When I was five years old, I used to like to go to my neighborhood park with my grandma and I always used the swings. She would take me because my parents were busy at work. While I had fun, my grandma would watch me since she didn't know how to use her cell phone. When her eyes were off me, I would get into trouble. I once pushed an older kid off of the swings. He was angry and chased me all around the park. He didn’t stop until my grandma had us leave the park. The boy threatened me and said that the next time he saw me, he would make my face look like a dog's. I laughed and went home. I know how to fight and I was ready to see him the next time we went. Unfortunately, two days later my grandma had a heart attack while she slept. My parents rushed her to the hospital. She was pronounced dead the following morning. I heard my mother crying while my dad comforted her. I asked what happened and she told me my grandmother died. I cried but I knew I was never going to the park again because there was no one to take me. She was a special person in my life. We loved her. I was used to my grandma waking me up for school or for breakfast. I also liked when she bought me stuff when we went to the store. I will miss the fun activities I did with my grandma.

It's been 9 years since I went to the park with her. I have changed my behavior. Like my grandma said to me “we grow older and when we grow we change the way we act, look, and like but sometimes we just have to change to move on in life and to succeed”. My grandma was a very poetic person. She would always read poems in her free time. Her words changed me deeply. I used to be a troublemaker and an irresponsible kid. I took her advice after she died. I changed. I was being nicer. I was more mature and not starting problems with everyone.

She changed me a lot and made me start to read poems, but I stopped two months after she died because I knew I had to let go of her somehow. So I stopped reading poems. However, a poem by Leo Marks really reminds me of her because it says “The life that I have/ is all that I have/ and the life that I have/ is yours/ the love that I have/ of the life that I have/ Is yours and yours and yours/ a sleep I shall have/ a rest I shall have/ yet death will be but a pause/ for the peace of my years/ in the long green grass/ will be yours and yours and yours''. This motivates me because, in the end, we don't have much time in life. Instead, I am using my time for good. I am helping my family instead of making trouble. I try to support them. Sometimes I help translate for my mom or clean the whole house with my dad. Sometimes I think about how bad I was in the past but I remember something, but I can hear the words my grandma told me, “Remember to focus on the future, not the past”. The confidence and the advice that she told me changed me. That's how people change, even me.

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