HUMANS Part 1 HUMANS Part 2 HUMANS Part 3
At the end of our school year, our seventh-grade students were asked to write one final piece of writing to share with the world. Topics include: About Us, Memories, People in Our Lives, What We Love, Thoughts, Lessons Learned, and Future Plans. Enjoy reading!
HUMANS Part 1 HUMANS Part 2 HUMANS Part 3
0 Comments
At the end of one of the hardest school years ever, our seventh-grade students were asked to write one final piece of writing to share with the world. Topics include: About Us, Memories, Plans, Pets, Struggles, Lessons Learned, and Inspiration.
Enjoy reading! HUMANS Part 1 HUMANS Part 2 HUMANS Part 3 Aaaaaah, that’s better, What are you looking at mom! “Yeah, I know I’m dead.”
15 minutes ago: Hi, I’m Mabel, and if you’re a human, DON’T read this. Now that the “people” are gone obviously I know why you pets are here: you want to know the secrets behind being a dog (or a cat I guess). Well, what better dog to ask than me! The trick is to ALWAYS, and I mean ALWAYS rebel against the owners, my personal favorites include eating their food, chasing squirrels, and escaping out of the house, it is VERY entertaining. My family loses their minds once i finish my mischief Anyway, now I’m in the car, my absolute favorite place, yet I’m not in the most cheerful mood today. The reason I’m in this beautiful “vehicle” is that I’m going to get blessed by a priest (at least I think that’s what it’s called). I perch in front of a window, begging my mom for it to open. Just a chance for an escape. I picture the gorgeous event: me leaping happily out of the car window, my mom screaming and having to chase and lure me in with treats as I gallop across the roads, I even do my famous crying that my owners go ballistic for, still no peep of opening the dumb possible entrance to freedom. I‘m considering breaking the car doors open when we arrive in the parking lot. No backing out now. The next thing I know a rope that my mom calls a “collar” is settled tightly around my neck. Jokes on them, I’m strong enough to break out of this jail cell. Oooh! More dogs! “Yo buds! I’m coming for ya!” I’m chasing these dogs just as well as I could’ve taught you pets. My family rolls their eyes, for some reason though their cheeks are starting to turn red. “Cut it out” my mom snaps, her teeth gritting. Oh, I can do that too, I growl and show my feisty teeth. Finally, boredom gets the best of me, spoiler alert: I’m spoiled. I wait in this unfair line thing, which is ridiculous: everyone knows I should go first for everything! I mean who else does this world revolve around? Finally, I’m next. This weird guy is wearing this thin robe and is smiling at me - creep. My mom tugs me forward, and he starts preaching this poem? “Bless this beautiful dog, may she be healthy…” Blah blah blah, whatever. I’ve been holding it for a while, might as well do it now…. Aaaahh. My family’s doing this red tomato face thing again, why is everyone staring at me? Ooh is he holding up a treat?! Gimme gimme! “Yeah whatever you said, just let me have my dessert.” None of us knew what the surprise was, not even our parents, but when my uncle tells you he has a surprise, you’d better be ready.
