Annotating Drowning in dishes

Intro The people who make a difference in your life come in all types. Some write on a chalkboard. Some wear a sports uniform. Some wear a suit and tie. For me, that person wore a tie with a Pizza Hut logo on it. What is this piece going to be about? What technique is used in the second, third, fourth sentences – comment on the reason? Why is the last sentence interesting?

Paragraph 2 I started working at Pizza Hut in December 1989, when I was a freshman in high school. Parents in my small western Colorado town encouraged teenagers to work in the service industry after school and on weekends. It kept us out of trouble. What is the linking device here to link to the first paragraph? Comment on the sentence length- what do you notice? Why is this done?

Paragraph 5 On my first night, the dishes piled up after the dinner rush: plates, silverware, cups and oily black deep-dish pans, which came clean only with a lot of soap and scrubbing in steaming- hot water. I couldn’t keep up, and stacks of dishes formed on all sides of me. Every time I made a dent in the pile, the call came back for help clearing tables out front, and I returned with brown tubs full of more dirty dishes. Name three techniques you can see here – can you also say what they are doing to help the passage be clearer or more interesting

At home, the chore I hated most was dishes. A few years earlier, my mother’s then boyfriend instilled a loathing of that task by making me scrub the Teflon off a cookie sheet, believing that it was grease, while he sat on the couch and smoked cigarettes. That boyfriend was gone, but another with a different set of problems had taken his place. How do you react emotionally to this description? What do you realise about the boyfriend? How does the writer make you feel this? What is the impact of the last line?

Paragraph Pizza Hut became not only my escape from home but also, in many ways, an alternate home. In my real home, I felt unstable and out of control. At work, the path seemed clear: Work hard and do things right, and you will succeed. This model had not seemed possible before. What kind of sentence is sentence one? Find an example of contrast Find an imperative

Paragraph Explain why the job at Pizza Hut meant so much to him. What was so good about the manager that made him so effective running the restaurant? How does this essay link back to the first paragraph?

Response structure What is the main message of this piece? What message does this have for you personally? Comment on bits you liked or felt strongly in agreement or disagreement with and quote to support what you are saying and link your feelings or ideas about this to your life. Does this have a message for everyone? Is it telling us we all have to get jobs at Pizza Hut? Or is there something more? Write three-five paragraphs (one plus pages) in response to this piece using the annotations you have made as jumping off points for the paragraphs.

Sample essay INTRO: Drowning in dishes is a good title for this piece especially when you realise it is about how this speaker felt he was really drowning in life. The first line sums up the whole purpose of the writing – he wanted to talk about someone who helped change his life for the better. The opening paragraph uses simple repetition in the parallelism to list for the reader the kinds of people who might influence you. The last sentence is both funny and intriguing because you don’t expect that a Pizza Hut worker would have that sort of influence.

2 nd paragraph As the writer gives details of his home life with a series of “stepfathers” you realise that he did not find any kind of comfort in his home and that is why he was quite pleased to get a job and go out to work. He says “ I was always looking for reasons to be away from home” His description of the one who made him “scrub the teflon off a cookie sheet” thinking it was grease, gives us an example of the stupid and bullying stepfathers he has had to deal with, and we feel sorry for him.

3 rd paragraph The job at Pizza Hut with the piles of dirty dishes sounds terrible. The listing “plates, silverware, cups and oily black deep-dish pans” the writer uses makes us see very clearly just how many there were and later how dirty and how he felt as though he was drowning in the smells and food- “my pants smelled like onions, olives and oil”. Using assonance here gives this line real rhythm and makes us notice it more strongly.

4 th paragraph As the article continues you realise that his boss, Jeff, was really teaching him some valuable lessons about life “Nobody likes to work with a complainer”. He also was caring and thoughtful and in time the writer was given more and more responsibility and became part of the “family”. This piece teaches us that if we are having a hard time, there may be solutions out there. Family can mean more than your biological family. I felt it also showed that when a man is a leader, he will create good things for those around him. When Jeff left the place, the writer felt things were not the same. We can all learn lessons from this article about striving to do your best, looking out for others, never giving up, going out of our way for others. For eg Jeff made sure the writer took his application to the college in time.

continued It also made me think about the false ideas on status we have – we may think running a Pizza Hut is not the most prestigious job but it enabled Jeff to be great man and to help others. The writer’s conclusion: “any job can be the best job if you have the right boss.” tells us something about people and what matters most in life. I enjoyed this piece because the writer painted such a clear picture of the people and gave me a real message about life