Week 6 - Analyzing Memoirs LLFH

 

  1) Although I can't relate fully to the community blog post #4: cousins, there is a part that I've experienced, not with family though. Every time I fall out with a person I may be dating at the time, reuniting with them is always a bit awkward. We try to communicate like nothing ever happened sometimes but you can cut that tension with a butter knife. "Seeing someone that you haven't seen in so long, but feeling compelled to pull a conversation out of thin air as if not a day had gone by." Man have I been there. "So....... have you still been having those headaches that you use to have?" I always tend that ask some random personal question that may not be the best way to break the ice. Or maybe so, who knows.

  I can't see myself going through this with a family member I lived with though. The communication with the family is pretty clear if its on this level. I'm not letting time go by before we address something like this. I'm not too prideful to call to make sure someone is safe that day, even if we got into an argument prior to them leaving. I thought this story was about someone driving off a cliff though. It had the dark feeling that this cousin of theirs passed away. I guess I was pleasantly surprised, or let down for the stories sake, that they were still alive and well after some time had gone by. I'm not sure that this conflict is enough in its entirety to draw me in. I don't think the two years washed away, just a miscommunication that should've been nipped in the bud a long time ago. If that makes the writer feel like time was washed away then so be it. 

2) I think the community blog post #4: cousins has a good balance of telling their story within the timeline of their topic. The blogger doesn't go to in detail of the 2 year experience of them living together or the time in between when they didn't talk, the focus is on the topic at hand, the rainy night she left and the emotions that followed after. I would say there was more telling than showing. It can be hard to tell the difference for me. We were told that the cousin drove into the rain storm after their falling out, not really showed. The details of that night were good though. Massive rainstorm without saying goodbye. You were in the car with the cousin as she took off on her 1,300 mile journey, upset with what had transpired. 

  There were comparisons to a sail boat going into the Atlantic, not knowing if that boat would be seen again. These details helped paint the picture for me. I could feel the emotions based on this description. I felt like I was at the dinner table with the family as they struggled to make a fluid conversation with the cousin. Expressing the feelings as they departed reintegrated how the writer felt from the moment his cousin left, to the time he was at his car. 

  The Lena Dunham, Difficult Girl; Growing up with help blog on the other hand lives by the title. From the start of this blog you are overwhelmed with information about the writer. She was afraid of everything as a kid from uncut meat, homeless people, and a list of many other things that kept her up at night. There is a bunch of overtelling leading up to what the main topic is about. Get to the damn point fam. I'll keep reading though. The writer does show us just what she is afraid of and its effects on her mental health, I will give her that. I'm waiting for the writer to get to the point about having therapy but the causes of the therapy keep stacking up higher and higher. It can take the air out of the room a bit when trying to get through the post. Like I got it after the first paragraph. You have trouble dealing with your fears and go overboard with them to the detriment of others.

 I feel like I am her father and have to go on a three hour walk after reading this. I guess that's the emotion she wanted to get through to us readers? The details are there. They are everywhere. I can visualize Lena's plump, pretty fourth grade teacher who she calls her best friend. I see the yellow hair and the floral clothes that she wears. The character descriptions are very detailed and descriptive. You can say this makes for good story telling but man, it is a extreme. We are on the journey with Lena as she experiences doctors and therapist for the first time though. She goes from not liking the experience at all to confiding in her therapist to cope with life. 

3) I do get a fair share of truth-telling from both of these stories. The community blog post #4: Cousins keeps it short and sweet with their story telling of the event with their cousin. This story seems like a realistic tale you'd experience with someone special in your life. It seems more fit for a breakup but I can believe that it happened with a family member who lived with the writer for a few years. Those relationships can be intense as well. The second blog, Difficult Girl; Growing up with help, slightly less believable because of the lengths they go to get this story told. The details of the characters and what Lena went through is like writing a script for a movie. Yes, I believe this could be about her real life and what she experienced as a kid but she does so much to tell the story of her life. I know I can be longwinded with my post but Lena takes the cake on this one. I can't compete with her.