The most unambiguously good memory that Ben shares in
Sag Harbor was from the chapter "Breathing tips of Great American Beatboxes." He finds absolute peace and happiness among the crowd at the concert, after finally getting in to Bayside. However, at the same time this chapter deals with his uncle's exile from his family that Ben sees as pure evil. I really liked the juxtaposition of these two memories in one chapter, the contrast made each memory seem, in a way, more vivid. This contrast is brought to the forefront by the way that Ben alternates between these two memories in his typical non-linear style.
I didn't know anyone. And it was ok. Something good was about to happen. I just had to wait. Weird trendoids surrounded me, fearsome geezers, drugged out wackos, but now we were comrades. We were all there for the same thing. The DJ hovered above us, throwing down his thunderbolts. He mixed in a segment of Debbie Harry singing "Rapture" and they screamed. Actually, I decided, I'm not dancing that badly at all. I thought, This is Good. No qualifier, chaotic or otherwise. Simply: Good.
I knew what Evil looked like. (263)
This passage describes with great clarity the capital "G" Good feeling that Ben experienced at the concert. However, as alluded to at the end of this passage, it is directly follow by the details of Uncle Nelson's situation. Ben's fond memory of the crowd at the U.T.F.O. concert is offset by his heart-wrenching memory of Uncle Nelson gazing longingly up at the house of his childhood. The most striking part of Ben's memory is when Uncle Nelson tells the boys what his own father had said to him so many years ago.
Uncle Nelson said, "He told me, 'don't set foot in my house ever again.' So I'm not." I stared straight ahead. "That doesn't mean I can't look, does it?" . . . The previous stops had been window-dressing. This is where he wanted to be. "I can look, right?" (266)
I found the juxtaposition of these two strong and contrasting memories very powerful, one the most good and the other the most evil. I think that the reason these good and evil classifications seems so pure and strong is because of the stark contrast provided by Ben's non-linear narrative. The resulting vividness of these memories made "Breathing tips of Great American Beatboxes" my favorite chapter in
Sag Harbor.
