Personal Narrative: To Be The Only Girl

I was squirming around with butterflies in my stomach sitting in the passenger seat of my dad’s giant Dodge Ram pick-up truck on the way up to middle-of-nowhere upstate New York. It was going to be my first time driving an actual go-kart, a kart that could go much faster than any Spongebob-themed ones at any amusement park. As I was sitting there, my dad was telling me that, no matter what, it was important that I was having fun, and to not be discouraged because he knew that I was going to be the only girl. Sure enough, I was the only girl. My story is not unique because there are millions of girls, young ladies, and women in our country alone who take part in activities that society has deemed more appropriate for men, an example being Danica Patrick. Girls who like cars or watching football or girls want to be a computer programmer or engineer fall into this category. I was not a stranger to being a little different than many of my friends because I was one of those millions of girls who like cars. However, I was not prepared to receive the looks of judgement from the other boys in the
Unfortunately, the boys kept zipping by me which was incredibly discouraging. However, the last lap of the first round, I made sure to go the fastest I could by pushing the limits of my comfort zone, and I passed one of the boys. For rounds after that, I was so comfortable with the speed that I often passed the other drivers. There was even a moment where I passed a boy because my form was better than his around a turn. When I was driving, much of my improvements were driven by my want to prove to the boys that I could drive as well as they could. I was focused on doing my best, but also on enjoying the time on the track. On the way home from the raceway, I could not stop talking about how much I enjoyed driving a go-kart and asking when we could go