Daily Prompt: Sink or Swim (Joint Post)

Daily Prompt: Tell us about a time when you were left on your own, to fend for yourself in an overwhelming situation — on the job, at home, at school. What was the outcome?

Mock Trial by Sophie

It was the end of the school year and everyone finished Finals and CST testing. This was my sophomore year in English ¾ Honors. Since we didn’t have any big projects to do, my teacher suggest we do a mock trial case about drunk driving. This was not graded, it was just for fun and maybe extra credit. I thought it would be fun; I had never done a mock trial before. I mean, I watched Law and Order: SVU and the Good Wife. It look really interesting and fun. My teacher assigned 4 lawyers on each side, a police officer, and a judge. My classmate was assigned the lead lawyer and she asked me to be one of her lawyers. I was on the side of prosecution. Against the alleged drunk driver (hit and run) Everyone else would be the jury.

On the first day, my team was the first to present our witnesses. It was agreed that I was to do a witness and the closing. I prepared and wrote a 1 ½  page closing statement. By and by, it was my turn to use my witness. The witness was a classmate, I was to practice with him beforehand. During the direct examination of the witness, my heart was beating pretty hard. It was just me and the witness with everyone else surrounding us. I asked all the simple questions smoothly but I overreached myself and asked something off book that we didn’t practice. My witness stumbled and I fumbled. ( Sorry for corny words.) During one of the questions and I mistakenly said the wrong name of the witness. Then I referred back to the Defense lawyers during direct examination but as I pointed to the Defense lawyer, I forgot his name. This was the end of the school year, you would I think I would have remembered it by now. So there I was standing there, pointing at him, and fumbling on what his name was. “Wait, what’s his name again?” I said. He was probably embarrassed and I was embarrassed too. It was too late to redeem my self because the bell rang and the case was to be continued the next day.

On the next day, I was really determined to prove myself on the closing statement. I even urged my lead lawyer to let my cross examine one of the defense witnesses. This time it went more smoothly but I still had that sunken feeling. It was finally my turn to do the closing statement first and I NAILED IT. I gave eye contact, a surprise explanation supported my facts from the packet used to do the mock trial. I could sense that everyone agreed with what i was saying. Later, it was one of the Defence lawyers turn to do the closing statement. He finished within 2 minutes. I glanced at his paper afterwards and I saw he had one paragraph that just restated facts. I was pretty happy that my hardwork and effort paid off. My teacher thanked me for being prepared (and a high five) and the results from the jury were something like 24 (guilty) to 2(innocent). Of course, my horrid finger pointing scene was probably the talk of the day but my classmates knew me for a long time and respected me for pushing forward. I’m glad I fended for my pride, my perseverance, and for myself because I became more self-confident after failing and knowing I can always get back up again.

Spotlight’s on Me by Cindi

Volunteering is something that every high school student is familiar with. Many students do it for the hours or for recognition on college apps, but I do it for the experience. Each service I’ve been a part of has taught me new skills and has taught me something valuable. There’s this one volunteer service i remember clearly, and it’s the same service that has shown me my inner strength as an individual.

It was in mid-August of this year, and I was a volunteer for a performance service.The dress attire was black and white, since the event was formal. Therefore, I wore pretty much the only formal attire I had at the time– a crisp, white collared blouse and a black high-low skirt.

The volunteer service was something I looked forward to, since it was completely different and that none of my friends were with me to take part in it. I’ve never volunteered without my friends prior to that time, and to find out that students from other schools were going to be there made me a bit nervous and self-conscious. But hey, I was there to do my job, so I focused on that fact.

One of my tasks as a volunteer was to help set up tables: rip open the plastic bags on the tables, take out the white table cloths, cover the table with the cloth. Simple. The other students had the same task, so we all worked individually to quickly set up the tables in order to receive further instruction from the coordinator.

When all the tables seemed to be set, the coordinator gathered all the volunteers together to discuss a problem she saw with the tables. Apparently, some volunteers carelessly did their task, since the coordinator stated that tablecloths were being put unevenly on the tables; one end was longer than the other.

Suddenly, the coordinator pointed at me and called me to the center of the formed circle of volunteers.

“See this girl’s skirt? This is exactly what we don’t want happening on the tables.”

The volunteers surrounding me all snickered. I was confused at first, but then I realized that I was wearing a black high-low skirt. As soon as this realization entered my head, my face turned red and I just felt awful. It was honestly one of the most embarrassing moments of my life. I was angry and humiliated; all I wanted to do was run away and cry. Yet I didn’t. I did something that actually surprised myself.

I smiled and acted as if nothing happened.

Although the moment was unpleasant, it actually showed myself how capable I was, even without any type of backup. In a way, I’m kind of grateful the experienced happened. 🙂