workshop--anthony

"Every Morning" by Anthony Setari

I think you did a great job capturing the drama that is waking up a little kid before he/she really wants to get up. There were a few sentences that I really loved. In the first crot: "There's this weird orange and blackness kind of cutting across the room through the blinds. My arm looks like a tiger." Great detail! In class, some people were a little confused about what made you so unhappy in the morning, they thought it might be some kind of family problem, but I understood that it was just you hating to wake up so early. But you might want to add some details to clarify so that readers aren't confused. I also thought that some of your run-on sentences were effective, like on page 2: "This is the best show ever because...like...they take Looney Tunes but make them kids, it's practically genius, it's like bigger than rockets." Haha I love that! You might want to look at a few long sentences like on page 1: "I hate this, I am so tired, how can anyone get up this early, it's still dark out." It is a childlike way of thinking, but you might want to think about breaking up long thoughts like this.
I know some people mentioned adding more concrete detail as opposed to all thoughts, and I agree. In the second paragraph when you're talking about brushing your teeth, you say: "Blah...(tongue sticking out) I hate swallowing the toothpaste, I always gag when I do." Why not show us that? Something like: My tongue is sticking out and I gag from swallowing the toothpaste (well, better than that). I thought you did a pretty good job of describing action in the second paragraph when you describe sliding across the wood floors in the morning. There were so many funny moments in this piece! Like how you know when a show is going to end and the detail about telling the doctor about eating bacon, eggs, and cheese every morning. So far, it's a good snapshot of a typical day in the life of little Anthony. Another suggestion made in class that I'd have to agree with is really show us why them saying "Good morning, Anthony." bugged you so much (like spell out how annoyingly they said it). Also, you could maybe add how comfortable you were in bed, how involved in a dream you were, something to show why you hated getting up so much. I also love the ending! "Out of your 'comfy' pajamas into what they call 'real' clothes." Good job, Anthony!