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So here is my entire paper! It is totally a rough draft, so please give me comments! I have no clue how to end it and I am also unsure what my overall question about me is. I really had no clue how to end this, so please give me a bunch of critiques! Thanks, Emily H!

(Wo)Man’s Struggle With Nature…

Emily Hinkler!

Have I been stung by a bee?

Nope. Never ever. Noooo way.

And I don’t plan on it.

But that’s not my struggle.

*****

4, 5…6…7, 8! I count my battle wounds of mosquito bites the same way I count my Halloween candy. The more, the better. (Well, unless you eat too much and then your tummy hurts… that is always a problem.)

Did you know that I am the luckiest girl alive?

Whenever I pick a clover, it just happens to be a 4 leaf clover.

Every time.

It may just be because I rock your socks, or maybe because I can say the alphabet backwards (which means I am super cool) OR maybe because I am super sneaky and know that if you pick a 3 leaf clover, and you rip one of the wider sides of the clover in half-

you get a magical lucky ducky 4 leaf clover.

I am screaming in my back yard.

“Mommm, there is a huge-normous spider on the wall… COME KILL IT!”

My mom knew the drill. She came running outside with her gas mask and fire extinguisher strapped to her. In a flurry of smog, the Tarantula explodes with flailing legs and blood everywhere. You hear my shrill shriek of horror and disgust echo throughout Illinois.

(Umm, okay what really happened is this: My mom calmly strolled over to the wall, took her Kleenex, and gently squashed the spider.

Soooo my mom just squished the spider normally,

nothing fancy.)

Okay, here is something legit:

I like to connect to my Native American Cherokee Indian heritage. So being the nature lover that I am, I decided to dig a hole in my “secret garden” (you will find out later why I call it the “secret garden”) to find arrow heads.

I dug a hole.

“Where in the world are the arrow heads?” I said to myself.

(And yes, I do talk to myself.)

Wanting to connect to my history, I decided to put my own “Indian-like” objects in the hole. So I found a ball that looks like the Earth, a pink pencil, and fake purple feathers that I put inside.

“Oh my! Look what I found!” I dragged my family outside to the “secret garden” and showed them my Indian treasures.

37…38, 39, 40.

40 mosquito bites.

Oh wait, no. 41.

I am singing in my back yard.

“Wild thing, na na na naaa naaaaaaa. You make my heart siiiing, NA NA NA NAAA NAAAAAAAAAA!”

I am also cutting the grass with scissors. It was my idea to do it,

So that’s what I am doing.

After awhile this song has gotten really boring and my fingers are starting to cramp. My mom wonders why in the world I am cutting the grass if we are having it cut in 3 days. I reply, “Because I want to do it.”

But now the reality is that I don’t want to do it.

So guess what I am not doing?

I am not a particular fan of cherries. They make my tummy hurt. But here is what I digest even though I usually regret consuming it:

• Cherry chocolate cake
• Shirley Temple’s
• My pet chicken named Cherry (but that is for a completely different story)
• Cherry Tootsie Pops
• Cherry cough medicine syrup (I definitely regret that.)

My family has 2 cherry trees. They died. And for some odd reason I was very attached to them.

I decided to have a proper burial service for my trees.

I dug a hole.

Putting the branches of the trees in plastic baggies, I carefully buried them in the Earth. Not knowing what to really do after that, I just walked away.

I bet you are in suspense right now.

I bet it’s because you are dying to know about my “secret garden.”

It would be fun to keep you in such excruciating pain, but I guess I will tell you.

My “secret garden” is where I keep my magical unicorns, 4 leaf clovers, and Indian treasures. Wildlife is abundant as well as fairies. There are many exotic flowers and I happen to have a huge pond where I keep my frogs and lily pads.

Actually, I transformed my Indian digging hole into my luxurious pond. It is more than awesome.

If you looked in the dictionary next to the word ‘groovy,’ my “secret garden” would be picture next to it.

It has a fence around it so you can’t get in. Only I can get in. (And my family… but that’s because I live with them and it is their property.) Because I have a groovy garden, that must mean that I am groovy.

*****

Have I been stung by a bee?

Nope. Never ever. Noooo way.

And I still don’t plan on it.

But that’s not my struggle.