Common App Admissions Essays

Rockport

Prompt:

Describe a place or environment where you feel perfect content. What do you do or experience there and why is it meaningful to you?

 


I find it really hard to be perfectly content. I'm always distracted by math homework and that book I need to finish and the scarf I'm knitting and my friends and getting my license. Worrying consumes my days and I don't always realize it. Sometimes I get tired of it and I'll go outside and sit under a tree to read. I'll be content for a while, listening to the wind and feeling the sunlight then I realize that I've had something on my mind the whole time and I checked my phone thirty times in five minutes. It's sad that I live in such a beautiful place and I don't even give it the appreciation it deserves.

There is one place that I love more than anything in the world. It is the only place that there is nothing on my mind but appreciation for its beauty and how many pieces of sea glass I can collect. The one place I can say that I am perfectly content. Since I moved to Kentucky, I only get to go here once a year. That used to bother me but I've learned that the distance makes it more special. I will never live here for fear of it becoming a monotonous part of everyday life.

    People hear "beach" and they immediately think sunny days and swimming. This place isn't like that. Cloudy days are the best days to go. It is always breathtaking. There's more room to explore and only the expert beach combers are out. There are so many amazing things to see. Baby ducks with their mother, hermit crabs, sea glass, clams, lobster traps, driftwood, sea urchins, the smoothest rocks I've ever felt. Even the seaweed fascinates me. I love this place. I love the fact that we build up walls to contain her. We fear her and love her. She destroys families and monuments and we have to forgive her. We forgive her because we all admire her perseverance. We all want to be fighters too.

    As soon as I arrive I immediately feel relief. This is my haven. This unforgiving coast is my favorite place in the world. I've been coming here since I was a baby and I will always have a connection to it. I'm sure there is still sand in my system from how much I ate as a child. The stairs down to sea level look worse every year. She never gives up on destroying them. Something about my feet hitting that rocky sand makes everything better. The water is always absolutely freezing but it has never bothered me. It wakes up all of my senses, from my toes all the way to my brain. It makes me realize just how beautiful our world can be. I could stay here all day long. I could sleep here, listening to the waves roll in. Listening to that icy water get closer and closer to the wall only to pull back and start over.

    Leaving is the hardest part. I can never get my fill of the most perfect place on earth. I can't take my contentedness with me and that is heartbreaking. I can take the sea glass and the shells and some sand but even those things can't replace the salt smell and the sound of the waves. They can't replace how determined I feel, how important I feel when I am on that sand looking out and I can see to the end of the earth. I leave willingly though, because all good things must come to an end even if the end is only temporary. I just hope my oldest friend in the world decides to go easy on the stairs so I can make the trek down them again next year.

 


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How to cite this essay (MLA)

Vautour, Madeleine. "Rockport" StudyNotes.org. Study Notes, LLC., 30 Sep. 2015. Web. 19 Mar. 2024. <https://www.apstudynotes.org/common-app/rockport/>.
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