The Common Application essay guidelines are as follows: Please write an essay (250 words minimum) on a topic of your choice or on one of the options listed below. This personal essay helps us to become acquainted with you as a person and student, apart from courses, grades, test scores, and other objective data. It will also demonstrate your ability to organize your thoughts and express yourself.
The topic I chose was: Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.
Keep in mind this is a first draft, and I feel like I have a great topic but I could be expressing it better. I'm also planning on significantly shortening my essay. Also tell me what you think of the tense changes I used: I got a little creative in the organization, and I want to make sure it's not confusing. Thanks so much in advance for the suggestions/comments; I appreciate them! :]
The cool night air swirls around me, a little too cool for comfort. I kneel before a small paper bag, filled with sand and a small, unlit candle. Everyone walks around the track during this part of The American Cancer Society's Relay For Life: the Luminaria Ceremony, where candles are lit to honor or remember those afflicted by cancer. Reaching over, I light the Luminaria and the name scrawled on the cover is illuminated: Rose.* I sit there on the asphalt of the school track, staring into the soft candlelight. My memories take me back to a time when I seemed like a different person, in reality only several months before.
I nervously stepped into the room towards which the nurse at the station had directed me. It had only been a month since I had decided to become a companionship volunteer for terminally ill patients, but I had finished my training quickly. The hospice resembled a dormitory and smelled like a hospital. Somewhere down the hall, I heard the clatter of a nurse with a cart stocked with foods or medicines for the residents. I made my way over to the bed by the window, where a weak but alert woman watched my every movement. I cleared my throat and began, "Hello! Let me introduce myself; I'm a volunteer and I'll be coming by to keep you company. Well, it sure is nice to meet you, Ms.-" "Rose," she interrupted with a grin, "Call me Rose."
For the next few months I spent at least an hour a week with Rose. Rose had colon cancer, and she knew she had less than six months to live. Her favorite movie was Titanic, her favorite color was pink, and she loved trees and flowers. I painted her fingernails when her hands were too unsteady, alternating from red to purple to pink. When she had problems reaching her cheap radio from her hospital-style bed, I brought in some Mozart CDs that we could listen to on the weekends. Rose told me about her family, who didn't live far from me. I told her about school, orchestra, and sports practice; she told me about her high school days and her passion for dancing. The more time I spent in that hospice, the more I enjoyed being a volunteer. The nurses waved when I passed them in the halls on weekends and even the other patients recognized my face.
My world changed one day when I was contacted by a nurse who informed me that Rose had passed away. I was fighting tears within seconds of receiving the news. It was the first real sense of loss I had felt in my entire life, and I suffered from intense grief for days. The next weekend, when it was time for me to visit other patients, I lay on my bed staring at the plain ceiling of my room, pensive. I didn't know if I could continue seeing patients, if I could relive the pain every time one died. I thought of my volunteer training, and it was at that moment that I knew the best I could do for Rose was to be strong for the others who were close to her and for myself. I wiped my tears, grabbed my ID off of my desk, and stepped outside. "For me to be mature, this is what Rose would have wanted," I thought to myself.
I repeat those words to myself now, "In loving memory of Rose... It's what she would have wanted." I stand up from the Luminaria and continue my walk around the track. I think, "I will visit my patients tomorrow; I have no regrets," and I cannot help but smile.
*Real name not used for confidentiality purposes.
Wow. I really like your essay. I can totally relate because I volunteer at a hospital as well. I think you should focus more on the impact of the situation on you.
Many of us have probably experienced death of another at one point in our lives, but how has that changed who YOU are? How has it changed your outlook on life, etc.
I hope that helps!
Do you have any more specific suggestions on how to do that? Another draft of mine had more detail pertaining to the death's impact on me, but it turned out to be a lot of telling and cliches. I'm not quite sure how to find the middle ground there. thanks for the advice, though!
