"Ups and Downs for My Love of Writing" by Daniel R.

My love for writing is extraordinary! I would say that I really knew I loved to write
around the fourth or fifth grade. My teachers were excellent in this fashion that they pushed me
into writing and always made sure that I was always challenging myself and creating the best
work possible to my ability. Well, like any up in life there has to be some downs.

My first major downfall was when I first entered the fourth grade, in my school we had
an “organization” called GATE. This organization was all about the more gifted and talented
students. These students were the ones that had the absolute best writing, they were the thinking
outside the box type of kids. So in the beginning of fourth grade my mom and I wanted to see if
maybe I could make the GATE program. Of course I had to take a test and this test had all sorts
of puzzles and math questions, and at the end of the test there was the almighty short essay we
had to write. As a kid in the fourth grade, a four sentence paragraph was scary and almost killed
me every time. So this essay just about automatically gave me a heart attack! I felt great going
through with it, I explained my summer like any other elementary paper with plenty of detail.
When I turned in my one and a half paged essay I felt like I was David who just slayed Goliath. I
put my puzzles, math worksheets and this golden egg of an essay on the coordinators desk and I
went home. I walked home with complete confidence, thinking without a doubt, no bone in my
body thought I failed that test. The next day my mom and I went back to the school to find out if
I failed or passed. Obviously I thought I passed. I walked in smiling practically skipping into the
coordinators room. She said “I have great news” I wasn’t surprised. So I waited for the “ok
you’re in” but instead she talked really slowly and said “your math was great, you’re thinking
outside the box was great but...” I stated sweating and I automatically got nervous, then it came
out “your essay scored a 2 out of 5, you need at least a 3 to join the program” my heart dropped
to my ankles, I was completely surprised.

We went home after all of this, I was still in great disbelief and for some reason couldn’t
get my head around this entire situation. To make matters worse I ended up taking this test two
or three times. I failed every single time. Every time it was this essay, this thing was just about
the death of my writing career as I knew it. I soon gave up trying to pass this test. Sadly I never
did accomplish my goal of making this organization, but after a while I just completely forgot
about the entire GATE organization and I just promised myself that I was work hard as possible
to become a great writer.

My freshman year I had a great passion for writing. In Mr. Hall’s class I wrote a
short story about a man that was stranded in a blizzard and eventually had to cut off his cold
dead arm. Mr. Hall said that I did a really great job. I felt great about myself and my writing
ability. So for the last couple of years I have felt magnificent about writing anything. If its
poems, short stories, or even a short autobiography. Without this experience I would not have
grown as a writer. It taught me that with hardships comes growth and with growth comes a better
you, whatever the situation.