Personal Narrative- Living Life on the Edge
Heart racing, palms clammy, stuttering with nervousness. All things that usually don’t describe one’s favorite thing in the world, however in my case those are the common symptoms for my favorite way to relax in the world, adrenaline rushes. Anything that puts you so close to death you could touch it, but still hang on to a thread of life to pull yourself back up with. It sounds immature and irresponsible, I know, but don’t judge until you’ve tried, and I could never describe the rush and the complete whole, peaceful state of meditation adrenaline rushes put me in that makes all the danger in the world entirely worth it.
It was late afternoon in early July and the most clear day ever conceived. I spent most of the day hiking on a mountain in North Carolina, surprisingly not sweating all that bad, but growing impatient of when “paradise” would place itself in front of me as promised. Every time I asked I got a clone answer “soon”. Alright soon but define soon, soon could mean different things right? Wrong! Right as the last breath of my question left my mouth it fell in front of me , Paradise. Well, the middle of nowhere to be exact, but paradise all the same. It was the side of the mountain where a long cliff jetted out. Being the little daredevil I am I had to see more. I climbed down off the side of the mountain on to the ledge and walked to the very edge. As I walked further out it narrowed to a one foot across point. I sat down and dangled my feet and where earth was below me there was this little hidden beach with crystal blue water. Not a single footprint in the white sand with a soft flowing waterfall of clear water and soft gray rocks strategically placed to make up a true paradise. It was the most spectacular sight ever. It was truly the closest thing to heaven I had ever seen. I have been told that nothing is perfect, well obviously whomever said that had never been here. As I sat there with my feet dangling the pit of my stomach dropped.
I smiled to myself and decided that I would go join in. With that, I took a huge deep breath and jumped into the salty water. The water was cool and refreshing; I felt it slide through my hair making it sway in the water. I swam deeper and deeper into the deep blue water. Sunlight streamed through it, lighting up the water around me turning it to gold. I kicked harder and I felt my muscles surge with strength and I pushed further. My lunges began to burn for the need of oxygen, but I refused to go up. I repeatedly told myself just a little bit longer. Until I was unable to proceed anymore without more air in my lungs, I swam to the top of the water taking a huge breaths, filling my lungs with air. I could then taste the salty water as it ran down my face and dripped over my lips. Just then I thought, I will never forget this moment, this place, or the experiences I felt while visiting
My life so far has been like a good hiking path. A path that is winding and twisting and encompassed with plenty of beauty. A path that is lined with trees like angels protecting you from the mysteries in the deep forest and that keep you rooted on the path you are destine to take. One that is filled with deep troughs and the most beautiful peaks you could ever image. Sometimes the path is rocky and hurts the soles of your feet until they crack and bleed, but other times it’s covered with a soft green moss that lifts your steps and revives your spirits. Through the last 17 years of my life, I have traveled that path and endured every step. I have gone into the dark abyss of the trough and have found in it the most precious grace of light. As I have gotten older I have come to recognize that the scary and shaky steps of my path have indeed been “fearsome blessings” (Buechner, 92).
Street Gangs are becoming popular in many cities across the country. According to the Department of Justice's 2005 National Gang Threat Assessment, there are at least 21,500 gangs and more than 731,000 active gang members (Grabianowski). Gangs bring fear and violence to neighborhoods, drugs, destroy property, involve youth in crimes and drive out businesses. When you have gangs in a community, it affects everyone in the community. An alarming amount of young adults are joining gangs and becoming involved in illegal activity. Most gangs have a rule that when you join the gang you are a member of the gang for life. Gangs can be removed from our communities with more community involvement and education.
A gang is a group of people who claim a territory and use it to make money through illegal activities. Gangs are usually split up into race or territory and are made up of 10 to 30 members. There are three types of gangs there are the Ethnic Gangs, Turf Gangs and Prison Gangs and each have different ways of doing things. Ethnic gangs are gangs made up by thei...
Gang violence is a growing problem in this world. No parent would like to imagine their kids dealing with weapons or being threatened by them. These violence’s affects each child individually and their families as well. These gangs recruit multiple different individuals for many reasons such as bribery, family traditions, or even threatening. Although, many kids feel like they have to be a part of it but there are many resources out in this world to prevent them from believing so. Gang violence has been a problem in society for several of years and is a growing problem each and every day.
Gang violence has been an issue within the United States since the colonization in the late 1400s. Although gang violence has always been around, larger more organized factions began arising in the 17th century. Today, according to youthinfo.gov more than 700,000 youth were treated in the ER for gang related incidents. While many actions have been taken against gang related, not all seem effective. While very interesting on how people are drawn into gangs, our government must implement more strict measurements against the clans of hooligans.
