Can you please give me some feed back on any or all of my essays? Likes/Dislikes? Thank you so much. I appreciate it dearly. Also, be as brutal as you need to be.
Some people categorize engineers as geeks or nerds. Are you a geek, nerd, or neither? Why?
On a positive standpoint, I'm completely literate with technology and have always been academically strong. I am addicted to learning. It doesn't matter the subject, just new knowledge. When people ask me if I like school I always say that I love it. I guess that makes me a geek. I'm constantly up for hours upon hours helping friends with their homework so they could understand what is so easy and fun in my eyes. When I moved to Chicago and transitioned to my new high school, I almost immediately made friends. I don't think I qualify as a nerd. I know how to balance a strong academic life with a perfectly healthy social life.
In a short paragraph, please briefly elaborate on one of your extracurricular activities or work experiences.
To be in the Peer Helpers club at my school, I was trained over the summer to be approachable, trustworthy, and warm to others. Now, during my lunch periods, I sit in the Peer Helpers lounge, waiting for students to come in and discuss anything they want. They could come in for a variety of reasons; such as, they are new to the school and do not have friends. In this case, Peer Helpers welcomes them in, by introducing them to new friends so they have a safe haven.
Now, for the meat and potatoes...
This is for the Common App: Discuss an accomplishment or event, formal or informal, that marked your transition from childhood to adulthood within your culture, community, or family.
I've been told I lived in eight cities and went to five schools before being homeschooled. Even though my mother doesn't have a degree, she loves education, culture and is a news-junkie. We went to museums, watched musicals, read newspapers and lived many different lives. We made a good team. We never lived anywhere more than two or three years. I was her "little man," an individual that she was honest with, regarding matters other adults hide from their children. She didn't believe in baby talking. We kept moving because Mom never had rent money. I lived with makeshift furniture. I learned a lot moving place to place, but it was difficult to develop an understanding of who I am and where I come from.
Raised by only my mom, I wondered what having a dad must be like. I imagined playing catch with a dad or watching football together. My mother doesn't like contact sports. I played tennis. I figure skated for five years, while my friends played ice hockey. I wore white girl's skates. She couldn't get a refund if we painted them black. I learned patience and tolerance but some lessons she couldn't teach me: how to shave, a man's perspective on dating and developing an understanding of cars. My mother tries very hard to be "Mom and Dad," but she's just my mom.
I lived with my biological deadbeat "donor" for a few months. He wouldn't marry mom. He tried committing suicide. I remember the blood and an ambulance. My mom won't talk about him except to say that he was a drug addict. He told my mom to tell me "he's dead." She loved him. God knows why? I was four years old, when he said to me, "You'll never see me again" and walked out. Frankly, I wouldn't recognize that man if I tripped over his heroin needles.
The real father figure behind the scenes was Rabbi Stephen Marcu, who I will always call Dad. I have vague memories of a townhome and one day getting a call from my sister. She said that she was walking with her two small children on a street, when she saw Dad lying on a bench. He was around 300 lbs. She thought he was a dead homeless man. She tried to wake him up and he didn't recognize her. Somehow he ended up living with us for a few months before dying. Dad was obese and always in pain, arthritic and diabetic. He couldn't walk more than a few steps and had cancer.
He loved me.
He died of "sudden death" with no life insurance. Rabbis buried him for free and he sadly has no headstone.
Mom and I had no money, no gas and no place to live so we slept in the car. I had horrible cramps in my legs, sleeping in that car. We ended up living in the religious part of Los Angeles, around La Brea and Beverly Boulevard. It was becoming more and more clear that the rabbis in that area wanted me to be a strict Orthodox Jew. Later, someone put us in a one-bedroom apartment in Beverly Hills, so we became modern-orthodox Jews. With no money for rent, we moved back to Chicago and became conservative Jews. My mother keeps the Jewish Sabbath. She drives me up a wall with religion. She has always been busy trying to transform me into who she believes I should be.
My mother loves living in the past.
I love looking to the future.
I'm looking forward to my independence in college. I will explore who I am, who I want to be and choose for myself, what I believe.
