Thursday, December 20, 2018


My mouth waters as the smell of pretzels fills my nose. My stomach growls quietly like a cat meeting a stranger. The moisty air around me hugs me like a cuddly teddy bear. I feel super uncomfortable when my sweat has nowhere to escape. It sounds like being in jail for the first time in an entire life. The floor is so slippery wet that it feels like a million groups of fry swimming around me. When I look down all I can see is stairs and fog. I gulp down the thought of an endless maze and begin to hike down the mountain.
I stop to hear my heart bump rapidly like the speed of a cheetah catching its prey. I really want to turn into an eagle so I can just dive down. I’m just halfway down the mountain! I can’t believe just 45 minutes have  passed by; I guess time flies when you’re having fun until you find out what time it is. All of a sudden my cousin cries like a mouse but can’t control her emotion; she bursts at all her stress through tears. I have to admit, I am surprised to see my cousin cry in public. My aunt asks me if I want to stay, and rest too, but somehow the yes comes out with a no. I don’t want to get embarrassed, I guess, so I take the hiking stick from my cousin and keep on hiking down. Now I am an old lady who needs a “cane” in order to walk.
After a few minutes fly pass, I actually start to think if I have reached my limits. Should I stop at the next rest point? Questions pop into my head like the speed of popcorn cooking. The closer I get the louder I can hear water gushing down; it cools down my head from all those questions that make my head explode. It’s like I’m in a horror movie. A curious person like me always wants to know what is going on. I need to survive this journey to tell my tales to the people I know, or maybe even strangers.
At first I think it is some kind of river, but I live and learn it is a waterfall. The three step waterfall of course got that name because it takes three steps to touch the bottom.  The waterfall is so tall it reaches to outer space. People these days are more adventure first and then safety second. There are so many people who try to climb and touch the waterfall; they’re a bunch of daredevils. When I’m about to get my phone and film the waterfall, I realize my grandpa has the phone, and he is with my cousin. Now I wish I can time travel back in time to get my phone. My leg is shaking so fast it could actually make a hurricane, but luckily it didn’t, or I will be to blame if they find out.
In summary, mountain hiking is a stressful experience, but there is a mixture of emotion that I will cherish. From this experience I learn a lot; life is a mystery, like the time when my cousin cries all of a sudden. After all, if there’s no pain, there’s no gain.




-Jessica Ren

10 comments:

  1. This was a very entertaining piece. I enjoyed all the metaphors, such as in the second sentence where you compared your stomach growling to a cat. Good job.

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  2. “My mouth waters as the smell of pretzels fills my nose”

    “The closer I get the louder I can hear water gushing down”

    “I stop to hear my heart bump rapidly like the speed of a cheetah”

    “Questions pop into my head like the speed of popcorn popping”

    All of these quotes show a lot of descriptave words and it makes it a good read. When I first starting reading it I didn’t know what you were talking about but when I got to the end of the first paragraph I realized you were talking about hiking.

    The message I get after reading this is that hiking is difficult but worth it. I can apply that message in my own life because, things can be difficult but if you don’t give up then you get through it.
    Troy


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  3. It was amazing! great job with the mature language and sensory language."After all if there's no pain there's no game"I can apply that to my life a lot

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  4. Wow, that was filled with a lot detail of your hike; it was great! I think the message is to never give up. Jessica asked herself, "Should I stop at the next rest point?" But you didn't you kept going; I can really relate to this because in Tae Kwon Do I sometimes want to quit really badly, but I keep going. You did an amazing job.

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  5. The amount of sensory language and metaphors you put into your piece is astounding, and really captured the message of perseverance will have its rewards. The text "My mouth waters as the smell of pretzels fills my nose. My stomach growls quietly like a cat meeting a stranger. The moisty air around me hugs me like a cuddly teddy bear. I feel super uncomfortable when my sweat has nowhere to escape." not only allows me to clearly feel like I am there, but allows me to feel a large part of the struggle. People can easily connect it to things that require perseverance, pushing yourself past your limit in order to see, or sometimes feel, the reward of satisfaction.

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  6. I think the main message of your story is persistence. ¨I don’t want to get embarrassed, I guess, so I take the hiking stick from my cousin and keep on hiking down.¨ I can relate to this because when being an artist it can be hard to keep drawing over, and over, and over again, but you must stay with it. I loved all the metaphors you used!

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  7. I can totally relate to your experience. Last year, I hiked the Samaria Gorge. I understand when you say that "somehow the yes comes out with a no". Towards the end of the trip,I was so tired but I wanted to get to exit point.

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  8. I love your use of metaphors and the descriptive words you used. "The moist air around me hugs me like a cuddly teddy bear". Out of all the descriptive language you used I really liked this one. It helped me know how you felt at that moment and it really brought the piece alive. I too also like adventures and after reading your story I would love to go mountain hiking someday to experience it myself.

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  10. The lesson I learned for this story was to never give up. "After all, if there's no pain, there is no gain". That's true if she didn't continue she probably would have given up and not have wanted to go down anymore. The thing I love about this story is her realistic metaphors.

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