Non-fiction / Lessons on Gerald Street (Analysis)
I don’t remember the exact year, late seventies maybe, or what age I was; I know this is when my family lived in East Providence, Rhode Island. So this would definetly make me pre-teen.
During the summer months, like most kids , I spent as much of my day as possible outside, usually with my best friend and neighbor, Mikey Morra. Mikey played Dr. Jeckel to my Mr. Hyde. Mikey was quiet but still fun to laugh with. We had tons of time for adventure as our mom’s would spend all day at each others houses smoking Eve 120 lights and sipping Seagrams. Mikey mainly served as my audience or creative associate. We would run around terrorizing the neighborhood with imaginary sabers and laser guns, squealing, and tossing ourselves off of structures the way only fearless little kids could. It wasn’t a successful play day without earning a scratch, bump or dirt caked scrape on the elbow or knee.
I was the little girl in the neighborhood everyone knew, constantly forcing people, pets and sometimes stuffed bears in a pinch, to pay attention to my every move with hollers of, “Hey, look what I can do” or “Mom! Mom! Look at me!!” I considered my front lawn as glorious a stage as any theatre. A non-stop ball of energy and nowhere to direct it, I sometimes would be so focused on what my next performance or demonstration would be, I would not even notice or care that I didn’t have a stitch of clothes on, out there in front of all the neighborhood kids and a few unemployed adults completely naked doing cartwheels and flips imploring all of them to watch. I actually stood in line for the ice cream man bare-assed once or once that i can remember. Thankfully my mother rescued me before it was my turn at the window but I also think she secretly got a kick out her nudist daughter. During these days, I would often take a trip with my Dad to Benny’s, the local store where one can find a tire iron and a badminton set on the same aisle. Benny’s had bikes, particularly a metallic purple Schwinn that I simply had to have because it matched my metallic purple bathing suit as I not so subtly demonstrated to my father everytime we were in the store by wearing the suit and sitting on the bike. Do I even need to mention that I was screeching for him to “look at me!”.
It Worked! The bike was unveiled to me in our driveway on one of those summer days, the kind of day perfect for wearing your bathing suit. It wasn’t even my birthday nor did I do anything I can remember to deserve it. I couldn’t contain myself. In a frenzy I screamed for Mikey to come over immediately and I bolted into the house to change out of my boring street clothes and into my metallic purple summer uniform . My maiden voyage on the Schwinn would be sweet, finally parading around in my coordinated bike/suit combo as I had envisioned on all those trips to Benny’s
Out there on the road, feeling on top of the world, ensuring that every person on Gerald Street saw me on my awesome bike with my awesome suit by hooting and laughing all the while making laps around the street. What a grandstander, cruising up and down the hot pavement, not caring that Mikey Morra was sitting on the corner waving back at me without a bike at all, never mind one that matched his bathing suit.
As I made my rounds, waving and smiling at the onlookers, Mikey jumped up and yelled at me in a not-so-best-friend-like manner, “Hey, MaryAnn stop being such a show-off; your bathing suit is on backwards” Indeed it was, and the neighborhood kids all laughed. No longer did they admire my cool new bike but chuckled at the little snot with her tiny boobies sticking out of her backwards bathing suit. Many parents, including my own, quickly unearthed hidden cameras to capture my horrified and admitedly hilarious expression
Anytime I find myself with a little too much swagger in my strut, I recall that day and pull that picture from the front of the photo album where my mother has so thoughtfully placed it on the front page
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I definitely chuckled a little at the end. A very amusing story. Some suggestions I have…..I’d leave out the first paragraph and start the story with the second paragraph. You can add in the details of your age at the time in that paragraph as well as location. The “characters”, you and Mikey, are well-written. I would like to know more about the setting. Is it hot? What does the neighborhood look like? All in all, it was a good read. Thanks for sharing!
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What a free spirited little girl, perhaps too spirited…
This is great! I can’t find fault. Go forth and publish!
I really like the feel of this piece. It was fun, it was heartwarming and cute but most importantly it was real. You help us see the scene as it happened and bring the characters to life in a very entertaining way. I can actually feel the nostalgia coming through.
A couple things I would raise that kind of relate to each other. One there’s not much of a conflict. You share a fun experience and you share it well, but there’s no contention, internal or external to make me want to read more.
This ties into my second point, which is you named your piece “Lessons on Gerald Street.” What lessons? What did you learn? You have a lot of lessons you could bring up in your conclusion, anything from “Be content with who you are” to “make sure you’re swimsuit covers what it should before you ride your bike.” By leaving open and leaving the reader wondering how you changed from the experience makes it seem like the piece would be better named “A Thing that Happened on Gerald Street.”
A couple lines I wanted to comment on.
“I don’t remember the exact year, late seventies maybe, or what age I was;”
This strikes me as redundant, if you knew one, you would know the other.
“to change out of my boring street clothes and into my metallic purple summer uniform”
I like your turn of phrase here. Very clever but still very clear, especially when combined with what you said earlier about being the kind of day for a swimsuit.
Keep up the good work.
Quite the entertaining anecdote. Your prose style is easy, readable and generally fairly polished. It might be an improvement to have the exact year on the photo in the end, so that the narrator says, “Oh, here’s the year . . .” to bring it full-circle to the beginning. A nuance like this would be a nice touch.
Proofreading notes:
definetly = definitely
our mom’s = moms
each others houses = each other’s houses
once or once (The second or once . . . needs to be set off as a parenthetical, perhaps just a comma before it would suffice.)
me!”. (A problem. This sentence is actually a question, so the period is wrong. Any punctuation after the exclamation point will look strange.)
birthday nor did I do anything = birthday, nor had I done . . .
Benny’s . . . backwards” . . . expression . . . page (terminal punctuation missing)
admitedly = admittedly
unearthed hidden cameras (I’m not sure that hidden is appropriate or necessary here. It’s not that anyone hid the cameras, right?)
LMAO…sorry for laughing, but the ending comes out of nowhere. Like the story is just like a nice summer day and I kept thinking okay whats the point. The ending made this whole thing perfect…and I could just imagine that scene of the little girl on her bike riding down the street.
Almost butt naked in front of the window of the ice cream van. Amusing story. I remember the seventies just about, where did she live?
First I would like to say as I was reading this at first I did not get the impression you were a girl! That was great! Overall a fantastic read but of course there are a few things I noticed like a bunch of i instead of I but that’s what an editor is for! Keep up the good work. Even though I’m a bit younger it still took me back to a place where I was young and free and things wern’t so tough!
Ah, I loved it! Any of those memory stories will always get me. Very well written, I could imagine the whole scene in my head, perfect. The way it was written allowed for room to let the reader to fill in the gaps with their own descriptions, which will usually become the street they grew up on, which will make any reader feel connected with the story. Keep up the good work, this is great!
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