I have learned much while taking this class. I am no where close to being Edgar Allen Poe, but Learning the different structures of a story is interesting.

  The paper I enjoyed the most was about my son being born. Since it was a personal experience, I did not have to put much thought into it. I let my heart speak, and I wrote it down. most writing from the heart are true feelings that cannot be made up. "They took Mikey to start cleaning him off, weigh him, measure him, and the rest of the normal things done to a new born. I was standing in the middle of the room looking at my son and then looking at my wife as they were working on her. At that exact moment in my I life, I had no idea whose side I should be next to, my wife or my son. I had extreme joy looking at my son, and extreme pain looking at my wife, as I was again powerless to help her." This by far, in my opinion, would describe the roller coaster of emotions I had that day, pure utter unknown of what to do. Luckily, everything turned out OK.

   The paper I least enjoyed writing was about illiegal immergration. i want to see everyone have the American way of life, but it shopuld be done legally. I finally decided, that in life you can only help so many, one person cannot save the world, it is a group effort over a long period of time. The best way to do this is to teach the public that simply putting up a fence will not cure the problem. There must be more done besides putting up the fence and be ignorant of the situation.

  I learned that there is more knowledge out there for me to learn about writing. No one is an expert, but I can learn much from others. While doing peer reviews, I learned that my views and and opions on how something should be written is not the same as others. Besides giving my recommendations, it helped me recogonize what I could be doing with my writtings and how to improve them.

I liked this story the best, because it envolves my family. 

Hi Mikey, I’m your Daddy             It was in the fall of 2002 that my wife and I were expecting our first child. 21 October was the due date, and we knew it was going to be a boy. I was in the Navy at the time and we had already planned on my son being born at Portsmouth Naval Hospital. Earlier in August, I had torn the meniscus in my right knee. Also at the same time, I was going to TCC for my EMT-B (Emergency Medical Technician) state license. Going through that class was rough, because it requires you to be on the ground kneeling to perform medical treatment on patients. My doctor wanted me to have an operation on the meniscus in September, but I said no. I would have had to drop out of the EMT class, and that was not going to happen. I would fight through the pain until I tested out which was in December. Another major reason to delay the operation was because of my son’s due date in October. There was no way I was going to be laid up for several weeks while the knee was healed. My wife’s belly was farther out than mine and her back was not cooperating either. I could not have her help me while she was going through the ninth months of pregnancy odyssey.           On 21 October, I thought “Alright Mikey, it’s time to come out of the oven”, but it did not happen. On 22 October, I was doing some training for a Naval Reserve unit out of Pennsylvania. My command trained reserve units on how to setup, operate, and break down a mobile communications container that could be placed anywhere in the world. By the end of the day, I told my LPO (Leading Petty Officer) that I think tonight is the night, and if I’m not here in the morning, Mikey is coming. Sure enough, at 2227 (10:27 PM) my wife and I was getting into bed to go to sleep. No later than five minutes after she got into bed, she turned to me with a weird look on her face. She said, “There is something wet and warm running down my legs”. The first thing I said is, “My knee is not exactly feeling good right now either, the Motrin is not helping”. Then she gave me a scared look I have never seen on her face before. Upon further investigation, we realized her water has broken. Good thing we put doggie pads down on the bed a month earlier. Oddly enough, I did not feel my knee until several days later. Of course, I’m freaking out while my wife is concerned, but calm. We call the hospital, and they said to come in now. We did not rush 100 mph. I got everything together we had planned on bringing; it was already packed. We packed enough stuff to last for a three month cruise around the world. It took us about thirty minutes to get to the hospital and about another hour for me to bring in all of the stuff. My wife checked in, and the Lieutenant nurse on duty at the time thought we were kidding her. Officer or no officer, I did not like that. I was a Second Class Petty Officer at that time. The nurse started an IV on my wife and she almost passed out, I caught her just in time. They gave her oxygen and then she was fine.             My wife was wheeled into the delivery room that we would be in for the next twenty hours. My mother in-law is the head civilian nurse in the Orthopedic department at the hospital. I told her what was going on and she checked in on us regularly. By morning time, I called my command to tell them what was going on. It took a long time for my wife to dilate. By afternoon time, it was coming along nicely and the labor was starting to begin. My wife had requested to use any and all drugs necessary to limit the pain as much as possible. She is not much into the au-natural delivery technique. By time the pain was getting rough, the Anesthesiologist came in to deliver the epidural. The first doctor to come in and deliver it had not done this before (Portsmouth Naval is an instructional hospital). He did not do it right and it was very painful for my wife. I was holding her for support and reassurance. I wanted to take away her pain, but I could not. If I did not know it before, I now knew how strong she really was to go through that. Unfortunately, the epidural did not take, so another doctor had to deliver another one. By this time labor was in full swing. Again, the epidural did not take. It hurt me so bad to see my beautiful angel hurting like this, and there was no a thing I could do. It tore me apart, but I did not show it for her sake. Again another epidural was delivered and guess what, it did not take. My wife was in so much pain, it amazed me how beautiful she was even in her condition.             Finally my son came into this world at 1531 (3:31 PM) on 23 October 2002. Everything looked fine; he had ten fingers and ten toes. The doctor immediately handed Mikey to my wife, and of course we were bawling. Yes, I was bawling, but I was in control. At that moment I thought the world was now perfect. Then, all of a sudden my wife’s blood pressure dropped like an anchor in water. The staff immediately dropped the head portion of the bed below her legs, to keep the blood mostly in the head in upper body region. This is done to supply vital organs as much oxygen enriched blood as possible. They took Mikey to start cleaning him off, weigh him, measure him, and the rest of the normal things done to a new born. I was standing in the middle of the room looking at my son and then looking at my wife as they were working on her. At that exact moment in my I life, I had no idea whose side I should be next to, my wife or my son. I had extreme joy looking at my son, and extreme pain looking at my wife, as I was again powerless to help her. After a while my wife’s blood pressure came back up, but she had to remain in the delivery room for at least four hours for observation. I was able to hold my son and have pictures taken and give him his very first bath. To say I was on cloud nine would be an understatement. Finally, my wife was stable enough to be moved to a private room.         After twenty hours of extreme highs and lows, my wife, son, and I were finally together in a room to start living together as a family. Everything was a blur and crystal clear all at the same time. I was extremely proud of my wife for the courage and strength she had to endure during the birth of my son. I naturally felt proud of my son because he bought much joy into our lives,  and our family was expanding. Two years later my wife had problems delivering our daughter Isabella, and again I was helpless to help, but she came through like a champ because of her inner strength and will. There is no person I know now or then, that I am more proud of than my beautiful wife. I have such respect and love for her that I cannot put into words. Two side notes, after Mikey was born, the doctor said the epidural’s never worked because Mikey’s head was coming down sideways, causing so much pain that the epidural never eased any of that pain. In December 2002, I completed my EMT-B course and passed the state test to receive my licence, and then two weeks later, my right knee was operated on to repair the meniscus.