Personal Narrative: The Tide

On November 6th, I encountered a cultural disconnect with a friend. My friend is a white, female, and the same age as me. This disconnect happened on the Berkeley campus when we were walking to our next class. We were both walking and talking about what we have been up to that past week. I told her that I was swamped with midterms and projects coming up so I was “studying and dying all week.” She chuckled at my statement and she said she had two midterms coming up too and has not begun to study. I asked her why she did not start studying yet. I assumed she was too consumed with her part-time job or preoccupied with other important obligations, but she simply replied, “I didn’t feel like it.”

You don't realize how easily little things turn into big things until after you wake up. I had been eating dinner with my family when I heard my favorite show's finale announce itself on the T.V. upstairs. I packed in what was left on my plate, thanked my parents for food, and excused myself from the table to throw my dishes in the sink that was piling high with dishes. I dashed to the stairs and hit the first step before my dad began to interrogate me with questions about school and other things that had not involved my show that was now beginning without me. I gave him words of assurance and darted for the couch.

Every Moment Counts I hug her knowing that this will be our last. Tears are streaming uncontrollably down my cheeks, staining her shirt. I'm not ready to say goodbye. I don't understand why this is happening. Out all of the 7.28 billion people in the world, why did it have to be her?

Overcoming “The” Struggle I don’t recall having a hard time learning how to read. It was one of those things that just came easily to me for some reason. For the most part I enjoyed reading as well. The only time I didn’t enjoy reading was when I didn’t understand a certain word or a certain phrase.

Find My Voice Accomplishments take me one step closer to happiness and tranquility. For example, maintaining an “A” in a rigorous course, helping others that are struggling, cook for my family, etc. are minor achievements and events that have formed me into a better being. Sometimes, ignorance gets the best of me, and it does conquer my sweet, timid personality that I possess. Accordingly, my accolades never suggest nor imply I am better than anyone else. I never consider highly of myself because we are equally intelligent in our own separate ways.

It was the last inning in our all-star game, and we were losing 10 to 8. Our team had 2 outs and we couldn’t get the third. Our pitcher was doing bad, throwing all balls, while all of us in the field were tired, ready to fall asleep at any moment. There goes another walk. They score again. Great! I was thinking. At this point in the game I thought for sure that I would die right there in center field. However, baseball is baseball and things can change rather rapidly.

For fifteen years, I put my heart, effort, and soul into my band Murky Waters. I made it into a career that supports my wife, my stepdaughter, and my parents. Murky Waters is what saved my family and me from poverty in the ghetto of Warsaw, Poland, and it’s what saved me from giving up on life entirely before I met my wife. I met her only a year after Murky Waters began and she was introduced to me by my best friend and drummer, Tony. Anka was two months pregnant with my stepdaughter, Antonia, at the time we met. When I fell in love with Anka after a couple months of hanging out after Murky Waters shows, I knew I wanted to support her and Antonia for the rest of my life. I was broke, an alcoholic, and had no idea how to raise a family, so I forced myself to figure it out and pretend that I had everything under control. Anka, the band, Antonia, and I

How a person behaves, what they say, what they do, where they go, what they watch, what they listen to all comes down to three things…what they believe, who they believe, and how much they believe it. As followers of Christ, we will act, speak, and respond differently than when we did beforehand all based on believing the Word of God as true. For me, sometimes believing is hard and seems downright impossible because of situations and circumstances that are beyond my personal control. Sometimes I even question God, His ways, and His plans, and then, He reminds me not to lean on my own understanding, but on His. It’s okay to have questions, but it’s not okay to lose faith over them.

It was a taciturn gloomy morning, the year of 1862. The 12th of September. At the end of it, I might be with my family again or buried someplace underground. It was my time to go into battle as soon as I finish saying goodbye to my loved ones. The tears slid down my wife’s face and my daughters lingered into their mother’s arms to cover their dripping faces. I gave everyone one last family hug as my wife said to me “Be careful”.

This psychological assignment requires us to break a social norm. In my case, I decided to break an appearance social norm. I thought in something weird, but at the same time really funny. Therefore, I entered to my little walking closet and I took the most brilliant and extravagant high heels shoes that I found to wear them at a place when people usually used flip flops.

Lani: I was helping for someone’s project for COMM 245; I was in the video lab, in the studio. I was on campus and decided to contact everyone I knew who comes to the school. I remember I sent out a snap saying guys I think there is a shooting, be careful and then I started sending out individual texts to people making sure they were okay, like hey are you good? Stay out of an area. I didn’t know how many people were getting shot. I just knew it’s not good and that we have to be careful. At first, the campus was like we are unsure, just be careful, and then it took some time till I finally got an email that said stay on campus and were held there for about two hours, I just kept recording.

I have been doing some thinking about our conversation a few days ago and have concluded that I will take you up on the offer! I just sold my old bike and now have some money left over that I can use to pay for those seminars. I am going to see how soon I can get this done, I am going to look at the dates and send my form in.

I used to be so oblivious. I would attend school every day and criticize my surroundings, little did I know how much I actually had. Come junior year, I observed a flyer for a club called S.A.L.T. (Student-Athlete Leadership Team), it seemed interesting to me so I decided to fill out an application. During our first meeting at 6:45 in the morning, Coach Jones, the head of the club, explained, “I did not cut anyone since you will cut yourself, you will give up and you will not want to put the work in, so you will stop coming. As a result, I will know who our leaders are”. That proclamation was something that genuinely made me think.

Hi, my name’s Donovan. I’m 17 years old and graduated this year with honors. I was raised with Christian values in mind, and attended a Methodist school. I was raised in the Christian faith yet I find myself, as with some of my friends who were raised in the same conditions, we seem to be growing farther away from our upbringing as we age. I find myself simply not understanding as time goes by, a complete polar opposite from the song ‘Farther Along’.

It was January 29th, 2012, and I felt as though I was just thrown under a bus. My life as I knew it, was changed forever. This metaphorical bus taught me a lesson... that being loyal, and doing the right thing, aren’t always the same. People try to live up to a standard, but most of the time, this is just the societal norm. Being faithful in a friendship, can conventionally be necessary, but it's never worth lying over, and that's where I went wrong.