...james LA p.3 20 October 2013 Life Narrative I think that my life’s story can best be told by first talking about both of my parent’s upbringings, which have influenced their personalities and how they raised me. My dad was born on Christmas Eve, 1969, to Harry and Valerie Piper. For about seven years, they lived together happily in Long Lake, Minnesota. Everything changed when he entered first grade. His parents divorced, and while his dad stayed in Minnesota, his mom moved to Chatham, Massachusetts, taking him with her. As part of the divorce terms, he only got to see his dad for a few weeks each summer, spending the vast majority of his time on Cape Cod with his mom. This was a situation that was not exactly ideal for a great childhood. His mother was a heavy smoker and drinker, which led to an unhealthy home situation. The house was usually filled with secondhand smoke, and she did not always provide the best care for my dad. Since she bred Hungarian Vizslas, there were at least eight dogs in the house at all times. This caused the already cramped house to be almost unbearable. To deal with this, my Dad often escaped into books. He would go to the library and check out twelve books at a time. Dog breeders don’t make a lot of money, so my dad and his mom lived on a shoestring budget. Sometimes to my dad, it seemed that she cared more about the dogs than she did about him. When my dad was in fifth grade, his house burned down due to a faulty chimney. His mom, eight...
Words: 1574 - Pages: 7
...In Marsh of 2018, my cousin and I went to Natchez, Mississippi and observed a plantation house called Rosalie. While we were there, we went on a tour f the and learned about the house. It all started on Saturday, at nine o’ clock in the morning. My cousin and I had been waiting for our tour to start. As we were waiting, we explored the front of the house. It was white and had tall beautiful pillars to hold the roof over the porch. In front of the house was a beautiful garden filled with trees, bushes, and flowers. In the garden, I spotted stone statues. The statues look as if they were angels. One of the statues had been holding a rose. About ten minutes later, it was time for our tour. Our tour guide had been dressed as a woman...
Words: 486 - Pages: 2
...have lived in the White House. The first person most people think of as having pets in the White House is John F. Kennedy. Pets are a common thing found in the White House. Many of the presidents had pets in the White House. Infact, John F. Kennedy has 21 pets and Theodore Roosevelt had about 50 pets that lived in the White House, or on the White House grounds. Kennedy had: dogs, cats, birds, horses, ponies, a hamster, and a rabbit. Although JFK had 21 pets, there are only two living there right now. Living in the White House now are two Portuguese Water Dogs. They are owned by President Obama’s family. THe two dogs names are, Bo and Sunny. You may not have known that many other presidents also had pets. Lyndon B. Johnson, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Herbert Hoover, Calvin Coolidge, Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, Grover Cleveland, Rutherford B. Hayes, Ulysses S. Grant, Abraham Lincoln, John Tyler, Andrew Jackson, John Adams, and George Washington all had five or more pets that lived in the White House. Many different president had pets....
Words: 497 - Pages: 2
...between tribes. I will bring to your attention the language. The Navajo people of the southwest and the Cherokees of the Southeast have totally unrelated languages. There were over 200 North American tribes speaking over 200 different languages. The Navajo language is an advantage in world war 11. The tribes spoke a wide variety of different languages. This would create numerous troublesome language barriers, because most of the tribes would feud. Some Native American tribes had large scaling farms, whereas other tribes did not. One main thing that the Native Americans had in common was that they were hunters and farmers. In this situation some lived by hunting animals and by bringing together plant resources in the wild. Tribes in different regions shared most of the same food resource. People who lived in regional areas ate more fish, while those who lived on the outside their diets were land animals, such as, deer moose and bison. The major similarity between all these tribes is...
