Personal Essay: How Stitches Changed My Life

Our drill director decided to stop by and see how we were doing. There was an issue that we had talked about before where the color guard would mesh with the drum line, while throwing a toss at the same time. This was extremely dangerous considering that we had no control of our flags and of how close we were to other people. Because of this, the drill director decided to change the drill so that we would be moving while throwing the toss. I was extremely resentful of this because i was not very good at this toss and now i would be moving while the flag was in the air. The first few times we went through the new drill i simply did not throw the toss and when i decided to throw it i would not throwing it as high as it was supposed to be. Once i had the drill completely memorized, i decided to push myself and throw the toss the way i knew to, with all of my strength and keeping my free hand in the air. We were going through the set and i was nailing it, i threw my flag up high up into the sky, watching it as it spun round and round. It seemed to come down with double the force that it was thrown with and because of that and because i didn't leave my free hand in the air to catch the flag and to guard my face i t came crashing down onto my nose. My hand flew up to my nose and i ran from the flag, not wanting to mess up anything else. I knew right away that my nose was bleeding. I took my hand away from my nose and

I dribbled the ball down the narrow hallway looked at Anthony defending the small net. He had a frustrated look on his face and I slowly walked towards him. I bolted to Anthony’s left and tried to get past him but crshhh the wall behind me collapsed as my body went flying through it. “owwww” I moaned as I felt my head throbbing with pain. I slowly stood up and murmured, “What was that for dude? We were just playing a friendly match of hockey.” I turned around and saw the gaping hole in the wall that my head went flying into.”My mom is going to kill me,” I said out of breath. As I looked at the damage

I fell. This felt like I didn’t have a wrist. But I got back up really carefully and went up to the lounge to my dad and sister. Ah, Ah, Dad I think I broke my wrist. No you didn’t. It was swelling up, It hurt so bad I couldn’t even believe this was happening.

Eric Thomas once said, “When you want to succeed as bad as you want to breathe, then you’ll be successful.” Many college athletes work extremely hard and get nothing in return except fame. In America today, the three most favored division one sports are men’s basketball, women’s basketball, and football. Many are opposed to paying college athletes because a great majority of the players that make up these three sports are African American. To be exact, around fifty six percent of African Americans make up the college football teams and sixty one percent make up college basketball teams.

So, when I was like five I used to hang out with Nick, Dakota, Kiser, Collin, Dawson, and a few other boys. That day it was just us six though. The boys were jumping off of the equipment at recess. We were playing “transformers”. I decided to just run around and not jump off it. I went down the slide and stuff like that. I was smarter than them and knew something would happen. They kept jumping and trying to make me but I refused. It was about a five foot jump down. They kept pushing me and literally tried to push me off a few times. After about ten minutes of this I finally decided to jump. It was fun at first and I kept going for a while. I would jump, run around to the stairs, crawl through the tunnel, and jump again. I did this about twelve times until they thought it would be funny to push me off. I’m sure my face was priceless when I realized what was happening. I ended up trying to land correctly but messed up and landed on the side of my right ankle so it turned in and immediately went down. The boys jumped off and surrounded me, looking at me because they had no idea what happened. I couldn’t get up until they blew the whistle and I had to. I ended up being able to get up but had tears in my eyes (I didn’t like to cry and still don’t. I like to think I’m tough and no matter what happens I’ll be ok.). I hobbled back to class while everyone else was running back. I almost made it back when one of the aid’s stopped me. She said “Oh my gosh, are you ok!?”. I looked at her and

Once we headed out, I noticed my mom’s car. I started running towards her car and my brother trips me, but I didn't fall immediately. It was the slowest fall ever, I kept running but I was slowly losing balance and then I just hit the floor, I scraped my hands, I had tiny gravel embedded in my hands, my knees

The crackling sound of my nose as a cheerleader’s elbow snapped the bones in half, I dashed into the locker room. Now you are probably wondering how this happened. Finishing a tiring day of school, I went strolling into the gym ready to start practice. While setting up the mats my coaches walked in with a positive attitude and a speaker ready to run our routine, preparing us for the next competition. After an exhausting practice of hard work, sweat, and tears we had the option of staying after to work on our tumbling. Me being the person I am, constantly stressing, I decided to stay after. Little did I know this tragedy would happen. A cheerleader asked me to spot her on a tumbling pass and, of course, I said yes because I want everyone to

