The summer sun hid behind thin white clouds, radiantly roasting the city below. The sky was uncomfortably bright, aggressively attacking my eyes and keeping them trapped to looking at the ground. If stepping on a crack in the sidewalk is bad luck, then my sidewalk is a minefield. My sidewalk clung tightly to an unpainted concrete wall. My sidewalk spanned true from the highway past my the first school I attended, past the first place where I scraped my knee, past the rusty iron gates guarding where I had spent my childhood. My sidewalk ended in front of a bland apartment building identical to the six siblings next to it. My sidewalk still had the same cracks, the same missing bricks, the same downward slant I used to love running on.
Stepping
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I sped up, trying to putting more distance between me and those bold red characters. Past the iron gates, down my brown and yellow brick sidewalk, and up the concrete ramp bordered by rusty railings, my arms began to feel heavy but not from dragging my suitcase. Inside the elevator, the same elderly woman sat at the controls hunched over slightly to the left on her wooden stool with one arm resting on her leg and the other waving a slightly crumpled paper fan. The display read 18 and I got off. My suitcase ran into the unpainted concrete wall, making a small dent next to the several others I had made as a soccer loving kid. The hallway said hello flashing on its automatic fluorescent …show more content…
Highways usually packed with red and yellow lights were now still. Aside from the period crackling of the train, the whispers of the summer wind, and the ticking of my wall clock, my room was silent. A shy moon peaked through the drooping shades, just barely illuminating the white walls. The bed, the soft sheets, the warm blankets were waiting.
But it was 2:30 pm. The summer sun brashly pierced into the room, blindingly reflecting off the glass coffee table and the ornate cabinet doors. The smell of pork chops and fried rice battled with odor of mothballs and cigarettes for control of the apartment. I walked past the TV which I once broke, the leather couch I once spilled water all over, the coffee table I had chipped. As I entered my room, I flipped open my suitcase and dug for my pajamas. As I slipped under the coarse bedsheets and felt the hard wooden bed frame press against my shoulder, the world slipped away from me.
When I finally awoke, the buzzing of the kitchen fan, the creaking of the wooden flooring, and the soft banter of the grandparents were all gone. It was pitch black save for a red light projected against the ceiling. I sat up and stared out the window. Those illuminated red characters stared
The night was tempestuous and my emotions were subtle, like the flame upon a torch. They blew out at the same time that my sense of tranquility dispersed, as if the winds had simply come and gone. The shrill scream of a young girl ricocheted off the walls and for a few brief seconds, it was the only sound that I could hear. It was then that the waves of turmoil commenced to crash upon me. It seemed as though every last one of my senses were succumbed to disperse from my reach completely. As everything blurred, I could just barely make out the slam of a door from somewhere alongside me and soon, the only thing that was left in its place was an ominous silence.
Sidewalks are different shapes and sizes, people tend to make their own decisions to which way they would want to go. Going through the motions on a sidewalk is similar as going through the motions of life. There are many turns that could get you to your final destination and turns that can also get you into places you would not feel so comfortable being. Staying on the right path and trying to get to where you need to go isn’t so hard but when you have other sidewalks with nice grass and big beautiful street lights that can be a very big distraction to the eye and that could cause problems in your life. Nice sidewalks sometimes don't always tend to continue a nice path so they can be very believing at first but when you make it to the end
The window slowly creaked open, a soft wind blew into the small room. The sound of light breathing came from under the sheets were a young boy slept, oblivious to the happenings that night. Soft footsteps hit the floor, the smell of old toys and new bed sheets wafted out of the room, hitting two men crouched down by the bed. A hand reached up, gingerly touching the boy.
Ralph heard the night watchman call lights out. The moon gleaming in the window was the only source of light within Ralph’s room now. Even in the dim light he could make out the sink and toilet. The room was padded, and the door had a glass window that reflected fluorescent light into the room. The combination of the artificial and natural light created a faint glimmer upon the mirror that hung above the sink.
My mind started to wonder though each room of the house, the kitchen where mom used to spend every waking hour in. The music room where dad maintained the instrument so carefully like one day people would come and play them, but that day never came, the house was always painfully empty. The house never quite lived to be the house my parents wanted, dust bunnies always danced across the floor, shelves were always slightly crooked even when you fixed them. My parents were from high class families that always had some party to host. Their children were disappointments, for we
Imagination can take you anywhere, and see beauty in unlikely places. Shel Silverstein’s “Where the Sidewalk Ends” takes the reader on a short, but poignant journey through the poem, and leaves the reader, somewhat expectedly, at the end of the sidewalk. Though it sounds like a very boring location, Silverstein unexpectedly transforms the end of the sidewalk into a rift in reality that contains compelling impossibilities, and he encourages everyone to see it for themselves.
cold, harsh, wintry days, when my brothers and sister and I trudged home from school burdened down by the silence and frigidity of our long trek from the main road, down the hill to our shabby-looking house. More rundown than any of our classmates’ houses. In winter my mother’s riotous flowers would be absent, and the shack stood revealed for what it was. A gray, decaying...
