Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Grandma's House (WR #2, Group #1)
By the time my sisters and I finish our salads the party is really heating up. I’ll be sitting in the comfortable, faded-brown armchair (because I’m the oldest and I get the best seat) while my sisters share the lighter brown couch with the cushions that sink in even when nobody is sitting on them. The television is our prime source of entertainment. We’ve been to so many parties that we don’t even notice the unusually large amount of pictures (mostly of us) that litter the walls, the piano, the dining room table, the end tables with the lamps that provide the only source of light for the living room and the old chest that houses the broken record player. When we were young kids Grandma would let us use the record player to play music that we would dance to for what seemed like hours. Frank Sinatra and Barbra Streisand were our entertainers of choice along with our personal favorite song, “Memory” from “Cats”. I loved pressing the button that made the needle move from its docked position onto the record. I could always tell when it worked because the record made that high-pitched slide sound that DJs make by spinning their disks.
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So I am not in this group, nor have I read the whole piece yet, but I felt it necessary to comment on the "cats" reference. For whatever reason, my brother and i also loved "Cats" as kids. 'Memory' was our favorite too. We had it on tape (yeah, on cassette) and used to make my mom play it repeatedly while driving.
ReplyDeleteI feel like i should also add something more substantial. You have a bunch of different tenses going on. Its confusing. You start in the present with "finish" and "is," then go to future with "I'll" then back to present for a while, then switch to past. Switching to the past could work if you are in fact switching back to the past, but its kind of confusing right now and the future tense came out of nowhere.
I like the sort of cheek in tongue reference to being the oldest, it gives some flavor to piece. I also really like the description of you putting on the record. Sometimes you could benefit from more descriptive scenes, like when you're talking about all the pictures you don't notice. A description of then, and then a comment about how you no longer see then would be really effective.
ReplyDeleteI agree with both Lauren and Linus. I feel like there is a lot going on. The tenses thing along with the very brief description of the scene is difficult. I can't feel the room at all and you mention that the tv is the prime source of entertainment but we don't know what you are watching or anything that is happening. I love the specificity of the song memory and what it is like to press the button that makes the arm go down on the record.
ReplyDeleteThe one thing that is obvious throughout the piece is the adoration the author has for grandma, which a lot of people can connect to.