closing doors by gavin rember

In the paired reading titled “Closing Doors” by Gavin Rember, the author takes us through the journey he faced as a child in dealing with the Denver Department of Social Services. Through his writing Rember focuses heavily on the detailed descriptions to enhance his arguments and feelings of the reality that he had faced at one point in time. He lived life moving from house to house because money wasn’t something his family, which included him and his single mother, had much of. Rember had grown to hate this building because it’s the symbol for all his family had which wasn’t much. Finally Gavin was able to leave a troubled past and move on, when he goes to revisit the closed down building he feels less hatred for it as if finally in his life things are stable.

The reading is big on details allowing the reader to picture the struggles that were faced, Rember opens up the essay with three descriptive images “A lonely child screams for her mother. A couple bickers in Spanish; the women begins to sob. I sit in silence, trying to drown out the noise.” (Page 142 1st paragraph) the reader is placed in the room with the array of details and is able to picture how it’s like to be inside the welfare office, the inside of the office portrays the struggle of instability that each family is facing. Rember goes on to explain how worn down the office was “The waiting area was filthy, unorganized, and overcrowded. Plastic chairs awaited the welfare-hopefuls, after they took a number” (Page 143 3rd paragraph) the room was worn down much like the people in it, fighting a struggle the is unforgettable, Rember has the images of this room imprinted in his memory as an example of the hardship he dealt with.