The Art of Eating Spaghetti

In “The Art of Eating Spaghetti”, an excerpt from Growing up, Russell Baker explains his fascination in writing after they tackled the informal essay Mr. Fleagle gave them. The young writer would have never thought he would have found his love for writing during his eleventh grade year of high school. While looking over the essay topics he was given , Baker saw a title that caught his eye, “The Art of Eating Spaghetti’.While writing this essay he felt overwhelmed because at first he was writing it for his own enjoyment. Using a vivid flashback , Baker tells about when he and his family got together one evening for supper and ate spaghetti together. “ Spaghetti was an exotic treat in those days” (Baker). When Baker got into class one day,he was surprised at the fact that Mr. Fleagle had chosen to read his essay aloud to the class. After this Baker realized for the first time that he may have a future as a writer thanks to Mr.Fleagle. His opinion about Mr. Fleagle changed from this day forward.

On May 5,2011 my little cousin Maliyah Jones, also known as Moosie, was born two or three months premature. After she was born, she was immediately taken from her mother and put into the NICU, where she stayed for a little over four months. We were told that she was deaf and blind and that she would never be able to walk nor talk. She was a premature baby who had strokes and seizures in the womb because her mother was doing drugs throughout her pregnancy. She is unable to eat on her own, so she has to have a feeding tube. Moosie now has a caregiver 24 hours of each and every day.

My first time caring for Moosie on my own was a bit scary and nerve wracking. I was sixteen years old caring for a child who was disabled and could not care for herself. Being completely unaware of how to care for Moosie is what scared me the most. We were lying down getting ready for a nap when Moosie began to shake repeatedly in my arms. I did not know what was happened, and I was scared, so I...