8 Images

1. " What was running through my head though, was the song the Munchkins sing when Dorothy's house lands on the witch with the stripy socks" (pg 99)

The fact that Mary chose to say with the stripy socks is evidence of how she uses extreme detail in her writing. We all know what scene she's talking about in the movie (if you've seen it). The stripy socks was an unecassary detail, but that's what Karr has done throughout the whole book. Give unecassary details that ultimately help us picture the scene.

2. "In the next slide, dark finally comes in" ( pg 116)

In the next slide is one of the many things Karr will say to transfer from memory to memory, or parts of the same memory. She does it throughout the book

3. "I wrapped my arms around my knees, bowed my head, and prayed to a god I didn't trust a prayer that probably went like this....." (115)

This shows how much Karr really cared about her sister, because she actually got down to pray to god after all the cynical things she'd said when it comes to religion. This also interested me because I believe this is symbolism for how the world is. We could care less about a God, question wether one exist, if there is we dont live like he wants us to, but when shit hits the fan its all praying and "please do this and that" for us.
4. "I stopped trusting the world partly from seeing how those meaty-faced men bellowed under the shadowy bills of their tractor or cowboy hats" (104)

This was the moment Mary's cynical attitude towards the world really started to take control of her I think. I personally don't blame her either.

5. "But I knew with cold certainty while I stood there in that lukewarm water that she was going up there to get drunk" (109)

I can't say because I'm not Mary Karr. Just doing some foreshadowing. I ultimately am convinced the passing of the grandmother is what started the mother on her psychotic trip. But I believe that with Mary's realization of this moment, this represented the spiral downward her family was going to take, or at least their mother. They took a family trip to have fun together, and instead of having fun with her children, she goes to get drunk. Would she have done that had grandma still been alive?

6. "My feet sank and couldn't get traction, like the run in a bad dream" (114)

This is an example of Karr's amazing writing style, where she uses something most of us have been through at a certain point in time or can imagine, and relates it to what was happening to her at that moment. It helps us put ourselves in her mind and feel her emotions at the time.

7."mother is shouting, shouting she'd wished herself dead before she'd ever married daddy" (138)

In writing about this, mary uses the word shouting twice, back to back. Putting it this way builds up the dramatic intensity to the climax of the memory I believe. It also helped me visualize it more because it made it easier to imagine Mary's voice in my head instead of knowing I'm just reading ink on paper.

8."and that's it, that's what I remember about my birthday" (139)

To have her birthday go the way it did must of had some later psychological effects unseen right now. To have your mother try to drive the car off the road, possibly killing you and the rest of your family, on your birthday? As we all read this book and are amazed at how this woman's life went. Do we question how it could have been this way? Or why? I didn't really have an answer up until now. Now I believe it's a result of the parents she had.