Transformations
The vintage chic clothing site modcloth.com is having a contest for bloggers. The task is simple--write about your greatest transformation. Here's a link to the contest: http://blog.modcloth.com/2009-07-09-announcing-the-terrific-transformations-contest?=6_9_transformations
Here's my entry:
Solemnly, Andrew picked up his sword, lifting it high over his head. He lunged at the invisible dragon before him. “This is for the warriors!” he cried.
“No screaming!” our grandmother shuffled in. “The neighbors will come and what will I do?” Andrew took out his frustration with the lost momentum on the dragon, which soon lay in invisible, meaty slivers on the floor. “We saved it,” he said, jaw set. “We saved this galaxy.” Andrew was never content with just a planet. We saved universes together-all before my aunt came to pick him up at seven.
I don’t know how a family can be harder to save than the universe.
It was all Dad’s fault our family was imploding, anyway. I didn’t know what was wrong with him. Grandma kept the house running and fed us chocolate milk and soup with noodles but somehow Dad didn’t like her. He hated her, actually. You could tell by his screams.
I don’t know when his screams started, either. Grandma and Grandpa had lived with us quietly since I was four years old-before Andrew was even born. Now, Andrew was big enough to play with me-any adventure we could think up, and Grandma and Grandpa were there to feed us and build us little ships out of wood. Chaos and screams and little kids running around everywhere-that was perfection. I couldn’t ask for more.
“If it weren’t for me,” Dad screamed at Mom, “they’d be living on the street!” I put the flesh of my palms over my ears, heart trembling. My grandparents stood in the hallway. Grandma wracked her brain for a cloak for her fear. She looked down at her arms.
“Look,” she cried. “look at these marks from carrying your shopping bags!” He slapped her. Grandma took solace in my room while Dad went out to his car to cool off. She called the police.
“It happens,” the officer said when he arrived, “with families like this. Too many people in a small space.” I guess everybody decided they agreed. My grandparents moved out soon afterward, and my cousin Andrew stopped coming after school.
We settled into our new, quiet life. I don’t know why Dad never asked if something was wrong. I didn’t know how to deal with the anger he’d given me. There wasn’t even an invisible dragon to slay.
Dad was a monster, I soon decided. The only thing worse than living with somebody I hated was hating myself for being a part of him. I had a name for myself-the Devil’s Daughter. Nobody loved me. I was sure of that much.
School wasn’t much better. The kids were spoiled and my teacher was a strict, old bat who screamed too often and gave too much work. There wasn’t much hope for somebody who didn’t like her; you were stuck with her for all of four years.
“We’re going to be doing the Thanksgiving play,” she announced one day, annoyed. Plays meant a break from learning, meant practicing lines with a bunch of lazy kids for at least a month. She waddled out of her chair and handed out the script..
I immediately knew what part I wanted. It wasn’t the lead-I never thought I could do the lead, but it had a lot of lines, anyway. I’d always been too shy for more than a line. Somehow, though, I thought I could do it. I raised my hand and read the part.
“Carol,” she said, looking at another girl. “You read it now.”
That’s it, I thought, glum. Forget me. She’s cast it in her head.
“You’ve got the part,” she told Carol. I burst into tears. She didn’t treat me with her usual mixture of exasperation and anger. Come here, she said with her finger.
She led me into the lunchroom adjacent to our class while a science teacher watched the other kids.
She looked at me with concerned eyes, letting me cry. She handed me a tissue, then thought for a moment.
“You’ll understudy the whole play,” she said, like it was something important. “if anybody’s absent, you’ll have to know his part.” I stopped sniffling in time for her to put her fleshy, grandmotherly arms around me.
She hugged me! I thought, confused. The day continued, ordinary as it had begun.
Faithfully, I learned the script, reciting the lines at my reflection in the window. I was even the lead one rehearsal-a live Statue of Liberty, which, you must understand, is the most serious part an actress can play.
I had accumulated all of four lines by the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. One of those was mine; two came from parts we didn’t have enough kids to fill, and the last was hastily given to me by a girl who spent that Thanksgiving in Disney world. There was never a prouder “Girls 1-4.”
I guess my teacher saw that-saw how carefully I decorated a notebook to go along with my costume and how hard I tried to say my lines loud enough for somebody to hear me. I dragged my mother by the arm to go meet her while the other kids were stuffing their mouths with chocolate.
“She’s my doll,” she told my mother, kissing my forehead.
