Ma Am?-Personal Narrative

I grew up an only child, without a brother or sister to look up to. Although I have a large family with many cousins, they all go home after the party. Then I would be alone, but that was all before I found my Friends.

My story begins when I looked at the world around me and wondered what it would be like without me. I would stare at the sunset near my home and just wonder. I thought things would function the same. I’m no one who's made a big impact in this world yet. But, I did know I’d have an impact on the people closest to me and though that may not be the world… it is to me. That was enough for me to realize that I had to get better emotionally because I am who I am. I realized I should not allow people’s ignorance determine my emotional state even if it’s from the people within the world I just mentioned. As anyone who’s gone through the same thing, they know it isn’t easy to overcome. I probably had an immense amount of resilience to get through this.

By the time kindergarden started, I was reading and writing all by myself. My mother said that I was so developmentally advanced that I treated kindergarden like social time. I had many friends and continued to include everyone. At this time I was especially close with my neighbor Layne and my other friend Meagan. I was with my neighbor almost every second of every day. We even went to the same in-home day care. My teachers took note of this and always paired us up with shy people so we could break them out of their shell. One of those shy people was my other friend Meagan. My parents were very impressed with all of the respect and kindness I showed at such a young age.

I was born and raised in the small but growing city of Perris, CA. This isn’t the best city out there but it tends to grow on you, and you begin to truly love it for what it is. The people, however, not so much. The community can vary from which part of the city you’re in. That’s because there’s diversity here in Perris. I’m a product of this diversity, being half Mexican and half African American. My parents fell in love after high school and later on began a family. I am the youngest of five. I have two older brothers, an older sister, and an older cousin who lives with us. The order is boy, girl, boy, boy, girl with my cousin being included in there too. We all live in the same house with my parents and are quite close with each other. They all seem to have raised me growing up due to the fact that my parents were busy trying to provide for us. This was a challenge by itself, resulting in lots of house moving and my father being unemployed for six years after losing his job. I never complained about moving because I knew that my parents were doing their absolute best and were working with all that they had and then some. This unquestionably made me adaptable to new environments and gave me a

My current resident assistant was unavailable to interview because he is usually a very busy and had a deadline coming up tomorrow, so instead I interviewed an RA that was working at the Willkie. His name was Vasu and he was super open with me about being an RA. He was really honest too, he said that the process of becoming an RA was and is hard and that it is a very competitive process.

Later that night, as I was falling asleep, I heard muffled voices outside of my bedroom door, and suddenly the door was kicked in by police officers. I jumped out of my bed and ran over to my oldest sister Christine. She held me and tried to shield me from what was happening. I glanced up from Christine’s chest and saw my Uncle in handcuffs and being frog marched out of our conjoining rooms. Then a female police officer walked over to us and in a soft, sweet voice she said “Everything will be alright,” then proceeded to guide us to the living room. We sat on the couch and the female officer turned the television on for us. Christine told me to try and get some sleep. I listened to her, and I didn’t wake up until the next morning.

My younger siblings were constantly screaming to get the attention of my parents. Every first day of school, other students looked at me weirdly once they found out how many siblings I had. I was embarrassed at first when I would talk about how many siblings I had, but I learned to grow with it. My neighborhood was often quiet, there were never any problems in the area, and I knew all my neighbors, which was great, especially during holidays. My next-door neighbors often threw parties or gatherings for holidays such as July the 4th, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s, which was fun for my family. They were always filled with positivity, which was seen through their festivities. My neighbors loved seeing the smiles on the faces of my siblings and I during any of their gatherings; my family has always had a close bond with them, and we continue sharing that bond with them, which I find really rewarding in a sense. My community was often connected; there were always events the city organized for everyone to attend, such as George Washington’s Birthday Celebration, which consisted of a parade and

Outline your Personal Narrative What one event has shaped you into who you are today?

It all started 5th grade when I thought I was depressed, I was a very happy little girl who had a dream of becoming a celebrity or something. Who knew that my dreams were going to be crushed that same year. When I was 10 years old, I lived with my parents, sibling, and my dad’s friend Samuel. Samuel was a friend of my dad’s, when he came from El Salvador he had no where to stay so my dad let him live with us. He was nice, he treated all of us like if we were his kids. One day I came home from school and nobody was home but him. I was doing my homework and he knocked on my room door and told me he wanted to tell me something. He started touching my legs and trying put

I believe, without my mother's independence and the way she raised me, I would not be applying to Queens today. I have had my share of ups although I've also had plenty of downs. I have two older sisters and a younger brother. My oldest sister chose a different path when she had the opportunity to choose a more successful path. She moved out at the age of 16 to flew across the country to live off of my grandpa's income. She dropped out of college, barely a semester in, with student loan debt. She could have been a multi-sport collegiate athlete on scholarship. I look at her and see what could happen if I don't make the right choices and take advantage of my opportunities. My second oldest sister made most of the right choices, and I look at her and see how successful I could become.

I am the youngest of seven kids, who all moved out while I was still very young. Therefore, I never had anyone there to help me when I was growing up. I grew up in one bed room apartment with a mother who worked night and day shifts, and my brother who was 6 years older than me trying his best to take care of a little girl. My other siblings were in the picture, but they stayed with my grandmother. My oldest brother went missing before I could even talk. Therefore, my life started off a little rocky.

My parents were out on a date. My older brother was talking to his friends. Everything was perfect until I heard the doorbell suddenly ring. My brother looked at me and we locked eyes. We knew, oh we knew it was Jake who had come for me. My brother looked out the keyhole. Eyes shining, mouth widening (absolutes), Jake stared back at my brother. He knocked hardly and demanded we open up. Both of us ran hurriedly upstairs and stayed in my brothers room till my parents got back. When they returned, my parents were horrified, my mom especially wanted to leave town but my dad was confident that this would maybe pass over in a few

I saw the tears creep from Mom's face, as she continued to argue with the police outside of this empty, and scary room. Her muffled cries and screams could barely be heard from the two windows that canceled any noises outside. The chair underneath me was uncomfortable, and the table in front of me was cold. I've done something bad, I thought to myself. The door in front of me slowly crept open and a fairly large man with a golden badge stepped in to the room bringing a metal foldable chair with him. He opened the chair and sat directly across from me.

Where you grow up decides what you are going to be for the rest of your life. To describe the neighborhood that I grew up in, a lot had to do with the environment that was around us. I grew up with my brother who taught me a lot about how to behave around people and at school. Anyways very early on in our childhood we became best friends with the neighbors down the street “the Johnson’s”. My good friend was Louie who is a year younger than me and my brother George hung out with Riley who was a year older than him. I was better friends with Louie than George was with Riley, our parents were also good friends, but I spent almost all my summer days, and most weekdays after school at their house. Me and Louie played everything and did just about everything that kids did. We both had big imaginations and we both liked to adventure. We lived in a very kid friendly neighborhood due to the park behind my house which was only separated by a forest. We built all sorts of forts and came up with so many games around my pond which in total is the size about two football fields. My Dad and I make a rink every year out on my pond and both of our family's play hockey so that is always fun and competitive. We slowly, as kids do, got more mature and our games became less of a made up joke but more as a project around the neighborhood.

My upbringing and experiences in life have shaped me and made me who I am today. I am defined by my troubles in the past, my family, my education, my goals, and money. A lot of things have happened in my life that put me where I am today. I have been through an abusive family, exposed to inappropriate things, had run-ins with the law, and experienced a lot of things in my life. There are so many interesting stories in my life such as the time I was taken from my parents because of abuse and how my life changed from there. I feel these stories I have to tell will inform people of who I am and what shapes me.