Guess What!

As children, my siblings and I rarely managed to keep secrets. Once, my uncle took my sisters and I with him to a jewelry store. At the ages five, seven, and nine, we could not believe our luck. We stood, mesmerized by all the pretty, sparkly jewelry, so much better than our plastic rings and necklaces. My uncle let us look at all the jewelry and “help” him pick out a ring as a present for his girlfriend, but we needed to keep it secret until he gave it to her. Hours later, all my relatives met at my grandparents’ house for dinner. Immediately, My sisters and I eagerly raced over to my uncle’s girlfriend, yelling "Guess what uncle Greg got you" before raving about the pretty ring he bought her. Little did we understand, but one should keep engagement rings secret. Lately, people in AP English have also commented on difficult babysitting experiences, causing me to remember my own childhood babysitters. My siblings and I always loved when my parents went out, leaving us with a babysitter. Our favorite babysitter, Courtney, always brought over barbies and played with us for hours. However, one night she could not sit for us so a new babysitter came over. She did not meet our expectations. First of all, she failed to bring over barbies. My sister and I were not impressed. Then, she spent the evening on the computer using whatever social network sites people used in 2002. Towards the end of the night, someone knocked on the front door. The babysitter reluctantly dragged herself off the computer and answered the door to find Courtney standing there with my five-year-old brother.  Somewhere in the midst of our babysitter’s self-absorbed actions, he became bored and decided to leave the house and wander around the neighborhood to find my parents…who left to attend a dinner over half an hour away. Fortunately, Courtney had returned home and found him. With my brother safely inside the house once more, our new babysitter quickly began showering us with attention and played barbies with us for the rest of the night. She also not so subtlety suggested that we keep my brother’s disappearance a secret between us girls. We agreed without hesitation and took advantage of her new attentiveness. However, as soon as our parents returned home, we ran to greet them, shouting, “Guess what the new babysitter did!” The night turned out much more exciting than we ever thought possible and needless to say, we never saw the girl again. In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, mystery and secrets surround each character. Tom and Daisy cheat on each other, Myrtle escapes every so often to New York to live her fantasy life with Tom, Daisy kills a woman and keeps it secret, and no one appears to truly understand Gatsby’s complicated past that he rarely mentions. As a child, I barely kept a secret for five minutes. While I believe my ability to remain quiet has improved, I could never keep as many dark secrets as the novel’s characters and not become crazy. Everyone lies to each other and uses others to keep their immoral behavior secret. Despite the characters’ attempts to keep secrets, the truth tends to emerge and destroy characters’ lives because they try to hide their flaws for so long. Reflecting on my childhood and the novel, I realize nothing remains secret forever and the longer people hide the truth, the more it hurts them in the end when it comes to light.