Middle School Student Award-Winning Essays. Essence Collection

Author: Yingcai Composition Research Institute
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-07-01
Features: I’m a girl who’s obsessed with money. An anonymous person once wrote: There’s a girl like me—she seeks warmth in clothes and sustenance in food, and her greatest hobby is reading and collecting books. But she has an extraordinary craving for money, sometimes no less intense than Grandfather Goriot’s obsession with gold. And she always dreams of the day when she’ll be rich. Don’t you think she’s a bit unbelievable? This girl is me, and honestly, there’s nothing extraordinary about it.
I don’t know if you believe it, but even before I started school, I was given the nickname “a girl obsessed with money.” Back then, my father was involved in scrap recycling, serving as a liaison to “transform decay into magic.” “Like father, like son,” I always played on the ground, carrying a small cloth bag, picking up things while walking and muttering, “Bag strips for one cent each, bones for nine cents, waste toothpaste wrappers.” Whenever I thought of my mother’s relieved smile because of my “maturity,” I completely ignored all the judgmental glares and whispers of adults and children.
After starting school, I was exceptionally good at math. Hey, you’d be surprised, but spending all day with my father collecting and selling scrap gave me a deep appreciation for the “clack-clack” of the abacus, which greatly benefited my mathematical thinking. To tell you the truth, I even sold paintings—collages made from exquisite cigarette boxes, sugar wrappers, and other impromptu creations. “What use is the money from selling paintings? Buy books at the Xinhua Bookstore!” That’s how my classmates and I, through this method, read great books like How the Steel Was Tempered, The Little Mermaid, and The Necklace, which, though not fully understood at the time, benefited us lifelong.
Some say, “Imitation is the deepest form of admiration.” I deeply relate to this. Imitating the activities I loved at school, I wanted to organize a sports day for children in our neighborhood. The biggest challenge was funding. Ask my parents? I quickly shook my head and said no. During lunchtime, I took the children out to collect apricot pits, and then spent the evening smashing them to sell to the recycling station. The sports day was a great success. The enthusiastic atmosphere attracted and inspired the parents and grandparents of the athletes, who eagerly cheered for their children. The prizes weren’t expensive, but they were earned through our own hard work!
A few days ago, I visited a neighbor, and he proudly showed me the prize I had personally awarded him back then—a pencil and two notebooks. He said it was a once-in-a-lifetime honor he would never forget. Truly, I was moved to tears. Money can be used to do many meaningful things, right?
Not long ago, one morning, I encountered “Rice Bin” (my school bell ringer back then). He married a mentally disabled wife in his forties and, like herding ducks, hurried three ragged and dirty sons to school. The children stopped walking, staring straight at the school bags of the children going to school. My heart ached terribly. Poor children. I hope my wish comes true—I will give everything I have in the future to you. Come on, let’s all look forward to the day when I’m rich. Then, I will make sure you all have beautiful school bags, and every child like you will carry one!
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