Personal Narrative: A Personal Essay -- Narrative Essay Writing Englis

â€Å"The inside of the shell looks to me like a sore throat mouth,† is the sentence I wrote on paper eighteen years ago. It was my first day of an expository writing class and I was a freshman in college. Assorted objects were placed in the center of a table, around which twenty students and I sat around. Professor H asked us to describe the objects. What I saw was a seashell, a piece of driftwood and a black and white framed photo of an old man and a silver pocket watch. I wanted to sketch the still life in opposition to writing. I looked around me and observed all the students writing. At the end of our allotted ten minutes, I finally scribbled down my single sentence. Professor H asked us to read aloud what we had written, and as I listened to each student’s long prose, I was amazed. They drew the objects using words. When it was my turn I read,â€Å"The inside of the shell looks to me like a sore throat mouth.† The class laughed as I blushed. â€Å"Brilliant†, exclaimed Professor H with his Welsh accent. I looked down at my single sentence with relief. That was the beginning of my understanding that everyone’s perception of something, may it be an inanimate object or experience is unique. The end of class he assigned us to write an essay about a personal experience, to be due the following week. He also asked us to bring copies to distribute to all the class. The days prior to the due date, I recalled many experiences, but when I attempted to write them down on paper, I was not able to portray them successfully. The sharpest memories I could recall were incidents I was ashamed to write about, much less to share with the class. I feebly tried to write about a family trip to Arizona. When I read over what I had written, I was disa... ...and waved her hands frantically and shook her head like a crazed Beatle fan. As I continued to write, I once again became an eight-year-old child who sat with her older sister in the back of our Dad’s station wagon. When I was finished and read the essay several weeks later, I understood how profoundly the experience of having a sister with disabilities has affected my life. That experience affects how I write and interpret others’ writing. If I had not written this particular essay, I am not sure how clear my understanding of this reality would be, even today. Today, as I pull out this essay, I see on the bottom H’s comment. He wrote, â€Å"Once again Liza, with remarkable verbal precision and economy you evoke rich layers of meaning, feeling, and suggestion. There is not a word wasted in this piece-all comes over with the stated immediacy of a flash-photo.†