My Passion Revised

English 101.002

English Essay #3 Revised

Word Count: 1211

It is just me and nature. It is early morning when the sun is peaking over the horizon. It is the evening when the sun is fading away and the darkness follows. It is me, my pole, and the water. This is my passion, fishing. I have been fishing since I was a young boy. I lived in the city when I was younger, and fishing was something that only happened a few times a year. My dad would take me fishing at my aunt and uncle’s house. There was a small pond, only about a quarter of an acre. It was an older pond, stocked with bass and bluegill. I never really liked fishing when I was younger. I never quite understood why anyone would sit there and enjoy fishing for such a long time. My dad tried and tried to teach me to be patient, but my cousin and I would also get bored. We would always end up playing tag next to the pond, instead of fishing. This went on for many years. My dad kept taking me, and I kept hating it.

The summer after sixth grade my parents decided to move out to Trafalgar. Trafalgar is a small farm community, in the middle of a bunch of fields, with very little to do. Our old house sold faster than what we expected it, and we did not have enough money at the time to rent out an apartment, until our new house was finished. So, we ended living in our camper for almost four months. Those four months lasted the whole summer and the beginning of my seventh grade year. Throughout the summer the living quarters were tight in the twenty-four foot trailer. I am an outdoors type person, so I could not stand sitting in the camper everyday. One day I decided I would go out and try to find something to do. The problem however was that there is not anything to do in that area. The one thing that was there, was my neighbor’s pond. It was about fifty yards from our camper. That is when I decided to give fishing another shot. My dad was not the one telling me to try it this time. It was all my decision for once. I went out to the pond by myself and caught a few fish. At the time, it was just something to do to get out of the cramped quarters of the camper, luckily fishing started to grow on me over the rest of the summer. Every time I went out to fish, the more I started loving it. I have been fishing ever since that day.

Fishing is a passion that will never let go. I am obsessed with fishing, and I think I will feel this way for the rest of my life. It is kind of hard because I have been limited to the time I am able to fish over the past year. I had a job over the summer. It is good money, which I need with being a student, but it took a lot of time away from fishing. I worked over forty hours every week. Yet, anytime I was not working I was going fishing. My friend and I walked Sugar Creek about five times this summer. It is really relaxing to walk the creek because it would be hot outside, and the water was cool. We caught a few smallmouths out of the creek throughout the summer. Smallmouths are a blast to catch because they fight like crazy. I also fished quite a few times in the pond in front of my house. Since I worked so much, I fished at my house before I went to work and after I got off. My dad and I would go out in our john boat almost every night. We would fish until it got too dark to see. We had competitions every night to see who could catch the most. I usually won, but he is a pretty good fisherman, too. My boss lives right next to me, so we would also go fishing together. He is really cool, and we went fishing a bunch together this past summer. We fished at my next door neighbor’s house a bunch of times as well. We also fished at the creek.

After I came down to college I lost even more time to go fishing. Now that I am in classes and getting homework everyday, it is even harder to find time to go out to fish. I miss fishing. I have only gone fishing once since I have been in school. I fished at the lake behind the language arts building. The lake is very nice. It has a lot of fish in it, and the good thing is that they bite. I only fished for about thirty minutes, and I caught two nice size bass. I had many little bites, but I did not catch all of them. It was a great time. It was nice to be able to get away from thinking about classes for a while by going fishing.

Fishing is such a stress reliever. It takes my mind off of everything else. It is so peaceful to be able to go out and just fish by yourself. It is nice because you do not have to talk to anyone, and the better part is there is no one talking to you. I wish there was more time in the day so I could go fishing everyday. If it was up to me I would love to quit school and just fish for the rest of my life. I would love to become a professional fisherman. Professional fishermen have the best job imaginable. They get to go fishing everyday. I think the best thing about being a professional fisherman would be getting everything free. They get boats, trucks, tackle, rods, and reels. Even better than getting free stuff, is getting the newest and nicest stuff. I would love to have a bass boat. That is one thing that I hope to do after I am done with school. I hope that I can become wealthy enough to have a nice truck and a bass boat. I would also love to live on a lake or have my own small lake when I become older. I would fish every single night if I lived on a lake.

Fishing did not start out as my passion, but I grew to enjoy it so much I do not know how I could live without it. Fishing is my passion because I love the serenity of being by myself, just me and the lake. No one around to bother me. It is my time to be alone with nature. Fishing is what keeps me happy, and without it I think I would go crazy. Fishing is not something I want to keep to myself. Hopefully, one day I will have kids of my own that I can teach to become fishermen and to appreciate it, just like my dad tried to teach me. Fishing is not something that everyone enjoys, but I hope to help other people understand and respect the sport a little more.

Semester Reflection

English 101.002
Word Cout: 874

Looking back on this past semester, many thoughts run through my head. I think about how at the beginning of the semester everything hit me so fast. I also think about the changes I have dealt with now living on my own. Along with that I had to make the choice for myself on whether I would go to class or skip. College in general has been a big scenery change from going from a house to living in a small room with three roommates. However, of all the changes the course work has been the biggest adjustment.

