workshop--neal

"Backyards" by Neal Brautigan

I really love the way Neal opens this essay. The parts about hunting bees are great! I love the sentence: "Grandpa says they're a real nuisance this year, them bees, 'even worse than the last,' and promises me the going-rate of ten cents per cadaver." There's a very childlike way of looking at bee hunting as a "real" job. I think that at the end of page 1, there could be dialogue instead of "...I ask them what do they think they're doing."
I like the second crot, about the man tossing you up into the air and dropping you, but I don't totally see how it connects to the bee story. It connects because of it's describing a backyard, yes, but there's a lot of other stuff that doesn't seem to fit. The part about the cooties potions was funny, especially the line: "'That means it's working,' I assured." But once again, not really seeing the connection. There's a paragraph about using tennis rackets as guitars and playing rock band; based on how much you wanted to buy records in the first crot, you could really focus more on this and make the connection stronger. Did you play rock band out in the back yard? Details! This could be really funny.
I feel like the whole story of Dad beating up the man who dropped you could be a mini-essay itself, and that focusing on just the hunting of the bees or maybe even how much you loved rock and roll even as a child could make the essay stronger and flow better. I really wanted to know more about the actual hunt--how long would you look for bees? You say you never got stung, but did you ever come close? How many years did you do this?, etc. I think elaborating on these details could take the piece in a different direction. But yeah. The beginning and ending crots are my favorite. I love this sentence on page 4: "Sometimes I feel guilty about my murders-for-hire, but even more so for the helpless bright pink flowers I decapitate along the way." If you take it in a different direction, you'll probably need another title (obviously). Good work! I liked reading this.