Words: 762 - Pages: 4
...Ten Years in Just 89 Square Feet Jay Shafer and the Tiny House Movement by Antony Taylor For ten years, Jay woke up every morning to his bedroom ceiling, just 3' away from his face. After climbing down from his loft bed into his 6' x 6 ½' living room, he would enter his 4' x 2' bathroom. To most people, Jay would appear to be a prisoner, and the conditions might appear inhumane, yet Jay is not a prisoner, nor has he been forced into these living conditions. In fact, Jay not only chose to live in such a small space, he designed it himself! Jay's house for ten years, the “Epu” is the size of a walk-in closet in most of today's homes, yet it contains a living room, desk, fully functioning kitchen, separate bathroom, and loft bed space. Jay Shafer is the owner of the Tiny Tumbleweed House Company, founder of the Small House Society, an ecological activist, a new-era architect, and a lifestyle revolutionary. His minimalist lifestyle design has been featured in The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Wall Street Journal, and Time Magazine. He and his tiny house has been featured on “CNN”, “Oprah”, “This Old House” and countless local news stations. Around the country, people are purchasing his designs, attending his workshops, and following his revolutionary example of how to live life with less space and less possessions, resulting in less of a drain on resources and the environment. A Mixture of Motivations Today's economy suffers in part due...
Words: 1653 - Pages: 7
...of Sicily, there lived a poor fisherman. He was so poor, he didn’t even own a boat. Every day he carried his net down to the sea, tossed it into the water and pulled it up at the end of the day. One day when he pulled in the net he saw something sparkling. At first he thought it was a doll. But he looked closer, he saw that it was a little mermaid, only two or three feet long. At first he was frightened and wanted to throw her back in the water. He was a superstitious man, like many of the poor people of Palermo. But as he was trying to decide what to do, he heard a little voice. “Please, please don’t throw me back.”’ The voice was coming from the mermaid. It was so small and sad that he looked closer. She was a pretty little creature with long blond hair and the bluest eyes he had ever seen. Just like the color of the ocean. “What,” he said, very surprised, “But you live in the sea.” “Please, please” she said again, “I’m lost. I’ll never find my way back home. Please take me home with you.” Now the fisherman was confused. “How can a mermaid get lost in the sea? “Oh,” the little mermaid replied, “I was playing hide and seek with my mother and my friends. I counted too long and when I tried to find them I couldn’t. I swam and swam for two whole days and never found them again. Please take me home with you.” The fisherman shook his head. “Well, I don’t know,” he said. “I’m very poor. My house is very small. I have five huge sons who eat me out of house and home. My wife...
Words: 811 - Pages: 4
...September 2014 I made a time traveler machine. I decided to travel to the Inca Civilization. The Incas Civilization lived in the Andes mountains from around 1435 to 1533. I decided to travel to the Inca Civilization because I wanted to learn how they lived, I wanted to learn about their culture and I just wanted to see their cities. I wanted to live as a Inca for one year. On 1st September 2014 I traveled to the Inca Civilization, I was going to be gone for a year. I walked into the traveler machine, everything around me became white. And when I walked out, I was on top of a mountain. Around me it was buildings and roads. I also saw people growing crops in the mountain hills. People walked around in the city. I had seen the city before, it was Machu Picchu. It were water canal around in the city. The city was beautiful, and the view. You could feel that it was hard to breath because it was so high over the ocean....
Words: 598 - Pages: 3
...felt good to be in such a place, for me it was my grandmother’s house. My grandmother’s house has a very special place in my heart. I lived with my grandmother for many years when I was little. There has never been a place where I had a feeling of such joy and happiness. What a wonderful feeling of joy and peace waking up in my Grandmother’s home, that grew small as I grew big. The humble white house with black trimming that my great great grandfather built had a tall chimney and a broke down picket fence that my brother and I loved to run and jump over in the small town of Mound Bayou Mississippi. From the squeaky front porch swing you could see all the way down the street. Looking to the left you could see my grandmother’s country store, and to the right there was a field with grass as tall as the days were long that my friends and I loved to play hide-n-seek in. Knowing if I lay in bed long enough I would soon hear my grandmother's heavy feet rushing down the hall opening the back porch door to go hang clothes that she had just finished hand washing. The door made a squeal, almost a wine then a slam! I was sure the door was responsible for waking me up every morning in that house. Her feet would almost stomp as she rushed back to the kitchen to prepare breakfast for my brother and I before school. I would lay there and say to myself that 5 a.m. was too early for anybody to get up and do anything. Soon I would hear my grandmother and Miss Minnie laughing, teasing...
