In the Cemetery...

This piece captivated me deeply, not only because of the interesting subject matter, but because of the very natural, very human way in which Hempel writes. Her tone is conversational, and her dialogue is natural, yet she conveys a certain air of mystery and insight which is difficult to attain when using this tone. Part of what makes this tone so natural and human is the fact that she goes back and forth between trains of consciousness, as any natural human mind would do. Still, every paragraph flows without losing my attention. One section which specifically caught my attention is the paragraph that begins with "What seems dangerous often is not -- black snakes, for example, or clear-air turbulence. While things that just lie there, like this beach, are loaded with jeopardy..." It is the little details like these, and the random trivial facts which the narrator relays to her ill friend (hearing-ear dogs, sign language-speaking apes) which make this story seem so... real. The narrator's thoughts on danger are thoughts that most people can read and think; "Hey! Now that reminds me of something i've thought about plenty of times, but she says it in a way that sounds much better." This sort of reminds me of the chapter on "Details" in the Prose book. Although some of the information in this chapter was interpreted as BS, I think that the details in Hempel's story are the kind of details which Prose was really trying to describe to us.