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As a child I always looked forward to what was coming next. Growing older was an exciting, I knew this would lead to more responsibility. When I turned twelve I would have the first event in life that would transition me closer to adulthood, when I was fifteen I would have the official event declaring me as a grown, then I when I was sixteen almost seventeen I felt confidant I was ready for adulthood. At age twelve I started middle school. To me life was still as simple as it would be for a fifth grader. But when I was twelve, the month December would bring the cruel realities of the world down on me. My grandfather officially had dementia, I would move away from my child home, to Pocasset, Oklahoma to take care him. This was my first passage into adulthood. This is when I learned how to go through hard situations and not letting work fall behind, that hard times will come, but that won’t stop me from the important things. This was the first time I understood, how hard adulthood could be. …show more content…
Three years after the first time I realized the world wouldn’t always be easy, was my fifteenth birthday.
I was proud of the fact I was half Guatemalan and I wanted to live up to the traditions that several of my family members had followed. My Quinceanera came along as my official transition into adulthood, at least by the standards of my abuela (grandmother). Though it seems like a large party, filled with certain traditions possibly ridiculous to the outside viewer, it showed me how delegate planning to people who weren’t me and to trust it would all be okay. My Quinceanera would also be the point where I learned it’s okay for me to have a voice and I shouldn’t be ashamed of wanting one. That new perspective and the want of extra-credit, would be what first brought me to Red Dirt Poetry. Red Dirt is where my new found voice grew stronger and stronger, teaching me independence in thought as well as
action. At sixteen I would go to Chicago and attend a program called Summer Seminary. There learned what it would take to have my dream career. The program was a dream come true that allowed me to do two important things. I made new friends who will also go into ministry one day and I networked with people who would be helpful to know in my future. After this on August 17th a day before her birthday, my mother would get Amnesia and once again I was put in the role of caretaker, but this time I knew exactly what to do. We would soon move to a small house in the city and this is where I would start working on my Youth Poet Laureate application. I sent a portfolio of five poems, hoping that I’d at least be a finalist. On November fifteenth, two days before my birthday I would be named the First Youth Poet Laureate of Oklahoma, this would be the final foot into adulthood. I would learn how to talk to the media, talk to a publisher, and how to put together a manuscript. All helpful things for wherever life takes me. Around this time I would start to budget my families finances and learn the art of self care, all of these things preparing me to be one-hundred percent ready to be on my own. I’ve had numerous experiences that have brought me to a point where I think after I graduate I’ll be okay on my own. I know no matter what the challenges I can overcome them because, I have already overcome so many and just like I did as a child, I look forward to becoming and more of an adult.
Julia Alvarez in her book, Once Upon a Quinceañera, explores the quince tradition from cultural, historical and personal angles. Herein, she seeks to clarify some of the myths and ideas that surround this tradition from the notion that quinceañeras are from old Aztec traditions to the idea that this rite has been passed down from one Latino generation to another. She discovers that most contemporary quinces are firsts for many families and are different from those of the past. Consequently, the tradition depicts a group that is experiencing transformation who seek to establish their roots in a past that is somehow bleak. Many have often described the US has a melting pot of cultures. Therefore, Americans from different cultures find themselves amalgamating their values with those of the American society, thus affecting the overall culture of their communities. In Once Upon a Quinceañera, the author demonstrate and applies the cultural myth of melting pot.
Memories are like your friends; they come and they go. Like the important people in our lives, we must live in the present and cherish our memories. They’re the things that keep us going, help us learn, and retain our best and worst experiences; or, they can be essentially useless. In “On Turning Ten”, by Billy Collins, the readers can learn and be reminded of the plethora of emotions and painful truths they experienced themselves when entering the double digits. By writing from a child’s perspective, Billy Collins is effectively able to disclose and describe the complexities a child goes through when turning ten.
The moment I’ve been waiting for turned out more hectic than I was expecting. From waking up super early to forgetting what to do, the day had its up’s and down’s. So, what day am I talking about? Well about June 22, 2013, the day of my quinceanera, the day I went from a little girl to a woman.
I remember the time when I had gotten promoted to high school as a 9th grader. That time was so important to me, at that time and age. It was a phase that you usually get over. I was growing up and starting all over again in a different environment with entirely different motives. I had started at the lowest class in the school, once again, as a freshman. I wasn’t a big 8th grader that internally felt more in control due to my age and experience. It was quite odd, just a couple of days before promotion, I was 8th grader, however I had more similarities with a 6th grader. This was me starting from strength to weakness. Through that I figured it out. Life is a process of phases that repeat, and helps a person grow. The famous novelist and blogger
My story began on a cool summer’s night twenty short years ago. From my earliest memory, I recall my father’s disdain for pursuing education. “Quit school and get a job” was his motto. My mother, in contrast, valued education, but she would never put pressure on anyone: a sixty-five was passing, and there was no motivation to do better. As a child, my uncle was my major role-model. He was a living example of how one could strive for greatness with a proper education and hard work. At this tender age of seven, I knew little about how I would achieve my goals, but I knew that education and hard work were going to be valuable. However, all of my youthful fantasies for broader horizons vanished like smoke when school began.
