#8:
The most powerful, not fondest, memory that I have of the last four years is a home volleyball game versus Monta Vista. Now, it wasn’t the game itself, or the fact that we lost, but what happened directly after the game ended. I walked to my duffel bag that was lying on the floor and pulled out my phone. I noticed on that my screen was flashing like crazy, a stream of incoming messages from a bunch of my family members. Confused, I unlocked my phone and opened the group imessage that someone had made. I remember scrolling with trepidation, scanning the group chat as fast as I could. Since I was reading the chat from most recent message to last, I was confused as the more recent messages were about a hospital. Then I got to the top. A message from my sister saying that our eldest sister, Carol, had stage 2 breast cancer. I dropped my phone back into my bag and backed up. My mind was whirling, I was confused, scared, horrified. A couple minutes later, I unfroze my limbs and gingerly picked up my phone again and re-read the chat. Now the messages about the hospital, the tests, they all fell into place. While all of this was happening, the rest of my teammates were meandering around, talking, taking down the net, and I just stood there, tears welling up in my eyes as I fought futilely to keep them from cascading down my face. Eventually, the rest of the girls came over, talking and laughing, until they saw my face. Of course they immediately asked me what was wrong and if I was OK and now, thinking back, making myself respond with the words, “I just found out my sister has breast cancer.” was the single hardest sentence that I have ever had to force out. The following days consisted of deep conversations with myself that, in time, made me realize how trivial, how ridiculous, most of my troubles had been in high school. It had been, “She said this about me…” or “She hates me…” and the whole event just slapped me back into perspective. I know it’s cliche to say that a single event changed me so drastically, but it truly did. A week later, someone informed me of some rumor that x person had started about me and when I was waiting for the crestfallen feeling to hit me, I suddenly burst out laughing. Yes, it was a relatively hysterical laugh but nevertheless, I simply didn’t care anymore. So, to answer the prompt, when I think back to a moment in the past four years that really impacted my life, this would, without a doubt, be the single most powerful memory that I have.
#5Since I’m unable to decide on one single person being the most influential person on the campus, I’m going to settle on my class. I think that everyone I have met in my grade has influenced me in some way or another. Whether it was the quiet girl in my class that had lent me a pencil and offered a smile with it, or the annoying guy that I’ve always disliked (oops), the people I’ve been in contact with have all contributed to the way I view the school, and sometimes my own outlook on life. Last Saturday was prom. On the bus ride there, I was sitting on one of the table booths that they had in the bus and my seat was facing the opposite way of how normal seats in a bus would face. There was a girl that I have actually never seen or met who was sitting by herself. Now, because it was prom and that involves dates, and friends or whatnot, it caught my attention that she was alone. Of course, she could’ve been going by herself or maybe her friends were sitting elsewhere, but the reason I noticed her was because she looked very melancholy, and in her own way, sad. I observed her for half of the ride, torn between asking her to sit with us (we had a group of 3 and there was an extra seat on our little table thing) or leaving her alone. On one hand, I didn’t want to hurt her pride by making the assumption that she was lonely just because she was by herself, but on the other hand, I didn’t want her to be lonely on the night of prom. Eventually, I caught her attention by leaning across the table, halfway across the hall as she was on the other side of the bus, and basically by sticking my face in hers. Then I smiled and told her that her dress was my absolute favorite color (mint!!!) and that she looked fantastic. Then I retracted and went back to my conversation with my friends. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her smile. And then she kept smiling. And then she turned towards the window, still smiling to herself. It literally made my day. Ok, I kind of lost the prompt during this story because it doesn’t even really relate. I could probably draw some imaginary connections to the prompt to have this story make sense but I would rather just leave it as is. Perfectly imperfect.
#4: My biggest fear in regards to my life after college is honestly being able to afford college. I was planning on attending Urbana Champaign but after sitting down with my oldest sister, creating a google spreadsheet and calculating out the loans I’d be taking out, the compounded interest over the course of 4 years, and other costs, I was hit with a splash of reality: I would have to pay $897.00 every month, for the next 10 years of my life after graduating. I had gotten a half ride to Urbana but even then, because my parents aren’t going to be funding me at all through college, everything would be a loan either from my older siblings, or from the school. On May 1st, I looked through all the colleges I had gotten into for the last time, uncommitted myself to Urbana, and signed up for SJSU, where I had a gotten a full ride, and De Anza with the plan of picking one of the two. Now, a couple weeks later, I know that I made the most practical decision at the mere cost of my own pride. Coming from Lynbrook, the stigma surrounding SJSU and De Anza is obviously negative. I haven’t really told anyone other than my few closest friends about my situation because I don’t think it’s something that many people here would understand. The other day, I was just talking to one of my classmates and they made one of the most ignorant assumptions ever. We were discussing colleges and she said, “Well, affording college isn’t the question here. Everyone who lives in this area and goes to Lynbrook is rich.” I hadn’t said anything at the time but it kind of struck me then that so many of the students here are so bubbled in that they wouldn’t really be able to empathize.