Words: 783 - Pages: 4
...Tiffany Scott English 1020 Dr. Hall 5/10/2015 The House on Mango Street The house on Mango Street was based on the life of a little girl named Sandra Cisneros. She wrote the book based on her life growing up. She was born in Chicago in 1954 where she had six brothers and was the only daughter. Growing up, her mother and father moved Cisneros and her brother around a lot. “Because we moved so much, and always in neighborhoods that appeared like France after World War II, empty lots and burned out buildings, I retreated inside myself” Cisneros said when explaining all her moves as painful experiences. She found a way to deal with her life by writing. This led her to writing the book, The House on Mango Street. As the story began the writer explained why she had her name. That girl’s name was Esperanza. She was named after her great-grandma. She never knew her great-grandma but she would have really like to have known her. She never liked her named but it did have some meaning to it. Other than it being the name of her great-grandma it also means hope in English and sadness in Spanish. She then explained how they didn’t always live on Mango Street. Before that they lived on Loomis and before that they lived on Keeler Street. But even before that they lived on Paulina Street and that’s all she can remember. This book is written in a very different manner, it seems a lot like a personal diary. The technique of the book is according to a story told from a girl's point of view...
Words: 768 - Pages: 4
...Eight years ago, I walked alongside my cousin on the way to school. The bustling downtown LA traffic did not stop us. We walked down the crime-filled streets, crossed the hazardous streets, and eventually made it to our destinations. Enrolled in preschool where I danced and played happily with my friends, no one would guess that I was usually at home crestfallen without anybody looking after me. My dad was working 3 low wage jobs, my mom sewing at a clothing factory, and I was walking back and forth from school and home. My cousin’s parents were working too so we had no one to really take care of us. The adults were all working desperately to try to pay the rent for a down trodden house that could barely hold both families. Contrary to our pessimistic views, my cousin and I still grew up to be one of the hardest working students and one of the smartest in each of our classes. I recently read several...
Words: 977 - Pages: 4
...first started out in the novel he was a poor farmer awakening to his wedding day. At this point, Wang Lung was very sensible about money and lived in an earthen house on his land. Wang Lung married O-Lan, a slave that lived in the Great House of Hwang. He was treated poorly and unequally by the Great family and he never would have thought he would later come to live in the Great House. Sure enough, his fortune changed and Wang became a rich man and his family became much like the Great family. Wang Lung became slightly careless with his money, but with the persuasion of his sons, he purchased the Great House later on in the novel. “I could sit on that seat where the old one sat and from whence she bade me stand like a serf, and now I could sit there and so call another into my presence” (Buck 288). Truly this is a great rags-to-riches story and this is ironic because once he was a poor farmer looking up at the Great house, and later he owned it. “Now Wang Lung, as this hour drew near stayed more and more in the house in the town and he walked about the courts and he could never have done with musing on what had happened, and he could never have his fill of wonder this, that in these courts where the Great family of Hwang, had once lived with his wife and sons…” (Buck 298). This quote seals Wang Lung’s feelings towards living in the same house as the Great ones. He feels that he himself is the new Lord of the...
Words: 866 - Pages: 4
...lives. As for me, my history follows a twisting and winding timeline that leaves many cliffhangers and loose ends. No part of my existence has been the standard apple pie, as-seen-on-tv type of life. There were no sunday barbecues and get-togethers with neighbors. The Braley household was more complex behind our front door and bolted windows. Happy stories were a fantasy I wished to live, but that’s alright, because it is these things that define me. My history and how it repeats/repeated itself through my life is what makes me, me. Me, I am worrying person, I am full of anxiety. I am called smart by others, although I believe I merely meet sub-par. I am self-conscious, and very emotional. I am too nice to people, and I trust too much. I get my hopes up too often, and I allow people to walk all over me. I am a perfectionist, and I stay up too late for assignments. I’m versatile, and athletic, silly and a little annoying....
