Corinna Ring

9/12/13
CD 124
Culture Assignment
I. Family
1. I am Corinna Ring, a 19 year old college student and a middle child between
my two brothers. I have an older brother named Deven who is 25 years old and joining
the navy. I also have a younger brother named Travis who is 15 years old and just
beginning his freshman year of high school. I grew up living with my brothers and
parents until 8th grade which I then moved with just my mother, and I now currently live
with my boyfriend Daniel.
2. On my Dads side of the family I only have my Grandmother. My Grandma
Ring is an amazing woman who raised my father completely on her own and provides
my brothers and I with everything we ever need. My Grandma is the only grandparent
who lives in California and she also happens to live at my fathers house so we grew up
being very close to her. I love my Grandma Ring to death. On my Moms side I have my
other Grandma and My only Grandpa who passed away in May of 2012. I am also very
close to those grandparents. Growing up they lived in Orange County and we would go
visit every other weekend. My Grandma now lives in Idaho, I see her rarely but we
continue to talk on the phone quite often. My Grandpas death was and still is one of the
hardest experiences I have ever had, and I miss him every single day. We were always
very very close. I also have a biological Grandfather who is in prison for life, was never
in mine or my mothers life yet tries to write me letters. I continue to ignore his letters
and I plan on keeping it that way.
3. I spent most of my childhood with my parents married and raising us together.
I was always a daddys girl growing up. My Dads name is Mark and he is 52 years old,
working for an insurance company. He is also a professional women's football coach
and a bodybuilder. We were very close until I began 8th grade, which he then cheated
on my mother leading to a divorce and that strained our relationship extremely. My Mom
is my rock, and my biggest supporter. Her name is Michelle, and she is 43 years old,
working for Walmart. After their Divorce I moved away from my Dads in Point Loma and
went with my Mom to Lakeside. My parents divorce really crushed my relationship with
my Dad, and also hurt my relationship with my Mom.
4. My brothers and I grew up with a family who lived down the street. The Mom,
Ramona is the same age as my mother, and she has three kids. CJ, who is my brother
Devens best friend. Kyra, who is my age and my best friend. Also, her youngest son
Cade who is seven years old. We all met in 1998, and have been very close ever since.
I consider them all family and call them my brothers and sisters as well. I have friends
who really know of them as my family and do not know that they biologically are not.
Blood really doesnt mean much to me, if you are there for me and support me and love
me, you are family. They are my family.

