Personal Narrative Analysis

I was born in the city of Tucson, Arizona on a warm but cloudy afternoon. My family and I lived in various houses located in Phoenix, Tucson, and Mesa for approximately three years. My mother and father came to the conclusion that Minnesota would be our new home; seeing as my father lived here a majority of his childhood and adolescent years. When my family first arrived in Minnesota, my aunt allowed us to stay in her townhome until we found a home of our own. Five months before my fourth birthday we moved into an apartment located next to the Cathedral in St. Paul. I began preschool the following months, although my birthday is in the summer. I attended school in Minneapolis until halfway through first-grade, due to my parents separating by

I was young when I began to question my sexuality. All my life I grew up around a supporting family who told me it was okay to be whoever I wanted whether that was sporty or nerdy, shy or outgoing, straight or gay. I went to sunday school and had great grades, I even played the piano. But something started to change my behavior, I felt ashamed for being who I was. I stopped going to sunday school and couldn’t focus on piano anymore. I knew I liked girls and

Days after I graduated eighth grade, I woke up in the middle of the night with the worst pain of my life: a stabbing in my stomach. I reluctantly woke up my parents, and they decided we should drive to the emergency room. The stabbing feeling persisted as I curled up in the back seat trying to block out the pain. We finally arrived at the hospital, and I somehow staggered to the entrance. Right outside, I threw up and then began to panic realizing that whatever was happening was more serious than a simple stomach ache. After this point most of what occurred was a blur; the only thing I remember is being transferred to Stanford Children’s Hospital.

The paradox of human nature is driven by the paramountcy of competition. Whether biological as powered by evolution, or modern as in the case of college admission, competition galvanizes progress. The simple fact that elite colleges are becoming more selective due to the large number of competitive students demonstrates this. Resolution is not earned without the conflict that precedes it; therefore, even defeat should be treated as an opportunity for improvement, as it is all we can really do.

Extinction? No! As I see it, families could have been lost long ago with the severity in which one parented. Upon my father’s death, I had an enlightening conversation, with my Uncle Bill, about the abuse my father suffered at the hands of his father and mother. My Uncle, by marriage, shared the many torments my father experienced, and yet his siblings were untouched. My father married, had two children with my mom, and adopted me. He was a terrific father, with very few exceptions.

Growing up, I had always been surrounded by adults, I knew I could rely on. The thought of being an adult, seemed very distant to me, at least that was until I entered teenagehood. At the age of 12, I went under the custody of my aunt because my mother had to move to another state, due to health reasons. Not having my mom definitely made me more self dependent. However, I still had my aunt and uncle as parent figures, who I could depend on, so I truly did not feel the need to grow up just yet.

The summer before my sophomore year, my cross country coach challenged our team to run 400 miles over the summer in preparation for the oncoming season. Numerous athletes on our team participated, including myself. Equating to running over four miles a day, it was not going to be effortless, however the challenge sparked a drive for success in me, and I was determined to satisfy that drive. In the final weeks, I grew excited as the finish drew near, and I eclipsed the 400 mile mark with a day to spare. Success soon followed, as for the first time our coach could remember, our team won our home meet. Overall, we were much more competitive as a team that year, and it was a fantastic experience. Partaking in those experiences again was something

I had always loved the spotlight. I was popular, outgoing, and lived for attention. I was active in almost every school sport and club with connections from all cliques. I guess you could say I owned the spotlight and ran the show….but I was never prepared for the day the curtains closed on me.

I found this narrative interesting because I can relate to the speaker. We were both raised in religious families and read the Bible when we were young. The speaker talked about how reading the King James Version of the Bible helped her to better understand Shakespeare, which is something I strongly believe is true. Listening to her talk about sitting on her couch reading the Bible before she was even in school made me nostalgic of my own childhood. My mom has always been an avid reader who pushed me to read books when I was young. My mom entered me in a summer reading program at our public library every summer; this is one other thing I found that I have in common with the speaker, whose parents encouraged reading. I loved reading when I was

As professor Sanchez announced the upcoming of our informative speeches I had no clue what I was going to do mine on. Of course I decided to procrastinate on finding a topic and put it to the last minute. The idea of “charreria” Mexico’s national sport came to mind due to the fact that my professor always mentioned a dancing horse when he would call my name for attendance. From there on I decided when the days of doing our speech comes I will give myself a week to practice in order for me to not mess up and break the average grading scale dilemma. Not only that but since we were going to have to record ourselves I wanted it to be good so I will not cringe or have any negative thoughts while watching my own speech.

Both my biological parents as well as my step parents are educators, so it is no surprise that the expectation of college is one that I have carried since the day I was born. Learning everyday was essential in both of my households, and throughout preschool and elementary school I was met with flashcards, workbooks, and encyclopedias encompassing every core subject. Yet somehow I always found time in the day to draw.

I moved here when I was three and I quickly found friends. With my spare time, I enjoy hanging out with my friends, playing on my trumpet, playing my piano and reading. I’m currently reading Harry Potter for the sixth time and watching all of the movies with my dad for the second.

Hartford, SD, the town that I am from, is a pretty small town with about seven churches. My family attends the Lutheran church nearly every Sunday and even sits in the same spot every week. When I was younger, I attended daycare and elementary school with kids who attended churches of different denominations. We would go through our days without discussing our differences. My parents would never discourage my sister and I from interacting with children who went to other churches. In fact, if we had a sleepover on a Saturday night with a friend, my parents said it was okay to go to their church the next morning. This allowed us to see what the different denominations looked like but we were young and often thought that it was all the same. Middle

Before I was born into this hectic society, I was assigned the specific gender of “female” based solely on the genitals I possessed. From then on, I was instructed and socialized by the ones I love and trust how to dress, love, carry myself, and act amongst others solely based off my gender assignment. My family was always trying to put me in cute dresses and put all sorts of bows in my hair. I remember them telling me, “You are going to make a man very happy one day,” or “Just wait till you get married to the man of your dreams.” This type of heterosexual enforcement continued to be encouraged in church and throughout the media by socializing and teaching me to believe that one day I would find one man that I would marry and continue to pass on the cycle of heterosexual socialization to my children. Due to all of this exposure, heterosexuality became natural and thus, normal to me; however, this type of heterosexual socialization and heteronormativity is often unrealistic to those who desire a different relationship or family, causing them to feel excluded by a majority of society. This kind of exclusion has made people realize that this type of socialization is dangerous because it makes those who do not fit into this idealistic society feel trapped. It is also seen as unnecessary due to the immense amount of pressure it creates on everyone to live up to society’s expectations and is simply inconsistent with today’s diverse social and familial formations that people

As years went by, as I began to enter puberty, I started to take more interest in boys. While in the locker room during physical education, I detected that I was sexually attracted to boys. Although, I did date a few girls here in there it was nothing serious (specially because we did not even kiss.) During my period of adolescence, I never thought about what I was. All the things that took place in the emotional and sexual real were, admittedly, real and concrete to me. I experienced real feelings for other boys, such as love and sexual attraction. At the same time, I never really confronted my feelings, so I continued to have them without having to worry about them. They just were, and that was fine with me. While some people claimed that my sexuality was “unnatural” (a claim which did not affect me in any shape or form), for me, my homosexuality was very natural indeed.