WilbuR

I had an adventure today. I hike through the trecherous woods across from my neighborhood. Nobody ever goes there because nothing is there and there is nothing to do. I had to go to a friends house so I cut through the woods because it is faster by like 20 minutes. He wondered how I got there so fast. I told him I drove, but obviously I hadn’t. My shoes were extremely muddy and my hair was soggy from the water off of the leaves. We laughed for a few minutes, thinking about something we did a few weeks back and I walked back home.

Fun In The Sun            One time I was out on Summersville Lake on Richie’s, my brother, boat and we were wakeboarding. It was the first time we had ever used the wakeboard. We were both terrible and could hardly get across the wake. The first time I got on, I got up and dropped over the monstrous wave Richie’s boat puts out. I rolled over the wave and dove the front end of the board into the smooth water. I was thinking in my mind “Damn this isn’t gonna feel good.” I smacked face first and felt the pain as I swam back to the top. Richie and his friends were dying laughing. They were all yelling “FACEPLANTTTT!” I laughed after I thought about Richie going on his turn.  I told him I was done and he strapped up on the board. I was already laughing because he couldn’t even stand up with it on. Knowing he was going to wipe out, I got out my camera and turned it on video. He tried so hard to get up but he kept falling forward and digging into the water.  Richie finally got up and everyone was already laughing on the boat. Miraculously, he didn’t fall for a long time. I was amazed when he did better than me and went across the wave a few times. He finally fell; he said “I’m getting old.”             The next day we headed out to the same spot to do a little more wakeboarding. We were pretty good now because we got the hang of it after a day’s of wakeboarding. I could jump half of the wake now and could do a little grab here and there. I went through a lot of face plants to get at the level I was at now. We both wake boarded side-by-side with two ropes and two wakeboards. I would go under his rope and he had the longer rope. I jumped over his rope one time and did a grab. We were being recorded too because everyone said I got so good in just one day. I did get tripped up on the rope once or twice slamming both of us into the thick wall of water. You will never know how hard it actually hurts to fall off until you actually do it. It feels like your running right through a wall. Sometimes you get lucky and land in a good position but if not you might be outta the water in a quick minute. My brother was still at the same level from yesterday. He didn’t really do much except yell at me to do tricks over his rope. They all suggested that I try to do a back flip but; I promised them I would do it next year. The peer pressure for doing tricks is quite intense. If you don’t do it, they will say you suck and you will be pain free. If I did do it though it would hurt for quite a while, and they would probably just die laughing because of how many times I wrecked. Some of the tricks I tried were tremendously stupid. I tried to do a 360 and got ¾ the way around and smack my back straight on to the wall of water. It took the breath out of me. After a few times, I got convinced to do another stupid trick. A barrel roll. It’s where you pretty much just roll in the air and land facing the same way. I tried it first try and busted on the top of my head, I had realized I didn’t get enough air and tried it anyways. The second try, I got all the way around and landed it. I couldn’t believe it, I actually landed a trick that I thought to be impossible. I yelled for joy and dropped the rope. My brother came back around and we noticed an awesome sunset just below the mountains making the sun shine through the peaks and we were all so amazed.

I have a lot of hope in myself. Theres a lot of think I hope to stop or start doing a few things in my life. Hope is a belief in a positive outcome related to events and circumstances in one’s life. I believe hope helps people overcome things easier.

The Columbine massacre seems like kids who have been neglected by their friends and family looking to get back at the world. Rachel Scott was one of the first people to be shot in the massacre. She left journals of her so people to know her story. The tears with the rosebud amazed me that the man called about it before it happened. If I saw that in my dreams I would probally never go to sleep. Rachel has 5 goals for people to accomplish, eliminate prejudice, dare to dream, choose your influences, small acts of kindness, and start a chain reaction with your family and friends.

A couple friends and I went up to Summersville Lake to hang out at my campsite. We ended up going out on my jetski & going to a waterfall people usually jump off of. Once we got there, there was too long of a line because I was very impatient. I came up with the idea to jump off a higher rock next to the waterfall. My friends didn’t want to unless I went first. I finally manned up and went up there and looked down. I felt sort of dizzy because it looked so high. The hard part was making it over the trees just below the rock. I took a deep breath and yelled. It felt like I was in the air for a good minute. I was really nervous and trying to keep my composure so I wouldn’t hurt myself once I hit the water. Once I hit the water, I was relieved. I almost forgot to swim to the top and I almost ran out of breath. My friends were dying laughing that I actually did it and they went back down to the waterfall and jumped because they were way too scared to jump. I felt like I could do anything after I made it back home.

I remember my brother, Ben, and my cousin, Ashley, used to hang out a lot when I was little. We would go to the park and play basketball. Ben would try to teach me to play basketball, while Ashley messed with Ben and made fun of him. Ashley would hang out with us whenever we did things. We even went to a couple high school basketball games together. When I was like 10 my cousin went away to college and my brother got a job for my dad’s work. We hang out sometimes still but not as much as we used to. I just wish we could still do a lot of the same thing together.

My brothers and I went fishing a while back. One of the most memorable moments of my life. We were at Summersville Lake at a fishing spot by my family’s cabin. My brother had 2 liters of Grey Goose with them. It was my brothers Ben and Richie, one of Ben’s friend named Jesse, and me. We got down there at about 10 pm. After a couple hours we started slaying the fish. I caught a catfish big enough to keep and eat later. Ben made a bet with Richie that he could catch the biggest fish. We ended up catching a lot of fish, but I caught the 2 biggest. Richie passed out in a lawn chair on the rock we were on, about a foot out of the water. The rest of us were still fishing and just sitting around talking. Richie falls out of the chair and lands with his legs in the water. Ben gets up and yells “Help, hes about to drown.” I kept on fishing and Jesse got up and helped him. They pulled him out of the water and he stumbled and mumbled around. We packed up while he passed back out in his chair. In the process, Jesse pulled in his line with a copperhead on it. Ben tried to act like Steve Irwin and grabbed it by the tail and threw it back in the water. We finished packing up and left.

My name’s Joey Wilbur. I am a junior at George Washington High School. I live in West Virginia. Basketball is my one of my favorite sports and I have been playing it since I was 3 or 4 years old. My 3 brothers, Ben, Brad, and Richie, are all older than me. They are all 3 years apart, and im 7 years from the youngest of them. They have all been role models to me ever since I was 8 or 9. One of my brothers, Ben, still lives in my parents house with me. He has a hurt leg and can’t work for another week.