Fears About My Memoir

I have been very lucky in having a writing group that is not judgmental or really "workshoppy" in the mean way.  My memoir topic is very personal and very close to my heart.  Writing out the experiences I went through with my grandma's death this summer took a lot of work, a lot of strength, and a big leap. 

The problem is, I have a lot of fear surrounding my choice to write about such a sensitive subject.  I'm too scared to show my family.  I'm scared that Grandma wouldn't have wanted so much shared about her life.  I'm scared that I wasn't able to show her for the amazing, loyal, caring person she was. 

I think I was ready to type it out, but now I feel like I can't get it back.  I'm not a very emotional person, especially with others.  The  majority of my feelings remained locked inside or written on the pages of my journal. The interesting part about when I began typing it, I started and didn't stop for over an hour hour.  When I was done, I had almost ten pages (double spaced).  I guess that if I had so much inside of me, it was time to let it out. 

six words about my week

Misunderstandings create tears.  I'm the shoulder.

I love this exercise!  It is so much more fun than writing a lengthy poem or a drawn out explanation about my week at work.  I could have detailed the gossip, given you the shouts and the anger, but instead I left you thinking for yourself about what the actual "misunderstandings" were.  Isn't that more fun?

It freed me from the guilt of sharing the details of my co-workers personal feelings.  It freed me from the fear of giving you the wrong impression of people.  I promise you the phone calls and texts could have created quite an interesting narrative, but I think the sentence above is much more poetic, much more enticing.

I'm going to use this with my students.  The task is flexible.  I can have them do this instead of turning in an outline with their thesis listed at the top.  I can have them create them for other papers that they are reading during workshop so the author can see if their view is coming across.  As teachers, we need ideas to pull out whenever the class needs a little spice.  The six word summary is officially in my bag o' tricks.

THANKS HEMINGWAY!

Speak

I just finished the novel Speak and recommend it highly for those of you that have not read it.  There is an art teacher in the novel who changes the way that Melinda (the main character) feels about communication and expression.  The teacher has each student pull a topic from a globe and they have the entire year to sculpt, paint, draw, or use any other creative outlet to express what the topic is to them.  Melinda draws the word "tree" and creates image after image after image of different types of trees until she finally comes up with a simple, slightly imperfect tree that encompasses what she wanted to create. 
How do we give our students the ability to try and fail and try and fail and try again until they are happy with their creation, all the while not judging their failures but their effort?  How can we give A's without the perfect "A work" to back our decision?  I want my students to feel like they can take risks and not be punished for them.  But how do I prove to administrators and parents that this IS learning?

Remembering My Roots

I read Jackie's blog and it helped me to remember how much I loved writing when I was younger.  My dad owns a monument shop and every weekend I went with him while he sandblasted headstones and grave markers to different cemeteries throughout Iowa.  While he worked hard for our family, I wandered the paths of stone to find a place to settle and read or write. 

The one constant about cemeteries is that they are peacefully quiet.  As long as a walked far enough away to lose the sound of my father's work I could lose myself in the silence.  I'm not sure if it was the quiet or the constant reminder of all the lives that had existed before me, but cemeteries were always a place that inspired me to write.  There is a calmness and a clarity that comes to me when I'm there.  My words flowed a little more freely, my poetry came together a little more easily, and I didn't question every word that was going into my stories.  I wish I still had those notebooks that I took with me.  It would be wonderful to see my writing when it was less inhibited than it is when I'm writing for a grade.

With my memoir I'm trying to lose those conventional thoughts that have been bashed into my brain throughout school.  I'm trying not to worry about leading the reader, but instead letting the story lead me.  I just recently axed my first memoir idea and started over.  Let us all hope that my writing takes me to a new place, that is truly me, and is inspired like the poems and stories I wrote in those cemeteries so many years ago.