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Madison Daniels
UWRIT 1101
Professor Blandford
Student Literacy Memoir
15 October 2015
At the age of sixteen I was advised, Educated minds are the most dangerous mind you
can encounter in life, by my grandfather. This man, in my eyes, was undoubtedly the most
literate and intelligent man I have ever met. The type of man who would indulge himself in a
book on any topic pertaining to an expedition on the back porch of our beach house and help
himself to a cup of a fourth of water with some Jack Daniels on the rocks. I looked up to my
grandfather, Tommy Boyer Daniels, as if he was the greatest and most intelligent man to walk
the earth other than my father. He was the type of adult who encouraged me endlessly to read
books.
During the summer I would always go down and spend time with my two grandparents,
my fathers parents, who have a beachfront home on Topsail Island. Walking to the mini puttputt course down the street was something I did every Friday night to get two scoops of ice
cream. One night was different though, and this night I was pretty upset about not getting the
paycheck I had really hoped for, and I met a kid named Daniel. This guy was so educated in
every area of conversation I had tried to bring up in our night on that ole putt-putt course
I had no idea how many people were this intelligent in the world but as far as I distinguished
there were only 3, my grandfather, my father, and this random kid named Daniel, who I had just
met. Conversing with him and my grandfather made me feel like my terminology was so

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constrained that I was almost talking like someone who had never experienced the creativeness
of a book in their life.
The following day, after that stellar night of losing ourselves in nervous chit chat, I took
my light blue Beach Cruiser and strolled down to the Bookstore across the street from the puttputt course. Kyle saw me entering Quarter moon, which was in fact the island bookstore, and
inquired what specific novel I was eager to find. I stated to him, I have no idea, but I want
something along the lines of a love story with big vocabulary words! He smiled at me and said
Have you ever heard of the book called If I Stay written by Gayle Forman? With a shy,
discreet response of something under my breath I murmured, No, I have not, then shadowed
him inside and around the Quarter Moon bookstore. How did he know of the perfect book to
pick out for me, and why was he so quick to choose this one? Was he forming some sort of
assumption on me that I am one of those girls who is wishy-washy and always threatens to leave
the boyfriend or what was this book going to be about?
I squashed those thoughts as soon as possible, grabbed the book, ordered my vanilla iced
chai latte smoothie and we left Quarter Moon. We walked down together to the Jolly Roger Pier
right on the beach extending out straight into the water, and he held my hand the entire way. I
felt like my face was on fire with how hard I was blushing. What do I do or say? He pulled out
a brown leather case that protected the same book he just told me to buy and we read together on
that pier from around noon till the pier lights came on and our eyes started to strain from reading
so much. How did this book make me feel so intrigued? Was it the reason he was sitting in front
of me reading it with me and being so curious as to how he felt and what he took from the book?
Was he smiling at me reading what he previously read wondering the same thing? Did he know

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how I was feeling when I read each romantic scene? Life was leaving me wound up in the
concept of a love story for my own experiencing, and I was caught in a whirlwind of confusion.
As we read, the sunset was slowly going down and I looked up from our book and saw
him looking right at me. Daniel told me about more romantic novels he had read and
experiences he learned from each new or old literacy that he had read through any of his school
classes coupled with what he was reading for fun. After talking about high school for a short
while, we came to the discover we actually went to the exact same one and Daniel was actually
going to be transferring there as a sophomore this year so we were going to be both going to high
school together next year. Was this newfangled thing real and how was the book we were reading
going to turn out? This moment in time captured my full attention, and held my five senses
extensively aware of what was encompassing me. My eyes, drawn towards the pages of the
book which separated our voices from being audible. My ears, listening to crashing waves as
they racked up against the sandy beaches of Topsail Island. I could taste the salt in the air along
with the wind, that was submerged in basically salt as well, while it tickled the hairs on the back
of my neck. All I wanted to do left was touch him, I was so cold by now and I needed body
heat. We were captivated, this was it. I found my secret fancy for books, and they were romance
novels. Anything from then on that was in the form of a love story, I was reading it. This book
in particular though, this book was and always will be my muse. Reading had never clicked for
me, I never felt smart enough to carry a conversation until I became truly literate. If I had never
read If I Stay my vocabulary would have never expanded, I would have never realized of a
homeless romantic I am, and I would have never known of this beautiful world of literacies.
As the summer came to an end, Daniel and I had to return to Raleigh for school to start
again. I went to the first football game, and Daniel was playing defensive end. Leesville 4-

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Jordan High school 1. It was the best time of year to reunite with all the friends you did not get
to really see over the summer. I finally found one of my best guy friends, Nick. Now we had
seen each other over the summer a few times but now it was school time and we were so pumped
to be at this game and see everyone. It was about 20 minutes until the game was going to end
and Nick had already been out past his curfew so he had to go home. In order to get home he
had to ride his moped back to Brier Creek which was a pretty long drive but being the crazy man
that is Nick he did not bother anyone and said his goodbyes and left. Little did we know that
was the last time we would see Nick ever again. Standing next to him in the hospital felt like my
world was crashing down around me. Never would I have thought I would of connected to If I
Stay in this way. That my best friend Nick on full life support and incapable of forming even a
sentence would be in the bed in front of me. Never would I have thought that I would be holding
his hand three days before his parents decided it was best to just let him go so he would not be in
pain any longer. Never would I have known I would be going through the loss of a close friend
at such a young age. After his funeral I could not function as well as I used to and my grades
slowly began to drop in school and in dance I began slacking as well as my attendance in my
daily classes. Daniel being the sweetheart gentleman and boyfriend that he was, brought me the
book A Walk to Remember one gloomy rainy afternoon when I was feeling especially low. The
book is a storyline about the main character losing someone close to him which is the other main
character who he finds out he loves very much. This is considerably alike the book If I Stay
which I ended up reading again and again because that book truly helped me back on my feet.
To this day romance novels are the only book I can form real connections to and I am so glad I
found my muse for books so I can grow as a reader and writer in my natural sense of it all. After
all reading and writing is the process of how we process information in our mind, learning

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experiences, and relative life situations and put them forth through our writing and social skills.
Reading helped me a lot that year, overcome many obstacles that I, myself, did not think I was
going to overcome. I am grateful for my grandfathers push, my boyfriend Daniels patience,
and the love of those who supported me through all the ups and downs of my life. It has made
living such a beautiful ride.