Exercise Paired Sentences

Danielle Orner
Exercise # 3
02/20/07
Pairs of Beginning Sentences
Beginning and End of the School Year
With a fresh coat of white paint on each building and carefully groomed lawns, the campus gives off the illusion of unlimited potential but, as soon as a door opens to the interior, the smell of old habits anchors the mirage in reality again.

Surveying the stripped dorm room one final time, I close the door and carry the last overstuffed box to the car.

Starting and Quitting a Job
Clarissa managed to find the coffee maker on the first day but not the pot, the filter, the mugs, the beans, the grinder, the cream, or any little plastic stir straws.

It was the pens that posed the only problem; which ones were his and which belonged to the company or his various other colleagues typing away behind their beige cubical walls.

Arriving and Leaving
The driveway leading to her sister’s cottage was far longer than expected and Sarah wished she hadn’t told the cab driver to drop her off at the corner rather than the front door.

Before I could find a seat, the train lurched into motion and forced me to spend those last moments in the station clumsily navigating the obstacles of knees and baggage rather than blowing solemn kisses out the window like they do in black and white movies.