My heart pounding, and despite the chill of the late autumn day I could feel little beads of sweat forming on my face. And as I was running I knew that this moment could change me as a person.
The day had started out like any other. I was at my friend's house playing video games. But after about two hours of vegetating in front of the television, we started to get restless. We went outside looking for some excitement, and unfortunatley we found it. A couple of houses down from his was a building site for a new house. He told me to follow him up the steep hill towards the house. As we were climbing the hill I can remember thinking to myself, "why are going there," and "what are we going to do there?" As we neared the peak of the hill I remember my friend saying, "pick up some good size rocks to throw." So I took this order thoughtless to what was about to come. As we peered towards the house in construction he pointed out a window to me. Then without any explanation he cocked his arm back and threw the rock towards the window with great force. As the rock was spinning through the air I cannot remember a thing except the visual picture of it. As it clanked of the siding of the house I heard a loud thud. Then he told me to throw mine, so we could see who can hit the window first. So without knowing my life would be changed by this one single throw of a rock, I cocked my arm back and released the rock. It struck the glass with a loud crack, and the glass shattered to bits. I then stood there pale faced and still, while my friend had alredy taken off running away. I saw a man come out of the house upset, and then I realized what I had to do. Run. So I ran faster than I had ever ran before with my mind running a thousan miles a minute. We ran back to his house and hid behind the couch. Then we heard the dreadful sound of the doorbell, only knowing that it was the construction worker. We knew we were on the verge of a long night with upset parents.
I tried to lie. The constuction worker and my parents confronted me, and I tried to make up a plausible story. Too bad my parents were too smart for that. I was then apporpiatley punished for the inccident. Shortly after this I started to act quite differently. I had realized that even though I was only eight that every action I take in life has potential consequences. I would stop and think to myself, "what would happen if I did this or I did that?" I learned that I cannot take everything others tell me to do for face value. That I had to think and do things for me and me only, and not to impress a peer. I learned that only I can decide what is right and what is wrong. This lesson that I learned the hard way when I was eight is used by me in every day life. This lesson will stay with me for the rest of my life, and it changed my way of thinking for the rest of my life. And I'll tell you something else eighty dollars for an eight-year-old to pay is not that cheap.