Well, it’s about time, right? It’s not as though I haven’t wanted to write a novel since I first took pen to paper way back when I was seven years old. So what’s taken me so long? Where do I even begin to answer that question? Maybe with this list:
- I started so many novels just because I had good ideas, but they lacked heart, and I lacked the perseverance to muddle through
- I didn’t trust myself enough
- I was never compelled to write the way others are: now the demand is greater
- Every word I typed was like drawing blood.
So what changed? Essentially, I changed. The biggest part of me that changed was the corniest part, the part realists will laugh at, and that is this: I finally allowed my ancestors to start helping me. It’s not like we hadn’t been in conversation for decades. We had been. We’d been talking, quietly, since I was four.
When I was four and my great-grandmother died, my mother explained that people live on in our memories. I was a completely literal child and took that to mean that I was responsible for remembering my ancestors, even if I didn’t know them. From that day on, I began a memory project with imagined ancestors. I imagined the grandfather who died when I was two as Colonel Sanders. I imagined my great-grandmother the way she was photographed in a hat and wool coat. I imagined people I knew and people I didn’t. I still feel responsible for the memories of the dead and now there is a cacophony of voices in my head. It includes friends and loved ones who died of cancer and car accidents, old age and heart disease, suddenly and slowly. They all live in me. They are me.
At a low point not too long ago, I was talking to a friend who sensed that I wasn’t paying attention to my ancestors. He counseled me to light a candle and ask for help. I did.
Yeah, yeah I know half of you think this is ridiculous. I used to be you and that was exactly my problem. I no longer see any value at all in denying a connection to the past or in silencing a kind of genetic memory that has been undeniably part of me since childhood. I wonder now why I did so much work to suppress my connection to the past. Who did I impress by rejecting the magic inside me? Who benefited?
I’m done with that part of my life. And now I’m writing. I will be blogging about the process here. If you’d like to be part of the conversation, sign up for the newsletter: