Simplicity in Boland

"I wanted simplicity. I craved it. At school I would learn Thomas Hood's poem: 'I remember, I remember/The house where I was born.' But as time went on, I didn't. Such memory as I had was constantly being confused and disrupted by gossip and homily, by the brisk and contingent talk of adults. 'Stop that. Settle down. Go to sleep now.'" ~Object Lessons, p. 38

What I like about this passage is that as Boland talks of simplicity and her desire for it, she manages to keep her sentences from their usual complexities. She is speaking of her childhood at this time, and so the quick and short sentences are fitting to the situation. Where the one sentence expands itself, it is for the purpose (as I see it) of accentuating that her memories of childhood were "being confused and disrupted" by those around her.

Two Quick Side Notes:
-I don't remember the house where I was born because we moved months afterwards.
-Ann Page, I'm sure you were pleased to see "contingent" used in this passage