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"MY Life" by PaulaM1958

This is just a short part of my book on my life. I have had many of my friends read it. I would like someone other then who I know to give me what they think, of my work.

Category: Book Chapter

Tags: about my life

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One night, we were all seated at the dinner table eating dinner in our brand new house in Centerport, New York on Long Island. While eating the meal, all of a sudden I heard this weird noise. I had no idea where it was coming from. It sounded like a frozen river that was still trying to gurgle, while the ice shrunk and then expanded, making crackling noises all at the same time. I tried to get Mom's attention about that very odd noise I was still hearing. I couldn’t seem to get her attention though; she never listened to anyone anyway, ever. I just sat there as the noise continued and thought to myself, she doesn’t listen. Within a moment’s time after that thought had passed, water started gushing out of the chandelier which was mounted directly over the dining table where we were eating. There was so much water at such a great force that the plates were immediately washed off the table and then everything in the room started to break everywhere as water went everywhere causing a parade of destruction. Mom’s face turned to a look of shock and horror when she came to realize what was happening. Her face had turned white. Both her mouth and eyes were wide open as she stood as frozen as an ice sculpture. I tried again to try to get her attention to say, “Mom, I really did try to warn you…” but she refused to hear a word of what I was saying. I must have uttered excuse me 50 times. As it had turned out, the pipes inside the walls had froze because when the house was built, the builders never wrapped any insulation around them. As enough wasn’t already happening with the gushing water… now sparks are coming from the chandelier light fixture on the ceiling. I was up and out of my chair, and running, now. The water was very, very cold and was now finding its way into parts of the house. And then the thought of electricity plus water was not a good thing, either. Mom was so angry at this point that she left the table to go to find the phone number of that construction company who built the house. She didn’t ask any of us if we were alright. She was yelling into that phone and making immediate demands. It went something like this, “Listen up you idiot, the pipes in the ceiling had no insulation and now they have burst all over our dinner. You better get over here now and fix it!!” I could not even begin to imagine what the guy on the other end of the phone was thinking as she continued to rant and rave into the phone. He had managed to get himself into a whole mess of trouble now with the pipe breakage and all. He did not do the right building construction job in the walls and, for that reason, Mom was not going to settle for anything less then a perfect job.Mom always wanted everything to be absolutely perfect which did not exclude her children. She could dress us up the way she wanted, when she wanted, how she wanted, but when it came to dressing the children, there was no inkling of care how we felt, or had any feedback or suggestions or whatnot, on the outfit she had chosen. That simply was not an option, anytime, never or ever. When she bought my clothes, there were only a few places that she went to shop which were primarily A&S, Macys, and, at times, the other high fashion shops in the area. I only wanted to wear blue jeans but she would not allow me to dress in that type of casual fashion. It was totally and completely unacceptable to her. That would be dressing down as she saw it. She continued to hold this notion even when I dressed myself and attended high school. I was totally driven insane by what she thought of others, how she viewed them and how she saw their images only in her eyes. She was extremely judgmental to the point that I just wanted to tell her to shove her clothes up her *****. It so annoyed the life out of me as far as what I should wear and should not wear.For now, I was a teenager so I had gotten myself a job and was never around. Who would want to be around to hear that crap day after day? I sure did not want to hear it but I was stuck in a family that was filled with people that didn’t even know who they were. The only real person I ever knew who for real was Dad. He would come to see us even if there was a blizzard storming violently outside. Now, that is a true dad. He never let anything stop him, no matter what, not under any condition. I have no idea what Mom put him through. Deep down, he is far better without her in his life. She is the purest form evil down to the bone.At sixteen, I had a sweet sixteen party. I invited all the people I could think to invite and, of course, and they all came. Some of those were bad kids and they tried to steal from Stepfather and Mom. They did get caught in the act trying to run away with some coins that were very valuable. However, I never ever heard the end of that one, either. Its not as if I sat there, tapped my friends’ shoulders, and said to them that they should go rob my family while at the party. Hello, who would do that? Not me. I’ve figured out in life, you cannot win with some people. I did the best to survive in a place