A Whole New World-Personal Narrative

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

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.

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.

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

Only this would happen to me I think to myself as I stumble around this dreadful forest. Today I decided to take a nice peaceful walk in the forest listening to the birds chirping a melody and the sun beaming down on me but my klutz of a self just had to get lost. I have been walking around aimlessly for hours now and the sun has gone down so it has gotten quite chilly and dark out. My phone happens to have no service out here, I can not even call my family to let them know where I am, they must be worried sick. To calm myself down I take a deep refreshing breath the air around me, smelling distinctly of pine and mildew

My flyer3000 landed on an area of dark green, soft blades after flying for 60 hours. The captain calls this place earth, whatever that means. In the distance, I hear voices that sound similar to my family’s except these voices are higher in pitch and fast in pace. If one does not listen closely, these little voices become high-pitched jumbled noises that make no sense. I peek over this tall and wide brown object that prevents me from moving closer to the voices. The sight surprises me. My captain showed us pictures of humans but none of them were miniature versions. There were many tiny humans of different colors running around with pointy cone-shaped head toppers. These looked dangerous, but no one seemed bothered to take them off. I also

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.

When I was 5, my hands grew old and weary, tired of construction and calloused from work. Day after day after day, I would fashion new worlds and cultures out of little LEGO blocks. I worked fastidiously- creating tiny planes, guarded forts, and expansive cities that swept from one end of the carpet to the other. (I loved to make castles with booby-trapped moats and false walls and hidden entrances.)

I’m starting to get slightly more comfortable on this ship, but it’s still nothing like home. Well, I guess this is home now. I’ve started to make myself fit in here, but I’m not sure how it’s going. Eldest still makes me feel like I’m stuck in a prison though. It’s almost like he’s a Pre-Hitler. He’s made everyone on the ship believe I was a result of some crazy lab mutation and that I am a freak. Now, barely anyone believes a word I say or even looks at me. All except for Elder and Harley. Harley is extremely curious but is a loyal friend. He even volunteered to watch over the people in Cyro sleep to make sure there wasn’t any tampering done to them. Elder, he keeps bringing back memories of Jason, it’s like the two are identical in personality.

I have only one word: listen. Humans became so loud, shouting to be heard over everyone else. So concerned with ourselves, our jobs, our money, or the internet that we stopped paying attention to the pieces of nature around us, beautiful and ugly alike. We try so hard to fill our lives with meaning in the most unmeaningful of ways, promotions and new cars, when there’s so much more to living. The trees sing when the wind blows and we’re listening to the radio. Hermit crabs chirp, dolphins name themselves, prairie dogs have voices and we ignore it all in favor of Facebook What doesn’t directly affect us is blocked out or put on a back burner so we won’t think about it. We became so removed from the natural world we no longer notice what’s

Thanks for the conversations! I really like what we have here. Well, I'm sure you know my writing style at this point and if its at least before 1 AM, don't be afraid to message me if you need to reach out to someone. I definitely would be here for you, if you let me. Try and keep an open mind, I've learned that talking to someone helps gradually. In the moment, eveyrhting they say can seem as if they're playing devils advocate as well as being unsensical and rude. It's up to you to listen and comprehend, just as it is up to you who you talk to. I hope you find the help or a someone that can provide the support you need in those times of need. Housing at SJSU is going through a transition as a new building opens here is another coming to a

Life really doesn't like to tell you what's ahead; sometimes it's nice and gives you a little hint, sometimes life replays itself so at least there's some familiarity in it, but most of the time my life seems out of my control. As a fifteen year old many people would hear me say this and scoff saying I don't have 'real' problems, or I don't know what the 'real' world is like. On one hand they're right, I shouldn't know what the 'real' world is like, most fifteen year olds are thinking about what picture they Instagram is a 'real' world problem. But being the not-so-average teenager, I do know what this so called 'real' world is.

There I am standing alone at the top of Mount Everest. I have everything I need to go back to the bottom. I don’t use any of it. I am a soldier, and my mission is not complete. Alone, I am still not afraid. Temperature is 28 degrees, but I am not letting it affect my skills. I walk alone through the dark, eerie woods. It has been 32 hours, and I have still not completed my objective. I was sent to assassinate the leader of an military trained group. The group was out here training to intercept signal for a helicopter transporting cargo to an unknown military base in the valley of the mountain Everest. I have intercepted their signal and found out where exactly they were located. I found them, and it wasn’t an easy mission. Many

I was 5 years old when my life took a big twist. One morning my parents had made the decision to get us a new fresh start, a better life. A life that they were not able to have. I had left my country, El Salvador, not just my country but my family as well. Coming into this country was a huge change for me, it was like a whole new world. I remember not knowing how to speak English. This eventually caused me to isolate myself from everyone else. I would go home and cry for not being able to understand and speak English. I went through depression at such a young age. Even outside of school it was complicated. My parents worked all day, I was left with a babysitter. She would speak to me in Spanish but she would speak English to the rest of the kids.