I and my cousins walked up the hill expecting to see something we hadn’t seen before, something new, but no. All that was there was my uncle’s Jeep. We looked at each other, puzzled, confused, wondering what my uncle had planned. My uncle broke the confused silence with two words, but all it did was make us more confused. “Hop in.” I got in the passenger seat and glanced at my uncle, not trying to hide the puzzled look on my face. He smiled and started the car. I shrugged my shoulders and buckled my seatbelt. Nothing could prepare me for what happened next. All I can say about it is this - it was scarier than any amusement park ride you will ever go on. My uncle took off, straight into the dense Northwoods. Immediately my cousins and I started yelling at him, asking him if he had gone completely insane. His only response was a grin followed by a chuckle that made it sound like he was having the time of his life. I, for one, was certainly not. The ride was insanely bumpy sprinkled with turns that screamed death. As we went on, the ride started to get a bit easier, and I was able to get my emotional state out of what could only be described as DEFCON 1. Well, that was until the last turn. My uncle was still tearing through the woods. Every bump still rattled every bone in my body. But one thing was different - the tree. It was getting closer now. I, for one, most definitely thought that that tree would be my certain end. It was a towering, white birch tree. As we raced toward the tree, it felt like the slow-motion scene of The Matrix in which time slowed down and the main character dodged multiple bullets. CRACCCCKKKK! The sound of my uncle driving over a fallen branch echoed through the woods. As we get closer, I noticed the slight moss growing on it. A slight, scattered, coating of lime green on that ocean of cloud-colored sandpaper. Then my uncle shifts. He spins the wheel as if he’s operating a carnival ride. As the car struggles to straighten out, the tires are digging into the jade-green grass and leaving a soppy mud trail behind us. Then I feel the tree’s branch on my arm. It felt like a cold finger trying to drag me out of the Jeep. But then, like it was nothing, the car straightens out, and my uncle changes gears and speeds away into the distance. As we returned to the house, my uncle was still laughing like he had just had the time of his life. It took the adults about a second to see the looks of utter terror on all of our faces. But when my cousins and I got out of the car, we all joined my uncle in laughing hysterically. Except our laughs weren’t “Oh my God! That was one of the best times I’ve ever had!” They were, “Oh thank God we’re alive!” Our parents asked us what we did and how was it. They had not seen us come flying out of the woods. We told them that they were about to find out. We watched the color drain from their faces as my uncle told them to hop in the Jeep. We waved goodbye as they drove off into the woods and disappeared from our sight. And I decided I was going to take a well-deserved swim in the crystal-clear lake. I know, I know, everyone is told not to smoke because it is bad for you, but what does it actually do to you? Why shouldn’t you do it? At first, you feel pain and burning in the throat and lungs; your body’s way of telling you to be smoke-free. Your body knows when something poisonous is in you, and it is warning you not to do it, yet so many people do. Smoking can cause cancer and heart disease; in fact, 1300 people die each day from smoking alone! The Medical News Today article “Why Is Smoking Bad For You?” states, “Smoking shortens the life of a male by about twelve years and the life of a female by about eleven years.” Just by making one bad decision can cause you at least ten fewer years of living. It is more dangerous for females to reproduce when they smoke. They can have a premature birth, miscarriage, low birth weight, and much more. Just thinking about it can make your heart sink, especially when a new human is involved. Smoking hurts your lungs and heart, plus makes it difficult for blood to move around in your body.
Not only the inside of your body is being affected, but also what you are on the outside. This can include bad breath, yellow teeth, smelly clothes, colds, coughs, and difficulty with sports. The smell of smoking is one of the hardest odors to get rid of. So when you see friends and family, they may smell your breath, car, house, clothes, and that is something you don’t want to be known for. Not only is your health at risk, so is your wallet. A pack of cigarettes is about six dollars, so if you bought a pack each week, that would cost $312 a year! If you buy a pack each day (yes, people smoke a whole pack in just one day!), that would be $2,190!! Think about how much you could buy with that, but instead you buy cigarettes. And, if you start smoking early, you are going to spend thousands of dollars on poisonous things. After reading this, is it really worth smoking? What exactly is the Armenian Genocide?
April 24, 1915, the Turks (Ottoman Government) killed over 1.5 million innocent Armenians. The starting date was on April 24 1915, the day that Ottoman authorities rounded up, arrested, and deported from Constantinople (now Istanbul) all the way to Ankara. In the 1870’s or around that time the Turks had already started to make the Armenian women and children walk and they started to kill the men and torture them. The Turkish people came and rounded up in front of people’s houses asked if they can talk to the father of each family. Instead of talking to the father they would slit their throats in front of the father’s family, they would break into the people’s houses, brake glasses, make the house a mess, take the fathers, and leave or beat up the women and children. Another terrible thing they did the the them was round up all of the fathers and the grandpas make them go on their knees and the Turks would take a