that was hard to survive in at all. It was living with people who (I don’t know why) would fly off the handle, throw ***** or try to hit each other. I have no clue most, if not, all of the time the reasons why and it doesn’t matter, anyhow. Cops were always at the house for one thing, or another. It got very old, real fast.I will never ever, forget this occasion, ever. One time, Mom and Stepfather got into it my, going round and round with each other. Stepfather had enough being at our home and wanted to leave the house for good. He planned to take my little brother Mitchell, his son, with him. Mom threw herself on the hood of his car being dramatic as she always was demonstrating. She must have thought she was Joan Crawford. She was wearing a see-through night gown. Things continued to get worse, and then the police came as things had escalated to the point that they were definitely needed. A crowd of neighbors had started lining the street amongst other things as well. What fun was this for any of us to watch as kids watching their parents behaving badly like this? She adamantly did not want Stepfather to take Mitchell any where. My thoughts were, “Why the hell do you care? You don’t really care about anyone but yourself. So, why do you care?” Just another thing she did to people, to control them like conducting an orchestra. I did not like him at all, stepfather, but I can relate with why no one wants to be with her as she is just a controlling freak. If you do not believe, or agree with, what she thinks and says, then she has judged & juried you as a no-good person. What sort of a life is that for anyone? All of this was just too bizarre to imagine, to even consider, this could be real - living in a household with people who were of the belief that throwing things, plates and cups, and anything else for that matter, was to show the other person that they were the one in control. That is a total whack job. Plain and simple.One time when I was about 10 or 11 years-old, someone stayed at the house to babysat me. I think it was a cousin of stepfather. I can not really remember my age when that happened. But, I sure do remember the event very clearly as if was not all that long ago. It seems this person who was watching us decided to lie. After being accused of doing this thing that I didn’t even do, I was taken out of my bed upon the return of stepfather and Mom. I was asked what had happened. I guess they wanted to hear my story or version. I explained but, of course, it was not believed what I said. It was accepted what was said by that older person telling this lie of a story about me. Stepfather began to beat the living daylights out of me. I still don’t know for what reason he punished me so severely. Nonetheless, this person had lied to him and I got the beating part out of it. He hit me so hard all over that I could not move, and I had wet my pants, as well. Guess what? Mom just stood there, said nothing at all and let him continually beat me. Not a word, nothing. She just stood there, in awe, as I was beat to bits by this man, stepfather. I hated him. He had no right to even touch me.You can bet your bottom dollar, when I planned to tell my own father, Dad, has was not going to be happy about this. I did tell him and he was not happy, at all. When he came to pick us up, he became livid when I told him. He was going to murder stepfather. He confronted Mom about it and she lied about the whole thing, as well. The babysitter said I had done something that I never did that night I was watched. I can not remember what it was that the babysitter said I had done. Mom could care less about what happened to me. Karma is going to suck her up one day and make her pay back all her nasty mistakes she did to me. I hope she begs for forgiveness; I will never give her any, no matter what, never. She has screwed my life up. I took how she was as someone and used as I knew I did not ever want to be like, or resemble her. No way, no how.I have had many talks with many people. Many have said they cannot believe I have survived what has happened to me. Many would have given up and tried to kill their self. I believe from this lifetime experience, it has made me a strong person. I have always had this strength or I would never have survived that household from day one, ever. It took endurance, resilience and continual strength to hold on, and faith to get through each and every day.I disliked going to high school as I had a learning disability. I was made fun of by so many people, being taunted and laughed at, which made it all the more harder returning back to school each day. Gym class did not make it any easier, either. That is, unless we played field hockey because I loved that sport. Gymnastics was the very hardest and nearly impossible so I never went to those classes. In my senior year, I went to the gym about 5 times a day when it was the field hockey. I got my own karma, too. But it was okay. I did not have to perform on those darn poles. The ones that you needed to swing around and around on, the parallel poles. I did do the other things on the other gym equipment like the balance beams, pommel horse, volt, etc. I spent additional months in the gym to make up for that lost time so I could graduate with my class. Now that I think about it, I should have gone to class but I hated those stupid poles ones where you swung around and around.