II. Culture
1. Growing up my family was a very active Mormon family. My father was very
high up in our church and there was not a single Sunday that my family missed church.
We had church every Sunday and Wednesday night, we read the Bible and Book of
Mormon nightly as a family, and also had family home evenings every Monday night. I
was baptised at the age of 8, along with my brothers, and we were also sealed as a
family in the Temple when I was 5 years old. We continued to go to Church until my
parents divorced, then we all just completely stopped going. I had a brief time period of
not believing in a higher power, and then eventually started attending a Christian
Church with friends. The rest of my family continues to not practice a religion.
2. Food growing up in my house was very traditional stay at home mom kind of
food. My Mother made dinner every single night and always had it ready right as my
Dad got home from work. She made a lot of American foods. She made lasagna,
hamburgers, and meat loaf was her favorite. She has two meals that are our familys
favorites and they are recipes I plan on making for my family. One of them is pizza
stuff, which is basically a lasagna that she makes with hamburger, and pizza sauce,
and macaroni noodles. She tops the lasagna with pepperonis and cheese. The other
dish is called Mexican Wontons, which is basically hamburger meat, taco seasoning,
peppers, and whatever else she decides to put in them, wrapped up in Wonton wraps.
She fries them up, and we eat them with sour cream, guacamole, and salsa. Those are
our families traditional foods.
3. The vacations my family took growing up were always family vacations. My
Dad never really went, but we always went on vacation every summer. My Mom would
take my Brothers and I every summer to go visit all of our family in Utah. I have a HUGE
Mormon family in Utah, with plenty of cousins. My Great-Grandmother had 4 kids, who
gave her 13 Grandkids, and then currently she has 20 something Great Grandchildren,
and 5 Great Great Grandkids. So our family vacations were always filled with family. We
would rent out restaurants just to all have dinner because we came into town. Those
vacations were tradition growing up. We also had a family vacation growing up and we
went to San Antonio, Texas. We went there because my Dad loves Texas. We saw the
Alamo, and the San Antonio Riverwalk. I was pretty young then and cant remember it
too much but that is really the only non-family visiting vacation we have ever taken.
4. My family doesnt have very many traditions but two of them stick out a lot in
my mind when I think of the word traditions. Christmas is a big tradition for us. Every
Christmas Eve we were allowed to open one present, and that is all. We got to choose
one from underneath the tree, and my Brothers and I always picked our biggest ones.
Christmas morning we were never allowed to wake our parents up before 8am. So my
Brothers and I would wake up really early and we would always sort our presents out
into piles. We would always count and see who got the most presents as well. We got to
open our stockings and play with those until Mom and Dad woke up. Grandma always is
there Christmas morning and videotapes the whole thing, every year. Then we end the
morning with delicious orange cream cinnamon rolls. Another big holiday tradition we
had was Easter. Every Easter, we had an Easter Egg scavenger hunt that my mom
would set up for us. We all started with a clue which would lead us to more clues,
eventually leading to our Easter baskets. Of course being younger the clues would be
easier just around the living room or the house, and my Mom would help us. Then when
we got older it got harder. Last year my Older Brother had clues leading all around the
neighbourhood. Easter has always been one of my favorite holidays due to that tradition
from my Mom.
5. My family has a very mixed culture. Growing up we were always just a
traditional American family. A working Dad, with a stay at home Mom, and we played
sports, celebrated holidays, and all the typical American Family things. As we got older
though my Brother Deven started his own family with his fiancee Nani. Nani is 100%
Mexican American. Her mother does not speak English, and her household language is
Spanish. Nani has two kids who also celebrate the Mexican culture very strongly. I love
having a new mixed culture in our family. My Niece and Nephew speak two languages,
and we celebrate things with more of a variety. We sing Spanish songs at birthdays
now, and we also have a wider variety of foods served at family get togethers, I would
list some of the foods but I dont even know how to spell them. I do love Nanis tamales
though! They are the absolute best in the world. I love being able to have my family be a
mixed culture family.

III. Self
1. I consider myself to be a typical 19 year old girl. I like to think I am very
independent from my parents, although they will tell you otherwise. I am a very hard
worker. I used to be very sociable but lately in the past year or so I have been
experiencing some struggles with social anxiety and self esteem. I am completely in
love with my Boyfriend. I want to work with kids and eventually own an in-home
daycare. So I can work with kids, and raise my own kids, the best of both worlds. I like
coffee, yoga pants, and Disney movies...Like I said, I am a typical 19 year old girl.
2. As a child I was very outgoing and sociable. I also did very well in school, and I
was very athletic. I was always the teachers pet, and growing up with all boys I was a
huge tomboy. As a child my parents were always proud of me and my educational
achievements. They were also very proud of my soccer abilities as well. Growing up I
was very close to my brothers as well, and spent most of my time with Kyra, following
Deven and CJ around.
3. Growing up I spent almost all of my time with school and soccer. The free time
I did have was spent with a few close friends I had that are still my best friends to this
day. My parents forced education on us very hard, as well as sports. I played club
soccer for Albion growing up, which is very time consuming. We had practice 4-5 days a
week, with games at least once or twice a week. Club soccer is also pretty much year
round, and you also travel, so much of my childhood was spent that way. Though not
always club, I played soccer from ages 3-17 years old. When I wasnt playing soccer I
was working on school work. I was always a bright child, a gate student with the option
of skipping third grade (my parents choosing not to), I had a lot of educational
expectations. So my parents always made sure it was either school or soccer I spent
my time on.
4. I had a few close girl friends growing up. Kyra C., Kyra M., Lauren, and Brandi.
Kyra and Kyra have both been my best friends since we were about 4 years old, we
have grown up together and even though now we are separated by college and just life
in general we still talk weekly. Lauren and Brandi both entered my life in 2nd grade, and
to this day are also very close to me. The best thing about this group of friends is the
fact that we are all this close with each other. We did everything together growing up,
and we still continue to do things that way.
5. The legacy I want to leave behind is one of a strong, hard working,
independent women. I want to leave behind a legacy of being a hard worker, a good
mother, and a good wife. I really hope to leave behind a legacy filled with family. I hope
to be an extremely family oriented mom and leave behind children and grandchildren
that strive for the same family bond. I want to leave behind a legacy that my family will
be proud of.
6. Many different events have had significant impacts on my life, both good and
bad. The one event that probably had the biggest impact on my life was my parents
getting a divorce. That event led to many other events that had significant impacts on
my life. After my parents divorced I began to struggle with bulimia and clinical
depression. In 9th and 10th grade my bulimia and depression, along with drug use, led
to me losing 50+ pounds. Another event that has led to a very big impact in my life was
my previous relationship being a physically and mentally abusive relationship. That life
event led me to more drug usage, and along with that more unhealthy weight loss.
Although I was curing my bulimia and no longer depressed, the drug use just got worse
and worse. In 12th grade I met my current boyfriend whom I currently live with. Daniel is
probably the most significant event that has impacted my life in a positive way, because
of him I am now clean, happy, and sober.
7. My greatest achievement so far at this point in my life is graduating high
school. I was so academically advanced growing up that when I reached high school
and hit one of the lowest points in my life, my grades dropped tremendously. I started
ditching school, and ended 9th grade with a 1.0 gpa. I spent the rest of my high school
years barely scraping by, ditching school whenever I wanted, and just goofing off. My
senior year I had to take 3 extra classes just to graduate. Walking across that
graduation stage was one of the proudest moments of my life. I had so many family
members and friends there watching me. When I was walking across all I could think
about is how I proved every single person wrong, and showed them all that I was
capable of doing it.
8. All of my significant memories of growing up have to do with my family. Some
of my most important memories are just memories of all the times I have with my
brothers when we all lived together with our parents. We used to play all sorts of
different games we made up, and I used to always follow Deven around everywhere.
My other really significant memories that I hold near and dear to my heart would be all
my memories of my Grandpa and I. My Grandpa and I were always very close. We
used to go camping, and he would take me fishing and hunting, and we would always
ride quads together. My brothers didnt like the same things my Grandpa liked, but of
course I liked to do them because Grandpa liked to do them. I just always had a closer
bond with my Grandpa, visiting him more often and frequently calling him. My Grandpa
had a stroke my senior year, 2 months before he was supposed to see me graduate.
Two days after his stroke, my Grandpa passed away with my Grandma, Mom, Aunt,
and Uncle by his side. I wasnt allowed to go miss school to see him those two days.
The memories I have of my Grandpa will always be some of my most important
memories.

