The Personal Statement My friends always complained about how specific the essay questions in school were, but I never had a problem with those. The stricter the parameters the better for me! It was the blank page that gave me chills.

And this prompt was as blank as essay prompts come. It asked to “introduce the reader to yourself as a young adult.” As if the vague question was not bad enough, this essay had far more riding on it than my school essays. Instead of being for a grade, it was for my future.

The Process

I had begun the process of applying to college the week before. By “begun” I mean mentally began. I had been thinking about choosing a college for months, but only the week before had I narrowed down my list of schools to my top three and filled out the common application. All that was left was my personal statement.

I was terrified that a bad personal statement would mean I would not get in to a college. And, to only heighten my fears, I didn’t think there was anything interesting for me to write about. I was supposed to introduce myself to the reader, but surely the goal was to make the reader not just understand me but actually want to understand me. And how could I make the reader want to know me when all that I had done in life was go to school?

The Idea

I pondered topics for days, rattling my brain for anything interesting about myself. Everything I thought of just seemed so stupid, though. I asked my teachers for advice, and they all said the same thing: just be myself. But that was the problem! I didn’t want to write about myself.

Then it occurred to me. If the problem was that I didn’t want to write about myself, maybe I should just write about someone else. I could write about who I wanted to be, instead of who I was. Maybe it would not score me points on originality, but at least it was something specific. And with a topic chosen, I finally sat down to darken the blank page.

A magic spell must have been cast while I was writing my personal statement. After it was done, it had turned into something downright interesting. Perhaps there was something about me that could be fascinating after all.
According to the first paragraph, the narrator

highlight text
A. prefers vagueness to specificity, unlike her friends
B. prefers specificity to vagueness, unlike her friends
C. prefers vagueness to specificity, like her friends
D. prefers specificity to vagueness, like her friends