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My Life is a Big Cliché |
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Chapter 1: Saturday Mornings
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Jen walked into the library, just as she did every Saturday morning. Sighing, she walked towards the juvenile section, just as she did every Saturday morning. Then, just as she did every Saturday morning, she paused, turned around, and headed to the return slot in the wall. After sliding her book in and listening to the thud that told her it had landed in the return bin in the back room, she walked back to the juvenile section, just as she did every Saturday morning. My life is a big routine, Jen thought. The week begins Monday Morning at 7:00 AM and ends Sunday night at 9:00 PM. Every Saturday, I do the the exact same thing. My school day never varies and neither do my after school activities. She came to the beginning of the juvenile section and paused for a moment. "Even the books I read are the same story line," she said aloud. As she did, Ms. Danni, her favorite librarian, came out from behind a shelf. "What do you mean?" she asked. "Oh, nothing," Jen replied casually. "You wouldn't understand." Ms. Danni raised her left eyebrow at Jen, then walked away, muttering about how Jen would come around, she always did. Today, Jen added a twist to her Saturday morning. Instead of looking for books and then looking up new words in the dictionary, she looked for words first. There was a total of 5 dictionaries in the small-town library. Jen preferred to use the most recent edition from 1990. It was located on a podium in the back of the juvenile section. Once she got there, she thought for a moment. She had heard no new words that week, but she had heard some old ones, boring ones, words that were over used. Synonyms, Jen thought. That's what my life needs, more variety. With that she headed to the computer corner where the only thesaurus in the entire library was located. Now her only problem was, what did she want to look up? As she thought for a word, she absentmindedly turned the pages. Jen looked down and saw a word, and was a new and interesting word indeed. Cliché, Jen thought. She felt sure that she had heard the word before, but she was unsure of the meaning. It was times like these when Jen's Father's lame language arts lines could be useful: “Know your dictionary, inside and out.” “A thesaurus comes in handy when your vocabulary is dry and sandy.” “Language arts is the non-living man’s best friend.” Jen shook her head and shut the thesaurus without looking at anything other than the word cliché. She always hated the way her father fired language arts lines at her, especially when he rhymed, but it had helped her do better in school, especially in language arts. She came to the dictionary she always used and flipped to the C’s and then cliché. “Cliché,” she read aloud, but very quietly. Jen always read definitions out loud, though she wasn’t sure why.” ‘The same thing repeated over and over again.’ Interesting. That sounds like my life.”Jen closed the dictionary. She was ready to look for books. The third book she picked up had the same story line as all the others she had ever read. As random kid finds out that they have special powers and must save everyone. Jen was thinking that was cliché when she walked to a shelf she tried to avoid. It was where the same six books sat, unmoving, never checked-out, gathering dust and rotting away slowly. Jen almost walked away from the shelf, but she was determined to break her cliché of a life. So, she began looking at the titles. Well the one she could read anyways. The spines were old and cracked, and the only readable one was in as foreign language. Jen began tapping on one of the books while she thought of what to do next. Then the books fell over to reveal a 7th book on the shelf. UCK EVERLA TIN the cracked spine read in faded golden letters. That wad a;; there was on the entire cover. This has definitely broken my cliché, Jen thought. She placed her 1st 3 books on a cart where she knew that a cataloger would put them back on their rightful shelves. Then she took UCK EVERLA TIN off the shelf and blew the dust off the red cover. She headed to the checkout counter. Ms. Danni was there. As she scanned Jen’s book, She questioned her about earlier in the morning. “Care to tell me about earlier in the morning?”Ms. Danni inquired, being a nosy young woman. “Well, ma’am, I’ve just discovered that my life is a big cliché. Do you know what that means?” Jen asked. She loved it when she outsmarted adults, so she was hoping that Ms. Danni didn’t know. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I do know what that means.” “Oh, well; so I decided to break my cliché of a life and from now on, I will be doing things completely different.” “Oh? And what will you do?” “I don’t know.” With that said and done, Jen snatched up her book and marched outside to the bike rack. She unchained her bike, snapped on her helmet, place her book in the bike basket and headed home, just as she did every Saturday morning.
