Life’s a Climb,

But the View’s Great

Emily Thomas
5D
C- The Game of Hangman and the
New Bestie
I met Cara in the fourth grade. It all started with an email to
my friend Grace with my class list attached. She wrote back,
“You lucky duck! Cara is in your class!” I told her that I didn’t
know her and she said, “Well, meet her then. You’ll have a
friend for life.” So I did try to meet her.
The next part of this story involves a game of hangman. Grace,
Cara, and I were playing the word game on the whiteboard. It
was my turn, and I had no clue what to write. So then Grace
whispered it into my head. The perfect idea! _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _? It was, “Will you be my friend?” She smiled and
looked me dead in the eye. I was worried. Then, it was her
turn. She wrote, _ _ _. It was… Can you guess? “Yes.”
F- Finally Dancing, Good or Bad?
In my third grade year, the grade put on a play all about South
Carolina. I wanted to be a Charleston Dancer so badly, and I got the
part! As a bonus, my class, The Wrenns, got to do the folk dance. I was
so happy! I did run into a problem on the way, though.
My dress was hot pink and sequined all over. It was exactly like a
flapper dress. During dress rehearsal, the whole Lower School came to
watch us. My first folk dance partner was Alston Lewis. He was playing
the role of the mayor, if I recall correctly. Anyway, I locked arms with
him and skipped in a circle. As I let go to skip to my next partner, I felt a
tug on my back. I turned around and a really long string had stuck to
Alston’s coat button! We were stuck like that for the rest of the dance.
He wouldn’t stand still long enough for me to take it off, either.
 H- La!
In fourth grade, my music teacher, Ms. Hughes, chose six people in the choir that could
sing very well to audition for a state choir. The six were Ali Rose Timms, MC Crawford, Karl
Schmidt, Molly Rothgaber, Margaret Kirby, and me. These people were the only people I’d
ever felt comfortable singing in front of. We’ve had a very special relationship since then.
We didn’t know that we were auditioning for the Honors Choir yet. She’d said that she
wanted everyone to sing for her to improve our voices. After that, I’d asked her how to get
into the Honors Choir, which is the name of the state choir. She said she’d email my mom.
Well, a week later, she did. Saying that I could audition!
I walked into her room one morning at 7:30 to audition. I was very tired and excited. I
don’t know how many times I recorded myself before I got it perfect. But, the whole of us
made it in. I believe the songs we sang were “Woody”, “Path to the Moon”, “Shiru”, and
“Carolina in the Morning.” I don’t remember the rest. We went to Charleston Tuesday,
February 7, 2010. A day before Ali’s birthday! MC and I stayed in my grandparents’ condo
while we were there. We got to leave a day early, so our new inside joke is “We get to chill
at the beach while the class does math homework.” I remember practicing with her in our
little room for hours. The time finally came for us to sing! Everything turned out great.
These people have been my best friends for a really long time.
 J- Jump and Land, Kind Of.
Growing up, I’ve always like horses and ponies. I took camps ages four
through seven, took lessons at one barn seven to eight, and then
swapped to another barn at early nine. I am still there now. At my first
barn where I took lessons, a terrible and frightening incident occurred
that scared everyone. I was riding a pony named Tartan. I’m supposed to
be very gentle on him because the least bit of rein pulling sets him off.
But I wasn’t.
I was going to canter the outside line in four strides. Wow. The line was
too long for my pony to do it any less than six. But I wasn’t going to
argue. Anyway, I tried. So I got him to a canter and after I sailed over the
first jump, I kicked. He didn’t like it. He decided to run into the fence and
dump me off into it. The fence was very old and splintery. I was also
wearing a school uniform polo. I had holes in my shirt and splinters in my
sides. Wow. That was dumb. I should’ve just done it in six strides.
 R- Reading by Emily Thomas
I’ve always liked to read. In second grade over the summer, I read over 60 books!
My point average for “Accelerated Reader” is 378.9 points. My Uncle John was a
reading teacher, so I think I inherited that quality from him. Currently, I am reading
a suggestion from him, The Hobbit.
My favorite book ever is The Mysterious Benedict Society, by Trenton Lee
Stewart. It has two sequels and is going to have a fourth book soon. This book is
about four extreme kids named Reynie, Sticky, Kate, and Constance. Reynie is a
logical person and is good with puzzles. Sticky is a genius and has a photographic
memory. Kate is tricky and good at setting traps and sneaking around, and
Constance is just plain out stubborn. And she’s only two years old. They all take a
test designed by Mr. Benedict himself, and they all pass. Mr. Benedict is the leader
of The Mysterious Benedict Society, their team name, and he has narcolepsy,
which is a disease in which you fall asleep during severe emotion change. My
favorite part of this book is when they have to help Mr. Benedict’s assistant,
Rhonda, retrieve a pencil that she “dropped” into a grate for a part of the test.
T- The Weather Announcement
On the spring break of 2010, my grandparents took my family to Hawaii. It
was a 16 hour plane ride, but it was totally worth it. We went snorkeling,
hiking, and even onto a live volcano! It is by far the best trip we’d ever had.
But we didn’t get there without a problem.
We’d just gotten to LA after leaving from Georgia. The flights went
from Greenville to Atlanta to LA to Hawaii. So, we’d just gotten to LA and we
realized that another plane was leaving for Hawaii! It was not our plane, but
if they had enough seats we wouldn’t have to wait two hours in the airport!
We ran around the airport trying to catch the flight with no luck. We missed
it. We all sat down exhausted when I noticed “Breaking News!” flash up on
the television screen. Here’s the caption: “Tsunami due to hit shores of
south Hawaii at 5:30!” That was an hour after our scheduled arrival time!!
We were staying in a hotel right off of the shores of south Hawaii, too. We
sat on the airplane in LA for one hour because they wouldn’t let us leave
before the tsunami hit. It was only two feet high.
 My Climb
I learned a lot about myself during this project. I
learned that I really care about my family and friends
and that past experiences are great to share with
them. My favorite part of this project was peer editing
with Cara and Cliff. Everyone was laughing at each
others embarrassing moments and got teary at the sad
ones. We all wrote notes on how to improve each
others’ stories and we all read everyone’s stories. Cara
and Cliff are likely two of my best friends, so I was not
embarrassed to tell them every detail that goes with
the stories.