Saturday, October 31, 2009

brush strokes

After trying to find something in my blogs that went along with brush strokes, I noticed that I pretty much lacked any kind of those subjects. So, I decided to take an excerpt from an essay I wrote earlier in the semester.

My Life as A Reader

Every summer, my parents would ship me off with a backpack of clothes and my “blankey” to my Grandparents’ house in Gig Harbor, WA. Every summer, I would cry and would pry my fingers around the frame of the car door. I hated my Grandparents’ house. I would have nightmares about how much of a boring week was in store for me (I still do). You see, my Grandparents are the kind of people who own a T.V., but don’t believe in letting their grandchildren watch it. For an entire week it was just me, myself and I . . . and the stiff smell of the elderly. As the first few days of the week passed (which was just me sleeping, eating or catching crabs on the beach to torture), my Grandma asked me if I wanted to go into town with her. Of course I did! I was ecstatic! Finally, a way out!
The town of Gig Harbor is a lot different than a lot of the suburbs surrounding Seattle. It is full of a lot of old, retired yuppies (including my grandparents) . . . but at the time, I was just happy to be out of the house. After walking around from shop to shop my Grandma asked me if I wanted to go into the bookstore (gross, the bookstore). You can’t be mean to old people though, especially your Grandparents; it’s like in the unwritten rule for grandchildren. So, of course, I agreed to go in. There was something different about this bookstore . . . it was old, small but had a mysterious and magical aurora to it. I liked it. It reminded me of something that would be in a book or featured in a sci-fi/fantasy movie. The smell, the old tattered books and new sucked me in like a vacuum sucking up dirt from a carpet. I was in awe at just the pure beauty of this bookstore. After starring off into this Wonderland of a shop, the sales clerk asked me if there was anything I was looking for. Knowing that I didn’t have a preference and didn’t have a particular love for books, I looked at my Grandma with a slight hint of fear and curiosity. My Grandma suggested to the clerk that she let me look around and browse through the selection that was offered. So I did. I looked, and looked, and looked. I finally found myself in the fantasy section of the store. I picked up a few books and read the synopsis on the back. At last, a book that sounded interesting to me. I figured, what’s the harm in doing some reading back at my Grandparents’ house anyway? I wouldn’t be doing anything else. So I found and told my Grandma that I wanted a book, it was called, The Ancient One by T.A. Barron.


My Life as A Reader with Brush Strokes

Every summer, my parents would ship me off with a backpack of clothes and my “blankey” to my Grandparents’ house in Gig Harbor, WA. Every summer, I would cry and would pry my fingers around the frame of the car door. I hated my Grandparents’ house. I would have nightmares about how much of a boring week was in store for me (I still do). You see, my Grandparents are the kind of people who own a T.V., but don’t believe in letting their grandchildren watch it. For an entire week it was just me, myself and I . . . and the stiff smell of the elderly [absolute]. As the first few days of the week passed (which was just me sleeping, eating or catching crabs on the beach to torture)[participle], my Grandma asked me if I wanted to go into town with her. Of course I did! I was ecstatic! Finally, a way out!
The town of Gig Harbor is a lot different than a lot of the suburbs surrounding Seattle. It is full of a lot of old, retired yuppies [absolute](including my grandparents) . . . but at the time, I was just happy to be out of the house. After walking around from shop to shop my Grandma asked me if I wanted to go into the bookstore [participle] (gross, the bookstore). You can’t be mean to old people though, especially your Grandparents; it’s like in the unwritten rule for grandchildren. So, of course, I agreed to go in. There was something different about this bookstore . . . it was old and small [adjective out of order], but had a mysterious and magical aurora to it [absolute]. I liked it. It reminded me of something that would be in a book or featured in a sci-fi/fantasy movie. The smell, the old tattered books and new sucked me in like a vacuum sucking up dirt from a carpet [adjectives out of order and absolute]. I was in awe at just the pure beauty of this bookstore. After starring off into this Wonderland of a shop, the sales clerk asked me if there was anything I was looking for [participle]. Knowing that I didn’t have a preference and didn’t have a particular love for books, I looked at my Grandma with a slight hint of fear and curiosity. My Grandma suggested to the clerk that she let me look around and browse through the selection that was offered. So I did. I looked, and looked, and looked. I finally found myself in the fantasy section of the store. I picked up a few books and read the synopsis on the back. At last, a book that sounded interesting to me [participle]. I figured, what’s the harm in doing some reading back at my Grandparents’ house anyway? I wouldn’t be doing anything else. So I found and told my Grandma that I wanted a book, it was called, The Ancient One by T.A. Barron.

I hope I did this right, haha. I'm no sure if this is what Barbara exactly wanted us to do! And I'm no sure if I got them all right, but I tried!

2 comments:

  1. I think you did a great job on all the brush strokes you tried out! I am slightly confused on what adjectives out of order is exactly because I had thought it was: the tattered books, old and smelly. Also I don't know if I missed it but I didn't seen any appositives. I think your participles were great. Especially, "At last, a book that sounded interesting to me." I enjoy that sentence.

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  2. Whitney is right about the adjective out-of-order stroke. Unfortunately, the other strokes aren't correctly done either. But I can see the misunderstanding: all your strokes are part of a CLAUSE, either subordinate or main. Brush strokes are al PHRASES... which means they're just brush unto the clauses and could be left out altogether without messing up the sentence.
    We'll talk more about this distinction today in class.

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