Being Brave

I was hungry I told my mom,
“Can I have some spaghetti?”
My brother said that he was going to warm it. My mom said, “Are you sure?” He said, “Yes.” He warmed it five minutes.
I was going to put it on the dinner table. It was so hot. The plate fell in my lap.
I was crying because it hurt.
My brother was laughing. He thought it was funny. “Ha Ha.”
I was scared my dad was going to whip me.
My Auntie came to my house. She said she was very sorry. She said, “sorry”.
My dad buyed me a medicine. He rubbed it in my legs.
I went to school. It was not hurting me. But then, it was hurting me. I went to the nurse. They gave me ice.


This is the book that was written by one of my first graders. She calls it I Got Burned.
I loved it so much because it showed from such a small writer, the pain and helplessness she felt at the time. It also shows her outlook on things. Amazing.
Here is the real story.

My young friend was home one Saturday night and was hungry. Her second grade brother offered to make her chicken noodle soup and warm it up in the microwave. It was in that huge warming up machine more than 5 minutes although there is speculation that it was maybe 10. Either way, it was WAY too long in there.
My first grade friend tried to take it to the table and spilled it on herself.
The chicken soup, you see, had created third degree burns on her little body. But no one bothered to help her. No one bothered to look. So she cried.
Can you imagine? She must have cried for hours.
And then it happened. No one in her family took her to the doctor. No one even made an appointment. It was a holiday on Monday, so she didn't come to school, but she didn't go to the doctor either. She just cried.
She wasn't at school on Tuesday either, although no one is quite sure why.
Wednesday, she came to school with a limp. Her tears had dried but her pain remained. She was so brave.
That was when we noticed. That was when we saw the burns. That was when the horror of it all was relived to us with every word that she told us.
No one had taken her to the doctor until we came along.

I love this child for sharing this story with me. I love this child for going through such an emotional time in her life and being so brave. I love her for writing about it. I love her for always remembering but being too young to hate about it. I love her because she was one we got to help. There are so many we can't.

I think B is the strongest, bravest person I know. He is not afraid of anything or anyone. He would fight lions for me if I asked him, but that day she told us the story, I was convinced that I had met someone braver than him.
I hope that everyone, at least once in their life, will get to meet someone brave and strong. Big or small, young or old, we can all learn from someone brave like that first grader, I know I did.