In the book “The Gang: A Study of 1,313 Gangs in Chicago,” by Frederic M. Thrasher, the main topic of this book is on older generations of gangs in America. Gangs and some types of gang cultures have been around for centuries. The book talks about how gangs were geographically shaped, and those poor neighborhoods had a higher rate of producing or influencing gangs to emerge. Around 1,313 gangs were discovered in the streets and areas of Chicago, Illinois. The gangs contained approximately 25,000 members that were a mixture of young men and boys.
Youth gangs and gang violence have been always been a problem in society, particularly in large urban cities. These problems have increased and spread in the recent decades. Youth gangs have grown not only in number but also in types of criminal activities ranging from petty thefts to mass murder. This problem of youth gang violence results from lack of family support, school socialization, lack of job-opportunities, and more. The Little Village Gang Violence Reduction Program (LVGVRP) was implemented to reduce gang violence and has had successful results in doing so.
Hallswort, S. And Young, T. (2004) Getting Real About Gang. Criminal Justice Matters [online]. 55. (1), pp 12-13 [Accessed 10 December 2013]
Gang violence is a major problem in our society today. If nothing is done soon, gang violence could take place in our neighborhoods. MW Klein, a gang researcher, says that gangs are an aggregation of youths who perceive themselves as distinct, and that are viewed as distinct by the community. Klein also states that the gangs call forth a consistently negative image of themselves through their actions (Klein). To those involved in gangs however, gang membership provided a youth means of attempting to consolidate their gender identities (Douglas). Most of the early American street gangs have historically been ethnically based. Early gangs were mainly Irish, Polish, or Italian (Klein).
As I walk even farther down the winding trail, I can see the cabin in the distance. It appears as if the sun is only shining on the cabin itself. As I get closer, I get the redolence of home made apple pie. This is the exact moment that I forgot about everything else that existed and began to wonder, “Am I still on Earth?”
When I stepped into the large neatly organized white polished plane, I never though something would go wrong. I woke up and found myself on an extremely hot bright sunny desert island filled with shiny soft bright green palm trees containing rough bright yellow hard felt juicy apples. The simple strong plane I was in earlier shattered into little pieces of broken glass and metal when crashing onto the wet slimy coffee colored sand and burning with red orange colored flames. After my realization to this heart throbbing incident I began to run pressing my eight inch footsteps into the wet squishy slimy light brown sand looking in every direction with my wide open eyes filled with confusion in search of other survivors. After finding four other survivors we began moving our small petite weak legs fifty inches from the painful incident. Reaching our destination which was a tiny space filled with dark shade blocking the extreme heat coming from the bright blue sky, I felt my eyelids slowly moving down my light colored hazel eyes and found myself in a dream. I was awakened the next day from a grumbling noise coming from my empty stomach.
Although gang members insist that gangs are the only way to ensure success today, others maintain that the only way to survive is to eliminate them. Many gangs threaten the safety of everyone in their 'hood (territory or neighborhood). Innocent people living in gang war-torn towns live in constant fear of death. However, for children who have no one to look up to and no future to look forward to, gangs can become their surrogate family. Gangs are not only a set of friends or a nights activity. Gangs are a way of life. There is no way to eliminate them, but changing the violent nature of many gangs is possible. Admittedly, gangs cause many serious problems, but they could end up helping more people than they hurt.
Gangs have been around for centuries and the earliest mentioning of gangs is the rebellious children in the Bible mentioned in second kings (Cohn). From the late 1800s and 1960s gangs activities included fighting and other thrill seeking activity for youth. In the 1960’s is when the amount of minority gangs drastically increased leading to more gang conflict ,and due to the easy access of weapons crime rates sky-rocketed (Cohn). Organized gangs control their neighborhoods through violence and intimidation; gangs don’t only restrain themselves to one type of crime gang’s deteriorate neighborhood’s in several ways this includes drug distribution, assault, armed robbery, drive-by shootings, auto theft, identity theft, extortion, weapons trafficking, and homicide (Parks). “National Gang Threat Assessment” report states that according to law enforcement officials gangs throughout the United States commit as much as 80 percent of the crime in communities” (Parks). This exhibits the role gangs have in community’s; gangs ruin communities and make it unsafe to live and raise a family in any area that they are located. Gangs bring danger to a community that wouldn’t be there otherwise, and due to their intimidation method...
I never really thought about where my life was going. I always believed life took me where I wanted to go, I never thought that I was the one who took myself were I wanted to go. Once I entered high school I changed the way I thought. This is why I chose to go to college. I believe that college will give me the keys to unlock the doors of life. This way I can choose for myself where I go instead of someone choosing for me.