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Student Narrative

Dr. Palmore

EWRT 1A

26 October 2016

The Lonely Life

Prior to her trip to the Capitol for The Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen lives the life of

an impoverished citizen of Panem. Living in District Twelve, Katniss describes her life as a

lower-class citizen: “The money ran out and we were slowly starving to death. There’s no other

way to put it. I kept telling myself if I could only hold out until May, just May 8th, I would turn

twelve be able to sign up for the tesserae and get that precious grain and oil to feed us. Only

there were several weeks to go. We could well be dead by then” (Collins 27). Katniss explains

that this is often the case in her district:

Starvation’s not an uncommon fate in District 12. Who hasn’t seen the victims?

Older people who can’t work. Children from a family with too many to feed.

Those injured in the mines. Straggling through the streets. And one day, you come

upon them sitting motionless against a wall or lying in the meadow, you hear the

wails from a house, and the Peacekeepers are called in to retrieve the body.

Starvation is never the cause of death officially. It’s always the flu, or exposure, or

pneumonia. But that fools no one. (28)

Katniss is the caretaker of her family and as such feels the pressure to keep her family going.

While out looking for food for her family she describes an interaction she has with another

citizen of District 12: “Suddenly a voice was screaming at me and I looked up to see the baker’s

wife, telling me to move on and did I want her to call the Peacekeepers and how sick she was of

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having those brats from the Seam pawing through her trash. The words were ugly and I had no

defense” (29). This event describes the relationship between the poor and the rest of the citizens

of Panem. The poor are viewed as an inconvenience, a bothersome group of individuals that

Panem would be better without.

Although Panem may portray a dramatized society to some degree, its descriptions of

poverty are quite accurate. For many of us, life is sweet and full of excitement. Sports, video

games, parties and social gatherings are abundant. We have plenty of food to fill our bellies.

Water can flow from the faucet at a consistent eighty-PSI for twenty-four hours a day and seven

days a week. My life has been fortunate enough to consist of these luxuries. I have never had to

scavenge for food or boil water over a fire to ensure its purity. Everything I have ever needed has

been laid out before me or is readily available at the store. In the United States, adults and

children alike die every single day from a lack of proper food, water, or shelter. Despite this,

most of us continue to live our lives as if nothing is wrong and act repulsed by a single

interaction with somebody that is homeless. The treatment that Katniss receives from the Baker’s

wife is like the treatment I witnessed a homeless man receive at a train station as a high school

student.

One spring day the school bell tolled loudly, signaling the release of two thousand

students. A large group of us rushed towards the train station to buy our tickets and search for

our group of friends to sit with. The train stop was damp and musky. The scent of urine screamed

off the walls, the pungent aroma biting as it soaked into your nostrils. The ticket machine

screamed a loud beep to insure nobody boarded the train without paying the fare. It was an

abandoned shack right before a sea of tracks. I could hear the sharp screech of trains turning on

the tracks around the bend in the distance. There was a mile of track going in either direction that

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ended with sharp turns. A man, whom appeared to be homeless, was resting on a bench opposite

the ticket machine. All the man’s clothes were at least one size too large. His sweatshirt was

stained with dirt from top to bottom. His hair had begun to form dreadlocks and was down to his

shoulders. The man reeked of alcohol and was clearly intoxicated. As he attempted to stand, he

fell directly back where he was sleeping. He started to swing his arms as if to shoo us all away.

“Get out of here!” he yelled loudly.

The security guard came running over concerned that the man was a threat. “Sir you need

to leave” the guard said. The man laughed and remained where he was seated. “Get up now or I

will call the cops,” the security guard said. The man growled sharply like a dog. “That’s it you’re

done” the security guard said with aggression. The security guard grabbed the man by the arm

and forced him to start walking. The man stumbled away from the station to the left. Walking

away from the road, he had nowhere to go but follow the tracks. Suddenly he veered right,

directly towards the first set of tracks. He tripped over the rail of the track and fell flat on his

face. We all stared, shocked by what we were witnessing. In the distance, a load deep horn

signaled a train had begun to move. The man slowly got to his knees. Every movement took all

the effort he could muster. He pushed to his feet and slowly made his way to the next set of

tracks. He tripped over the railing of the next set, but he maintained his balance and continued.