There comes a significant time in everyone’s life when we reach the point that we are no longer seen as children, but as adults. This transition from childhood into adulthood is often referred to as the “coming of age” stage or growing up. The transitional stage of life occurs differently in everyone, which is why the initiation of change differ in “Quinceanera” by Judith Ortiz Cofer, “The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara, and “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” by Joyce Carol Oates. These three pieces of literature all embody the “coming of age” theme. Some people reach this special point in their life by simply grasping a better understanding of what is going on in the world around them, by suffering from a tragic event, or by being honored with a traditional celebration. All of these events mark the passing of a person from one stage of life to the next and what is known as this “coming of age” phage of life is one of the most popular themes expressed in literature.
Life in the middle school and high school was not easy for me. I had become an introvert, I still didn’t know how to be social, and I had very few friends. I was teased for being very quiet, and some people insinuated that I’m scared of fellow people. On the other hand life at home was difficult. My mother had become so bitter and pleased her was next to impossible. She became very harsh with my brother and me, and we were always scolded for even the smallest mistakes. Once in a while, my father would come for us and take us to the city he lived. I would look out of the windows as we drove out of town and would imagine how life in another city would feel like. I looked at the skies, and all I saw were promises of a better future. All my life I had lived in San
I stat on my bed trying to assess a difference in my body and my mind to as if there were to be any clear and obvious indication that I was no longer a child. But the thing is, you cannot simply wake up on your fifteenth birthday and become an adult. Adulthood should not be marked by a person’s age, but rather by his/her mental maturity. In order to become an adult, one should be able to live a life where one is financially comfortable along with many other basic necessities of living a comfortable life. One should be able to learn from your mistakes, know his/her limits, and know that everything is great in moderation.
Lights flashing, the booming bass of the subwoofer, a fiesta with crowds of people, all enjoying their time gleefully in their festivities and music. All I was thinking was getting out soon and not afterwards. My mother nags me, "You need to get out more and make friends." Thinking in my head, I called back, "They way I see it, I do not need or want more friends who don’t care about me, and outside confrontation is not my forte nor do I seek to explore it." Comfortably fine and staying in my solitude exploring and learning for enjoyment. If others happen to partake in a common interest and talking flows naturally then I shall decide the following steps.
Adulthood, as a child, was always portrayed as a time of freedom. The short sighted minds of children, as I once also had, only wanted to get away from the parent’s all-seeing eyes. I never thought a job too bad, what my mom did, my dad did, it didn’t seem too bad, but how wrong I was. I thought I could
My quincenera was a celebration in which I will never forget. Not only because of the party or the dress, but due to the fact that I never felt more part of my culture until then. There has always been two things that I had always wanted in my life. They were to have a quincenera and visit my family in Mexico. Since both of my parents were one of the first of their family to migrate here from Mexico, most of my family members were over there and i never met any of them. However, it was always set that I was most likely not going to do either due to expenses. I was incredibly disappointed, but deep down i understood that money for us was not always available. So I never tried to After I finally lost hope, my mom told me that my sister and I
Though people see adulthood and childhood more different than alike, we never stop growing, no matter the age. We never stop learning. We always have rules to follow through life. There is an
During that time, I made two games: You Only Live Once and A Few Minutes in an MRI.
Yesterday at work, I was helping an older gentleman find a pair of hiking boots. I was asking basic questions about what he was using them for and so forth. He begins to tell me he had to drive 2 hours to the city, so he thought he'd stop in to get a pair of hiking boots for his upcoming trip. I ask why he had to come down to the cities, and he told me he had to get treatments once a month for his bone cancer. I began to get sympathetic because obviously cancer is a terrible thing. He looks at me and says, "if you put a smile on your face and look at all the positives in life, you can conquer anything." He then tells me he's had bone cancer for 5 years, and he just tries to keep a smile on his face at all times because life is too short. Then
Have you ever had something happen in your life it made you so happy you still remember? I do. I remember the day my mother made a surprise party for me. She knew that turning fifteen in a Latina's world meant so much. My mother couldn’t afford to do me a Quinceañera- the celebration of a girl's fifteenth birthday in parts of Latin America . It is celebrated differently from any other birthday, as it marks the change from adolescent to young womanhood.A Quinceañera is a celebration in which a girl turns fifteen which in the Spanish speaking countries it is a recognition of her journey from adolescent to young womanhood. It starts out with a religious ceremony. Afterwards comes the reception which is held at home or at a banquet hall. The celebration includes food, music, choreographed dances or waltz (performed by the quinceañera and her court). A court is made up of fourteen people ( seven young girls and seven young men) plus the quinceañera making it fifteen. She wears a ball gown. Normally the gown’s color is chosen to be white or pink but in last few years it has changed as more trends come out. Some dresses are now chosen to be blue, purple, yellow, orange, red, and even black. As I was growing up I started hearing about girls turning fifteen getting ready to plan their parties and inviting people to their quinces. They would say they would get a DJ or a Mexican/ Guatemalan group to come sing at their party.