IV. Influences
1. My culture has influenced my life because how I was raised was all based off
of my familys culture. Our culture of Mormonism really structured the life we lived when
I was growing up. Our American culture added to a lot of the traditions, and foods we
ate, when I was growing up. Culture has also influenced my life with my Niece and
Nephew because of how culturally diverse they have taught me to become, and the
cultural experiences they have allowed me to experience.
2. Biology and genes have of course impacted and have an influence on my life.
My genes have given me my identity. The way I look, my freckles, my glasses, and my
brown eyes are all from my Dad. The genes my Dad gave me influenced a lot of my
physical traits in life. The way I talk, think, and the attitude I give people are all from my
Mom. My Moms genes that she passed down to me influenced my personality traits in
life. So of course without biology and my parents genes I would not be the same person
I am today, so those have both influenced my life quite a bit.
3. My peers, family, and friends have all influenced my life probably more than
anything else has. My family has influenced me to stay strong through anything thrown
my way in life. Every true friend I have had has left a positive influence in my life. Also
peers of mine and fake friends have influenced my life negatively, with pressures of
drug use and other bad habits. Most of my friends and my family have influenced my life
in a good way. I am grateful for all the positive influence they have provided me in life.

V. Reflections
My life so far has taught me so much. Every step of the way I am facing a new
challenge, embracing a new adventure, and with all that learning something new about
my life. My family has taught me how to love unconditionally. They have taught me that
family is everything, very important, and always there for each other. My family has
taught me that no matter how hard life can get you keep going. My culture has taught
me about myself, and my family. My culture has taught me about the importance of
tradition, and family. Growing up I also taught myself about life. That in life I wont
always get what I want, things wont always go my way, but I still have to keep trying,
push harder, and never give up. All of my influences in life have taught me the
difference between good and bad. They have taught me what the positive aspects are
that I should focus on in life, and also what is negative and which I should move my
focus away from. I have learned so much throughout my life, not just about myself but
about life in general as well. I enjoyed writing this paper because it allows me to look
back and really look at myself, how far I have come, and how much I really have
learned.