Life writing: Stitch it together, one story at at a time

I do not sew and would not contemplate making a quilt, but I understand the concept: create something from smaller pieces by stitching them together to make a beautiful new whole.

The other day, it came to me that this is how I approach life writing. It is how I am approaching writing about my life.

Not for me a linear path of carefully planned chronological tales. No. My approach is to keep my eyes open for prompts that spark a memory. Nurture that spark, and tease it into a story. Safe-keep that story in a metaphorical box or actual drawer. Keep being open to prompts and alert to sparks; keep writing them into stories; and keep saving the results.

One day, sometime, will be the right time to take those bits and bobs, those scraps of a life lived presented as story, and stitch them into a whole of some sort. This, then, you might call a memoir and you might give it a title and others might read it. What a day that would be!

In the meantime, it is both fun and valuable to be prompted by external sources quite uncontaminated by any of my own preconceived notions of what is or might be important to capture in story from my life. When someone else says, “Hey, why don’t you think about this?” it resonates with force and clarity. That outside source legitimizes the exploration of experience and emotions.

So it was for me earlier this year, when the prompt came from the online magazine Persimmon Tree, which publishes writing by women over the age of 60. The topic for their fall issue was Shameless Self-Promotion. Here’s how the editors described what they were looking for: “Women of the ‘boomer’ generation and before were, by and large, raised to be self-effacing, not to trumpet our accomplishments. In fact, many of us came of age believing it would be unseemly for us even to have accomplishments. It’s time to step outside that (dis)comfort zone: Short Takes is open for bragging. Of all the fabulous things you have done in your life, until now cloaked in demure silence, what makes you proudest? Share it, or them, with pride, and without embarrassment” in no more than 500 words.

At first I was stumped. This prompt was unusual, to be sure. To be asked, nay, to be given permission to brag. Wow. How often does that happen to any of us? Maybe not often enough, because once an idea formed in my mind, my words took off on the page. I share the result below. It didn’t make the cut for publication, but I am pleased to have this smaller piece stored safely in my memoir drawer, ready for stitching into that larger piece when its time comes somewhere down the road.

Certainly, without the prompt from Persimmon Tree, I would not have thought to write this particular story in this way: no holds barred, just go for it. It was fun and liberating and rather interesting to uncover, as I wrote, just how proud I do feel about this accomplishment in my life.

I encourage you to think about what story (or stories) from your life you could tell in the style of “shameless self-promotion”. That invitation doesn’t come very often, so come on: Jump in. Be proud. Tell the story. Take all the words you need.

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No experience meant little fear: How I started my own business

I am pleased as punch: I started a business that kept a roof over my head and put food on my table. I ran that business — hard — for six years, and I remain proud to this day of what I achieved as a sole proprietor.

I had gone into business once before, with three partners, but failed spectacularly. That’s not something I’m proud of, though my survival of the emotional rollercoasters and five-figure financial loss is an achievement of a different kind. What distinguishes the two ventures is the experience I brought to the table and the urgency of my need, both practical and psychological, to succeed the second time.

That time began with bad news. I was called into the VP's office of the company where I had been employed for eleven years, doing communications work I loved and was good at. But within an hour, I had been let go due to organizational restructuring, had packed up a few things, and was sitting at home.
Over the years, I had advised countless others not to mope about career misfortune in an endless loop of ‘what if…’: Get moving, I always advised. So I got moving.

First, I secured a lawyer and finalized my severance package. Second, I emailed everyone in my network announcing my new need-work status. Third, I set off for the three-week on-site residency in the master’s program in communication I had registered for earlier in the year — and for which I was now well and truly available.
I maintained this pace of active movement for the next six years: Being a grad student and finding clients for the writing and editing contract work through which I was now earning my living.

I was building a business! Credit for its name goes to my friend Randa, who came up with the clever play on words (inc.): Clear Thinking ink.

It was exhausting, exhilarating — and profitable. By the end of the second year, I had earned my master’s degree and, a few years later, I out-earned the annual salary I had been paid during my corporate-employee years. I am as proud of that as I am of the persistence it took me to achieve it: attending networking events, talking to strangers, making presentations, asking for referrals from satisfied clients, taking on jobs that stretched my skills, and saying YES even when I wanted to say NO.

Maybe most significantly, I am proud of the self-confidence my courage inspired and my success nurtured. Hard work and a growing belief in myself kept me going. Only when I found my way into college teaching did I let up on the pace and close down the full-time status of my business. But it kept on giving, because hardly a day went by that my communications students didn’t benefit from the countless lessons I had learned as solo operator of a writing & editing business that, for six years, put food on my table and kept a roof over my head.

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Land acknowledgement: I respectfully recognize that I live on the original lands of Anishinaabe, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota and Dene peoples, and on the homeland of the Métis Nation.

Photo by Olga Ferina on Unsplash