Personal Essay [1st Draft]

“Hey did you hear what she just did to the poor kid? He ran up the stairs crying! Dude I can’t believe she just did that. This is getting worse and worse man. Someone has got to put an end to this.” Statements such as these were heard throughout the summer from students, staff, and teachers. From the sound of it, this lady everyone seems to be talking about seems like a pretty cruel person. Don’t you agree? I did at the time. It’s kind of an unavoidable thing to believe after you hear things like that, even if it is about the director of the program that you are in.

It was the last night of the Upward Bound summer program, and there was a lot of tension within some certain individuals. One of the teachers had built up this tension bit by bit, but avoided any suspicion by staying under the radar. Earlier in the day and several other times, he had approached me privately, or sometimes accompanied by some few individuals whom also shared some similar thoughts to his own. In these conversations were things I did not expect, especially from someone who seemed as loyal and devoted as he did. These conversations held information I never would have thought to have heard from such a group. So unexpected and surprising, I believed it all without much question.

“Hey guys, we have this one last night to pull off the biggest prank. Anyone here have any ideas?” asked one of the students in the hallway. Suggestions ranged from pranking the girl’s floor beneath us to water balloons and things of that nature. Randomly shouting out ideas, I suggested we all sneak outside and hang out in the dimpled grass area outside of the dorm. Not expecting it, everyone agreed to do it, even the girls.

With a lot of phone calls and careful planning, everyone was in position to leave the building on my signal. I played lead role and watched over things to make sure that it was going according to plan. In the first phase of the plan, the boys quietly moved down a floor, followed by the execution of the second plan, which was to get out of the building through the side door. I held the door as everyone ran out of the door in a surprisingly neat single file towards the wet grass.

No one really knew what to do after this. My plan was just to go outside and hang out. One of the students suggested something, and their plan went into action in mere seconds. In the cold night air, the only thing you could hear was the word “revolution”, followed by some giggles and laughter. The front door of the dorm opened up and everyone hit the deck, forgetting that the grass was wet of dew. After another shout of the word, everyone stormed back inside, all having had fun in the brief moments outside with the group.

After a little stunt like that, everyone would have guessed that things were going to be quiet for the night. Of course, it wasn’t the story in this case. Going around was a plan to just simply sleep outside for the night. Word spread like a forest fire. In a matter of minutes, everyone heard the news. 2:30AM, everyone was to meet back at the same spot following the same procedures, but this time with a blanket, pillow, and anything else they may need.

When the time struck, everyone was ready and eager. Boys and girls were both in position and ready to leave. As people were leaving, something went wrong. The noise of the front door echoed through the quiet night and struck fear in some of the prankers. Instead of backing out and going back inside, everyone decided to rush outside even faster, but the plan was altered a bit, and the meeting grounds changed. Basically, the entire plan was ruined, and no one knew what to do now. There wasn’t much to do now. We were all outside, and had blankets. There wasn’t much we could do, so we began to have some discussions with each other. One thing led to another, and we ended up talking about some things that had been brought up during the conversations I had mentioned of earlier.

After a while, the topic of discussion came out with a furious look. When questions were fired at the students, no response was given back, which increased tensions between the two forces. Eventually, I spoke out. Not out of any deep thought and anything like that, but out of the anger and despise that I had gained through listening to the voices of the program. This moment of speaking out caused a tension greater than any other that I have ever been a part of. After everything was forcedly settled, everyone went to bed. Everyone but me of course. I stood up thinking of the situation, unable to reason things out

Little did I know everything that I was told was used to feed the anger that would help someone accomplish a goal that they were too cowardly to achieve on their own. I wouldn’t find out until months later that I have been tricked into doing someone else’s dirty work. I now have to accept the fact that what I had done that night was a mistake, and that I have been manipulated into a tool used to try and bring down something no one else could. This is why I can no longer see a single side of a story but two, to determine the truths and logics of what is and isn’t, so I’ll never be tricked again.

Generating essay ideas.

Generating an idea to write about for the personal essay assignment was difficult at first. When the assignment was first assigned, I had no clue what to write about. Of course this puzzled me because of the fact that this was a personal essay, which meant that I could write about virtually anything meaningful that has happened to me. This made me question if my life was actually so plain and dull that I couldn't even think of something meaningful from it to write an essay about. Then I realized that I had more to write than I thought. It wasn't that nothing in my life was meaningful. I realized that most of the things that happened in my life had tons of meaning in them to me. Everything had happened to me for a reason, and has taught me a ton of things about life. After some thinking, I finally had a list of topics to chose from, contrasting the empty one I had when I started.