Soon I saw that horrible truck of death drive away with poor Dapples in the back. The man drove away as though she was worth nothing. I buried my face in my mom’s arms and just cried my heart out.
I’ll never forget that awful day. I remember telling my mom on the way there to turn off the radio. I didn’t want to remember the song that played, because I knew I would hate it for the rest of my life. I still sit in my room and cry sometimes because I know I could have proven to everyone that just because she bucked didn’t make her a criminal. It’s just like people. Everyone has a chance to be as good as they want to be. It all depends on what goes on in their minds and hearts. I will never know how well Dapples would have done if she would have survived. I am forced to wonder the rest of my life.
She left me before I was ready, but in the short time I owned her, she showed me how strong friendship can be. It can survive anything, even if everyone else is against it.
She also taught me how to trust, to love and to have faith in others. I had faith in her when no one else did. And that is something I’ll never regret, or forget.
Nicole Buckner, twelve
My Uncle Frank
If it weren’t for memories, I’d probably still be crying. I have come to realize that sometimes, all you can hold on to are memories.
Brooke Raphalian, twelve
When my mom and dad bought their first house on Kendrick Loop, they moved right next door to Frank and Eleanor. Our house was a cute little three-bedroom rancher with a very big backyard and there was a fence between our yard and theirs.
That same year in May, I was born. When my mom and dad brought me home from the hospital, Frank and Eleanor were the first neighbors to hold me. He was over almost every day to see me and hold me. As I got older, he would come over and ask my mom if I could come over to his yard, so I could talk to him and keep him company while he worked in his garden. The best thing was that he had a big cherry tree in his backyard, and he would save one branch, one that I could reach, and let me pick all of the cherries and eat them. Before long, I began to call him Uncle Frank because he was just like family to me.
On special occasions like my birthdays and holidays, he would always remember me and come to the door with presents. On Halloween, he would save a big bag of candy for me. For Christmas, he would bring me a candy cane or a doll.
Uncle Frank was one of the kindest and most generous people I have ever met. He was always ready to help people out. I remember times when he drove people to the grocery store and helped them do their grocery shopping if they were sick or couldn’t do it themselves.
Every summer, you would see Uncle Frank outside in his summer gardening outfit, which were his baggy shorts and sometimes no shirt. He wore a big straw hat with a wide, floppy brim, his gardening gloves, which were the kind of gloves women wear to wash dishes, and always his boots. In the winter, he wore his gardening overalls along with his boots and gardening gloves.
Uncle Frank’s backyard was like the Garden of Eden. It was always perfectly groomed, with lots of flowering shrubs, blueberry bushes, grapevines, rose bushes, lilac bushes, and his grass was always very thick and green. He loved to garden, but he also loved to use his hands to build things. Uncle Frank built a gazebo so that his wife and daughter could sit outside in the backyard and have some shade. Then he built a smokehouse by hand with scrap lumber to smoke the fish that he caught on his fishing trips. And he made lots of bird feeders. He especially loved to feed the birds.
But Uncle Frank was happiest when he was working on something special in his woodworking shop. His shop was full of power tools and everything was always very neat and organized. Everywhere you looked, you would see jars of nuts, bolts and screws and tidy rows of screwdrivers, hammers, saws and all sorts of other tools. His shop was always clean and tidy.
Uncle Frank just loved our old dog, Kodiak. He was a big malamute and husky cross with blue eyes. Uncle Frank loved him so much that he cut a big round hole in the fence so that Kodiak could stick his head through the hole and see him while he was gardening. Kodiak was too heavy, so he was on diet dog food that he really hated. Although he never ate his dinner, he was gaining weight! One day, we found out why. Feeling sorry for Kodiak, Uncle Frank and Eleanor had been feeding him things like Black Forest ham, cheese, salami and anything else they had that they thought Kodiak would like.
One day, Uncle Frank had smoked some salmon and put it out to cool in his backyard. Someone had left our back gate open, and when Uncle Frank came out after lunch he discovered that all of his smoked salmon was gone. Then he found Kodiak lying on his back in the shade, picking and eating grapes off of his grape vines! Kodiak would spend all day with Uncle Frank, keeping him company. Even after we told them that Kodiak was on a strict diet, every once in a while, Eleanor or Uncle Frank would sneak him a special treat.
When we moved into a bigger house that was across the street and five houses down, Uncle Frank was very sad to see us go. But almost every day, he would stop in to see us or wave to us as he rode his bike to the mailbox. In the summer, he would stop by to see if I wanted to come over for a cold drink and a visit in his gazebo or to pick cherries. He loved to talk about how he met and fell in love with his wife, and he loved to talk about his four children and all of his grandchildren.
Once or twice, he took my friend Jeffrey and me to Dairy Queen for some ice cream. He also took many videos of Jeffrey and me as we grew up. He loved and knew every kid on our block, but I know I was special to him.
