Plans for the New Year?
I think they include the usual, which means finishing the memoir (ha!). I also want to write a lot more, and send it off to magazines and journals, online and print. I seem to spend too much time fluffing around on the internet, and too much time not writing and not reading books. I would like to earn more money, but that's common to most of us, isn't it? Considering I earn hardly anything, however, I really need to earn more money!
And what will I write, besides the memoir? Creative non-fiction, and whatever fiction comes. Medical matters interest me, how we cope with illness, or not; how we cope with other people's illness, or not. Parents and children interest me, and how adults become parents, and how adults behave as parents. My own experience as a daughter has shown me that no amount of well-meaning makes up for the damage done by mental illness, paranoia, emotional manipulation and a mania for control.
What is the fate of this memoir that hangs around like a bad smell? I lose heart, get bored, then become enthusiastic for a while, then that slips away and I don't write for a long time. It's the writing in a void, it's the pain, it's the pointlessness sometimes. For whom am I writing? It's to let others know what it means to live with a mentally ill parent, what my mother and I suffered, what my father suffered. It's to correct the balance, to show that behind the laugh that seems to come so easily lies the hurt that never goes away.
Many of us wear masks, it's nothing unusual. Too many of us forget, or are ignorant, that this is so.
All true, think I could've written most of this myself Sue!
ReplyDeleteBut really hoping you made that january memoir deadline!
I'm fascinated by your mix of the 'muscular' (medicine) and the creative. Like some lawyers who write fiction doctors can also have a toughness that really gives good bones to their writing. Good luck with your progress Sue. It's great that blogs exist and that we can give and get insights into one another so readily, regards Barbara
ReplyDeleteThis posting is almost scary in that my life is (and has been) so much like yours. Could having a mentally ill parent be the cause of our not finishing our memoirs? It certainly would be handy to have such a specific excuse, rather than laziness, embarrassment, lack of confidence and an oversupply of procrastination. (But of course all those could be the result of a MIP too. Anything to be let off the hook is the way I [sometimes] see it.)
ReplyDeleteThanks for your feedback, Carol. I've felt all of those things you list (laziness etc)! It's a strange, ambivalent state: I really need to tell others of the experience, but it's so painful that I have to keep pausing. I've actually written most of it, but need this break, or I shall get sad and mad again. I have recently sent one 'chapter' of it to a journal for consideration, just for the sake of getting in the habit of sending things out. But I constantly feel that in fact I'm more suited to small chunks of writing rather than one large one i.e. memoir or novel. How far are you with your memoir?
ReplyDeleteHi Sue, I write for you at MC-Reviews and have just read your review on the biography of Grays Anatomy. It was so well written and I saw the link to your blog and thought I would come over and take a look. I am so glad I did as this post (written quite a while ago now, I realise) moved me significantly. I agree that so many of us wear masks to protect ourselves and the people we love. My mum has a similar tale and I feel it is affecting her more now (she is in her sixties) than it did when she was younger. I have actually suggested to her that we do some writing together as a kind of cathartic exercise.
ReplyDeleteI wish you all the best with your memoir and look forward to reading it and hopefully sharing it with Mum one day.
Kind regards, Jennifer