Tuesday, November 8, 2011

The Body - Memoir of childhood

Stephen King's The Body begins with a narrative, sometime in the future, that describes how the most important things are the hardest things to say. It’s painfully true. Most of the time, words are just not enough to convey the intensity and value of the emotions felt. As this story is, in essence, a memoir of one of the characters in the story, this introduction is very appropriate. So it’s basically saying, “Okay, listen. I’m going to describe memories that are precious to me beyond compare. But know that the words and sentences you read here aren’t everything, merely a small part of what I felt.” And with that said, 'Gordie', or a fictional representation of Stephen King, begins his story.
           I would like to begin my little memory. I thought about my own childhood when I read this, and what kind of friends I had. There were four of us - me, Na-young, my brother, and Byung-woo. We weren't the same age or gender, me and Na-young being girls and three years older than my brother and Byung-woo, but we managed to grow close just the same. We were pairs of siblings, my brother and I, and Na-young and Byung-Woo. And we had some adventures of our own. We spent our days racing each other on sidewalks, finding a beehive and coming up with plans to throw rocks at it without dying, endeavoring to stay quiet in our rooms so as to not provoke our parents to saying that its time to leave, and when we ran out of things to do there was always the hide-and-go-seek which was usable anytime and anywhere. However, our ultimate dream was to find a clubhouse all to ourselves, kind of like the treehouse in The Body. We always dreamed about what our clubhouse would look like. A place where no parents could find us, a hide-out sort of a place to share secrets and hang out, somewhere where there were lots of trees and that looked both cozy and magical. But, where can you find a place like that in Korea, so our clubhouse prospered in our imagination. We would go to some apartment-property playground and pretend that a random slide was our clubhouse. We would go collect flowers, clovers, grass to match the place to the clubhouse of our imagination until the sun went down and our parents told us that it was time to go.
             It's amazing how much you learn from these childhood friends. Na-young, my brother, and Byung-woo, they opened my eyes to a whole new world, and I hope I opened theirs. I found out that I was brave (perhaps stupid), daring to do things that they would be too timid or scared to do, such as climbing up the swings and attempting to walk on the bar or eating an unknown berry from a tree. Yes, as we grew older, our roles in each others lives became smaller and smaller and we each went on our separate ways. Na-young and Byung-woo became just a memory and my brother became more of just a related being rather than a friend. But, memory is a word that retains great power. It is capable of making one smile, chuckle, laugh, cry, ache, but to all these there's an element of pain, knowing that it's just a memory. In my mind, I still see us as little ten-year-olds and seven-year-olds searching for that clubhouse of our dreams and someday, I hope we find it. 

1 comment:

  1. Good Reading Journal, and I'm happy to read your personal connection rather than a summary of who's who in the book. It shows you appreciate where King (and Gordie) are coming from as personal narrators. "Why" he is telling the story is as important as the story itself, and a lot of students don't get that. The film helps forward that theme, I think.

    I guess I was lucky, because I did have a clubhouse when I was young. My dad built one for every house we lived in. But the one I remember most is the back porch as a teenager. Not a real clubhouse, but where my friends and I would bbq etc during the summer.

    Good post!

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