as a workout split, it is just a simple way for me to describe how I trust that my hope in Catholicism would help me grow to be a better person (“The Screwtape Letters” By C.S. Lewis – Moreau FYE Week 12).