@font-face { font-family: “Times New Roman”; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: “Times New Roman”; }table.MsoNormalTable { font-size: 10pt; font-family: “Times New Roman”; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }

          My life had always been the same old routine.  Each year passing like a revolving door, in quick, sudden spurts.   Now though, everything has changed for the better.  I have people in my life in which I cannot live without anymore, despite the fact that there have been plenty of instances that have endangered their wellbeing.  We have all been brushed by death, threatening our tight bonds with one another, but I know now that I have a way to prevent that.  I have a way to save someone instantaneously, with hardly any effort at all.  However, I will save that explanation for a little later in the story. First, I should probably start out by telling you more about myself.           

My name is Alaina Steerwell.  I live in a town called Walker, in the state of Minnesota.  Minnesota is my life, I love it’s cold, stinging winters, followed by its hot, humid summers.  I have lived here all my existence, in a small house only fit for a few people.  But that’s how it is now, my mother Elizabeth and I have been abandoned. 

You see, my father died when I was just 13 years old.  He played a pretty big role in my life.  We did absolutely everything together, sat out in a boat on Leech Lake for six hours until I finally caught my first fish (and it was only a stinking sunfish), worked on putting together an old sailboat that he had discovered the pieces to one day on a beach, and my most favorite memory, we would read together every night. All of these things were done all the way up until his death.  He would do the best voice imitations of the characters that it would keep me giggling until I finally fell asleep.  He had also been a great cook, and I still to this day cannot match his perfection.  No lies, he was excellent at pretty much everything.

Lastly, he helped me survive through school.  Without the memories of my dad, I don’t know how I could have gotten through middle school.

          I had been at the same school for too long, and it got pretty dull.  I didn’t really have any friends because most of the girls were always very different from me.  They were more of the girlie-type.  They thought that putting on ten pounds of makeup on every morning made them look “stunning”.  Still, the guys were all over them like bees attracted to honey.  I don’t think I was ever jealous, more of the fact that I didn’t intend on having a guy actually like me for who I was.  I was willing to accept the truth; that they went for girls that looked like a fish (and I was quite okay with that).   There wasn’t anything special about me in the least, but that didn’t mean I didn’t like the person I was.