Journal staff
Mireille Miron remembers well the day she read her own story in the newspaper.
“It was an assignment in university – we had to write an article and try to get it published,” said the French Immersion teacher at Sarnia’s Errol Road Public School. “I remember feeling so proud of myself.”
So she decided to give her own students that same opportunity, and approached the Sarnia Journal about publishing some outstanding works from her Grade 7/8 class’ narrative writing unit.
“I have a class of exceptional students with incredible writing talent,” she said.
So she pitched the idea to her students and organized a panel of judges. Participants were asked to write their own short narratives, with a focus on Mothers Day.
“It was really fun for us,” said Miron. “I am so proud of them.”
The top three entries are included here:
Broken English - Mended Hearts (By Rebecca Ramharry, age 14)
When my mother struggles to pronounce a word in proper English, I want to break the entire language into little pieces, so the edges of these letters will stop cutting her. The willpower she has to put on a smile, even when she feels like breaking, but knows I’m watching, it’s indescribable.
My mother is a foreigner. The progression she has endured is both difficult and outstanding. She is the one who has built my character, helped me, loved me. Yet, I can’t seem to tell her how thankful I am. I’ve done wrong, many times, and yet she forgave me. That’s the thing about mothers, even if you’re the most annoying little blister, they’d still love you and think you’re beautiful.
I’m sorry that I don’t show my gratitude enough. I’m sorry that even when you’re tired, I still continue to bother you. I’m sorry for some days, not respecting you as needed. You’re beautiful, confident and forever important. I love you so much, even when I don’t seem to.
I wanted to make Mother’s Day special for her this year, so I bought flowers, a little tub of chocolate, I even made a card. I felt in a sense that, maybe if I could get this right, she’d realize how much I really care.
However, it was raining that day, so walking home, the flowers were ruined… The chocolate all melted by the time I got home… And the card, well, I forgot it at school. I realized that day how horrible of a daughter I really am. I completely ruined Mother’s Day! I wanted to cry, because any chance that I had of making her way of seeing me better, was thrown out the window.
When I went through the front door, I realized, I could still give her a hug. I raced all the way upstairs, and ran to her, wrapping my arms around her…
“Best Mother’s Day present ever, thank you sweetie!” she said to me.
I realized then, that it’s not the gifts or fancy words that grab her attention. But to know that I love her just as much as she loves me. Mom, you truly are a gift from above and I know I don’t say it enough, but I love you, and thank you for being the best mom ever!
Without you, mom, I would be lost.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It's The Thought That Counts (By: Staisya Murphy, age 14)
The month of May draws near, and you are thinking of a Mother’s Day gift. In the past, you’ve given a plant in a painted flower pot, you’ve made cards with glitter, you’ve even gotten your dad to pick up a bouquet of flowers. Although these gifts are thoughtful, you’re looking for that special gift that will blow her mind away. Your mom has done everything for you since you were born, and on this special day, you want to celebrate her and thank her for what she’s done for you. We all know she will appreciate the gift no matter what it is, still, we want it to be perfect and we spend countless hours thinking about what it will be.
Finally, you've got the perfect idea! One that has thought, affection and creativity all wrapped up with a velvet ribbon. “A POEM!” you yell out loud, realizing that you have just shared your amazing idea with the entire world.
You grab the prettiest piece of paper you can find and with a freshly sharpened pencil you start to write, but after an hour, you've only got crumpled up paper, so you keeping trying.
After what seemed like a century, you have what you need, with the exception of the perfect last line.
On Mother’s Day, you wake up early, put your slippers on and make Mother’s Day breakfast. You burn some toast and lather it with butter, you pour some cold, strong coffee into a tall mug and cut up some old fruit that you forgot to wash. You put on your best smile, walk upstairs and place it on your moms lap. She smiles in appreciation as though everything is perfect.
You head to school, poem in hand and spend every spare second thinking until you finally have the perfect poem ending. After school, with great excitement you rush home in the rain to find your mom at the window waiting for you. Once inside, you pull out the poem and realize your bag had been left open. You hand your mom the wet soggy piece of paper with the illegible letters smudged all over it. You frown in sadness as your mom opens her arms and gives you a big hug. "It's absolutely perfect!" she says. "It's the thought that counts."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Love makes the world go round (By: Sarah Eng, age 12)
Hello everyone and welcome to our guided tour!
I'm sure you've heard some story about how the world turns, something about gravity and the sun. Yeah, that one… well it's completely wrong.
Welcome to the only factory in the centre of the earth. We here at Evol Co. are in charge of making sure the world keeps on turning. We have this huge engine that does the actual turning, but that isn't really interesting.
Oh! But I know what'll be real interesting! I could tell you how we go about powering everything! Well as I'm sure you'll have heard somewhere, love has this huge amount of energy, so we harvest some of that energy. A fair percentage of love has a catalyst of some kind, so like heartfelt gifts, such as macaroni necklaces or tissue paper flowers, we use these gestures with our sucky-beepy-flashy-machine-thing to get some of the energy from them, and then we use that energy to power the engine. So that is how the planet really goes about turning.
Unfortunately, recently there aren't as many real handmade heartfelt gifts going around anymore, especially since gift cards got invented, man do I ever hate those. I hope we don't run out of energy because if we did, the world would stop turning and something equally ridiculous and devastating would probably happen, like all squirrels would explode.
At least this time of year, we get a whole bunch of gestures; I think it has something to do with Mother's Day or something. Well anyways, hope you enjoyed the tour, and don't forget, "love makes the world go round".
Remember all the little things count, so this year, embrace all the homemade gifts, because really, do you want exploding squirrels?