I didn’t set out to write a memoir.
I thought I was writing a book about my dad.
When I was born, my parents were living in rural West Virginia, and my father was a coal miner.
He’d had the job for less than a month. He got hired just in time for his insurance benefits to cover my birth.
Before that, he’d been a copper smelter, a truck driver, and an assembly line worker in a Ford Pinto factory. My mother worked at A.C. Nielsen, wiring switchboards by hand. They were living in northern New Jersey by then. Elizabeth. Across the Hudson from Manhattan, where they met.
When they met, my dad was a PhD student studying sociology at Columbia University. He had a bachelor’s degree from Harvard, in history. Between those two Ivy League schools, he also attended Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond and went to Nigeria as part of the first-ever Peace Corps. Along the way, his politics veered ever farther left.
My parents moved to West Virginia in 1974 because the Revolutionary Communist Party told them to. I’ve haven’t come across an official card, but they were definitely members.
Which brings us to the start of my story.
My Path to Memoir Writing
My father died on Valentine’s Day 2015. As executrix of his estate, I was charged with finding a permanent home for his papers—all 47 boxes of them.
His will allowed for that process to be delayed if either of his children or any of his nieces of nephews wanted to use them to write.
Could I really turn down that invitation?
My father’s papers, aka “The Archives.” Since these boxes also contain my life, they are a memoir writing mother lode.
Wait? This Book Is About Me?
As I began to dig into the archives he left behind, I realized that the book I am writing is about me.
It’s about my father, too—and my mother—but it’s more about the influence they had on me and the way their unorthodox choices shaped my life.
And while I may be new to memoir, I am not new to writing.
I’ve been doing it pretty much since I learned how to hold a crayon. I studied English and Spanish literature as an undergrad at Columbia and journalism (along with Latin American studies) as a graduate student at NYU.
I began my career in magazines, working for Parents, Astronomy, and finally BusinessWeek.
That last one branded me a business writer, a designation that’s been hard to shake. Funny given my Communist roots.
In subsequent jobs and as a freelancer, I have written about everything from canine couture—yes, high fashion for small dogs—to the redevelopment of Lower Manhattan in the wake of 9/11.
As I set out to write my father’s story, I quickly realized I am much better qualified to write my own. And as it turns out, my life has taken some unusual twists and turns over the years. Which have taught me things I’m grateful to know. And might even be helpful to others?
Why Memoir Writing Now?
Among those twists and turns was losing both my parents before I turned 40. As mentioned, my father died five years ago. My mother died well before that—of colon cancer when I was 25.
I know parent loss, and I’ve done some time with grief. I’ve discovered that everything shifts when you find yourself alone in the world without your parents.
I set out to write about my dad in part to grieve his death. I realized along the way I hadn’t ever fully grieved my mom’s.
I also realized this: You can get to know your parents even better after they die.
I know my parents now in a profoundly deeper way than I did when they were alive.
It’s bittersweet, for sure. I wish I could talk to them about SO MANY THINGS.
Our Past as Teacher
Learning about my past has taught me so much about myself.
I’ve learned that staring down the past isn’t as terrifying as I thought it would be. I’ve learned that tackling the things I’ve carried the most shame around often leaves me with much greater compassion for myself.
I’ve learned that my parents did one hell of a job raising me. Under some crazy conditions. Even as they did things I wouldn’t chose to do with my own kids. I’ve learned they were always trying to do the best they could with the resources and understanding they had at the time.
Why a Memoir Writing Blog?
My goal with this blog—and, ultimately, with the book I write—is to show you the healing power of writing memoir. To show you why I think you should do it, too. How the more you know about your past, the more you understand about your present.
The downside of writing memoir is that it can feel hugely narcissistic. It’s the Me Show all the time. Even when I’m writing about my father and mother well before I was born, it still serves as the foundation of my own story.
(I’m reminded that my father once put in a foundation beneath a house we were living in at the time. Maybe filling in my foundation is likewise helping to shore me up.)
As someone who has hidden herself for decades by growing skilled at asking other people questions, it feels uncomfortable turning the spotlight around.
Asking you to pay attention to me is well outside my comfort zone.
But I’ve come to believe that only by doing this can I be fully present and available to others. I hope you’ll bear with me.
I absolutely want to read your memoir, too.
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