bat and hit them in the stomach and kill them. They would kill the men one by one, put them against the wall, and have Turkish soldiers line up with guns and shoot at the same time and kill the men. The women and children were left, clueless not knowing anything. Once they finished that terrible crime, they took the women and children to walk, all the way from Armenia to Syria (if you look on the map it is 791 km from Armenia.) The Armenians were very wealthy and had amazing jobs, so the Turks were skeptical. Then they started to get really mad. Keep in mind that the Armenians used to work in Turkey and with some of the Turks. Some people tried to run off but got caught and put into more torture, some of the people who ran got away with it. The men died the women children and grandparents had to walk, walk for many many days. All the way to Syria. “Ottoman rulers ordered that all Armenians be expelled from their homes in areas outside of war zones. The Armenian men, women, and children were then lined up and made to walk in convoys of tens of thousands toward the Syrian desert.” said by Rouben Paul Adalian, a man whose a Dictator of the Armenian National Institute in Washington, D.C. I want to tell you something else that happened in the genocide with one of my family members. My grandpa's moms mom was in the Armenian Genocide, she lost her father, she lost her husband and she was pregnant. She was one of those million people walking to Syria, but even worse she was pregnant. She gave birth in the desert, to her first child. After a while, that baby died and she had to bury her own child with her bare hands. Then a couple of months later she found another baby, abandoned, on the side of the street. She picked the baby up walked with her for who knows how many miles. Then, the baby died. She again buried the baby with her bare hands. She survived the genocide. She had my great grandma Lydia, unfortunately, she isn’t here with us, but she told us all she knew about the genocide. We have it on video. Another story, my grandma's dads dad, he was also in the genocide. But he worked with the Turks way before it started. He lived in Armenia but he worked in Turkey. His good friend during the genocide helped him. Told him if he hid up in the tree he would bring him food and water every day. But sooner or later the Turks found out. They took my great grandpa down from the tree, made him go down on both knees, hands behind his back. Sat there for many days. Sooner or later his wife was wondering where her husband went. He also wanted to see his wife and the Turkish soldier said you can see your wife, but then he killed him took his clothes and one of the soldiers put his clothes on called my great grandpa wife, what his wife saw was terrible. One of the soldiers took the husbands clothes, put them on and danced around in it. They did horrible things to my family, and to others. The Turks killed not only the Armenians but Assyrians (750,000 people) and the Greeks (950,00). I will tell you some stuff that I know about the Genocide myself. On April 24 of 2015 remarked the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, friends, and family went to Chicago to protest. Over 150 people went, maybe more. We got on the news and if you search up 100th-anniversary Armenian genocide in Chicago we will pop up. Every year we go to the same place and at least over 70 people show up, for the Turks only 10 or more. Another thing about it was when the Turks wanted to kill the Armenians it was mainly because all the Armenians were rich, had good jobs, and they had families. So they wanted to kill us and not have any Armenians left. So some guy wrote ways to kill an Armenian, told his fellow soldiers and they went to go kill them. We have evidence of the papers. Almost every Armenian song is about the genocide and that person's tragic story. Still, the Turks deny the massacre that they did to the Armenians till this day. They go to high schools and colleges and pay them so they don’t tell the story to the students. But there are still Armenian students who make presentations and present to the students. Like what my sister did for the eighth graders, and what I am doing is telling you about what they did, just for people to recognize. They wanted to ge us out but we are still here. There is one movie called "The Promise" which is about the Armenian Genocide. When the movie first came out the Turks did not want to people to watch the movie so they would buy a bunch of tickets so a bunch of people that wanted to see the movie wouldn’t be able to buy any tickets because people thought that the movie was packed and there was no room. But it was completely empty, no one showed up. They gave the producers a bunch of money so they don’t air it on TV but they didn’t take the money. I looked up at the green scoreboard. The numbers seemed to be haunting down on me. The glowing red numbers read Home: 1 Away:4 Inning: Bottom 9. I stepped up to the plate. I dug my right foot into the tan dirt. My bat was gleaming in the sun on the beautiful summer day. I pointed the bat up, then right to the pitcher. The pitcher was staring so hard at me, he could have shot a dagger from his eyes. I tugged at my red jersey that read “Arlington” in cursive across my chest. I touched the top of the white plate, then the middle, and I was ready. The crowd’s chants started to fade out. It was just me and the pitcher. The pitcher gave a slight nod to his catcher. He stepped to the side, had a leg kick so high that it seemed like he was trying to touch the sky, then came firing. His arm cocked back and a tiny white blur came whizzing at me. In my head I recognized the red seams spinning backward almost like it was trying to go back to the pitcher. Curveball. I saw it come in high, and I knew it was gonna dip down just like a sinker. I swung as hard as I could. My hips turned a full 360 and I could hear the umpire yell, “Strikeeeee one!”
I whiffed. I thought to myself, “That was the one pitch I was gonna be able to hit.” I looked back at my coach and he just gave me the slightest nod. I dug in again. I went through my detailed routine yet again. I looked up at the pitcher. This time, he didn’t look as intimidating. He stepped to the left again, came up with his leg kick, and yet again, fired it home. He threw it so hard I couldn’t even see the little red seams. It went outside. 1-1 was the count. I looked at Justin who was at first. He was clapping and yelling, “Here we go kiddddd you got thisssss!” I looked towards the crowd. I saw my dad. He was wearing a Cubbie blue Cubs jersey with a black and red Arlington Cardinals hat. Everyone was on their feet. The cheers could be heard from miles away. They were pounding and ringing in my ear drums. I stepped back up to the plate. Everything seemed to slow down. I took a quick peek out of the corner of my eye to my coach at third. Again, he gave me a slight nod. I looked at the pitcher yet again. He kept shaking his head. “This could be an offspeed pitch”, I thought to myself. He stepped off the mound. The crowd groaned. I took my left foot and put it right in between the white lines meeting with the dirt. I leaned back, then got back in the box. The pitcher was staring at me this time instead of the catcher. It was turning into a cat and mouse game. I thought to myself “Alright I see how it is”. He now looked down to his catcher. He nodded and right before he moved his leg, I put my right hand towards the umpire and I heard the ump yell, “TIMEEEEE”. I took a few steps to the left. I looked down and grinned. I stepped back up to the plate. I could see the perfect white ball poking through the pitcher's glove. He gave me a death stare after that trick I pulled. I messed up his rhythm which is exactly what I wanted to do. He went into his windup. As the ball came flying in, I could see it slowing down. Changeup… and I recognized it, coming right down the middle. I lifted my leg up extra high. So high, I could have leaned over and touched it with my face. I reared my bat back and then let my body explode. My wrists drove right through the ball. The sound was the most recognizable sound ever. DING. I watched the ball soar through the sky. I dropped to a knee and just watched it. That thing was loooooong gone. It dropped almost 30 feet past the fence. My heart skipped a few beats. I could hear the crowd cheering but my brain couldn’t even process it. I started jogging towards first. I stopped and did the best bat flip you’ve ever seen. I looked up and knew this was the best moment ever. As I rounded second I looked at the scoreboard again. This time it read Home: 5 Away: 4 Inning: Bottom 9. I took a quick peek to the crowd. They loved the bat flip. I looked at my dad. He was on his feet, his face beaming with pride. My mom was clapping, going crazy. My dad gave me a little wink. My mind went crazy, I still couldn’t process what was happening. I rounded third and went for a low five with my coach. I ripped off my helmet and threw it to the side. My hair was a big moppy mess but I didn’t care. I ran into the herd of my teammates. Everyone was jumping up and down screaming. It felt like I was in the middle of a tornado. One person pulls you this way, then that way. I didn’t care. We won, and I hit a Walk-off. Grand. Slam. I stood in line squeezing my toes together. A hot rush of adrenaline went up my head. My head spun violently making me regret my decision. A chill went up my spine even though it was the middle of the summer. I was in line for the most scariest ride in the waterpark, The Funnel. It was me, my uncle, my grandpa, and my cousin. I really didn’t want to do this, but there was no turning back now. You get on a raft the color of mustard with four other people. You slide down a very steep slide and once you slide down, you go into something the shape of a funnel. Once you get to the funnel part, you slide up and down. I studied the faces of the people going on the ride. A women had her head tilted back, she had her eyes clamped shut. Her hair flew up with her as she went up and down. She screamed so loud that I needed to plug my ears. There were dozens of people waiting to go on this ride. The only reason I decided to go on the ride was because my cousin was six and he was brave enough to go on it and I didn’t want to be a coward. The hollering and screeches of people were just making things worse. Now there were only three people left, and I started having a panic attack. My heart was skipping beats, and I was shivering with fear. I was so nervous that it felt like butterflies were doing cartwheels in my stomach. The blazing sun burned against my skin. I kept telling myself that it wouldn’t be scary and people were overreacting for no reason. It was finally our turn and, I felt like I was going to have a cardiac arrest. I sat down in the raft clenching on the handle bars on the side of the raft. The rest of my family sat down in the raft with me. I wondered if I was strong enough to survive the ride. The lifeguard was waiting to get a signal so it would be safe for us to go down. I rubbed my thumb nervously on the handle bar. When she got the signal, I was so frightened. The water drifted the raft into the slide. We were going to get to the drop in fewer than five seconds. I screeched at the top of my lungs as we fell down the steep slide. It felt like we were falling through the black hole. I had a stomach drop each time we went up and down the funnel. I kept screaming as water rushed up and splattered onto my face. As we slowed down, I was finally done with my panic attack. That ride was terrifying. I was so soaked that water was cascading down my face rapidly. I was never ever going on that ride again!