The first day of classes began, and I felt so awkward knowing that I was now in college. Everything seemed to be happening so quickly. Welcome Week was already over and college courses were now part of everyday life. Professors were handing out course syllabuses, and I took everything in, while deep down inside I felt a bit overwhelmed. I went on trying to keep up with the fast pace of college classes. It seemed to me that things that took three weeks to learn in high school would only take one or two classes in college. I went on doing everything asked of me, trying to impress all of my professors. Work seemed to come at me from every direction. We were getting speeches assigned in speech class, papers to write in English, and tests in both math and history. I felt so overwhelmed with all of the work that seemed to be piling up on my plate. I worked through it one assignment at a time. Everything that was asked of me during the first few weeks showed me that I was going to have to take this seriously.

At first, it was really weird living on my own at college. I had been away from my parents before, but only for around a week. It was weird because at home my parents were always there for me if I had any questions or problems I needed help solving. I had to learn to solve my problems on my own. I could call my parents and talk to them over the phone, but it just was not the same as them being there next to me. I was never really homesick, but I did feel a bit lonely. I believe what made the transition easier was knowing that I had friends from high school down here with me. I felt that if I needed anyone for anything that one of my friends would be there for me.

Another big change for me over the first semester was the fact that I decided if I was going to make it too class or not. As a college student I was responsible for myself. The professors are not like high school teachers, they do not run around the campus trying to find you for their class. It was just weird knowing I was the one who decided if I was going to class or not. I learned to be responsible for myself in high school, so the decision for me going to class was not hard. I only missed one of my classes throughout the whole first semester. It was a math class, and I regret missing it because I did not even have a good reason.

College life in general was another great change. Throughout high school I would always go to bed around 9:00 or 10:00 pm. Now that I am in college, I usually go to bed no earlier than 12:30 am. College life is just so much different than high school life. I usually never spent much time in my bedroom at home in high school, which is totally opposite of how it is now. Throughout the first semester I have spent hours upon hours in my room. I also have to keep the room clean because I am in it so much. At home my room was only where I slept. My home this past semester has been my dorm room, so I have had to keep it clean since I spend so much time in it. College life is quite different, and I experienced this throughout the first semester.

College courses are the greatest change that I have noticed over this past semester. I think professors expect quite a bit from their students. Professors give out lots of work, and the work is usually in depth and hard. I just had a hard time getting all of the work done in the time limit the professors gave. Throughout the semester it began to get easier because I learned how to get the work done in a more efficient way and I became better at time management.

Overall, college has been a life changing experience that continues to change everyday. This first semester has been difficult, but I have adjusted to the changes and will continue to better myself. Even though it has been difficult without my family I will always have my friends to give me the support that I need. College is definitely different from what I was expecting, however, this first semester has been a great experience.

The Big Catch

English Essay #1 Revision
Word Count: 981

I have been a fisherman for many years. My passion for fishing comes from knowing that each time I go out, I have a chance to catch a big one. I had caught a few fish that I believed were nice enough to be considered the big one, but my dad did not agree. I had caught a few three and a half pound fish, but my dad still wanted something bigger. I tried so hard to catch a fish worthy of being mounted, then one day my dream came true. It was around six o’clock in the morning, and the alarm on my phone went off. I turned it off and rolled out of bed. I was quite tired, but I was alright with getting up because I knew I was getting up for a good reason. I jumped into the shower to start off my day. After getting out of the shower I got dressed, then made myself a bowl of cereal.

Next, it was time to prepare myself for a full day of fishing. I went out to the garage to get all of my fishing equipment together. I pulled my pole down from the rack, then tied it down onto the four-wheeler. Afterwards, I tied my tackle box down to the front, and I filled the four-wheeler full with gasoline. It was now time to go to the lake. I started up the four-wheeler and headed away from the house. My destination was only right across the road. There are three ponds on the other side of the road which I had to choose from. That day I decided to fish the very last pond. It is the farthest one away from my house and it is also the biggest. The lake is about five acres and partly surrounded by thick woods. It was still quite early in the morning, but it was already beginning to heat up. I could already tell that it would be a blistering, humid day.
As the temperature rose, so did my passion to catch a big one. I had been fishing for about 30 minutes, and I had only caught a few fish. The fish I had caught were only about 12 inches long and weighed around a pound. They were not anything to be proud of but they were still fun to catch. I had been fishing with soft plastic worms all morning and they were working alright. I kept fishing into the heat of the day, and now I was sweating and there was nothing I could do to stop it. The heat did not really get to me because I was so focused on fishing. I fished with many different baits and they were all catching fish. The only bad thing was the fish that were being caught were all the same size. They were all to small. The only thing I had left to do was make a change.

