The Butterfly Effect by Jenniffer Lunden
"[Metamorphosis]
It was cold in Maine. Cold. And the snow was heaped in dirty piles on the side of the road. And the sidewalks were icy. And it got dark at 4:30 in the afternoon.
It was the dead of winter, and I wanted out, so I flew to California—to Pacific Grove, aka Butterfly Town, USA, to see the monarchs. It was a journey home, really, though I had never been there.
I grew up in a box-shaped house on a well-manicured lawn in the suburbs of a mid-sized Canadian city in Ontario. Across the road and abutting the river was a patch of city land, untended, wild, a field of tall grasses flecked with milkweed and Queen Anne’s lace. There, I discovered my first monarch caterpillar. I was 9 years old, and I had never seen anything like it. Boldly ringed in concentric stripes—black, yellow and white—it was stretched out on a milkweed leaf, eating. I plucked it off, held it in my hand, touched it with my fingers. Its skin was smooth, leathery. It did not roll up in a ball. It did not seem afraid. Docile. I broke off the milkweed near the top and carried my find home."
Aralia Giron
"My daddy just called me, he says he's going to catch the next bus and visit me because he's sorry to have missed my birthday. He told me to wait for him, so I will. It's quite early but I'll hurry and prepare myself for his arrival, it's been a while. The red glow of the digital clock numbers stare back at me. 12:03 p.m. He will be here soon.
I am seated by the window, waiting for him to park his bike by the gate. I'll run outside and give him a big hug when he does so. I'm so excited!
He still hasn't arrived but I'm not worried, he did promise me after all. My aunt is complaining to my grandma, honestly, what if the poor man is caught in traffic? He didn't forget did he?
It's getting dark now, my aunt is trying to pry me away from my post. I tell her to let me go because if I go eat now then I won't be able to hug my daddy when he gets here.
It's time to go to bed now. I pretend I'm not crying when my aunt comes in to check on me. Someday, I tell myself, someday I'll be able to see him more often, someday...
*****
My father just called me, he says he's going to catch the bus and visit me because he couldn't make it to my birthday party. He told me to wait for him, so I will. It's quite early but I'll try to hurry. It's been a while. The bright glow of my cell phone stares back at me. 12:30. I will be there soon.
I find him seated by the window of the starbucks cafe, waiting for me patiently. I'll go through the side entrance and surprise him. I promised him I would come today. I promised him that this time I wouldn't forget to make time in my busy schedule to see him, even if it meant taking the bus myself.
What worked:
Both stories follow the format of the montage writing technique, separated by blank spaces or asterisks for each new scene introduced. In a way, both pieces are written like snapshots, conveying a different image per mini paragraph that when pieced together, formulate one big story.
What Didn't work:
In the "Butterfly Effect" the author does establish a new scene by incorporating blank space between each paragraph, however, I felt as a reader my understanding was slighted because she strayed a bit from tradition and broke one moment down into sub-scenes.
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