My Favorite Day At School

Mrs. Wilson instilled a love for reading in me. In first grade this didn’t seem like much, but as the years went on I saw her impact on my life in many different ways. In fifth grade I was given the opportunity to be “student leader”, presented the opportunity to go to the young grades and read to the kids. I of course chose to read to Mrs. Wilson’s class. This

Author and writer, Eudora Welty once stated, “The only fear was that of books coming to an end” (Welty 53-54). In her autobiography, One Writer’s Beginnings, Welty writes about her childhood, which revolved around books and reading. Despite the fact that her childhood librarian, Mrs. Calloway, was infamous for intimidating every student that entered the library, Welty never feared. With the help of her mother, Welty unearths a genuine passion books, ultimately discovering her first step toward a lifelong career as a writer and an author. In Eudora Welty’s autobiography, One Writer’s Beginnings, she utilizes figurative language and loaded words to express vehemence her toward reading.

It had been the third day in a row that I was stuck in there with those two, watching my friends have a great time with a book shoved in my face. It just got drilled into my head that reading meant I had done something wrong. This distaste for reading continued through my life, faking my way through reading log descriptions and forging my parents’ signatures, up until about seventh grade. I was a bit angsty in middle school. I got into some trouble and veered off course a bit. Mrs. Caudill, though, saw the good in me and didn’t give up on my character. She offered new and creative ways to express ourselves, and it renewed my interest in English in a big way. I remember the first book I had read since elementary was a recommendation from her, Unwind. I fell in love with that book immediately. I actually read it a few more times later in high school. It just changed my entire perception of reading. Instead of using it as an escape from my life, I used it as an example of how my life could be worse. I think that’s why I enjoy the horror

Mrs. Sohnly taught me that books have a deeper meaning than just what was written on the pages; it was almost like a life-lesson. Life comes at you directly, but you have to look at life with its hidden message. Many students dreaded to read a new book for class, but I loved it. Mrs. Sohnly’s love for reading books influenced the way I felt about them. I loved the way Mrs. Sohnly would engage with her students while reading The Great Gatsby or How to Kill a Mockingbird. Evergreen High School was quite fortunate to have Mrs. Sohnly as an educator because she made a success out of all her students.

There, I had access to my father’s vast library of books. Reading books and writing poetry have been my chief joys since I was a girl, when my father, Thomas Dudley, educated me. I read Virgil, Homer, Geneva Bible, and countless other literary masterpieces. But in this new place, books are extraordinarily scarce.

I was in the sixth grade when I met my social studies teacher Mrs. J.R.; she was a different breed. She wasn’t there to just collect a check but to help us succeed and to reassure us of our admirability. She would stand in front of the class and teach until everyone hand went down but she didn’t stop there. Mrs. J.R. became my confidant. I would confide in her about how other girls made fun of me for the big bows I wore in my thick wild hair and my neon color tube socks. Mrs. J.R. would say things like "they're just jealous because they don't have big colorful bows and long pretty hair.” She would always know just what to say and on gloomy days you could find me on the second floor sixth grade hall in Mrs. J.R. room doing my work sitting

Blowing dark brown bangs from her eyes, Vanessa Grounds looked around the sleepy atmosphere of her history class and glanced at the clock that hung loosely over the door. The clicking of Mrs. Heath’s keyboard and her classmate’s pens lulled her into a daydream, and she rested her head on her thick, almost plush, textbook.

The library was my Pandora’s Box, and it allowed me to escape into places and ideas far removed from what I thought to be a banal existence in a small historic village in the Appalachian Mountains. My youthful rebellions, and inquisitiveness, though often misguided and misplaced, were not to be tempered in my adult life. As a high school student I was emboldened by an

This year we will be gettin’ books, real books may I add. Books are great and all but nothings fun when you have Miss Crocker as a teacher, she’s horrible. This year I have to sit up front, where I get to see Miss Crocker’s beautiful face all day, fun. I wave g’bye to Little Man and T.J. and walk to my classroom. “Here we go” I mutter and take a deep breath. I open the door. I see all the kids from last year and …Miss Crocker. No! “Hi Miss Crocker” I say quietly and quickly.

I remember as a child the weekly trip to the public library. Our town was a typical small town in the Midwest and a trip to the Carnegie Library on Main Street was always an adventure. I remember the high ceilings and the slowly turning steel gray fans which hung from elaborate plaster medallions. I remember the smell of wood, of leather and paper covered in printers’ ink. I remember dust lines on the shelves in some sections, and I remember standing in lines behind children in others. Yet, most of all I remember the wonder and the excitement waiting to pick the perfect book with the perfect story to fill a need of adventure in the coming week.

My best day was graduating from Goldsboro High School in 2014. Hundreds of proud classmates, including myself, stood waiting patiently in our blue and gold graduation gowns. Preparing for that moment to walking across the stage where I would receive my diploma. While getting settled in, I started to reminisce on all the goals, I accomplished in addition to graduating with close friends that I'd gained relationships for more than four years.

Francie, while strolling her neighborhood for the last time with Laurie, arrives at the library- the library that had defined her as a child and that held all her hopes for the future. However, now as she reflects on everything this building was, she understands that life is so capable of altering her perspective on things. Or, more so, that the exposure to reality and growing up could take away that childlike paradise of the world. For, in the beginning of the novel, Francie was so idealistic; she believed the library was this heaven to digest and that “all the books in the world were” within it (22). Though, as she leads herself to mold into an adult and endures those responsibilities from just the age of fifteen, she starts to realize that

Two weeks prior to summer vacation my 8th grade year, Amy and I were in one of my favorite places, a place that was supposed to be nearly silent, but was often much too loud. A fact that was overlooked by most, for we had all just come from lunch and were full and happy.At this point in time the vast room was in a state of orderly disorder, with books strewn everywhere.From the long battered hicory tables and matching chairs, to the typical boring and dusty blue/green carpet found in most schools,to the small, cramped office where the books were usualy sorted.The taste of the creamy tomato soup I had with lunch, was still fresh in my mouth, slightly tainted with the faint smell of paste and fresh lamanation. As always, you could hear the soft roar of papers rustling as the pages of the books held in the hands of engrossed readers turned rapidly. The stained maple book shelves felt more empty than normal and the long and difficult process of replacing the old books with the new had begun, shown by the library specialists rushing frantically around, trying to complete all of their tasks before the end of the school year was upon

As I sit in the “Teen Room” of the Cresco Public Library, located in the center of Cresco, IA on the corner of 4th Avenue and North Elm Street, I can hear the sound of silence, with a hint of blowing air coming from the air conditioning. I hear a truck revving its engine outside the tall, screened windows. I see shelves lined with varying sizes of books, their shiny covers reflecting the sunlight. I can see the hundreds of titles, all running vertically along the book’s spines, in many colors, fonts and sizes. I can feel a sense of calmness, as there is little to no movement inside the room. Looking out the window, I can see a tree barely starting to turn the colors of autumn, still full of green leaves, and another tree already blazing orange

We spent the time shopping, packing, and talking. She told me stories of her old school: cantankerous students who got a particularly rewarding attitude check; times her students were able to cajole her out of homework assignments; and instances where they would some to her for advice and guidance. Listening to her reminisce, I was touched by her affection for her students. She had a monstrous bin full of cards, photos, albums, yearbooks, and newspaper clippings all from previous students. Suzanne still remember them all like it was just yesterday that they entered her classroom. By the end of the day, it felt like we had known eachother for years. When the tasks we had set out to accomplish for that day were done, she drove me home. As I was opening the door, she handed me a twenty dollar bill.