I’ve started to write about life recently. Actually, I started writing about life not-so-recently, but I started publishing writing about life recently. For months I’ve written about life every morning in my morning pages (in one way or another). It’s hard not to, because life is the thing that I’m doing all the time, so it provides pretty good material.
Writing about life makes life better, I think.
When I wrote about controlling your destiny, I was thinking about writing. The writing comes right after the thinking. Sometimes, it feels like it’s happening at the same time as the thinking (sometimes it seems to happen before the thinking, but I’ve got to think about that some more). I’ve already said that writing about life has changed my life, but I think I’d write about life even if it didn’t.
Something that I didn’t realize that I enjoyed until recently (not because I only just started doing it, but because I only just realized I particularly enjoy it) is reading memoirs. Specifically, I love reading memoirs from regular people. People who I could imagine being friends with. People who I’ve met; everyone I’ve met. If I could read your memoir (if you wrote or have written a memoir) I would.
On a flight from Atlanta to San Francisco yesterday, I read Heating and Cooling by Beth Ann Fennelly cover to cover. It’s a collection of 52 “micro-memoirs”, and I loved every one of them. Here’s an example titled Married Love, III:
As we lower onto the December-cold pleather seats of our minivan, we knock hands: both of us reaching to turn on the other’s seat warmer first.
In just a sentence or two you can convey so much about a moment. So much about your character and your life and your relationship. So many of your values. It doesn’t need to be for anyone else, even. Just writing it down can be a reminder of who you are, what you remember, and what you cherish (or maybe something you feel less good about).
Writing about life has made me notice more of it. A simple overheard comment that I would have otherwise forgotten about in minutes suddenly feels like something sort of special. I sit with it for a moment longer. Sometimes I type it out on my phone. On that same flight I typed out the below after the moment made me smile:
Heads, shoulder knees and toesss (drawn out, like a broadway musical), the steward sings, pushing the food cart down the aisle. I smile and mind all of them.
It’s a normal little moment, really. She probably does it every time she pushes the cart down the aisle. It wasn’t typical though—not for me. An instruction that’s probably been repeated thousands of times could have been delivered curtly, or with a hint of exhaustion. Instead it was melodic, almost joyful (and very quiet; just loud enough).
There are so many small moments like that one, and when you start writing about life you start noticing them. Enjoying them more.
It’s not just the small moments, either. You could unearth big, important memories from your childhood. You could sit with all of the small interactions you remember from your wedding day. You could recall what it felt like when something big changed in your life; when you started viewing the world in a different way.
Everyone should be a memoirist.
We’ll forget so many moments that might seem insignificant at the time, but might mean the world to us later. I’ve forgotten more memories than I can remember, I’m sure. If I can help it, I’ll remember more from now on, because I’ll write them down.