The Introduction
The author might have commenced with this essay with the conversation that begins after the first paragraph. Instead, the writer settled on imagery which first establishes the context in which that conversation will take place:
“The moment I walked into the dry-cleaning story, I knew the woman behind the counter was from Korea, like my parents. To show her that we shared a heritage, and possibly get a fellow countryman’s discount, I tilted my head forward, in shy imitation of a traditional bow.”
Flashback
The story features a non-linear chronology. The central moment is situated as the narrative “present” before flipping backward in time to the past in order to provide context. Interestingly, though those flashbacks will take the reader to high school and college, it is only her teenage years that gets the benefit of imagery to bring it more vividly into the present day:
“To ensure that I reaped all the advantages of this country, my parents saw to it that I became fully assimilated. So, like any American of my generation, I whiled away my youth strolling malls and talking on the phone, rhapsodizing over Andrew McCarthy’s blue eyes or analyzing the meaning of a certain upper-classman’s offer of a ride to the Homecoming football game.”
The Turning Point
Imagery is used much more judiciously in the portrayal of the college years. In fact, it really all comes down to just one single line which intensifies the power of imagery by exploiting the uncertainty of the narrator at the time with language that is itself inelegantly imprecise:
“I had seen the flaw in my life of halfwayness, in my planned life of compromises.”
Closing Paragraph
Imagery is used in the final paragraph, but it is a distinctly different sort for a distinctly different purpose than that found in opening. The point of the final paragraph is the contextualization of the specific immigrant experience of which the narrator speaks. Instead of using imagery which creates historical and personal context as the most effective tool with which to start her story, she uses as a more effective tool for concluding it:
“Children of immigrants are living paradoxes. We are the first generation and the last. We are in this country for opportunities, yet filial duty binds us.”