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Category Name: My Thoughts

I did not enjoy the chapter. The chapter was okay. I really enjoyed the chapter.

This section is for overall comments and general ideas. The score should reflect how much you enjoyed the chapter.

Category Name: Character Development

The characters were not credible, interesting or unique. I don’t care about or understand the characters because they were poorly developed. The characters where somewhat credible, interesting and unique. I partially understand their thoughts, feelings, and actions. I somewhat connected with and care about the characters. The characters where credible, interesting and unique. I thoroughly understand their thoughts, feelings and actions. I felt connected with and started to care about the characters.

This is act of bringing a character to life on the page. It is a combination of the author’s description of the character and the character’s dialog, action, and thoughts. Though all characters should be believable, the protagonist and antagonist are usually the most developed characters.

Category Name: Chapter Ending

If there is another chapter I don’t have any desire to read it. The ending was OK. I am not dying to know what happens next but I am interested in finding out. The ending left me craving the next chapter. I have to know what happens next.

Category Name: Setting

I don’t know when or where this chapter takes place. The setting was inadequately described or inappropriately used. I know when and where the chapter takes place but I can only vaguely picture it in my mind. The setting did not add to or distract from the chapter. I know when and where the chapter takes place. The setting enhanced the chapter and helped me better understand the characters or plot.

The setting is where a story takes place. The choice of setting and its description helps the story come alive in the mind of the reader. Appropriate setting contributes to the plot and mood of the story.

Category Name: Mechanics

The story contained so many mechanical errors that it was hard to follow the plot or understand certain sentences or paragraphs. Occasional mechanical errors were distracting, but these errors did not inhibit me from being able to understand the plot or connect with characters in the story. I rarely if ever noticed mechanical errors. As far as I could tell, the writing was clear and correct.

Mechanics includes sentence structure, verb agreement, grammar, spelling, voice, punctuation and aspects of basic style.

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Category Name: Dialog

The dialog caused more confusion than clarification about the characters. It was almost impossible to follow. Some of the dialog helped me learn about the characters and revealed new facets of their personalities. I could follow the dialog when paying close attention. The dialog helped me learn about the characters and revealed new facets of their personalities. The dialog flowed well and was easy to follow.

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Click on a paragraph or highlight text from the paragraph to provide inline comments. While detailed grammar correction is welcome, the purpose of inline commenting is to spark the author's creativity. This is best done by expressing feelings, questions, and concerns you have about the story while you are reading.