One Tuesday in November, I was walking home from school with my friends when I saw a fire truck come screaming down our street with the lights and sirens on. My dad and his fellow firefighters were on the truck. The truck stopped in front of Uncle Frank’s house. Eleanor was in their front yard waving frantically. My dad ran inside with his medical bag in his hand. Peter, the fire chief arrived next, followed by Rescue 11 and an ambulance. By this time, I knew that something terrible had happened to Uncle Frank. I saw Uncle Frank being carried outside on a backboard; he was wearing his gardening overalls. They lifted him over the fence in front of his house, placed him on a stretcher and rushed him into the ambulance and off to the hospital. Then I saw my dad come out; he was kind of crying. He told me that Uncle Frank had suffered a massive heart attack and that he had tried to save him with CPR, but he didn’t think he would make it. He put me in his truck and some of the firemen that I know came over to talk to me. My dad took me home and snuggled with me for a while, and then he had to go back to work at the fire hall.
It was a very sad day for me, one I will never forget. I still find it hard to believe that Uncle Frank is gone, and every time we walk or drive by his house, I expect to see him out in his front yard in his overalls and sun hat, watering his garden and waving to us. I loved him very much and I will never, ever forget him. I know he is up in heaven with Kodiak, eating smoked salmon and grapes and looking down on me.
MacKenzie Exner, thirteen
Ramon
I didn’t know about the feelings you felt
You should have told me, I could of helped
I didn’t know, and now I just cry
Suicide is a horrible thing—you were too young
to die.
Tori Lowes, twelve
It was an average April day when the phone rang. I rushed to answer it.
“Hello,” I answered “Hi, Emma, it’s Kim. Is your mom home?”
Kim is my mom’s friend, and she sounded like something was urgent.
“She’s out of town but should be back this evening,” I replied, wondering what had happened.
“Well, is your dad home?” she asked quickly.
My dad was in the shower, so I told her that he couldn’t talk at the moment. She told me to tell him to call her as soon as possible. I hung up the phone thinking, What could be that important? Had something really gone wrong? Had something happened to her son, Bain, who had been in my class since kindergarten?
I sat do
wn to read, but I was shaken.
A while later, I was reading and had forgotten to tell my dad about the phone call, even though he had been out of the shower for quite some time. The sky was dimming, and it was getting to be dinnertime. I was jolted from my story by the ring of the phone. I hopped up to get it.
It was Kim again. I handed the phone to my dad, who had come into the kitchen to see if it was for him. I went back to my chair to read, but of course I wasn’t really reading, but rather pretending to read while I listened intently to their conversation.
My dad’s voice became serious and solemn, and as I listened, it seemed to become more so. I heard things like, “I’m so sorry,” and “He was a great kid.”
My stomach became queasy. What did my dad mean by, “He was a great kid”? Who was he talking about? I felt nervous and scared.
I heard my dad say a quiet, “Good-bye,” and a click. The floorboards creaked as my dad headed across the kitchen toward me. I braced myself for whatever news I was about to hear. Dad came to stand next to me and was silent for a moment before he spoke. He seemed very nervous and things felt awkward.
“Emma,” he began. I stared up at him, dreading the news, yet wanting to hear it.
“Ramon’s dead,” he said quietly.
My stomach lurched. I shook. Had I heard wrong? This couldn’t be right, but my dad wouldn’t joke about such things.
Ramon had been in my class since grade one, and had become an important part of my school. He had come from Germany, not knowing a word of English, but he learned the language rapidly since reading had become a passion of his. He had loved the outdoors, excelled in soccer and had been quite a gentleman. He had been my teammate and classmate. At one point, I had even had a crush on him. And now he was gone.
I thought back to that day at school when he and Shane had been playing roughly. Ramon hit his head, but he had seemed all right afterwards, though not in the best mood.
“He hit his head pretty hard at school today when he and Shane were fooling around,” I told my dad, wondering if the accident had been more than it seemed. I tried hard not to cry.
“That wasn’t quite the reason for his death,” my dad said. “It seems that he hanged himself.”
That made it even more horrible. How could someone who was so full of life just take it away? So what if he had been suspended? That was no reason for him to do this. He had been a very emotional guy; when he was happy the world was heaven, but when he was mad, the world was . . . well, you know.
“Oh,” I responded, not knowing what else to say.
“I’m really sorry,” my dad told me—truly meaning it.
At that moment, I really wished my mom were there. I love my dad dearly, but my mom was so much more comforting. I stood up and wrapped my arms around my father, and he returned the embrace warmly.
A few minutes later, my mom came through the door calling to us happily and talking about her trip. My dad and I didn’t say much until she had gotten up the stairs. We then told her what happened. Tears rolled down her cheeks as my dad told her the horrible news. I held her close and cried.
The next morning, my teacher told us to come to school with our parents, and that it would be a half-day in which we would grieve together. That day we shared stories and experiences that included the happy Ramon. I saw people cry who had never cried in front of me before. That day brought my class together in a way nothing ever had.
Weeks later our class went to Ramon’s house to plant a garden in his honor. We planted cloves (his favorite) and wild plants. His mom watched with tears in her eyes, touched by what we had done in his memory.
