Why I Shouldn't Be Allowed in the Kitchen

My Cookies Looked Nothing Like This

   It’s a common joke that women belong in the kitchen. Honestly, I’m the last person who should be in there. I’ve melted plates, destroyed frying pans, and once I even caused my dinner to explode. I’m just not good at cooking. However, despite all my previous failures I tried once more over Summer vacation.

   My family had just finished our regular dinner time routine of eating dinner and watching one of our “family shows”. I can’t exactly remember what we were watching, but it was probably The Big Bang Theory. Suddenly my sister piped up that she wanted cookies. In my opinion, chocolate chip cookies happen to be some of the best things in the world, so I definitely wouldn’t have minded having them.  Everyone else agreed that they sounded pretty good, too. The only problem is that no one wanted to make them. Mom volunteered me for the job.

   Despite my protests that the cookies weren’t going to turn out right if I made them, I was pressured into cooking. Shockingly, my baking went unhindered for a while. Then I added the baking soda. I swear, I honestly thought the directions said to add ¾ of a cup. I added that much baking soda, and blended the cookie dough.

    After I finished adding all the ingredients and placing the cookie dough on the baking tray, I stuck the tray in the over. I then sneakily walked over to the bowl that once contained the cookie dough. There was still a bit of dough on the side of the bowl, so I tasted it. It was the most horrible tasting food I have ever put in my mouth. I quickly read over the directions, attempting to see where I went wrong. Then I saw it. The directions said to add ¾ of a teaspoon of baking soda, not ¾ of a cup.

   I felt like an absolute failure at cooking. This was no shock, honestly. I was expecting something to go wrong. I think I was honestly more disappointed that we didn’t have enough ingredients to make another batch than I was about my failure. All I could do was sit, wait, and hope that maybe the oven would bake the baking-soda flavor out.

   When the cookies came out, I quickly took a nibble out of one. It was equally as awful as the dough. I walked out to our sunroom to announce my failure to my mom. It only took about two minutes for my whole family to know I botched up the cookies. I remember my dad picking one up to see how bad it really was. He immediately spit it out. We had to throw out at least twelve cookies that night. The worst part was the stomach ache I got after for swallowing that baking-soda infested cookie-dough bit.

   Ever since, the cookie incident has been a running joke in my family. I actually made cookies tonight, for a celebration I’m having in one of my classes tomorrow. All throughout my cookie baking tonight, my family kept poking fun at me, telling me not to botch this batch up. This time, the cookies turned out great, courtesy of last time’s incident. Always double check instructions and read each line carefully, all the way through.  

Losing Tally

Tally, Taxi, and Cupid

   When I was little, I had always wanted a puppy. All I had, though, was an old, eight-teen year-old mutt who hated me. I was in first grade, so why wouldn’t I want a playful, cute puppy that I could grow up with. That was all I truly wanted. It was winter when I got my first puppy. The only reason I remember that is because my birthday was a few days away.  Mommy was driving me home from school, telling me that there was an early birthday present in my room.  I was so excited guessing what it could be. When we arrived at our house, I rushed inside. The second I opened the front door and heard barking, I knew what it was.

   I excitedly ran to my room and took an eyeful in. There, on my bedroom floor, sat a very excited, adorable puppy. I was so pumped to have a puppy. She would be one that actually liked me, too! My mom, my dad, my siblings, and I spent the rest of the day trying to think of a name for the small border-collie mix. At the time, my favorite movie was The Wild Thornberrys Movie. My mom, taking this into consideration, suggested the name Tally. In the movie, one of the leopard cubs was named Tally, and Mom just thought the name was too cute. Thus, Tally was officially mine.

   Tally wasn’t exactly the best dog in the world. In fact, she was bad. She ate everything in sight, wasn’t exactly potty-trained, and tended to break things. This behavior, along with the fact that she was getting very large, caused drastic measures to be taken. Tally had to become an outside dog. Little by little, Tally continued to grow. Her claws became larger and sharper, she grew heavier, and she became more hyper. Whenever I tried to go outside to play with her, I felt more like I was being attacked than played with. This eventually led my mom to make a very serious decision.

   Four months after we got Tally, my mom made the announcement that we were getting rid of her. I immediately burst into tears. Tally may have scared me, but she was still my dog. I begged my mom to let me keep her. I made all the classic kid promises, like “I swear I’ll play with her more” and “I’ll make sure that she’s always fed”. Mom wouldn’t hear any of it. Apparently she had already given Tally away to another lady with a large backyard and another border collie. The lady was supposed to pick Tally up later that week. I went outside to hug Tally and cried about the loss of my new best friend.

   When the lady came to pick Tally up, I stayed in my bedroom and cried. I officially decided that I was going to stay mad at my mom forever. I was planning on giving her the silent treatment and going on strike. Unfortunately, the best strike I could come up with involved refusing to watch The Wild Thornberrys Movie. My silent treatment plan had also failed by dinner.

