Narrative Essay

The Second Year Round

Nicole DuFault
Professor Wieland
English 900-17
February 11th, 2010

Narrative Essay---Personal Experiences

The back of the warehouse looked the same from the year before; with the folding chairs in the far right corner that were by the long wooden table and everything for the CarnEvil clowns at the opposite end. CarnEvil was a 3D carnival themed maze that held clowns that were ‘no longer funny or happy, but psycho, demented, and over the top.’  The maze was one out of the six mazes home to the Valleyscare Haunt, a Halloween event that’s been held every year since 2006 at the amusement park Valleyfair in Shakopee,MN. As I observed everybody in the back room, there were familiar faces and fresh new faces sitting on some of the folding chairs in the job fair group for Valleyscare.                                            
        I took an empty chair closest to me and caught eye to eye with Blake, a previous co-worker from last year’s Haunt. We shared quick smiles and a small staring contest, chuckling softly to myself as my former ‘Head Master’ bosses Marshall and Kim started to make the introductions of what they expected from their employees. The thought about having a job and being back for a second year around left me impatient for next weekend, starting up on a Saturday for the first day. Of course, the impatience had been there for 10 months. The familiar smells of the warehouse and scenery of yellow and red stripes weren’t in my mind’s eye, the songs for the maze not being as usual as they used to be whenever 7:00 PM would hit.                                                    
     Maybe I’m weird for enjoying my seasonal job so much, but what the experience left on me made it worth it, even if the ride to Shapokee took an hour and a half from where I live, which is in Ramsey. Thankfully the invention of car pooling was made up and for the fact that my brother and his friend Greg deciding to work at Valleyscare. It was a nice relief from having my friend Megan having to almost fall asleep at the wheel at midnight every night last year when we both worked for the first time.                                    
   Now taking a look back to the past two years,  it’s been a rewarding experience and a fun time. It may sound like I’m over exaggerating a bit, and maybe I am. But there were a few things to learn while I was working at Valleyscare. For example, having to be vociferous and on edge for a shy person as a security guard, or as our title says, Black Out. In CarnEvil, there wasn’t a lot of people that were full time Black Outs, only being part time Black Outs / Monster or just being a full time monster. The other full time security guard besides me was a woman named Judy. When the month started to roll into October, the days got colder and the two of us would switch every hour being up front clicking people into the maze.                        
     Clicking people in wasn’t hard, having to count how many people came into CarnEvil that day and what the total was at the end of each hour.  On our busiest days, it was hard to keep track of how many people came through because of the large waves of groups that would come in. Those days would usually be Saturdays, and the numbers would double. But nevertheless, there were always people that stood in the front of the maze, memorized and dizzy by the neon splatter paint and bright orange strip spinning around them.                    
        On one of the weekends at my seasonal job, it got really busy. People weren’t moving fast enough across the bridge in the spinning tunnel, holding up and crowding the line that was forming behind them. I had to yell at them to keep going, and they wouldn’t move for a few seconds until one of the clowns scared them or when they really listened to me. While I was up in the front clicking people on that busy weekend, there was a man in a wheel chair that came in with two of his family members with him. When he was crossing the bridge, his front wheel got stuck on the edge. Filled with panic, I had to shouted at Matt, who was one of the clowns and who let people into the maze that night, to get Kim.  A few minutes later, Kim came running through the maze, helping the man out with his front wheel. The man was fine, yet I asked him if he was ok anyways and watched him go through the maze with his family members as more people started to flow in.   
     Not every weekend day was crazy, and my co-workers had a lot of fun scaring each other while working, even trying to scare me while I was at my other posts. Andrew and Blake were the main guys that attempted to scare me, Andrew succeeding only by a little bit one Saturday night. I was in one out of the four sections that the Black Outs had to be at, being in Area 2. While my eyes looked around to see if anything was happening, nothing was going on and I had slightly zoned out. As I turned my head around to take a look at the entry way into the maze in Area 2, Andrew had popped out with a metal pot top, slamming it against the wall nearby. The noise made my head snap in the direction where he was, and my mouth gaped at him as he laughed at my expression. Andrew couldn’t stop himself from laughing, and then asked for a high five while I still gaped at him, giving him the high five with surprise.                    
     There are countless of memories and more life experiences that I could share, but the paper would have more pages and there are too many to tell. Helping out as a security guard made me feel good about what I did, and it kept me on my toes for the worth while ride. I can’t thank this chapter of my life enough for letting me find the seasonal job unexpectedly on the main Valleyfair website, and for forming friendships along the way.

“Seize the moment of excited curiosity on any subject to solve your doubts; for if you let it pass, the desire may never return, and you may remain in ignorance."
-William Wirt

Author's Note

This is a narrative essay that I had to do for my college English class. We had to write an experience that we had that we wanted to write about and what we learned from it, ect. xD

I had to rewrite some of the essay because I wasn't pleased with how it had turned out. But I know I lagged on the last part of it. I'm just very impatient and wanted to get going on my reading log. Plus, I couldn't think of anything else to put in there. I'll ask for more help on my essay when I get the chance. But for now, here it is. I know I should put more examples in it,though....

And the paragraphs turned out weird because I had this on different writing program than what would be on my laptop.