Every year my grandparents, mom, and I go to Door County. It takes about 4 hours of being stuck in a cramped car to get there, but it's worth it. I love when we pull up to the hotel and my stomach whirls with butterflies. With aching legs, I help carry my suitcase out of the trunk. The hotel is white in the shape of an upside down L. Each door leads directly to a hotel room. The pool was right in the middle. The thick smell of chlorine evaded my nose. We heaved our luggage over the curb and into the lobby. The “lobby” is about the same size as a classroom, maybe even smaller. In the center of the room, there is a small table where the owner lays out bagels, muffins, and other breakfast items. In the corner is a small black and white coffee nook where all the adults roam. We walk up to the desk where Susan recognizes us immediately. My family has been coming here even before I was born. A smile spreads across our face as she jingles our room keys in front of us. My grandma grasps for the keys holding them in her small wrinkled hand. Altogether we walked back to our room and decided to get outside.
The hotel was directly on the lake making the trip just a few steps away. Before you reached the beach there is a sitting area. The crisp green grass prickled your bare feet when you walked across it. Wood beach chairs turned facing the lake. The chairs were an assortment of dark blues and yellows. Further down stood a wooden archway. The wood was darkened by age. From the archway is a brittle staircase where people usually kick off there flip flops or sandals. With each stair, a small creak rings into the air. Plastic buckets and shovels lay half buried in the beach. I step down into the sand only to quickly pull them back from the heat. Walking on the sand was like walking across hot coals in a circus act. Instead, I watch as the cool breeze sways the trees back and forth. Long feathery clouds drift across the pale blue sky. I inhale deeply, filling my lungs with air. I decide to make a run for it towards the water. As I dash across the beach sand kicks up from behind me. Once I'm close enough I leap into the brown murky water. The water splurges in all directions from the impact. The icy liquid surges my legs with pins and needles. I shudder as a small shiver itches up my spine. I watch as ring-shaped ripples roll from where I had jumped into the water. The wind started to pick up as it swept my hair into a tornado, blowing it every which way. I ran my fingers through each strand trying to tame it back into place. The sun wrapped me up in a tight blanket making my eyes droop. I squinted trying to look across the horizon. I placed my hand above my eyes, blocking the light. The lake was so broad that it was a little overwhelming. As if it would swallow me whole. The woozy feeling made me turn away. I smiled to myself as I hopped back up the ancient stairs. One thing I want to do when I grow older is make a car that generates its own power/electricity. I also wonder sometimes why we exist and what is our purpose. BIrds keep the bugs and other birds in check, and lions keep other prey in check, but we don’t do anything. I wish that man would stop polluting and that man would be less greedy. Once I found 5 bucks on the locker room floor and I gave it to a teacher. When I grow up I want to go around the world to places like Africa and Antarctica. I want to be the first man to build a fully independent house that makes all of its energy, water, and is made from biodegradable materials. I wish that one day man will find a way to bring back extinct species using fossils and that we can bring back the Dodo bird. Sometimes I wonder if we can reach the bottom of the ocean and no longer fear pollution. I hope that one day all forms of discrimination will be destroyed. Sometimes I think about some of my family that has passed away. I wonder if there is another place that we go once we die (I do not count religious beliefs for this). I wonder if man is the most advanced thing on this planet or if there is a species like man deep in the ocean that can breathe under water and withstand the water pressure. I wonder if they are farther along than us and if the air gets too polluted and everything on land dies will the underwater creatures survive because the water can take in CO² and give out O², I wonder what would happen if man never existed.
|
AuthorsAs a class, we'll be sharing some of our stories here. Feel free to leave positive comments and / or questions to learn more about our stories. These stories are published with each student's permission. Archives
May 2022
Categories |