“Mom, I’m home!” Jen called. She had parked her bike in the backyard storage shed, just as she did every Saturday morning, and was coming into the kitchen through the back door when she called out. I don’t need to tell you that she did this every Saturday morning for about the sixth time, so I also won’t tell you that Jen and Mom had the following conversation every Saturday morning. “Watch Lily for me while I’m in the garden, okay, dear?” “Sure, Mom. Don’t call me dear. Want to know the book I got for the week?” “What book?” “UCK EVERLA TIN.” This is where the conversation begins to vary. “What?” “It’s an old book. See?” Jen held up the book for her mother to see. “Ooo, Tuck Everlasting! You’ll like this one, Jenny.” “Don’t call me Jenny,” Jen groaned. “Anyways, what’s it about?” “It’s about a family who drinks magical water that makes them live forever. No matter what happens to them, they never die.” “Cool!” “Uh-huh.” Jen headed for the stairs and climbed them to Lily’s room. She was talking to her stuffed animals as usual. “Hey, Lily, Mom’s in the garden and you know where I am.” “Okay, Jen.” Jen walked into her room across the hall, shut the door and began to work on her blog on the school’s website. Every student had one that only other students could access. Hers was lime green with neon pink and purple polka dots. ?The text was neon blue. Her picture resided at the top of the page next to her full name:
JENNIFER ELIZABETH
In the picture, her hair was in two, plain braids, her face freckled as ever and her purple glasses matched her braces perfectly. The main screen said: Hi, I’m Jen! My parents, little brother Jake Ryan, little sister Megan Lilian, and I live in a three-story house with two cats and a dog. Ali is my cat, Jojo is Lily’s cat, and Roscal is Jake’s dog. I like to read and play basketball. I play the clarinet and I recently joined the marching band. I’m almost 13. Hope you like the blog! There were pictures of the pets, her family, you know, that kind of stuff. Then there was a page with all of her pic’s, with captions, another page where you could listen to the music on her i-pod, another showing her calendar, and another where she recorded her day-to-day life and kids could email her. The school payed for it all, and it helped the students stay in touch when they weren’t in school. Jen downloaded her new TobyMac CD and some new pictures. Then she recorded her day so far and her new word. Ping! That meant one of her friends had just logged on. She clicked on the smiley in the corner of the page and Kay-lyn’s username popped up. Kay-lyn and Jen had been best friends since the day they were born! They IM’ed each other back and forth for a few minutes: kayln1212: wuz up? jenlizcal110011: same ol, same ol… u? Kaylyn1212:nuthin Jenlizcal110011:I went 2 de lib. As always. Kaylyn1212: wat book do u have 4 de week? Jenlizcal110011: Tuck Everlasting Kaylyn1212: I read dat book! It real good Jenlizcal110011:says u & mom K:yo mom is right J: I learned a new word K: tell me J: guess K: verb J: no K:adj? J: no K:o, I give up! J: come on, kay-lyn, u only guessed 2 times! K: ok, ok...is it a adv? J: no K:uh… a noun? J: yes!!! K: tell me what letter it start w/? J: not a vowel, before L, after b K: C? J: BINGO! K:wat’s the word? J: looks like clique K: is it pronounced click? J:no K:come on, tell me! I’m tired of guessing! J: cliché K:I like dat word! J: u know wat it means? K:ya J: my life is a big cliché K: ya, I know wat u mean J: your life seem like it 2? K: 3 words: tote-al-e J: lol K:=) J:(= K: im glad u my BFF J:right back atcha (x2) K:no, im gladder J:no, im gladder K:gladder than u x100=) J:(= x 1,000 K: x 1,000,000 J:x infinity!!! K: ooo, u got me there=( J:(= K:=) J: we should do somefin 2 break our cliche-like lives K:wat 2 do Jen? J:idk )= K:let’s think tonight and talk tomorrow J: k, @ 3? K: sound good! J: heart u! K: heart u! J:(= bye(= K:=)bye=)
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