  About a year later, just a few weeks after the anniversary of getting Tally I got a new dog, Taxi. This one we kept. Tally had taught me to be a better owner. I didn’t make the same mistakes I made with Tally. I still have Taxi to this day, and even though she’s arrogant, lazy, and misbehaved, I still love her to death. Currently I have two fur-balls, Taxi and Cupid, and I really do love them both.

   It’s ridiculous how many lessons I learned from my adoption, and rejection, of Tally. One thing I learned included the right way to take care of a dog. That’s shown as I still have my two, old cutie-pies still. I also learned that every cloud has silver lining, since had I kept Tally, I wouldn’t have Taxi or Cupid. Also, and most importantly, it taught me how to let go. Not everything in life will always be there. Things change and go wrong all the time. It’s not hard to lose something one loves. While something one cares about it with them, they should cherish it; when something one cares about leaves, all one can do it let it go.

Cards for Everyone

Another Card Made by a Kid for his Mom

   I was having a play date with my friend, Molly, at her house. I was in first grade (pretty much all of these lessons I learned in first grade) and we were sitting in her kitchen making cards for our parents. I folded a yellow sheet of paper in half, hamburger-style, as I started making a card for my mom.  My heart wasn’t really going into the card, though. Molly had this huge tree in her backyard that I loved to climb. Climbing it made me feel like a big kid, so all I wanted to do while I was there was climb that tree. The way I saw it, the faster I finished my card, the faster I could climb Molly’s tree.

   I quickly cut out a big red heart and pasted it to the front of the card. I was almost done. I grabbed a purple marker, opened the card, and wrote, “I ♥ U”. I was done. Now I had a choice to make. I could either waste time making another card, or have one for only one of my parents. I chose the latter option. I just had to decide which one would receive my card.

   Deciding between parents was easy at the time. My dad was in the Navy, and always out at sea. I hardly got to see him. When my dad was home, he didn’t smile very much and was rather intimidating. I easily decided to give the card to my mom.

   When I got home, I delivered the card, and was rather proud of myself. My card was absolutely fabulous, despite my lack of interest in making it. I remember handing it to my mom, and she asked me if I made one for my dad, too. I replied no. A few days later she told me that by not making my dad a card as well, I had hurt his feelings. This struck me as odd, because up until this point I didn’t really consider that my dad had feelings. He always wore the same expression, and I had never seen him upset. That guilty feeling I previously mentioned slowly crept up again.

   To this day I still remember the day I left out my dad. Just the other day, I was telling him about this, and he just looked at me like I was crazy. According to him, he couldn’t remember anything of the sort happening; I still can remember. I still feel bad about that card incident. However, that incident so very long ago taught me an important lesson. It’s important to include everyone, even if it is harder to do so.

The Salty Slug

Slugs may be gross, but even they deserve respect.

   It was another cool fall day when I saw the slug. I stepped out onto my back porch, a silver spoon in hand, determined to make archeologists everywhere proud. I always hoped that if I tried hard enough, I’d eventually manage to unearth a dinosaur that had passed away in my own backyard millions of years ago. All I ever managed to find were clumps of dirt. I could feel that that day was going to be different, though. I was determined to find myself a dinosaur.

   I strode across my patio, and happened to glance down. Then I saw it. I stared down at a disgusting, slimy, gross, horrible looking creature slowly inching its way across the concrete patio floor. My bone-hunting antics were immediately forgotten as I stared at the slug; I had a new mission to complete.

   I quickly ran back into my house and slammed the spoon down on the counter. I then began to look around for the salt. I saw the shaker of salt sitting on our dining room table.  I made a grab for it, and once I had it in my possession, I was satisfied. Now all I had to do was tell my mom. After all, she needed to know what I was doing, in case that vicious slug decided to attack. Plus, my mom might be proud of me vanquishing that horrible beast.

   I sighted my mom and excitedly ran up to her, salt in hand. I looked up at her and quickly asked if I could pour salt on the slug I found in the backyard. She just looked at me knowingly and said, “I don’t think you should.”  I looked up at her and replied, “Why? I really want to!” Now my mom knew very well what would happen to a slug if one were to pour salt on it. She looked at me seriously a just stated, “Fine. You can pour the salt on the slug if you want to. Just keep in mind as you’re pouring salt on that slug, that’s its last few moments of life will be completely filled with pain and suffering.”

   That answer was good enough for me. Who cared? It was just a silly slug. I skipped out back to my backyard and stared down at the slug. I tilted the salt shaker slightly, ready to pour. Then I stopped to think. My mom's words came back to my mind. Now, it’s ridiculous how much guilt affects me. Just the smallest twinge of guilt can convince me to never attempt to try something again. This little feeling of guilt just crept up inside me and kept growing until I finally lost all interest in killing the slug. I turned around, salt shaker still in my hand, and went inside. That slug got to live to see another day.

