As children we always find a place that holds deep memories for us to remember. These memories could come from events that have occurred in the person life, places we go or see might trigger these memories from the past. As time went by, many changes have occurred in my city of Virginia where I had some positive and negative memories as I was growing up that developed and influenced the way I chose to live my life.
Before we moved to Lynn, my family lived in Richmond, in Virginia. Our apartment had one bedroom, one bathroom, a small kitchen and a tiny living room. My father had to work hard to save enough money to move us into a bigger place. Eventually, he bought a house in Lynn. The Virginia house was quite different than the Lynn apartment. It had a bigger living room and more bedrooms. Whereas the apartment was surrounded by commercial and other apartment buildings, empty lots surrounded the Virginia house. The neighborhood was still in the construction phase and not many houses were built. The streets were unpaved and the sidewalks not yet poured. As time went by, the stages of construction compares to when I was a young child and then moving along the different stages of life, as I become an adult.
At that time, Virginia did not have any parks with playgrounds for my friends and me to play. Therefore, there were a lot of open lots around the neighborhood of Virginia where my friends and I would have our own sandlot. We would gather as many children around our neighborhood to play baseball. We made our own base path to run around and mark where the foul ball lines would be. There was also no grass in the outfield to slow the ball down, so if the ball reached the outfield it would skid along the dirt and passed the outfielders for a homerun. Another thing my friends and I would do is that we would bring shovels to make several dirt ramps by piling dirt together. Then we would use our bikes to jump off these ramps to see who would jump the highest and we would also try to do some tricks. Sometimes when I go by these open lots it brings back fond memories I had with my friends when we used to play in these lots.
As the years went by, the city of Virginia started to change with more houses and buildings being built. Dirt roads are now covered by asphalt and streets finally have sidewalks. More people are starting to move into Pasadena as well as gang members. My memories of Virginia have changed and it also made me feel ashamed to be living here, since these gang檚 would graffiti their names on commercial buildings, on people檚 houses with block walls, and on the sidewalls of liquor stores. These gangs want to put their names (gang signs or nick names) on these buildings to show who owns the territory; however, it has made my city look ugly. I remember a few times when the block walls on my house were covered with graffiti. This angered me so much that I wanted to catch these gang members who did this to my own house.
One of my favorite memories from Virginia would have to be that Joe檚 dad showed us how to use a car jack and where to put the car stands if we were going to change the oil from a car. He showed us what we had to unscrew, the nut, that was holding the old oil and also we have to unscrew the old oil filter and replace it with a new oil filter. Then he showed us where the oil needs to be poured into and how to check the level of oil so it would not overflow. He also showed us how to replace sparkplugs if we have to change it. By replacing new sparkplugs, he told us that we have to use the sparkplug gap for each new sparkplug because it needs to be the right gap size. To find the gap size he showed us how to find it up in the car manual. Besides teaching us how to tune up a car he would also try to get us involved in sports by enrolling us in leagues for baseball, basketball and football, so that way we would stay out of trouble. He was a man who I looked up to and who was there for me when I needed to talk. Joe檚 dad influenced me by being there and teaching me new things. As an adult, I am always involved in sports and I also know how to change the oil and replace sparkplugs when I need to tune up my car.
A horrible memory I had was when I went to Lynn Elementary School. It was down the street from my house where I went to elementary school. I was in the 4th grade at the time. It was during recess time and my friends and I found a body lying behind a tree where we were playing on the swings. I recognized the person because he was one of my classmate檚 brother檚 who was from a gang. He had a few bullets lodged in his chest with blood flowing out and onto the ground. We ran and told the teacher about it and Mrs. Johnson called the police. The police officers arrived and asked my friends and me what had happened. We told the police officers that we found the body lying behind the tree where the swings were located. The police officer went over to check if the person was still aliHelp me with this homework paper?
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