As I walked down the corridor I noticed a man lying in a hospital bed with only a television, two dressers, and a single window looking out at nothing cluttering his room. Depression overwhelmed me as I stared at the man laying on his bed, wearing a hospital gown stained by failed attempts to feed himself and watching a television that was not on. The fragments of an existence of a life once active and full of conviction and youth, now laid immovable in a state of unconsciousness. He was unaffected by my presence and remained in his stupor, despondently watching the blank screen. The solitude I felt by merely observing the occupants of the home forced me to recognize the mentality of our culture, out with the old and in with the new.
A ray of light completely filled the room. Daisy was stirring in her bed, feeling the warmth of the sunlight bursting through the window. Her eyes flickered open, adjusting to the light. She glanced around her room, thinking about a dream she had last night. She sat upright in her bed, rubbing her eyes; remembering if it was a dream or if it was real.
Moya blinked. "Well, that’s just stupid." Fritz stood beside her in the doorway and looked in. The room was lit by a strange, golden glow that apparently came from nowhere since there were no windows, and no lights that they could see. Like the stairway, the ceiling in the room loomed so far overhead that it disappeared in darkness.
Comparing your life to that as a sidewalk may be one odd comparison, but you will be surprised when you notice how many things from your life can be symbolized within a sidewalk and its surroundings. I chose image number 3, a clean, newer looking sidewalk because it represents my life in a way that nothing has before. A few metaphors that I can relate too from this image are the clean surroundings of the sidewalk, the underlying roots of the sidewalk, and the concept of the sidewalk being replaced thus its new appeal. Your life can be depicted through many things that you may have never even thought of!
My childhood was a playground for imagination. Joyous nights were spent surrounded by family at my home in Brooklyn, NY. The constantly shaded red bricks of my family’s unattached town house located on West Street in Gravesend, a mere hop away from the beach and a short walk to the commotion of Brooklyn’s various commercial areas. In the winter, all the houses looked alike, rigid and militant, like red-faced old generals with icicles hanging from their moustaches. One townhouse after the other lined the streets in strict parallel formation, block after block, interrupted only by my home, whose fortunate zoning provided for a uniquely situa...
I wearily drag myself away from the silken violet comforter and slump out into the living room. The green and red print of our family’s southwestern style couch streaks boldly against the deep blues of the opposing sitting chairs, calling me to it. Of course I oblige the billowy haven, roughly plopping down and curling into the cushions, ignoring the faint smell of smoke that clings to the fabric. My focus fades in and out for a while, allowing my mind to relax and unwind from any treacherous dreams of the pervious night, until I hear the telltale creak of door hinges. My eyes flutter lightly open to see my Father dressed in smart brown slacks and a deep earthy t-shirt, his graying hair and beard neatly comber into order. He places his appointment book and hair products in a bag near the door signaling the rapid approaching time of departure. Soon he is parading out the door with ever-fading whispers of ‘I love you kid,’ and ‘be good.’
Walking, there is no end in sight: stranded on a narrow country road for all eternity. It is almost dark now. The clouds having moved in secretively. When did that happen? I am so far away from all that is familiar. The trees are groaning against the wind’s fury: when did the wind start blowing? Have I been walking for so long that time hysterically slipped away! The leaves are rustling about swirling through the air like discarded post-it notes smashing, slapping against the trees and blacktop, “splat-snap”. Where did the sun go? It gave the impression only an instant ago, or had it been longer; that it was going to be a still and peaceful sunny day; has panic from hunger and walking so long finally crept in? Waking up this morning, had I been warned of the impending day, the highs and lows that I would soon face, and the unexpected twist of fate that awaited me, I would have stayed in bed.
Behind my house lies an alley. It is an old one, the pavement has been torn up and battered for years. On the brightest days, the sun hits the surface of the hard grey rock and you can see all the little cracks and holes for a long ways. The surface is rough and coarse and very unforgiving to the unfortunate knee or palm that scrapes against it, perhaps from play or an unexpected fall. A few feet from the pavement stands a wall.