A Brave New World-Personal Narrative

This past year, I have been apart of Naperville Central’s brand new Special Spaces club. When my friend approached me and asked me to join, I agreed even though I had no clue what I was involving myself in. In retrospective, I can honestly say that becoming a part of Special Spaces has been one of the most meaningful, fun, and fulfilling experiences I have had in high school.

It was late one day in June, and the sky was as blue and clear as sparkling wine. I sat back in my hammock reading the book Unbroken enjoying myself, and my uncle came up and asked me if I wanted to play poker with him, 5$ buy in. I jumped at the idea finished my page and went inside the house. Poker is a pretty big thing in my family and I’ve grown up playing and my uncle was one of the best, so spending time with him playing poker is always one of my favorite things to do. We proceed to set up the table, “Texas Holdem“ he says, Jacks to open”. Nothing weird, so we get the game going and the pots getting pretty big when all of the sudden he drops his cards. I stare the cards dead in the eye and see that i'm going to surpass him! He looks

Max discovered something yet even more extraordinary in his findings. His eyes rolled heavenward as the sense of joy of discovery turned to a sense

I never thought I would be labeled an outsider, a misfit even. As I trudged my way through the halls of my small town high school, I would endure the gazing pairs of eyes, that belonged to my peers, followed by whispering and often times some laughter. I always used zone out during those repetitive speeches and commercials about the effects of gossiping and rumors; never did I imagine that one day I would be on the receiving end of of the everyday potshot. Growing up I was always the center of attention, the one everyone yearned to be friends with, never was I the antisocial child in the corner with nowhere to turn… not until high school. They say high school changes you. They say high school accounts for some of the greatest years of

I think that my family realized that I had crossed the threshold between childhoods when I began to form my own opinions. This first took hold when I took part in poverty stimulation at my local shelter. I was giving a character and a story behind the card I was given; the story made me become emotionally attached to this name I had been assigned and the family in which I came from. The experience made me question the prejudice of the society I was living in. How many times had I avoided eye contact with the people on the side of the road begging for money? I began a long journey of soul searching and questioning the beliefs my parents had raised me on. My thoughts were continually brought back to a book by C.S Lewis, it was called Out of the Silent Planet; a character named Weston believed that individual human lives don’t matter, they must be sacrificed to save mankind.

I’ve always been an outsider, it’s been hard for me to build friendships and relationships. Not too long ago, there I sat in the corner of the room in the way back, trying to hide from the world, and be myself. I didn’t really want to get involved with anything or anyone. I was afraid to open up, talk to others, maybe because I was afraid to get rejected. Until, I met the best people I could ever meet, my best friends Marisa Mendoza, Jessica Contreras and Deseray Reyes, the ones who up to this day have sticked by my side, at my best, and worst moments. They have all been a big part of my life, I can enjoy every minute I spend with them. For me, they aren’t only my friends they are like my sisters.

Having experienced the suffocating heat of a summer in Spain, Ulric fully believed he understood what it's like for the lobster that had to spend time in the pot before being delivered to their table with far too much grandeur and ostentatious presentation for such a simple sea creature. Honestly, he'd tasted better meals cooked by his father, but he didn't mention this, hasn't mentioned it for well over four decades. As is the case increasingly often now, the faint thought ended up emerging his consciousness in memories seeping with nostalgia, guilt, and nostalgic guilt. Only freed from the thoughts by a gentle nudge of the foot, and a gentler look, from Paul, Ulric offered a meek grin before nibbling on his sides, choosing to focus on the mushrooms as they're softest and he didn't even have to chew them.

If I was a European thinking about moving to the New World, I would base my decision based off the images and descriptions that were available. One of the images that would deter me from migrating away was a piece of artwork done by Jacques Le Moyne. His picture entails a group of natives who are trying to fight off a fearsome looking alligator. Theodore De Bry describes them plunging a pole into it’s mouth and turning it around so they can stab their stomach. He goes on to say that the natives have to watch out for them day and night because of how frequent they appear. Since I don’t really know how to defend myself against such creatures, I would be afraid to live somewhere where danger is constant. I also would not want to deal with vampire

What Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci coined "The New World" was now overrun by man-eating zombies. It all started in Chile and Argentina; news of a highly infectious pathogen had begun spreading at breakneck speeds. By the time epidemiologists had discovered the cause of this pathogen it had already spread to the Western half of the United States and was making its way east.

The object given to me was the heart of a boy who I was fond of for quite some time. We spent the summer nights frolicking through green pastures of open land ready to take on the world like an explorer ready to find a new adventure; now what I look back on to be no more than a barren field filled with patches of weeds poking their heads above ground, hoping to catch even the smallest array of sunlight. I spent most of my summer nights with this boy, let us call him James.

The sound of the rain landing hard onto the frozen soil was always a nice one. It accompanied me just staring straight into nothingness. It felt great, as if I was just focused on one thing, the “1000 mile stare”. I was on the verge of falling asleep, but at the same time there was no way I was going to. The stare was great, much too addicting. However, there was one thing I hated though. It was the fear that I could get stuck in it. That nothing else would happen in this god forsaken world If I just gazed into 1 thing...for a long period of time. Maybe that wouldn’t be a bad thing? People would stop dying and the world would finally be at peace. I finally leave the 1000 mile stare for a second, just to look in another direction and focus

We stared at each other speechless, literally speechless. No matter how hard I tried I could make a sound. Her eyes darted back and forth and slowly she opened her mouth and out came a small insect. She screamed, or it appeared she made the motions of screaming but like me no sound came out, she pushed herself away from the desk and stood up baking away in fright. We watched the strange insect like creature scurry away across the room and slide between a crack in the front door.

Growing up with a father in the military, you move around a lot more than you would like to. I was born just east of St. Louis in a city called Shiloh in Illinois. When I was two years old my dad got the assignment to move to Hawaii. We spent seven great years in Hawaii, we had one of the greatest churches I have ever been to name New Hope. New Hope was a lot like Olivet's atmosphere, the people were always friendly and there always something to keep someone busy. I used to dance at church, I did hip-hop and interpretive dance, but you could never tell that from the way I look now.

It is the summer of 2018 and there is still an ongoing Syrian war. As of now there are around one million Syrians coming into a new world, joining the Americas. I am kind of excited to possibly bring a new person into my life. However with school starting back up, it might be very difficult to juggle both new and old challenges. The new world being with the Syrian refugees and the old being my normal school life.

One casual Wednesday afternoon, I was back in 5th period with Mrs. Zombottle just reading away in my wonderful mystery book. She came up to me in a quiet fashion, “Are you busy?”