Laughing, Sharing, and Guessing

My [cute] baby sister amazed by her carrot.

During the middle of my sophomore year, I decided to have a Journalism class as my zero period elective. I’d say its one of the best decisions I made last year because I’ve grown to become a better writer and interviewed so many people and made so many friends.

Today, my journalism class decided to have an activity day. We all had to write a short story or experience we had as a kid. Then we had to fold up the paper and put it on a table in the front of the class, making sure our name wasn’t on it, and the editors would read the story and we would have to guess who it was.

I wrote a story about the time my baby sister was born, and I’m going to be completely honest, every bit of what I wrote is true.

“During the summer between 6th and 7th grade, my baby sister was born. I stayed at home with my aunt while my parents were at the hospital about an hour after she was born, my father sent us a picture of her. Everyone gushed about how cute she was and how guppy her cheeks were but for some reason I thought she looked okay. Just okay.

Later that day I went to my room and shut the door and made a prayer to God.

I asked. “Dear God. Please please make my sister as cute as the way everyone describes her. Please make her cute, even if it means I fail every test all the way till 12th grade.

I guess I was pretty selfless because my sister turned out to be cute and I’m a junior right now and I haven’t failed my tests :)”

The moment my classmates heard “baby sister” some of them yelled “OOOH this is Zainab’s paper!”

Reflecting on this share-a-little-memory activity, I realized there was so much I knew and didn’t know about my classmates. One can argue that none of it was really “important stuff” since these were all childhood memories, but in actuality, little (so-called insignificant) memories like this where we share our lives in the past are ones that draw people closer together.

I feel like today I really bonded with my journalism class; just laughing, sharing, and guessing peoples stories was a perfect way for everyone, even people who always seem grumpy, to share a common language. The language of love.

 

❤ Zainab