Solly Jarrett example essay topic

Some stories start out slowly. Some start quickly. Some, unfortunately never start at all. It was the latter that was slowly becoming the bane - or, as he saw it, the description -- of Morgan Dubois' existence.

Granted, his story was slow in forming not because of lack of effort or desire on his own part, but fizzled time and time again due to an enormous lack of cooperation from the outside world. The outside world, of course, being girls. Standing a modest six feet, two inches in height and tipping the scales at one hundred and eighty-five pounds, Morgan Dubois wasn't that demanding of attention, and his brown hair and hazel eyes - maddeningly typical, in his eyes -- did nothing to change that, much to his chagrin. Though not unattractive, Morgan never fancied himself good-looking, and though he wasn't a heartthrob, girls never seemed to notice him, either. Unlike many other teenage boys, though, he found little solace on the athletic fields or courts of the high school scene. He wasn't gifted in any real sense of the word, he thought.

Made and played on the basketball team but never started, and with a few minor exceptions and headlines from a sectional championship relief pitching performance his junior year, the same went for football and baseball. Even Morgan himself didn't take much from his athletic prowess, if one could call it that; when you " re a kid of above-average height in a school population numbering barely 170 - if all the Jarrett kids were there, the running joke was - you damn sure better play something, or you " re a queer. You were weak. Though he'd willingly concede the fact that he was nondescript and perhaps all but invisible to the girls he fancied, Morgan Dubois was no queer. He wasn't weak. And though the thought never crossed his mind, for fear of the attention he sometimes so desperately craved, Morgan Dubois damn sure wouldn't tolerate you thinking he was.

And that declaration, though unmade as of yet, is where Morgan's story, and ours, truly begins. I've got to tell you, I saw it coming. Solly Jarrett, on the other hand, was. He was weak. And he'd be the first one to admit it. The youngest - by six minutes; his twin sister Holly nearly edged him out for the honors - of eight children, Solly was raised in a household that had seen enough achievements, both scholastic and athletic, that he wasn't going to get much more than a 'good luck' from Mom or Dad whenever he got dropped off at school or the baseball field.

But ah, the sweet release that that field brought him. It was the place where Solly Jarrett, broad-shouldered Solly Jarrett, 225-pound southpaw Solly Jarrett with the rocket arm and looping uppercut swing that deposited baseballs onto Millie Jones' rose boxes just over the right-field fence - just parked them there 'like it was a damn driving range,' Coach Phillips liked to say -- Yeah, the baseball field was where he felt at home. He was deemed by teachers to be the smartest kid in the entire freshman class, though that was no achievement, he thought; Like it takes a lot. I mean come on, out of all these country bumpkins, I'm the one that can spell my name right on the first try, so I guess I'm the intelligent one by default, right? His blue, almost cloud like eyes belied nothing of the storm that brewed just beneath them.

He could melt ice with those eyes, the girls in school said and fawned, but it wasn't as if he cared. Screw 'em all, Solly figured. Baseball was life, and the rest of it was just a time kill until he got out of this crap town and didn't come back. But right now - right now - all he could think about was getting the hell out of fourth hour and going home to eat lunch. Or, in case you " re keeping track at home - and it's not as if anyone at the Jarrett house was - eating lunch at home meant forging a note from Ma and hopping in the Le Sabre to go smoke a quick cigarette and get his mind off everything. Everything but baseball.

Come on, Ms. Murdock. I could do your stupid preposition worksheets in my sleep. Come to think of it, Ms. Murdock, I AM doing them in my sleep, because your boring crap just isn't cutting it in my world. Too bad he'd never say that. Well, I take that back. It's too bad he couldn't find a better way to say it than he did.

Which brings us to me. I'm pretty inconsequential, really, except that I'm the only one left to tell you this story. I guess that's not necessarily true. People in town still tell it, especially at the Newsstand, especially if you ask why that picture of those kids has all those flowers around it. Go ahead, ask. Listen.

They weren't there, though... I was. If we were in person, I'd be about half-tempted do it in my best Robert-Stack-from-Unsolved-Mysteries impersonation, just because he's so damn cool... but we " re not in person, so I can't very well do that. I'll just relate it the way it happened, or the way I saw it happen. Best take it with a grain of salt, though; it's not that I'm not trustworthy, but, well... last summer, I learned that on its own, information is nothing. Perception is everything.

And if you control perception in a small town, you control the town. Even if you " re ready or not. These bottles are all he's got His only friends around.