The train’s hum rang again. This time it was much closer. The man only had one set of tracks

left. At this point I believed he was going to make it. I could hear some classmates encouraging

him under their breath, “you got this!” Right before the last track the man bent over. He appeared

out of breath. Hunched over, he vomited all over his shoes. Letting out a loud groan, he stumbled

back. He wiped his mouth and continued forward. Only now, he appeared to be weaker. He

pushed forward to the last set of tracks. As he crossed the first railing of the last track, he paused

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on the sleeper. He put his hand on his forehead and let out a stream of vomit right below him.

Only this time, he passed out as he finished. He landed perfectly in the center of the two rails.

Everyone took a deep breath and stood still except for my friend Luke. Luke was one of the more

outgoing individuals of our group and took it upon himself to help the man. He headed for the

first set of tracks as everyone was dumbfounded about how to help.

“Luke what are you doing?!?!” I exclaimed.

“Somebody has got to help him!” He yelled in reply.

“You’re going to hurt yourself it isn’t safe!”

“I’m not going to let this man die!”

“Hey get back here!” Yelled the security guard.

“Then do something about him.” Luke said pointing at the man crossing the tracks

“My job is to keep you kids safe, nothing more.” The security guard retorted with a clear

designation of authority.

“You’d let this man die because you are afraid to help?” Luke replied.

“Get back here now or I will be forced to go to the Dean of Discipline.” Luke looked

back at the man and begrudgingly returned.

As Luke returned to the train station the horn sounded for the third time. This time the

horn was ten times louder. We collectively looked to the right and saw a train that began to head

around the corner directly for the man on the tracks. Panic struck us all. Every single student

waved their hands at the conductor to get his attention. “Stay back!” Yelled the security guard.

The train rapidly approached, no more than three hundred yards away. The conductor responded

to our waves with a long drawn out blare of the horn. Two hundred yards. We all screamed

“Stop!” but to no avail as the engine drowned out even the loudest of noises. One hundred yards.

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My heart sank as I knew it was over. The train was not slowing down, and it was impossible to

stop at this point. Splat! The train ran right over the man with the sound of a bug crashing into a

windshield. The conductor slammed on the breaks as the blood smeared the front of the train.

The brakes screeched at such a high pitch that we all were forced to cover our ears. I looked

around and some of my classmates had begun to cry. I felt the tears on the edge of my eyes begin

to form. Just like that it was all over. The man at the train stop was gone.

The school gave all of the students a ride to the next train station to take our trains home

while they cleaned up the mess. The train ride home was full of silence. Only the rattle of the

wheels on the tracks could be heard. We were still all in shock about what we had seen. I felt a

sense of sorrow as well as shock. Could we have saved the man? Should the security guard have

let Luke help the man back to the station? I couldn’t help but think that if he was anything but

homeless that the security guard would have gone out there himself to help the man return. I felt

guilty for not standing up with Luke. That somehow I could have stopped the man from dying.

The counselor that all of us had to meet with said something that stuck with me to this day:

“Since he was homeless and had nothing going for him, you have to believe that his suffering has

ended. He is in a better place now.” Just as Katniss was disregarded in District 12 for being poor,

we too disregard people for having less than we do. Instead of finding a solution or lending a

helping hand, we tell ourselves that they did it to themselves. That it is their fault that they are in

that position. Just as Katniss is shooed away by the Baker’s wife, we too shoo away the homeless

in their greatest time of need. I had never seen anybody die before; it was a defining moment in

my life. Watching a life end, especially in one of the most brutal fashions imaginable,

dramatically affected the way I treat people in my life.

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Work Cited

Collins, Suzanne. The Hunger Games. Scholastic, 2009.