1) A fish finds itself trapped outside of its home fish bowl after being captured by a strange creature with holes. It is separated from its wife and children who remain inside the fish bowl. 2) As night falls, the fish tries desperately to get back to its family but cannot break through the hard glass walls of the fish bowl. 3) Remembering how strong a swimmer it is, the fish devises a plan to build up speed and momentum and launch itself out of the air and back into the fish bowl, reuniting with its terrified family.

1. Julie Kitchen
FYS
11/24/2014
The Great Fish Bowl Escape
This is absolutely horrible. I really am stunned by what has happened in the last twelve
hours. Everything was fine. My wife and our children were swimming happily, had all the food
we needed and were healthy. When I think about how stunning and impossible this situation is, I
feel so helpless. I couldn’t believe it when that funny looking creature with all the holes invaded
our home, but when it took me inside of its mouth I nearly had a stroke. It began to take me up
and as it did all my water went through the holes and I was out in the air. It was stifling. I
couldn’t breathe. I was so scared. My family was hysterical. Just when I thought I couldn’t
survive one more second, I felt the cool refreshing water of our home. I was happy, but
suddenly, wait a minute, this is not my home.
I swam around frantically. I was alone. Where was my wife and my babies. Then the
stunning sight. There they were right beside me, still in our home. I tried to communicate with
them, but they couldn’t hear me. I could see they were as upset as I was. They were scared. I
didn’t want them to see that I was too. Why had this happened? Who was against us? How
would I get back to them?
As the day wore on, the light around us started to fade and I realized night was falling.
My children were already resting, but my wife realized how bad things were and I knew she nor
I would get any rest. As the night wore on, I frantically tried to devise a plan. I hit against the
outer edges of my home with my head, but they were hard and it became obvious I couldn’t pass
through. With the morning sun, I became more and more hopeless. I had been away from them
for 18 hours now it seemed hopeless.

2. Suddenly, I remembered something my wife always told me. “You are strong, you have
such strong fins and you swim so fast. I trust you to take care of our family.” That’s it, I am
strong. I always out swam all my friends when we lived in the big waters and I could jump
higher than any of them. Maybe, just maybe, if I swam fast enough, jumped high enough, I
could jump out of this prison and back into my home. I was getting excited. It really was
possible.
I began to swim round and round, building up momentum. When I felt I couldn’t go any
faster I jumped as high and hard as I could. Suddenly, I was in the air, still scared and, again,
unable to breath, but then I could see my body was headed straight toward the opening of my
home and in a split second I would hit the water. I was strong, I was brave, and soon I would be
home.