Autobiographical+incident+(personal)

As a kid everyone learns how to do small kid things; like how to ride a bike, how to cook macaroni and cheese and how to swim. Learning how to swim might seem small to an adult. Nevertheless that was a gigantic feat in the eyes of the five year old me. It was May 2nd, my birthday. I woke up in my freshly painted room. Just the week before my aunt had painted a rainbow on my door and had let my sister and me put handprints all over the wall. We had had the best time ever putting hand prints everywhere and getting paint as high up as we could…that wasn’t very high considering that we were both under four feet five inches!! My mom, dad, baby brother (Grant), and my older sister (Julianne) were singing Happy Birthday above me as I was trying to wake up. After they finished singing, my mom happily told me that she and dad had bought me a very special birthday gift. I squealed with delight, jumped up and ran down the stairs yelling “What is it!?!?!?!? What is it!?!?!?!” My parents followed more slowly, my mom carrying my brother Grant that was just about eight months old, down the stairs. “Ha ha ha-ha ha!! You get five birthday punches!!!” My sister cheerily said in a brat-ish way as she skipped down the stairs behind my parents in her pink, plaid PJs, with her dark blonde hair swishing behind her in the most annoying way. I skidded to a halt at the bottom of our staircase and glared at my sister. As she glared right back at me, I wondered if I could get away with giving // her //one of // my // birthday punches. “Over here Kate,” said my dad. Kate was my nickname from when I was younger. It came from my middle name Kathleen, which my grandfather shortened to Kate. I walked over to the coffee table in the far corner of my family’s living room and giggled with delight. I was staring at a box wrapped in bright blue with a huge bow on the top. I smiled up at my mom and dad. My dad nodded and said, “Go ahead and open it!” I ripped off the wrapping paper and yelped in excitement when I saw my gift. It was the bathing suit I had seen and liked in the store just a few days ago. I jumped up, hugged my mom and dad, kissed my little brother on the top of his cute little head, and danced out of the way as Julianne threw a punch at my arm. I stuck my tongue out at her and she responded in kind. My mom frowned ran her hand through her medium length blonde hair, and said in an irritated voice, “If you want to try that suit out any time soon you and your sister had better behave!” As soon as she wasn’t looking my sister and I both stuck our tongues out at each other again.  - “You promised you wouldn’t back up or move so I could not reach you!” My voice was loud and it echoed in the large rec center pool room. Later in the afternoon I had found myself with a choke hold on my mom, yelling, “Why did you move?” She hugged and reassured me that I was doing fine without her with in my reach “You were doing great, Kate. Nothing could happen to you while you have a life jacket on!” Dad said with a confidence that I didn’t feel. “Then how come it feels like I’m sinking??” I asked sadly. “You started to kick and then you stopped moving your feet so they started to sink, but don’t worry that is the only thing that will sink,” mom answered in a serious tone of voice as she turned to see what my sister was doing. Mom did not have to worry about Grant because he was with the rec center day care while we were in the pool. My dad grabbed my waist and dragged me back a few steps in the water and whispered, “Come on Kate, I just know you can do it. Just don’t stop kicking your feet until you reach the wall. Keep thinking, just keep kicking over and over again to yourself!!! Do you understand?” “I’ll try….” I whispered back gravely “Okay. I am going to count to three and then I want you to start kicking. Kick your little heart out!” my dad said to me with a slight smile on his face. “All right, on three I will go.” “One, two, thr”-- <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">“WAIT, WAIT!” I yelled nervously, “What if I sink?! What if I get tired and I drowned?!? What then?!?” <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">“Calm down Kate. Look at me please.” <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">As I turned to look at my dad I looked at the water around me. I turned back around (facing away from my dad) took a huge breath, relaxed, and kicked all the way across the pool. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">After that day I could never have enough time swimming or playing in water. For good luck before every one of my swimming competition I swim across the pool width wise. I know now that I wasn’t really all that afraid of drowning or not being able to reach but I was afraid to fail.