I have learned so much from this, but most of all, to be kind to people, for even if it seems what you are doing and saying is harmless, it may not be so harmless to the person you’re aiming it at. Be kind and think before you act—you may save a life out of your kindness.
I hope that Ramon has found peace and happiness where he is now, which he was unable to find here. And, although I may not pass to Ramon in soccer anymore, I’ll always remember his big smile.
Emma Fraser, twelve
[EDITORS’ NOTE: If you, or someone you know, is thinking about suicide, call 1-800-suicide or log on to www.save.org.].
11
ALL ABOUT
ATTITUDE
One hundred years from now, it won’t matter how
you did on a test
Or how popular you were.
No one will care about how many hits you got in
a baseball game.
It won’t matter if you miss a day of school
Or what you got for your eleventh birthday.
Your highest score on a computer game won’t be
remembered
Or if your family had a swimming pool.
No one will care who came in first in that one
race.
It won’t matter if your handwriting was messy
Or if all your artwork wasn’t the best.
But, if you made life a little better
for just one other person
That’s what will be remembered.
That’s what will matter.
Sydney Miller, twelve
Adult Teeth
As a young girl, two of my wishes were to have glasses and to have braces, items that I associated with the magical preteen world of growing up. I got the glasses in second grade, and quickly realized that I had been wrong—I did not want to wear glasses, after all.
Still though, I clung to the romantic vision of braces, the metal and plastic that would transform me into someone older and infinitely more appealing.
As my adult teeth started to grow in, I was horrified to realize that my neat little rows of baby teeth were being replaced by a mouthful of mismatched, overlapping grown-up teeth.
In sixth grade, at last, I got my braces. And again, I found that the reality was far different than I’d imagined. I didn’t like the way that the braces looked on me, but far worse was the way they felt.
The first night after I got my braces on was the worst. My teeth felt as if a world-class bodybuilder was yanking them apart. Hard. My mother made hamburgers for dinner, and I was starving, but I could only eat slowly, miserably, with a minimum of chewing and a maximum of pain.
Two excruciatingly long years later, after months and months of those agonizing torture sessions called “getting your braces tightened,” I was finally, finally, scheduled to have my braces removed. I was also, my orthodontist mentioned in an offhand way, going to need gum surgery.
My mother immediately made an appointment with an oral surgeon whose office was in a nearby city, an hour away from our small town.
I sat in the passenger seat of the car, staring out the window as we drove.
“You’ll be fine,” she assured me.
“How do you know? You’ll be out in the waiting room reading Cosmo,” I muttered sourly.
As she had predicted, I did survive the procedure.
Afterward, since we were in the city already, my mother decided to do a little shopping. I should mention that she is not a cruel woman, and that this was toilet-paper-in-bulk kind of shopping, not just felt-like-another-new-dress shopping. Also, neither one of us realized at first that my mouth had been numbed to the point where I could no longer swallow.
I followed her into a large retail store with my jaw drooping and my own drool hanging from my mouth. I had never realized how many times a day I swallowed automatically, without ever giving it a thought.
Distracted by the immediate problems at hand—trying to avoid slobbering on the floor, periodically sopping up the spit with a handkerchief—it took me a few minutes to notice what was going on around us. As we walked, everyone we passed was staring at us. Their expressions ranged from curiosity to pity to revulsion. They didn’t know what was wrong with me, but whatever it was, they weren’t sticking around long enough to see whether it might be catching. No one knew that I had just undergone gum surgery
.
Mom and I finished our errands and drove home. The anesthetic wore off, and I went back to involuntary swallowing. With my gums healed and my braces removed, I used my now smooth, even teeth to eat whole hamburgers and grin like a Cheshire cat at every person I saw.
When I was alone, though, I spent a lot of time thinking about how people had looked at me when I was in the store that day, when they had thought that perhaps I was a mentally or developmentally disabled teen. I was fourteen years old and, I had never in my life been looked at that way. I also thought about how my mom (who could have walked ahead and pretended that she didn’t know me) stood by my side talking to me as she always did, and ignoring the stares.
This experience didn’t drastically change me or my life. What it did do, though, was to alter my perception of the world just a little. It changed the way I thought about appearances, making them seem a little less important. It also gave new weight to the clichés my mom had been repeating ever since I was little: “Don’t judge a book by its cover,” “Everyone has feelings,” and “You have to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes.”
I knew that I had only walked a few steps in someone else’s shoes, but I was newly determined to treat other people—regardless of their appearance—with more compassion and respect.
And that, I realized, was something truly grown-up.
Leah Browning
Staying True to Myself
This above all; to thine own self be true.
William Shakespeare
I don’t know why I believed them after all the teasing and bullying they had put me through.
When the bell rang for our lunch period, once again, the four of them tricked me. “Oh, y’all, we’re just gonna go out and play,” they said as two of them grabbed my hands.
Stories About Facing Challenges, Realizing Dreams and Making a Difference Page 24