She loves me, I thought, nestling into her. I’d found my newest piece of family in a crabby, uptight old grandma.
Here's my entry:
Solemnly, Andrew picked up his sword, lifting it high over his head. He lunged at the invisible dragon before him. “This is for the warriors!” he cried.
“No screaming!” our grandmother shuffled in. “The neighbors will come and what will I do?” Andrew took out his frustration with the lost momentum on the dragon, which soon lay in invisible, meaty slivers on the floor. “We saved it,” he said, jaw set. “We saved this galaxy.” Andrew was never content with just a planet. We saved universes together-all before my aunt came to pick him up at seven.
I don’t know how a family can be harder to save than the universe.
It was all Dad’s fault our family was imploding, anyway. I didn’t know what was wrong with him. Grandma kept the house running and fed us chocolate milk and soup with noodles but somehow Dad didn’t like her. He hated her, actually. You could tell by his screams.
I don’t know when his screams started, either. Grandma and Grandpa had lived with us quietly since I was four years old-before Andrew was even born. Now, Andrew was big enough to play with me-any adventure we could think up, and Grandma and Grandpa were there to feed us and build us little ships out of wood. Chaos and screams and little kids running around everywhere-that was perfection. I couldn’t ask for more.
“If it weren’t for me,” Dad screamed at Mom, “they’d be living on the street!” I put the flesh of my palms over my ears, heart trembling. My grandparents stood in the hallway. Grandma wracked her brain for a cloak for her fear. She looked down at her arms.
“Look,” she cried. “look at these marks from carrying your shopping bags!” He slapped her. Grandma took solace in my room while Dad went out to his car to cool off. She called the police.
“It happens,” the officer said when he arrived, “with families like this. Too many people in a small space.” I guess everybody decided they agreed. My grandparents moved out soon afterward, and my cousin Andrew stopped coming after school.
We settled into our new, quiet life. I don’t know why Dad never asked if something was wrong. I didn’t know how to deal with the anger he’d given me. There wasn’t even an invisible dragon to slay.
Dad was a monster, I soon decided. The only thing worse than living with somebody I hated was hating myself for being a part of him. I had a name for myself-the Devil’s Daughter. Nobody loved me. I was sure of that much.
School wasn’t much better. The kids were spoiled and my teacher was a strict, old bat who screamed too often and gave too much work. There wasn’t much hope for somebody who didn’t like her; you were stuck with her for all of four years.
“We’re going to be doing the Thanksgiving play,” she announced one day, annoyed. Plays meant a break from learning, meant practicing lines with a bunch of lazy kids for at least a month. She waddled out of her chair and handed out the script..
I immediately knew what part I wanted. It wasn’t the lead-I never thought I could do the lead, but it had a lot of lines, anyway. I’d always been too shy for more than a line. Somehow, though, I thought I could do it. I raised my hand and read the part.
“Carol,” she said, looking at another girl. “You read it now.”
That’s it, I thought, glum. Forget me. She’s cast it in her head.
“You’ve got the part,” she told Carol. I burst into tears. She didn’t treat me with her usual mixture of exasperation and anger. Come here, she said with her finger.
She led me into the lunchroom adjacent to our class while a science teacher watched the other kids.
She looked at me with concerned eyes, letting me cry. She handed me a tissue, then thought for a moment.
“You’ll understudy the whole play,” she said, like it was something important. “if anybody’s absent, you’ll have to know his part.” I stopped sniffling in time for her to put her fleshy, grandmotherly arms around me.
She hugged me! I thought, confused. The day continued, ordinary as it had begun.
Faithfully, I learned the script, reciting the lines at my reflection in the window. I was even the lead one rehearsal-a live Statue of Liberty, which, you must understand, is the most serious part an actress can play.
I had accumulated all of four lines by the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. One of those was mine; two came from parts we didn’t have enough kids to fill, and the last was hastily given to me by a girl who spent that Thanksgiving in Disney world. There was never a prouder “Girls 1-4.”
I guess my teacher saw that-saw how carefully I decorated a notebook to go along with my costume and how hard I tried to say my lines loud enough for somebody to hear me. I dragged my mother by the arm to go meet her while the other kids were stuffing their mouths with chocolate.
“She’s my doll,” she told my mother, kissing my forehead.
She loves me, I thought, nestling into her. I’d found my newest piece of family in a crabby, uptight old grandma.