Personal Excerpts

Recently in Ms. Olmsted's class, we wrote personal narratives that were modeled after either Joyce Zonana's Dream Homes, or Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary pf a Part Time Indian.  We have also been reading The Sum of Our Days by Isabel Allende, which is a memoir.  Since a memoir is pretty much a really long personal narrative, here are some excerpts from the personal narratives written by the authors of this blog... 

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From Personal Narrative

by Liz Weary

I left the only town that I ever knew at the age of 11 when my parents decided to separate. I grew up in that house, played with all my friends on that street, went to the same elementary school since I was in kindergarten. I knew all of the teachers and was close to my principal. School was my life and I loved it. The hardest had to be leaving all of my friends, my school, my teachers, and the house I loved and trading all that in for something I knew nothing about.
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From "The Day Life as I Knew it Changed Forever" 
by Ashley Zsedenyi
 
The days leading up to the funeral are a blur. I remember playing with my cousins, trying to stay out of the way of the adults, trying to stay active to keep our minds off of why we were all there. People were
coming and going, bringing tons of food, giving lots of hugs.

I should probably mention a hobby Dadaw had…he had been saving bottles of Crown Royal for many years, only to be opened by his family at his wake. Well, of course I was too young to drink, but I did sneak a small sip. I didn’t see any big deal, that’s what I’d always been given as cough syrup anyway. I think the wake is typically after the funeral takes place, but those bottles got opened up a little bit early, and there was plenty to last through the wake…just how Dadaw would have wanted it.

The actual funeral was emotional. I don’t remember anything the preacher said. I only remember watching my mom, her brothers, half-sisters, half-brothers, my cousins, Mumum, and all the friends and other relatives that were packed into Alapaha Baptist Church. I watched Dadaw lying in the casket, draped with the American flag, and I kept telling him I loved him and would miss him very much.

I was also telling him how sorry I was for being mean to him the last time I visited, just a month before his death. Dadaw was a heavy smoker…beyond heavy. He would light his next cigarette with the one he
just finished. I hid his cigarettes from him and told him he needed to quit. I even made a sign that said “hippocrite” (I was 10, I didn’t know how to spell hypocrite correctly) and stuck to his back, for saying he would quit smoking but not doing it. I’m sure he knew I was just being a kid but I kept telling myself I wish I hadn’t done that, I wish the last time I spent with him wasn’t focused on his smoking but on how much I loved him and how much fun we had. I had no concept of “here today, gone tomorrow” at that age, and at that moment I wish I had.

As the funeral ended and we headed to our cars to drive to the cemetery, the most beautiful, touching thing started happening. I don’t know if it’s because it was the first funeral procession I’d ever been in, but even my parents were amazed. Every car we passed on the road pulled completely off the road. Even on the four-lane highway separated by a median. I’ve witnessed cars here in Kentucky that don’t even stop for a processional. I believe this event is what will forever connect me to the small town of Alapaha. The amount of respect I witnessed that day will forever be ingrained in my memory.

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From "The First Few Men" 
by Laura Sullivan:

            
            Amos had been my friend since the first grade.  At our fourth grade Christmas party, he called me over behind the coat rack and asked if I would be his girlfriend. 

I said, “Sure.”  My lack of enthusiasm when answering important questions still haunts me today. 

When we came out from behind the coat rack, all of the other kids pointed at us and sung, “Ooohh…Laura and Amos sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G.” 

“We were not kissing!”  I was enraged.  It’s not like Amos wasn’t good enough for me to admit to kissing him, I just didn’t want to be credited for (or accused of) something that I didn’t do. 

After that day, I was mean.  I don’t know why I was so mean to Amos in public.  I drew on him with markers.  Sometimes boys will be mean to girls because they like them and don’t know how to properly express it.  Was that it?  Or was it because the whole class still thought we had been snogging behind the coat rack, and I subconsciously wanted to prove otherwise?  We “dated” until the seventh grade and never kissed at all.  I don’t think we ever even held hands. 

Our almost non-existent relationship ended when I was feeling un-attractive, un-popular, un-liked, and told him I wanted to break up.  He seemed fine with it, but throughout the day I was chastised by the popular kids for breaking his heart on his birthday.  Was it worse that I broke up with him on his birthday, or that I didn’t even know it was his birthday?  I apologized to him when I saw him later.  He said it was fine and that he was surprised it lasted that long anyway. 

We became best friends after that.  I sat with him on the bus every day during high school.  I used his shoulder as a pillow, and we even held hands a few times when we were both single and we knew no one was watching. 

            He found a couple of girls to lavish his attention on, even though they weren’t interested.  He would write them poetry and stick roses in their lockers.  A few years ago, I decided that he would be my brother, not by blood or law, but in spirit, I suppose.  He’s more to me than a friend, and I love him in the same way I love my blood sister, Dawn.  Amos has been married for four years now, and I love his wife, Amy, too.  I call her my sister-in-law.  They just had their first baby, Morgan…my first nephew. 
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Bits and Pieces of Me, From "MY PERSONAL NARRATIVE" by Kara Thompson

In December 1990, my mother and I were in a car accident, not seriously injured, but in order to return to her job, she had to undergo treatment. She went to see her physician and he prescribed her pain meds for injury to her back. After going through a battle with depression, she was referred to her psychiatrist. I was supportive of my mother through all of this, still a child myself.  In 1991 she was diagnosed with D.I.D, (Dissociative Identity Disorder) or multiple personality disorder.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

 I had to learn at the age of 14, what that meant for OUR lives. I had always taken

care of my mom, but come on, I was a child, and I didn’t really understand what

that really meant. We made it through many different bouts with so many alters,

(alternate personalities), that I cannot name.      

Most children my age had one mother, I had 2 or 3 on any given day.

Ha, ha!

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