A Coin

The creative technique for this short story written by Hemon is macabre images and grotesque textual content. That doesn't necessarily seem like a technique but none could argue that the story is not shockingly gruesome and gory. I believe what the story is really getting at is focused around the symbolism of the last paragraph when the narrator is talking about the feeling you get when you run from point a to point b without getting your head, arms, legs, or chest blown to bits. "When you get to point B the adrenaline rush is so strong that you feel too alive. You see everything clearly, but you can't comprehend anything...the feeling is always the same but i've never had it before...You pick yourself up and walk back into your besieged life, happy to be...(you) put your hand in your pocket where you may or may not find a worthless coin..." The point a to point b symbolism is much like flipping a coin. Heads or tails- a or b. Your life is in the hands of chance. Will you live? And if you do live did the snipers just decide to not shoot at you today because of the particular clothes you are wearing? Did they miss? Or was someone else simply more interesting? Maybe the story is an allegory (ha that rhymes) relating to life's brevity or longevity. Everything can be taken from you at any one moment. The camera man Kevin is like the apathetic citizen to me. He uses his camera, his "third eye," to take himself out of the realness of the situation. He only faces things with his camera. That's why the narrator likes him. But that is also why he leaves her. I like the ambiguity this story offers. If i were to relate it to something less surreal i would have to pair it with the baddest bad of America. Every slum, ghetto, dirty street in America would have to be thrown into one scene and every bad thing that had ever happened on those streets or places would have to be replaying all at once. To me this story represents things as extreme as that. The really deep dark and twistyness of life. I think the snipers could potentially be symbols for the power heads of America. They get to choose everyones fate. And everyones fate still likes to chance. This story was an awesome read but i really can't fathom the true meaning of most of its content. What were the letters purpose?

Metaphorically Speaking

Sweet success! I have finally created the bloggy thingy ha! The short story Greasy Lake is packed with delicious metaphors. Everything seems to be something it is actually not. Even the title, greasy lake, is a metaphor because the lake that once used to be so clean is now murky and turbid. "We wanted to snuff the rich scent of possibility on the breeze" is an excellent metaphor that encapsulates the possibilities of being young and, dare i say it, stupid to that which is real. "The first lusty rockette kick of his steel toed boot" is a metaphor that symbolizes the sexuality and testosterone of 19 year old boys. "Digby vaulted the kissing bumpers" is yet another one. "he was a stunt man and this was Hollywood" is my personal favorite metaphor in the story. I can see the whole movie slowing down in order for the stunt man to barely miss being clobbered by the crowbar and mock crumpling- fake blood all over his face and ear. The various and different gradients of metaphorical language enrich this short story and make it deeper. The three 19-year-old men/boys are described, in many different variations of the phrase, as bad. They are cool cats prowling the town. Underage drinking, smoking pot, sounds like a night in athens! Dead bodies, raping, destroying are all however very unlike our typical college experience. The metaphors make these boys seem much more relatable to us, experimental maybe, OU students. It allows the story to come alive and the reader or audience to be a part of it.