Personal Narrative: How Payon Changed My Life

For most people, having your face pushed into a cake doesn’t make your eyes go puffy. Unfortunately for me, that cake had chocolate icing, and it triggered an allergic reaction. After all, I’ve been allergic to chocolate my entire life. As a child, I was forced to watch as my younger brother received a large chunk of my Halloween spoils year after year, solely because I couldn’t eat it. I believed I was an anomaly until I met David Kim, who shared two major traits with me: our last names and our allergies. As I discovered that day, it’s always interesting how life’s circumstances turn out. Sometimes, we get the short end of the stick; sometimes, we are blessed with opportunities that others cannot grasp. Occasionally, life throws us an opportunity
to expand upon our mindsets and deepen our worlds, allowing us to probe through unknown and previously unconsidered territories. This kind of spark can conceal itself in the most harmless and unimportant of events, but once unearthed it can change lives. One such seemingly harmless, unimportant event occurred in the winter of 2011, when Payton Fong enlightened our class with a short story about a man named Bob.
Back then, it would be accurate to compare me to the stereotypical slacker boy: lazy, unmotivated to succeed, devoid of life goals, and addicted to video games. Ultimately, Payton changed all of that, catalyzing my past self’s gradual transformation and growth that helped sculpt me into who I am today. Of course, at the time I didn’t realize any of that; the only thing I knew was that writing sounded fun, and that I was going to try writing a fan-fiction of Payton’s
story. I had never really thought about writing before, even though it was tightly intertwined throughout my life. While I had always been an avid reader, I never stopped to think about how the book had been written. Some ethereal obstacle was blocking my view, completely covering my mind’s eyes and leaving it oblivious to the possibilities. Thanks to this inexplicable blockade, I was completely incapable of connecting the process of writing a story with the countless hours I spent chatting with my elementary school friends, where we lost all track of time developing a lore and backstory for our sworn enemy, Dr. Evil, and his Inner Council of generals.
This blindfold stayed firmly wrapped around me until Payton’s story tore it apart, leaving fifth-grade me to gawk at this new, alien world that was hiding under my nose for the past decade.
Hypnotized by my discovery, I recklessly dove into the uncharted territory of writing. But only a foolish adventurer charges out into the wilderness unprepared. Though my “Alternate Bob” fan-fictions were well received by Payton and the class, they were essentially a poorly written rip-off of the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time plot, albeit unintentionally. I spent the next few years blindly pacing through the writing world, gradually honing my skills through practice. Even then, it took me two novellas, a handful of short stories, and three incomplete projects before I finally managed to get a grip on writing and complete my longest story yet: an 84,000 word draft. Even through all its setbacks, writing gave my life newfound purpose. I was no longer the slacker boy drifting aimlessly through life; for the first time, I could confidently answer my father when he asked me what I wanted as a job. Inspiration began to materialize in the form of a spiritual muse, dragging my thoughts to and fro as it danced from idea to idea, from world to world. I took on the mantle of a reporter, providing snapshots of these fantastical, hidden worlds in the form of a
story. The easiest way to identify a mental blindfold is through an unexpected catalyst. As a recipient of one such spark, it is my duty to continue writing in the hopes that I can one day act as a catalyst myself, unraveling a blindfold and changing someone’s life.