1st person - writing question

I am confused, when you write in 1st person do you use....looked, not looking or look?

Here is a sample of my writing:

I looked down at my matriculation pad when it beeped and suddenly a voice rang out of it,
"Melor, this is intel we have evaluated your intelligence and tactical applications and you have been submitted into the ESOSU and are to report to the nerve center for farther debriefing, do you understand?

"Yes sir," I replied as I walked out of the dull, dark grey room, and into the dimly lit corridor. I could vaguely make out doors placed at irregular intervals and wondered where they led to. In the dim light I could barely make out the sign at the end of the hallway, it read: "Debriefing room" with an arrow pointed left. I turned left and kept on walking

Am I using the write tenses and what parts sound "awkward" ?

"to report to the nerve center for further debriefing, do you understand?"

Your tenses are good. The key is to be consistent. If you start out in the past tense, stick with it. Use of first person has nothing to do with it.

In the dim light I could barely make out the sign at the end of the hallway: "Debriefing room." An arrow pointed left.

That is a suggestion, above. Everything seems fine, though! You write very well. Maybe you can ask your question in a different way so we can understand what you mean; like Sean said, the perspective does not change the verb tense.

I look, he looks, she looks, we look, they look
I looked, he looked, she looked, they looked, we looked.

i thought it was a good piece and it was not awkward at all. it was all in right tenses. where is this from? a short storry of urs?

really good!
good luck

[Moved from]: a sonnet in the Third person - poetry question

I wrote a sonnet in the Third person. I am suppose to write about the message of the sonnet. I need help with the introduction n as the persona.

let me know
'
thanks

Perhaps you could post the sonnet here, so that we have some idea of what it is exactly that you need help introducing. As it is, it is difficult to know how to advise you.

no more came up. why?

What do you mean, Newsha31?

I think he is asking why Luke didn't post the entire story for us. That would have been really cool, because the story sounds as if it would be very interesting, based on the excerpt he did post.

yes Sean thats what i meant. tnx.:) (btw that's be "I think she is asking" haha)

Well, you haven't included your real name in the post, so I won't apologize -- I had a 50/50 chance of getting it right going with "he," and 100% of giving offense if I went with "it." :-)

I'll bear that in mind for next time, though.

well its totally ok. i dont mind at all. good thing u didnt go with "it". lol