We had a great plan, we decided to go explore the fourth room of the basement. Once inside we started climbing and playing with the elliptical. I looked over to the treadmill and said to jerry, “I’ve got a great idea. Why don’t we get on the treadmill with only our socks on and run as fast as the treadmill can go and then jump off.” Now jerry was only a year younger than me but he of course thought it was a great idea. So, we each took our shoes of and stood on the treadmill, the treadmill itself was relatively old and was so close to the wall. We stood there not thinking of the consequences of our actions, looked at one another and grinned a big grin. I turned the knob slowly, we started speed walking the running and running faster till we were panting, the knob was on fast burn the fastest setting on the treadmill. Jerry jumped off, me on the other hand tripped over my socks, I fell and the treadmill still on the fasts setting pushed me up against the wall my neck to the back of the treadmill and my legs bent over my head like a contortionist. I screamed and screamed. My cousin sat there in silence watching this horrid event unfold before him, all the color flushed from his body. I screamed and yelled at jerry to go get help as I attempted to reach for

I was 15 years old when I was at the north field skatepark trying to land a trick that me and my friend learned recently at a different skatepark, it was called a front foot impossible it wraps around your front foot but it normally goes around your left foot that's why it is a difficult trick, so when I was skating around we decided to start tying the trick and it was going pretty good until I randomly just started falling a lot which made me start to sweat and get mad, it was like the skatepark could feel the heat from my feet and was moving my board so I didn't land it, so about ten minutes later my friend that was trying it landed it, so I was trying to get his back and land it too but once I popped my board off the ground

3…2…1…GO!” Will shouted. As I jumped off the ladder, I slipped a little, but that didn’t really matter until I realized mid-air that the small slip cause me to rotate onto my stomach, and land on my arm in the wet mulch. SNAP. Is all I heard before hearing my cousins shout “Are you okay?!” almost in unison. Then bursting into tears, my mom ran over to me, and picked me up. As we ran to the car, my cousins explained what happened.

Now off to the McBride household of fun activities. We’ve had tons and tons of fun at my house. First up is the pool parties we used to have at my house. It was mostly just Jake’s family and Madison’s and Michelle’s family that would come over and swim with us. We’d pull up our old trampoline and jump from there into the pool. During one of our pool parties, the twins and I in our swimsuits, decided we wanted to play with this wooden stake that was in the ground. Michelle then, hit me right in the forehead and split my head right open. You could compare the pain as to getting a knife stabbed into your leg, but then again, I was like six years old when this happened. My mom came outside finding me balling my eyes out like water coming out of

In Compton there are only two rules, the blood's own the streets and Trey and Dequan can't be beat.

I was walking back from lunch with my friend Matt, we were telling each other jokes about dead babies. I looked over and saw my little brother, I turned to Matt and said “watch this” then I ran up to my brother and tried to do a jumping high five. He didn’t think I was trying to high five him he thought I was trying to hit him. Out of instinct he pushed me away and I fell backwards, I landed and pivoted on the ball of my left foot. I thought I had gotten away safe and clear, I went to take a step and BAM! I had been tripped by my own untied shoelace, betrayed by my own apparel. I fell backwards and expected to hit lockers, unfortunately it wasn’t lockers or even a door. I had crashed into the glass display case, oh the utter humility. I hit the ground and leaned up on one arm, I was fine, not a scratch. Mrs. Wright come running up in total mom mode “ Oh my God, are you alright, AHH, don’t move!”.

I was quite a rambunctious child, always getting myself into precarious situations; whether it was climbing trees, playing with matches, or running with scissors. My actions did not reflect my parenting; my parents tried to teach me to be careful, unfortunately it took an unpleasant, but humorous experience to teach me that lesson. I was three years old at the time and that day I decided to run through the house like a superhero. I pulled an Atlanta Braves hat over my head for some odd reason and proceeded to start my mission. As I ran into the kitchen I felt something grab the corner of my mouth and it completely stopped my momentum. It just so happens that a few minutes before my run, my mother opened the kitchen cabinet and forgot to close

They remember me flying through the air and smashing into the pole, gashing my cheek. Ben reached me first, and he began to inspect how much damage had been done. Shocked, he discovered a hole going right through my cheek, baring my teeth and tongue. Frightened to see such a ghastly injury, he didn’t know what to say. When my parents reached me, they glanced over my head searching for injuries. Upon inspection, my dad realized the seriousness of the injury, and he lifted my limp body up in his arms. He rushed to bring me inside the house, where the wound could be cleaned and assessed. He ran water over my face and head, rinsing away the blood and dirt I had accumulated. Seeing the damage, my parents knew a hospital visit would be necessary. They put me in the van and raced to the hospital while I flashed in and out of consciousness. I don’t have any recollection of it, but when I reached the hospital, they took me in and stitched me up. Luckily I had not lost any teeth. After I had been cleared to go, my parents brought me home and laid me down for a long, much needed