Discovering Pig Magic By Julie Crabtree

I am Elisa from "Discovering Pig Magic"  and I’m thirteen years old. My favorite sport or activity is hanging out with my friends. My fourteenth birthday is coming up and every birthday I get a pig, not just any pig. It's a glass pig that means something to me. I've been collecting these pigs for fourteen years. My mom or my grandma always gets me them because it's a girl thing. It would be weird if my dad or grandpa got me them. But my dad doesn't really care what goes on as long as no one talks to him when his game is on. On the other hand me and my mom are closer then ever. We do everything the same. We even act the same too. Some people say that we even look alike but that's just cause she's my mom. All my friends at school don't really collect anything like I do. Most of the girls are into all the drama and are all about themselves, that's annoying. But some of the girls that I don't talk to might collect something that other people might not have a interest in. One day I was with my friend Alexis and she and I were walking to get ice cream and saw all the "popular"  kids walking in a group. Alexis knew most of them from her family but I didn't so it was awkward when they were saying hi to each other. When I was just standing there this girl named Rebecca was saying who's that and I replied, with "Elisa." Then she said, "what are you interested in?" "Um um." I didn't say much because I didn't want the most popular girl at school making fun of me because I'm interested in collecting pigs. That's just weird. So I said, "I like to go shopping for my free time." The next day at school I sat with all the girls at lunch. They didn't really know much about me so I told them what I like to and what I wouldn't like to do. As they were listening I was thinking about telling them about my collection I've been getting since my 1st birthday. But then I said, "maybe next time or I will just tell one of the girls." Tuesday I have decided I was going to tell them. Once I told them they all looked at me like I had four heads or I wasn't speaking English, but then they all took turns saying what they had collections of. Some of the girls had weirder ones than me, like dogs or genie pigs. After I told them, it felt so good getting it off my chest and acting like myself.