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Analysis Of Rick Bragg's Upside Down And Pathways

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Journal Entry 3 The moment I finished the first paragraph of, Rick Bragg’s, “Upside Down and Sideways” narrative I was taken back to my own ‘slingshot’. Gratiot Avenue, an old state trunkway, begins in Detroit and runs in a southwesterly direction through what used to be the grand estates and historical districts of the motor city, outward toward the sprawling suburbs. Gratiot has history, in fact, it was used as a supply road for old Fort Gratiot in Port Huron, which was tucked into the space between the thumb and the hand in what Michiganders affectionately call the mitten. Even though this road wasn’t unlike any number of others across the united states, it held a special magic. Growing up just outside of Detroit means you live and breathe automobiles. If your dad didn't work for one of the “Big Three” automotive companies, your …show more content…

I gripped the wheel and made a sharp left and went up the curb into the heavily landscaped median. My shiney black Charger went airborne, grazed a tree and landed on top of some shrubbery. A disaster had been averted, I was humiliated and ashamed at my negligence, but we were all alive. The people in the car ahead of me with the terrified eyes never even pulled over, they just kept on going. I sat there atop the shrubbery in my sleek black Charger, first laughing and then weeping. I never played the radio that loudly again, and that was the last time I cruised Gratiot Avenue. It was a lesson that was not lost on me. I still love cars but that moment was a slingshot into adulthood, where my carerfree reckless world gave way to booster seats, and insurance rates. Don't get me wrong, I still get goosebumps when I hear the sound of a six cylinder hemi, but from that night on I learned to understand and respect the responsibility that comes with that kind of

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