Greathouse 1
Mark Greathouse
Mr. Harrell
English Composition 1
4 November 2013
The Fun in Life
The life of a high school student can be rough. There’s peer pressure, drama,
heartbreak, classes, college application, one’s future, and independence. These factors
can cause teenagers to be overwhelmed, nervous, irritable, and depressed. This may be
the reason teenagers are seen slumping around and irritable at some of the simplest
things. Being a teenager can be tough at points, and may not be all too much fun.
Stephen Hargreaves is not like this, however. Born on 26 July 1997, this 16- year
old likes to find more of the fun in life, rather than be depressed. He says, “If everyone
was depressing all the time, this world would be a dull place” I don’t even think I have
seen Stephen depressed and I have known him for two years. He loves to joke around
about almost anything and everything, which can sometimes cause problems in the wrong
situations. One example of this is when Stephen and I were in a church service and one of
the speakers said something along the lines of “Don’t you just want to punch that guy in
the face?” Stephen, being the jokester he is, then shouts “Hallelujah!” Everyone turned
and looked at us. It was quite an embarrassing, yet funny moment. However, this is not
the first time this type of event has happened. These types of actions are in Stephen’s
personality. He has said, “I’m a really obnoxious person. I’m constantly making jokes
and that probably annoys the crap out of some people.” He loves to mess around with
people. There’s never a dull moment with him around, however his jokes may come back
Greathouse 2
to bite him. Stephen is quite the troublemaker, but not in a destructive way, but rather in
an obnoxiously humorous way.
Stephen attends Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy or CVCA for short. Up
until this year, his junior year, he had been homeschooled. At first, he was worried about
how he was going to fit in at high school. Homeschooling differs from high school in
many ways, and can be a very awkward transition. Homeschooling is a more
individualized approach to schooling, where the teacher focuses mainly on the few
students that they have, which normally is their children. The teacher can move the class
at a pace that is comfortable for them because they are the one of very few in their class.
High school, however, normally has more of a curriculum-based and more grouporiented approach. The teacher has to not only teach that one specific student, but all of
the other students in their class as well. They do not have enough time to keep up with
each student’s individual progress. This can cause previously homeschooled students
trouble learning because they are used to learning at their own pace rather than at a fixed
pace. Homeschooled students entering into high school may find it difficult to adjust.
They will be overwhelmed with work, away from home, and in a strange setting with a
strange group of peers. However, this is not the case with Stephen. He told me that so far,
he has adjusted fairly quickly and is enjoying his time at CVCA. In fact, he states that
CVCA is, “pretty beast because it is much more group oriented and more organized than
homeschooling.” He really enjoys the atmosphere and he has been quite busy in his
engineering class. He told me how much he loved the class and that he is currently
building a trebuchet. Stephen also seems to be fitting in at school as well. He told me,
“Most of the people there are really nice and inviting. There’s a few jerks there, but
Greathouse 3
anywhere you go, there’s gonna be ‘that guy.’” His humorous and outgoing personality
has helped him meet people at his school and he has really gotten connected there. He
realized that the switch between homeschooling and CVCA wasn’t very hard after all. He
is actually looking forward to the debate team that starts up very soon. Even though these
transitions can be difficult, he pulls through such an awkward event.
Stephen does a number of things in his free time, from air soft to video games to
sports with friends. He is an extravert, wanting to hang out with people as much as
possible. With friends, he enjoys, “Playing good old Mario or Super Smash Brothers and
such, and I love playing Ultimate Frisbee, golf, and pretty much any other sport I can
mess around in with some friends.” Friends are a huge component of his life, and many
fond memories are made with friends. Video games are one example of these fond
memories that he has made. Stephen had some friends over recently, including me, and
we had a huge Super Smash Brothers Brawl tournament. When playing games he likes,
Stephen can get extremely intense with any type of competitions and it can get quite
humorous. My friend Ian and Stephen were in the final battle for the tournament, so
Stephen grabs an iPad and some speakers, and played “The Final Countdown” by Europe
as loud as he could. Eventually Stephen won, but his intense demeanor was memorable.
Speaking of video games, he is a huge fan of them. He really enjoys almost any type of
video games, especially Mario Party, Super Smash Brothers, and Sonic. In fact, he stated
that his favorite video game is “Super Smash Bros. Brawl because you can beat the crap
out of your friends!” I have played Super Smash Bros. Brawl with him, and I will say that
it is really fun to “beat the crap” out your friends, as strange as that sounds. Playing video
Greathouse 4
games, as nerdy as it may be, provides exceedingly great entertainment, especially when
there is a group of friends.
When he’s not playing video games, he’s outside playing some sports. He’ll play
almost anything, from football to airsoft wars, but two sports that are his favorites are
Ultimate Frisbee and Ping-pong, surprisingly. Ultimate Frisbee ,for those who don’t
know, is a game in which two teams try to catch the Frisbee in their end zone, but once a
player has the Frisbee, they cannot move, they can only pivot and throw it to their
teammates to move forward. With a group of friends, teamwork is extremely important
and can result in a really fun experience. At our past youth retreat, which is basically a
church camp for a weekend, Stephen organized an Ultimate Frisbee game with the camp.
Tons of people joined in, way more than he expected. There were some funny memories
made there. People crashed into something or someone at some point. One example is
when Stephen passed the Frisbee to our friend Austin, who, while chasing it, accidentally
smacked into a pole. Another crash happened to Stephen himself. He was chasing a long
pass to him in the end zone, when he ran and smacked into a picnic table. That picnic
table gave him such a bad bruise on the next day to the effect that it was there a week
later as well. A final story about ultimate Frisbee is when I was with him and a group of
friends; we played a large game of ultimate Frisbee. The game tired us all out so much,
midway through we all lay down on the ground because we had been playing so crazily.
Stephen also loves to play ping-pong, and is incredibly good at ping- pong as well I
might add. He can play really intense ping- pong matches with his friend Ian. In fact, they
have perfected some insane spikes that are impossible to block. In fact, I think that they
Greathouse 5
have broken a few ping-pong-balls because of these spikes. Stephen likes to take part in
activities that normal teenagers enjoy.
Stephen is quite the jokester, especially when he is with his friends. He proves
himself to be the life of the party most of the time. However, this humor can cause some
major problems for him. In fact, he told me a story where his jokes went wrong.
At a Sunday Night Live event at church, we were playing dodgeball. One girl was
jumping around like crazy and eventually got hit and landed on her arm semihard. Jordan and I just started laughing like crazy. I shouted, SHE”S FLOPPING
LIKE A FISH! I felt really bad afterwards though because I found out she actually
did screw up her arm… Everyone was glaring at us. I felt terrible.
Unfortunately, his joking was in the wrong place at the wrong time. That joke might have
been funny if the girl hadn’t been seriously injured, but she had messed up her arm so
badly that the joke was making fun of a very sensitive subject. Sometimes, some jokes
are just not meant to happen.
Stephen Hargreaves is basically your typical teenager, but he has such a sense of
humor that sometimes gets out of hand. In fact, he said, “Sometimes my messing around
can get obnoxious to people, and sometimes, that’s funny in itself because people’s
reactions can be pretty darn funny too.” He realizes that his jokes can get out of hand, but
he honestly finds that pretty funny too. However, he also enjoys some of the other fun
things in life, such as good sports, video games, and some great laughs with friends. As
he has said himself, “What’s life without some fun?” Stephen makes sure to set himself
apart from the teenager standard of depressed and bored, but rather he prefers to enjoy
Greathouse 6
life. No matter what other people may think of him, He will joke around and enjoy his
life.