What writing technique is being used here? "if i could go back"

Read the excerpt from “the railroad earth.” o well anyway i'll be learning eventually to like the railroad and sherman will like me some day, and anyway another day another dollar. the narrator of this excerpt can best be described as friendly.optimistic.wealthy.intelligent.

After taking notes carefully and studying freqently, derek not only passed the test, select the word group below that best completes the sentence in parallel structure. and he got 100% but he scores well on classwork but he also scored the highest in the class and he was also scoring the best he ever had

Explain how johnny got hurt. how does this affect his personality