Words: 1417 - Pages: 6
...1. My findings for these answers were analyzed between 2004 and 2010 in the United States. The percentage of Whites living in poverty is between 9.4% and 9.9%. The percentage of Blacks living in poverty is between 25.8% and 27.4%. The percentage of for Asians living in poverty is 12.1%. The percentage of Hispanics living in poverty is between 25.3% and 26.6%. The percentage of Whites having a bachelor’s degree is 30%, for Blacks having a bachelor’s degree is 19%, for Asians having a bachelor’s degree is 52%, and for Hispanics having a bachelor’s degree is 13%. The median income for Whites is $62,000, for Blacks $38,000, for Asians $75,000, and Hispanics 39,000. The percentage of Whites that own their own home is between 72%. The percentage of Blacks that own their own home is between 46%. The percentage of Asians that own their own home is between 53%. For Hispanics that own their own home is between 46%. The percentage of Whites (Non-Hispanic) is between 74%. 2. In this reading there are “4 myths” in the United States. The first myth is “The United States is fundamentally a classless society. Class distinctions are largely irrelevant today, and whatever differences do exist in economic standing, they are-for the most part-insignificant. Whether rich or poor, we are all equal in the eyes of the law, and such basic, needs like health care and education, are provided to all regardless of economic standing.” Mantsios disproves this myth by saying, “In fact, the United Stated...
Words: 2184 - Pages: 9
...Prof. OldsCST 229 3/2/2014 Native American Culture Perhaps no other culture is quite rich as much as of the Native American culture. So many aspects of our modern life were adapted from the old Indian cultures practiced centuries ago. The Native American way of life is different, but unique in its own way. The Native Americans’ way of life is very traditional and is still very similar to the way the earliest settlers lived. The Native Americans have strict beliefs and guidelines that they live by. They live to serve themselves and their tribes. They grow their own food and raise their own meat. There are few things from Native Americans that still exist in other cultures. I have visited to the Native American Museum in D.C. I have seen many different things that present the Native American culture. Weapons: When people think of American Indian weapons, bow and arrow is the first thing that comes to mind, their weapons are not limited to the arrows and bows. They also used spears, sword and knives for hunting and other good reasons. Native American bows were made of wood. Those bows were so powerful, able to shoot an arrow completely through the body of animal to be hunted. American Indian arrows were fletched with feathers to make them fly straighter. Spears are another kind of weapons that Native American used. Just like bows and arrows, spears are also made of wood and used for hunting and warfare. Knives and swords were also the common weapons used by Native Americans...
Words: 746 - Pages: 3
...putting pressure on their individual self-expectations. Magazines, television shows, and books are always coming up with new strategies to help parents cope with children’s expectations for life and other material goods. “The House on Mango Street” by Sandra Cisneros and “Cinderella” by Anne Sexton both show how kids grow up expecting perfect situations in life like fairytales; the main difference is that Cisneros’ story shows a young person waiting for the parents to provide her with happiness whereas in Sexton’s piece the young girl shows initiative to make her dreams a reality. In “The House on Mango Street,” by Sandra Cisneros, a child details her living situation with her parents. She talks about how they lived in apartments and moved around before finally moving to a house. The house the family finally moves to does not meet her expectations that were created by her parents. Although the house is “a real house that would be ours for always so we wouldn’t have to move each year” (Cisneros 392) it has lots of problems and things seem to break a lot. At one point her teacher passes by the house where she sees the girl playing and reacts in a way that makes her embarrassed of her home. The story ends with her expressing a desire to move to “A real house. One I could point to.” (Cisneros 392) but her parents just say this is how it is for now. “Cinderella” by Anne Sexton starts by giving examples of...
Words: 1230 - Pages: 5