1. One night, we were all seated at the dinner table eating dinner in our brand new house in Centerport, New York on Long Island. While eating the meal, all of a sudden I heard this weird noise. I had no idea where it was coming from. It sounded like a frozen river that was still trying to gurgle, while the ice shrunk and then expanded, making crackling noises all at the same time. I tried to get Mom's attention about that very odd noise I was still hearing. I couldn’t seem to get her attention though; she never listened to anyone anyway, ever. I just sat there as the noise continued and thought to myself, she doesn’t listen. Within a moment’s time after that thought had passed, water started gushing out of the chandelier which was mounted directly over the dining table where we were eating. There was so much water at such a great force that the plates were immediately washed off the table and then everything in the room started to break everywhere as water went everywhere causing a parade of destruction. Mom’s face turned to a look of shock and horror when she came to realize what was happening. Her face had turned white. Both her mouth and eyes were wide open as she stood as frozen as an ice sculpture. I tried again to try to get her attention to say, “Mom, I really did try to warn you…” but she refused to hear a word of what I was saying. I must have uttered excuse me 50 times. As it had turned out, the pipes inside the walls had froze because when the house was built, the builders never wrapped any insulation around them. As enough wasn’t already happening with the gushing water… now sparks are coming from the chandelier light fixture on the ceiling. I was up and out of my chair, and running, now. The water was very, very cold and was now finding its way into parts of the house. And then the thought of electricity plus water was not a good thing, either. Mom was so angry at this point that she left the table to go to find the phone number of that construction company who built the house. She didn’t ask any of us if we were alright. She was yelling into that phone and making immediate demands. It went something like this, “Listen up you idiot, the pipes in the ceiling had no insulation and now they have burst all over our dinner. You better get over here now and fix it!!” I could not even begin to imagine what the guy on the other end of the phone was thinking as she continued to rant and rave into the phone. He had managed to get himself into a whole mess of trouble now with the pipe breakage and all. He did not do the right building construction job in the walls and, for that reason, Mom was not going to settle for anything less then a perfect job.Mom always wanted everything to be absolutely perfect which did not exclude her children. She could dress us up the way she wanted, when she wanted, how she wanted, but when it came to dressing the children, there was no inkling of care how we felt, or had any feedback or suggestions or whatnot, on the outfit she had chosen. That simply was not an option, anytime, never or ever. When she bought my clothes, there were only a few places that she went to shop which were primarily A&S, Macys, and, at times, the other high fashion shops in the area. I only wanted to wear blue jeans but she would not allow me to dress in that type of casual fashion. It was totally and completely unacceptable to her. That would be dressing down as she saw it. She continued to hold this notion even when I dressed myself and attended high school. I was totally driven insane by what she thought of others, how she viewed them and how she saw their images only in her eyes. She was extremely judgmental to the point that I just wanted to tell her to shove her clothes up her *****. It so annoyed the life out of me as far as what I should wear and should not wear.For now, I was a teenager so I had gotten myself a job and was never around. Who would want to be around to hear that crap day after day? I sure did not want to hear it but I was stuck in a family that was filled with people that didn’t even know who they were. The only real person I ever knew who for real was Dad. He would come to see us even if there was a blizzard storming violently outside. Now, that is a true dad. He never let anything stop him, no matter what, not under any condition. I have no idea what Mom put him through. Deep down, he is far better without her in his life. She is the purest form evil down to the bone.At sixteen, I had a sweet sixteen party. I invited all the people I could think to invite and, of course, and they all came. Some of those were bad kids and they tried to steal from Stepfather and Mom. They did get caught in the act trying to run away with some coins that were very valuable. However, I never ever heard the end of that one, either. Its not as if I sat there, tapped my friends’ shoulders, and said to them that they should go rob my family while at the party. Hello, who would do that? Not me. I’ve figured out in life, you cannot win with some people. I did the best to survive in a place that was hard to survive in at all. It was living with people who (I don’t know why) would fly off the handle, throw ***** or try to hit each other. I have no clue most, if not, all of the time the reasons why and it doesn’t matter, anyhow. Cops were always at the house for one thing, or another. It got very old, real fast.I will never ever, forget this occasion, ever. One time, Mom and Stepfather got into it my, going round and round with each other. Stepfather had enough being at our home and wanted to leave the house for good. He planned to take my little brother Mitchell, his son, with him. Mom threw herself on the hood of his car being dramatic as she always was demonstrating. She must have thought she was Joan Crawford. She was wearing a see-through night gown. Things continued to get worse, and then the police came as things had escalated to the point that they were definitely needed. A crowd of neighbors had started lining the street amongst other things as well. What fun was this for any of us to watch as kids watching their parents behaving badly like this? She adamantly did not want Stepfather to take Mitchell any where. My thoughts were, “Why the hell do you care? You don’t really care about anyone but yourself. So, why do you care?” Just another thing she did to people, to control them like conducting an orchestra. I did not like him at all, stepfather, but I can relate with why no one wants to be with her as she is just a controlling freak. If you do not believe, or agree with, what she thinks and says, then she has judged & juried you as a no-good person. What sort of a life is that for anyone? All of this was just too bizarre to imagine, to even consider, this could be real - living in a household with people who were of the belief that throwing things, plates and cups, and anything else for that matter, was to show the other person that they were the one in control. That is a total whack job. Plain and simple.One time when I was about 10 or 11 years-old, someone stayed at the house to babysat me. I think it was a cousin of stepfather. I can not really remember my age when that happened. But, I sure do remember the event very clearly as if was not all that long ago. It seems this person who was watching us decided to lie. After being accused of doing this thing that I didn’t even do, I was taken out of my bed upon the return of stepfather and Mom. I was asked what had happened. I guess they wanted to hear my story or version. I explained but, of course, it was not believed what I said. It was accepted what was said by that older person telling this lie of a story about me. Stepfather began to beat the living daylights out of me. I still don’t know for what reason he punished me so severely. Nonetheless, this person had lied to him and I got the beating part out of it. He hit me so hard all over that I could not move, and I had wet my pants, as well. Guess what? Mom just stood there, said nothing at all and let him continually beat me. Not a word, nothing. She just stood there, in awe, as I was beat to bits by this man, stepfather. I hated him. He had no right to even touch me.You can bet your bottom dollar, when I planned to tell my own father, Dad, has was not going to be happy about this. I did tell him and he was not happy, at all. When he came to pick us up, he became livid when I told him. He was going to murder stepfather. He confronted Mom about it and she lied about the whole thing, as well. The babysitter said I had done something that I never did that night I was watched. I can not remember what it was that the babysitter said I had done. Mom could care less about what happened to me. Karma is going to suck her up one day and make her pay back all her nasty mistakes she did to me. I hope she begs for forgiveness; I will never give her any, no matter what, never. She has screwed my life up. I took how she was as someone and used as I knew I did not ever want to be like, or resemble her. No way, no how.I have had many talks with many people. Many have said they cannot believe I have survived what has happened to me. Many would have given up and tried to kill their self. I believe from this lifetime experience, it has made me a strong person. I have always had this strength or I would never have survived that household from day one, ever. It took endurance, resilience and continual strength to hold on, and faith to get through each and every day.I disliked going to high school as I had a learning disability. I was made fun of by so many people, being taunted and laughed at, which made it all the more harder returning back to school each day. Gym class did not make it any easier, either. That is, unless we played field hockey because I loved that sport. Gymnastics was the very hardest and nearly impossible so I never went to those classes. In my senior year, I went to the gym about 5 times a day when it was the field hockey. I got my own karma, too. But it was okay. I did not have to perform on those darn poles. The ones that you needed to swing around and around on, the parallel poles. I did do the other things on the other gym equipment like the balance beams, pommel horse, volt, etc. I spent additional months in the gym to make up for that lost time so I could graduate with my class. Now that I think about it, I should have gone to class but I hated those stupid poles ones where you swung around and around.

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