Sample College Admission Essay: Influential - Continued

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I looked up and saw all the eyes on me. The nervous feelings that traveled with me from my seat to the podium were now long gone. The words I had written flowed easily from my mouth. I wanted everyone, even those who had never seen the Memorial, to feel the same sentiments that I had felt. I don’t remember people clapping after I finished reading my essay. Maybe they were too moved to make a motion; maybe I was too moved to hear them.

As my family and I were walking back to our car, the VFW President stopped me. He told me that he had served in Vietnam and that some of his friends’ names appeared on that wall. He was one of the contest judges, and he had found it difficult to complete reading my composition from behind his tears. He had to give it to his wife to finish. When he concluded his story I replied, “Thank you,” but I was completely dumbfounded as to what to say. The idea that he was moved by my simplistic writing made me realize that I was a writer! I had reached into someone’s internal self, touched it, and left a mark.

Reading my essay to everyone was one of the most memorable moments in my life. That day I realized something very valuable about the power of the written word—if you place the right words in the right order, you can change people’s lives! Despite my many remarks to adults that I was going to be an engineer or scientist, I knew deep down that I really wanted to continue writing. To remain satisfied, I would have to publish my writings. What good is a powerful statement if it isn’t heard or read? The answer was clear: I would become a journalist.

Sometimes I wonder where my road to the future would be leading me if that man had never approached me after my oration that day. I never would have known that someone had listened and cried because of my words. “Memories in Granite” would have been pushed into a manila folder and never have been thought of. The only time I would have even remembered the essay would have been while sipping my refreshing—and free—Coca-Cola.