I decided that to switch to the best bait I had. It was a top water Pop-R. It was about three inches long and it had a white furry tail, and two treble hooks. I felt like something good was about to happen. I cast the bait as far as I could into the middle of the pond. The bait was floating on top of the water with no movement. I decided to give the line a few tugs, which made the bait make many ripples across the top of the water. Then, all of the sudden from under the bait a huge, largemouth bass appeared. The fish smashed the bait. On the top of the water there was ripples and splashing everywhere. I set the hook and the bass was hooked. I started to reel in the fish and I knew it was going to be a big one. The bass put up a great struggle, especially into the bank. I was worried that the fish would come off the hook when I was reeling it through the thick moss. Luckily, the bass stayed on through the moss and I was able to reel it out of the water. When I was taking the fish off the hook I realized I was even more lucky that I thought. Out of the six hooks I had on the bait, only one was hooked to the fishes mouth. Now that I had the fish I had to keep it alive for a short while. I carefully unhooked the fish and held it in the water while I waited for my friend to go get a tub of water to keep it in. He brought back a trashcan and he dipped into the pond to fill it with a couple gallons of water, in order for the fish to survive. Once the trashcan was full I placed this fish into it.

Then I called my dad and asked him to come see if the fish fit his standard of being mounted. After a few minutes he arrived and took a look at the fish. He was very impressed and said to me, “Damn Jack, that’s big enough to mount.” I was so excited. We took the fish back over to my house and weighed it, took pictures, and put it on ice in a cooler. The next day my dad took the fish to Woody’s Taxidermist. I did not get the fish back until a year later from the taxidermist. Now the fish hangs in my room above my bed.

In conclusion that day was one of the best days of my life. Every time I look at my mount it brings back all the memories of that day. It also keeps the drive in me to continue my passion and maybe one day to catch something even bigger.

Michael Jordan
mjjordan@usieagles.org
English 101.002
Essay #1
915 Words

The Truth About College

I remember the last few weeks of high school. Everyone was ready to graduate and enjoy the summer before going off to college. I worked the whole summer, and it seemed like it was going so slow. I just wanted it to be over so I could get to college and experience the atmosphere. I am now going into my fourth week of college and I have enjoyed every day since I’ve been here. People have this view about college that it is just one big party. Everyone thinks that it is the time in their life to go to parties every night and drink when they are underage. Now that I have been here I notice that the view everyone has on college is not true. I believe that you can have fun and enjoy college without partying.

I believe college is the best time of your life. It is the time you get to spend with friends and make many memories. Today, kids look at college as a way to get away from parents and do things they would not do if they were at home. College is way more important than people think it is. It is sad to see all of the people that are away from their parents for the first time in their life and how they act. Students think they can do all the partying they want and there will be no consequences. I’m not trying to tell everyone not to have fun at college, I just feel that you can have fun without partying. My friends and I have had a blast since we have been down here at USI. We hang out with each other every day and enjoy being around each other. People ask us all of the time, “why are you guys so boring?” Personally I think they ask us that question just because we are not the partying type kids. When I am asked that question, I just want to say, “is partying the only way to have fun?” It bothers me that people act like the only way you can have fun is going to a party and getting drunk. My friends and I have a great time just hanging out in the dorms, throwing the football, playing basketball, and just messing around. Everyone is always talking about parties and drinking during class. People ask one another, “do you know of any parties tonight?” I just enjoy sitting back and listening to all of the other people talk about parties they have been to and ones they may go to. I am just proud to see that I have great friends that are not all about going out and getting trashed every night. My friends and I have had many talks about how we feel about parties and drinking. We all agree that most of the kids at college are out of control. Everyone else believes that the only way to have fun is to go to a party night in and night out. I just feel that I have had a great time so far and I don’t have to have alcohol or anything to make me have fun. I just want everyone to know that they can have fun without going to parties every night. I hate when people tell my friends and I that we are so boring. I do not think that they notice that we are having fun just hanging out with one another. We are the type of kids that can have lots of fun without being drunk. It just really hurts to have people tell my friends and I that we are boring, when they really do not know who we are, and what we do to have fun. I just want kids to look at what we do as having fun. It is sad to see that kids are so into parties and believe the only place where you can have fun is at a party. Even some college professors talk about drinking and all of the parties because they think every kid in the class can relate to that. That makes me really angry because that goes to show that everyone expects that to be an accepted activity on college campuses. I am really happy that I have been brought up that getting drunk is not the only way to have fun. Even though my parents are not here to tell me what I am doing is wrong, the things they have told me throughout the years keeps me from doing things I know that are wrong. I am having the greatest time of my life since I have been in college.

College is not all about parties. I believe that everyone can have a great time at college without partying. I think kids just want to fit in with the crowd, so they do what everyone else does. I am very happy that I am strong enough to say no to something that I believe is wrong. Peer pressure is another big reason I think kids get sucked in to doing things they normally would not do. Kids think that if they say no to something everyone else wants them to do, then they will never have anyone that will like them. I just want kids to stand up for themselves and say no to things that they know is wrong.