Being a kid is a great beautiful experience but it doesn’t last forever.

As a child we were innocent, selfish

and not aware of things outside ourselves. The loss of these traits inevitably means the end of you being a

child,the moment you lose that self centered view of the world, you’ll also lose your innocence. To

become an adult means that you’ll have to lose those childhood traits, the main characters in Eugenia

Collier's “Marigolds” and Judith Cofer’s “American History” are both prime examples that growing up

means that you have to lose those childish traits, these stories Will show that coming of age is when you

lose the things that made you a child. Lizabeth Collier is a young African American girl living in the great

depression,her home town is a dusty dirty grim place where the people are imprisoned by poverty,but

there was one thing that stood out of place ms. Lottie’s Marigolds, the beautiful red and yellow flowers

stood out in the grim and dusty town. By the time Lizabeth was 14 her younger brother “Joey” and her

were the only one’s beside their parents staying in their home, while Eugenia was outside with Joey and

some other kids she started getting “A strange restlessness of body and of spirit,a feeling that something

old and familiar was ending, and something unknown and therefore terrifying was beginning. One day

returns to me with special clarity for some reason,”(Eugenia Collier 7,8). This is showing the start of her

losing her innocence, meaning her becoming more adult. It's the start of her losing her innocence aka her

losing her childishness and starting her path to adulthood. On one night Lizabeths Fathers broke down in

tears because he wasn’t able to provide that much to his family, Lizabeth’s world was shattered by this

how could her big strong whole hearted father cry like the tiniest child, she was filled with an array of

emotions but out of all of them one stood out the most rage, rage begging for a target any target, ms.

Lottie's marigolds. With the target in mind she knows what she's going to do, she wakes up joey because

she’s scared and doesn’t want to be alone while she does this, she opens the window and jumps out of it

and starts running straight for the marigolds she leaped right into the mound of marigolds and started

ripping and tearing them until there was none left standing as Lizabeth was standing there on the mound

of destroyed marigolds she started to break down in tears, she then saw a blurry figure in all white, she

soon then realized who it was “ Miss Lottie “ I scrambled to my feet and just stood there and stared at

her, and that was the moment when childhood faded and womanhood began. That violent, crazy act was

the last act of childhood . For as I gazed at the immobile face with sad, weary eyes, I gazed upon a kind
of reality which is hidden to childhood. The witch was no longer a witch but only a broken old woman

who had dared to create beauty in the midst of ugliness and sterility.”(Eugenia Collier 62). Lizabeth

destroyed Miss Lottie's marigolds, out of anger then bursted into tears out of sympathy of Ms Lottie

because she knows that she’s not some witch but an old woman trying to find happiness in her dark and

sad life. That's when she lost her innocence and gained sympathy because you can not go into adulthood

without losing something that made you a child.

To become an adult you must lose something that you had as a child, these events have shown you it to

you but to make you understand it more let me tell you of my own moment. I had a dog his name was

snoopy I had him ever since my 4th birthday, I loved him alot, but he passed away, died on the 18th of

july

And this event showed me that becoming an adult means you have to give up what made you a child and

that the things that come with you as a child don’t come with as an adult.Being a kid is a great beautiful

experience but it doesn’t last forever. As a child we were innocent, selfish and not aware of things outside

ourselves. The loss of these traits inevitably means the end of you being a child,the moment you lose that

self centered view of the world, you’ll also lose your innocence. In marigolds Elizabeth stops having that

self center view and starts seeing the people around her as people(Eugenia Collier 62). Mine said that the

things we had as a kid won’t stay for when we are adults. It's hard to accept it this way but it's true we

can’t have what we had as a child because for a lot of people the things we want to take with us in

adulthood don’t always make it people, things, and loved one’s can’t with us in that journey because

nothing stays the same, the universes constant is change.