   That little incident in first grade taught me that I need to respect all
forms of life. Life is absolutely precious, and absolutely no one has the right to end it prematurely, especially in such a cruel manner.  The only exception to this little rule in my life is spiders. Spiders are way too dangerous and scary to be allowed to crawl around my house.

The Golden Rule

Life's Most Important Rule

   It was a cool, fall day when I learned life’s most important t lesson.  I believe my dad and I were picking up a pizza, which means it must’ve been a Friday. I was sitting in my dad’s car, staring out the window, thinking about leaves. I Where I live, during fall the leaves don’t fall off of tree. There aren’t any leaves to fall off the trees, really. Pine trees surround the area, and it’s impossible to make a decent leaf-pile with pine needles. This fact absolutely crushed my little first-grade heart. I just continued to sit in my dad’s corvette, staring out thinking about the leaves, inwardly complaining.

   Soon, my inward complaining shifted towards more outward complaining. I wasn’t complaining about leaves, though; I was complaining about this girl in my first grade class who I absolutely did not like. Once the girl and I had been friends, but after a certain incident involving a password and slide, we’ve disliked each other. Well, at least I didn’t like her. I didn’t know how she felt about me. Still, I continued to bash this girl until my dad asked, “Do you know the most important rule in life? It’s even more important than the ones your mom and I give you. The Golden Rule?”

   I was a curious child. I wanted to know everything there was about the world, and absorb all the information my little brain could possible hold. Of course I wanted to know this important rule. Plus, gold was a really pretty color, so because of that, the rule must be pretty as well, right? I piped up from my angry, gloomy state and asked my dad to tell me the golden rule.

   My dad continued staring at the road ahead and stated, “The ‘Golden Rule’, the most important rule in life, is the rule that says to treat others the way that you want them to treat you. Before you go off and do something to someone else, stop and ask yourself, ‘would I like it If they did this to me?’ The same goes for what you say to others. Before you say something, just double check to make sure that you wouldn’t mind if someone said the same to you. If you follow this rule, you’ll go far in life.”

   Only when he finished explaining did my dad look at me. Maybe he just wanted to make sure I looked like I absorbed everything he just said. I turned back towards the window and thought. This was the ‘Golden Rule’. How could I not follow it? It was the most important rule to follow after all. The longer I let the thought sink in, the clearer it became that I needed to follow this rule. The next time I saw my nemesis, I vowed to be nicer towards her. After all, I never was much of a rebel.

   The lesson here is pretty obvious. The ‘Golden Rule’ is absolutely an important rule to follow during one’s lifetime. To treat others the way I like to be treated has gotten me far in life. Following this rule has helped me make plenty of new friends, for one thing. This rule is definitely hard to follow, because it’s easy to forget the rule and make an offhand remark. Nevertheless, if one always tries their hardest to follow this rule, good things will happen.

Teacher Three: The Sleepover Team



The Sleepover Team (Minus Lorraine)

   One of my greatest teachers in life is actually more of a group of teachers. In seventh grade, courtesy of Rachel, the sleepover team came to be. The Sleepover Team consisted of my best friends and me. Every single member has each taught me something valuable in my life that I use today.

   Bridget informed me on sarcasm, and how to use it. She also helped me learn how to take a joke. Up until then, I had been pretty serious, but I became more relaxed as Bridget’s laid-back attitude rubbed off on me. Lorraine taught me how honesty can pay off. For a while, Lorraine wasn’t the nicest person. I finally told her one day about how others, including myself, thought she could be pretty mean sometimes. We ended up working through it, and now everybody loves her. Nicole taught me to never give up on a relationship. I’ve known Nicole since third grade, and we were pretty good friends. In fifth and sixth grade, we fought a lot, though. Even though Nicole and I still went head to head a lot, we still never gave up on each other, and now I don’t know what I’d do without her. Rachel taught me how it was okay to be silly and goofy. I knew I could always be myself around Rachel and she wouldn’t care how weird I was being. Finally, Taylor taught me how to have fun. Taylor was definitely the crazy one in our group, and she helped me become a bit more outgoing (although I’m still pretty shy) and how to goof off and have fun.

   The Sleepover Team is split up now, as Nicole, Bee, and Lorraine go to different schools. Taytertot (Taylor) also moved to Panama City. Rachel and I went to West Florida. I still talk to Rachel, Nicole, and Taylor, and I occasionally talk to Bridget and Lorraine. Even if The Sleepover Team does break apart, I’ll always remember the memories we share and the lessons every member taught me.

Teacher Two: Mom

Mommy

   One of my greatest teachers in life is my mom. My dad was in the military for pretty much all of my life, out at sea. Because of this, I didn’t get to see my dad very often when I was little. My mom raised me, so of course I learned plenty of life-lessons from her.

   Some of the lessons I learned from m mom included having compassion for all living things. That lesson I learned will actually be seen on here, further down. Mom also taught me to be respectful of others. Mom also taught me my manners, and how I should always say “please” and “thank you”.  Mom has taught me many others, but like Dad, it would take too long to list everything. Mom still continues to teach me new lessons every day.