-As appeared in the Denver Post
Do you remember those summers driving to New York to visit relatives? You're in a closed car smelling your father's cigar and your sister's inevitable vomit running down his back. If so, you have begun your memoir. After all, no life is dull. Writing memoir is not for the timid. It requires the courage to unlock private cupboards of memory, to sift and sort the gems inside and have the stamina to write it all down.
Memoir is a popular genre. Nonfiction books like Frank McCourt’s Pulitzer prize-winning Angela’s Ashes, Arthur Golden’s Memoirs of a Geisha and Frank McBride’s The Color of Water are best selling examples. You don't have to be famous to write memoir. McCourt took 30 years to write about his childhood in the slums of Limerick, Ireland. Using the storytelling he learned at his mother's knee, he went from relating memories to writing memoir.
Maybe you're a Senior Citizen trying to pass on the lessons of World War II or a Baby Boomer wondering, where have all the flowers gone? At first, your recollections may lie dormant. When mind and page are blank, try freewriting, drawing, listing or even dreaming to open the underground mine of memory. Even when the stories are vivid, the process may still be elusive. How does one transform tiny fragments of memory into memoir? Just exactly what is memoir?
Memoir is not autobiography. Gore Vidal says, “A memoir is how one remembers one’s own life while an autobiography is history requiring research, dates, facts doubled-checked.” Told in the first person, memoir is your story, not history. The protagonist is you, the writer and keeper of the past. The setting is your hometown, your high school, or your family farm. The characters are the quirky relatives, loyal friends, adversaries, dedicated teachers, and passing acquaintances you have met on your life's journey. The plot is a series of stories that quilt together the threads of memory.
Where to Start
It is far too intimidating to begin memoir with birth and end in the present day. Memoir is not chronological. A hybrid between fiction and nonfiction, it moves back and forth in time. Memoir allows one to track the processes of life, reporting and honoring moments that were most significant. One way to begin organizing those moments is to list five to ten of the most memorable. Then, prepare a time line.
Divide your life into increments of years, decades or by a series of personal milestones. Next, draw a line down the middle of a sheet of paper, dividing it in half. Place the dates, facts and events of each segment of your life on the left and the feelings and emotions evoked on the right. For instance, if one side of the time line shows that in 1955 your family moved from the country to the city, the other side will reveal the emotions involved in this significant change. Was it traumatic or liberating? Did it impact friendships, education or your ability to adjust?
Once the time line is complete, focus in tighter. Take one aspect of your life that is meaningful to you and write about it freely and honestly. The challenge is to select a theme or themes that bind the work together. If you're stuck, try this helpful exercise: Write “My First…” and fill in the blank. Topics like My First Day at School, My First Kiss, My First Job, My First Trip, or My First Spouse provide endless possibility.
Pete Greene, an “Ageless Adult” enrolled in memoir classes at the Arvada Center for the Arts and Humanities, has vivid memories of his first kiss. He recalls that in his sophomore year of high school he applied for a part in the school operetta and got the lead. Greene writes, “Unfortunately for me, the script called for the leading man and the leading lady to embrace and indulge in a long kiss as the curtain came down to end the play. During practices up to the last week, we just said, “As the curtain falls they embrace and kiss,” and merely walked off. It was not only embarrassing to kiss her in front of the cast, but I had never kissed anyone other than an adult relative.” Greene’s trauma lasted until opening night. He describes that moment in time. “Finally, on the night of the play when it came to the end, I threw all caution to the wind and grabbed the leading lady and, pressing her close, gave her a passionate kiss and held it until the curtain dropped. That finale had some measure of success as shown by the whoops and hollers of our school friends in the audience.”
Memories such as this provide a record of the writer's world. That world is full of the sounds, sights, smells and flavors of the past. Don't be afraid to call upon the senses to illustrate your life. One exercise recommended to beginners is to capture the “Present Moment.” Writers go out of the classroom for ten minutes of freewriting to record sensory reactions to their immediate environment. After putting random thoughts to paper, the results are often astounding. It soon becomes easier to recall the smell of Grandma’s peach pie or the sound of Grandpa’s Model T. Such raw material eventually becomes art.
One such exercise prompted Arvada Center student Elena Garrido to masterfully describe her father’s occupation. She writes, “My father was only twelve when he was introduced to the underground world of black dust, black rock and back breaking labor in the bowels of the earth, barren of even the slightest ray of daylight for hours on end.”
Common Pitfalls
One of the common pitfalls that memoir writers face is their own personal deadline. At first, the task of writing down a life appears overwhelming. If you set realistic goals and take stories one at a time, the prospect of actually finishing the memoir is not so daunting. Also, it is not necessary to list every fact, event or date. Literal inclusions without emotional attachment are dry and mundane. It is better to take the leap from fact to emotional truth. But, whose truth is it?
Memoir writers often succumb to the pitfall of trying to please "the family" and play it safe. If the fear of censorship lurks in your skeleton closet, don’t be inhibited by what others think. Many writers tend to protect siblings, neighbors and children from actual events in their life for fear of hurting someone. Waiting for Aunt Edith to die before describing her backyard still during prohibition may keep her from disinheriting you, but is the story as colorful? Each writer has to make these storytelling choices, but they don't have to be made by consensus. Don't consult Uncle Marvin about your memoir. Tell him to write his own. Remember that truth isn’t always readily available for an event that happened decades ago. Gaps filled in with a touch of imagination tend to be far more interesting and fun to read than a play by play.
Another pitfall is lack of detail. Memoir without detail is like a portrait without paint. Tolstoy put it best when he said, “I don’t tell. I don’t explain. I show.” By showing the action, written memories come alive. When Arvada Center student Carol Grote was assigned to portray her mother through description of an inanimate object, she wrote, “The old Singer treadle machine, powered by foot, stitched pinafores of organdy and school dresses from flour sacks. Always prints. Perhaps that’s where I acquired my lifelong aversion to printed material… The wood drawers were where my manners were kept since Mom was always asking, "Did you leave your manners in the sewing machine drawer?” I’ll always remember that old wooden Singer with the fold-over top and wrought iron foot treadle. And, I’ll always wish I had saved it. After all, that’s where my manners are.”
Now that you know where your memories are, keep them alive. Instead of wishing you had saved them, write them down. George Meredith calls memoir the "backstairs of history." Leap down those stairs, now. Those gems you find in the memory cupboard are a priceless legacy for generations to come. Remember, no life is dull.