#inthewaitingroom

(1) What is going on in this story?  Relate the actual events of the essay.

A man in France who can't speak French can only say one word "D’accord,” which translates basically to O.K. By only being able to say okay, David agrees to many things he'd likely wouldn't have. From sewing a button on a bear to having extensive mouth surgery. David unfortunately has a kidney stone, this winds him up in the hospital where he has to return the following week for a check up. As he says OK to the nurse, he winds up in a quiet waiting room just in his underwear.

(2) What is the larger theme or themes at play?  (What is the point?)

Going though life is a strange adventure if the only thing you can say is okay. You need to know when to say no otherwise you might end up in a waiting room in your underpants. The things you will experience while your going through life won't all be good, but they will be remembered. (3) How does the author use their inner thoughts within their writing?

He explains past events and relates them to the current situation. By bringing up his childhood, or the dog with a peg leg his interests the reader and brings in strange new twists. Inner dialog is helpful to have the reader put themselves in his shoes. Although comical, him thinking of ways to die while mostly nude is what most of us would do. (4) Pick one passage where the author uses vivid description.  Paste it into your post.  What stand out about that passage for you?  How is it effective?

"Perhaps on their way home they’ll see a dog with a wooden leg, which I saw myself one afternoon. It was a German shepherd, and his prosthesis looked as though it had been made from a billy club. The network of straps holding the leg in place was a real eyeopener, but stranger still was the noise it made against the floor of the subway car, a dull thud that managed to sound both plaintive and forceful at the same time. Then there was the dog’s owner, who looked at his pet and then at me, with an expression reading, “That’s O.K. I took care of it.”

With this style of writing the author paints a picture in your mind of just how ridiculous this dog really looks. It stood out to me because of the dog's owner and just how he is totally fine with the dog being the way it is. It's effective because of how he explains how it looks, sounds, and how others feel about it.

(5) What does the author do to make this piece interesting and hold the readers’ interest?

In Worcester, Massachusetts, I went with Aunt Consuelo to keep her dentist’s appointment and sat and waited for her in the dentist’s waiting room. It was winter. It got dark early. The waiting room was full of grown-up people, arctics and overcoats, lamps and magazines. My aunt was inside what seemed like a long time and while I waited I read the National Geographic (I could read) and carefully studied the photographs: the inside of a volcano, black, and full of ashes; then it was spilling over in rivulets of fire. Osa and Martin Johnson dressed in riding breeches, laced boots, and pith helmets. A dead man slung on a pole —“Long Pig,” the caption said. Babies with pointed heads wound round and round with string; black, naked women with necks wound round and round with wire like the necks of light bulbs. Their breasts were horrifying. I read it right straight through. I was too shy to stop. And then I looked at the cover: the yellow margins, the date.

The last day I worked at my box was last Thursday. I then got injured at work and have been out since. Today I either get cleared by the doctor or I wait another week.

I seriously can’t wait to get back to working out. I’ve been doing so good and even though I want to work out injured, I need to think of the long run. So I wait a couple weeks to keep reaching for my goals.