Knowing Me for Me :: Personal Narratives California Essays

Knowing Me for Me Who a person is can be shaped by many different things. Understanding how a person came to be who they are is important to grasping their inner-most uniqueness. People, places, and even events can shape a person. Things like having a supportive parent, growing up in a unique place, and being suddenly injured can help to define a person. This paper explains and evaluates my characteristics as they have changed through having a loving and comforting mom, living in San Diego, and getting hurt playing Water Polo. One of the most influential and most respectable people in my life is my mom. Though my dad is a close second, my mom has truly helped shape me in to who I am today. Since the day I was born my mom has always been there for me. Whether it was being in the front row of my dance recital or wiping my teenage tears away, she has always been a comfort. I went through a rough time during my sophomore and junior years of high school. A week before she found drugs in my room, my mom found out I had gotten my belly button pierced and a month later I got kicked out of a class at school. Alone and afraid were only the beginning of how I felt and would feel for a while. Of course I was in trouble, but my mom did her best to get me back on track and get me help. To this day she is amazed at how I have drastically changed, but it is all thanks to her. This is only one example. It has been a consistent pattern throughout my life. She has made me who I am; the person I want to be. The place in which a person lives can change their life forever. â€Å"California,† by Tom Petty describes the atmosphere in which I grew up. I grew up in Southern California, which is unlike any other place in the world. The busyness all around me all the time forced me to fight hard to find out just where I belonged. The high school I attended was huge with almost 4,000 students. The school however was build for 1,200. Everywhere you looked it was a sea of students you could not escape.