From the Bow Seat Essay
Naples, FL
2015, Junior, Creative Writing
Finally I’m here! In the store here in the refreshment aisle. I’ve been waiting for this my whole life…….my life that’s only been 3 days long. But I’m here. Now we wait to be bought. Ten days have passed and its 5:00 AM and I still have not been bought, but it’s okay there is a family approaching me right now. They pick me up and put me in their cart but after that it’s all very vivid. All I remember is towels, coolers and packs of soda being stacked on top of me. After that all I feel is me being packed into a car then just hours of driving. We finally come to a halt. All of a sudden I’m being taken out of a car someone puts me up to his or her lips drinking all of my contents. I haven’t even realized what had just happened when I’m drifting through the air and SPLASH!! I’m in the water looking at the people that just carelessly tossed me in.
Is that it? Just toss your garbage aside to where it seems that no harm can be caused. How wrong they are! Not just them. Everyone everywhere, who deal with their garbage so carelessly. Sad, but enough of that. Well , in all the time I took feeling pity towards those humans I didn’t realize how far I drifted away. I can’t even see the shore anymore. There is not much I can do. I can’t attempt to swim back to shore….. I have no arms. The only thing I can do is just sit here and drift away even farther from shore. I guess that’s it.
I’ve been drifting farther and farther away for hours now. I still can’t see anything. I finally spot something. It looks like another water bottle. I’m drifting closer towards it then, without warning, a massive bird swoops in and takes the water bottle away. That was over just as fast as it started. Then I feel something starting to nibble on me. It looks like a turtle. It keeps on gnawing on me. All I can do is hope that nothing happens. Finally after it realizes it can’t eat me, it leaves. Now I guess we go deeper into the ocean.
It feels like I’ve been drifting for days now. I spot something in the distance. That at the moment seems like just a speck on the horizon. As I get closer it gets bigger and bigger. Then I just come to a stop. I’m just sitting there. For hours….the hours turn into days, then into years and eventually into decades. I remain there today. Over the time I learned that what I was stuck in one of the great ocean garbage patches. I will remain here for a long time. After a long time of being trapped it feels like part of me isn’t there anymore…..literally. The bottom part of me is gone. I think I’m decomposing. I don’t know a lot of how I was made but I do know that what I’m made of Isn’t good for humans, so it definitely isn’t good for the ocean. I think I’ll just have to wait until I decompose completely. I know it won’t be good, for the ocean, but there is nothing I can do. But wait. It’ll harm the ocean…. Sure. But it’s not my fault. The humans threw me in here and brought this upon themselves. They threw me in here after all.
A few more decades pass. At this point the only part of me left is the part above the wrapper. I think to myself everyday “Only a few decades left and I’m gone. No longer causing harm to the ocean.” Finally, the only part of me that is left is my rim. I am so excited. Then all of a sudden I’m lifted from the ocean into the air. I’m being eaten! I’m going down the bird’s throat. I’m still not in its stomach. Actually I think I stopped moving. I remain like that for a matter of seconds. Then all of a sudden it starts struggling. I go up and down its neck. I think it’s trying to spit me out. Then it feels like we’re starting to plummet. We land back in the ocean. The bird is dead. I caused the death of a bird. Now I’m stuck inside of it. There is nothing I can do. I eventually get out of the bird. But now I’m floating again, probably to the great garbage ocean patch again. But now I’m being eaten by some sort of fish. It chokes on me once again. The fish dies again because of me. I make it back to the great garbage ocean patch. It seems different though. It seems smaller. Then all of a sudden, I see something in the distance that looks like a boat. It appears that that they’re taking trash out with a net. They finally pick me up sorting the actual garbage from the recyclable stuff.
At least some humans are doing something to help. Finally we go back to land and I’m thrown into a recycling bin. Well I hope people stop doing things like this, throwing their garbage away so carelessly. You wouldn’t think that something so little can do so much damage to marine life and animals in general. It will affect everything in the long run. What is already in the ocean is going to be almost impossible to get rid of. After all it is the size of a small state. Despite that we can keep it from growing even bigger. Humans can help. It’s up to them. They can throw away their trash in actual trash cans and dispose of it responsibly. They can make a change if they try and change their ways. After all, they are the ones that caused all of this. It is up to them and only them.
Reflection
I decided to write my story from the point of view of a water bottle to teach the reader that the things we use every day can affect us in the long run if not disposed of correctly. That things as simple as a water bottle can harm the ocean and its wildlife. The animals can eat the garbage with no regard for what it is. They can easily choke and die. The garbage can also make the water unsafe for the fish to live in. The things in plastic are not safe for us nor animals. We have to try our best to keep things like that out of the water and out of the grasp of the fish and creatures that inhabit the ocean. I wanted the readers’ eyes to be opened. I wanted them to know that little things like a water bottle or a plastic bag can have a huge impact on wild life. I wanted them to realize that the things that are happening to fish and the ocean are our fault. We, the human race, have to try to rid the oceans of plastic and make the ocean a safe place for everything in it again. However, at this point that is going to be almost impossible. One of the great ocean garbage patches is about the size of a small state. But we have to try to get the garbage out of there. It is up to us to make that change. That is why I wrote my story the way I did.