Write as if you were dying. At the same time, assume you write for an audience consisting solely of terminal patients. What would you begin writing if you knew you would die soon? What could you say to a dying patient that would not enrage by its triviality?
It's the living that matters. I've written about the death of a daughter (from AIDs in 1996) in Family LIfe - Birth, Death & the Whole Damn Thing, but most of the book is about bringing up a young family of four chidren in a remote valley in Andalusia - hello birds! hello sunshine! - and by the time you get to my daughter's part of the book (inc a chapter in her own words), you already know her and who she is. She was 28 when she died, so not long on the planet, but her friends and those who have read about her remember her with love and admiration (she was a journalist and fledgeling artist) and sometimes I meet them round and about, or they write to me to say so. What I'm trying to say is, there's an obligation if you're a writer to write. But I guess you know that, and might be why the not-writing is a worry.
Sometimes I think of writing as an attempt (mine, anyway) at immortality. To make something good and memorable of this mess of living. I had thought - and have started - to write about my father's death in the context of realizing a great dream of mine as he sagely faced his terminal diagnosis. How music and loss were intertwined in those years. I strive to make it more about life than death, even as my grief was coupled with great joy.
I loved this one, Charlotte. We all suffer, yet there is so much beauty in this world. You write with such grace. Thank you.
Beautiful and so sorry to learn about your loved one. I like to think one reason we write is to keep our loved ones alive in our hearts, as we remember them and how their ripple in life intersects ours and makes our lives better, just for having known them.
Charlotte--thanks for this, beautifully written, it's hopeful and as someone said, hope is a verb with its sleeves rolled up.
It's the living that matters. I've written about the death of a daughter (from AIDs in 1996) in Family LIfe - Birth, Death & the Whole Damn Thing, but most of the book is about bringing up a young family of four chidren in a remote valley in Andalusia - hello birds! hello sunshine! - and by the time you get to my daughter's part of the book (inc a chapter in her own words), you already know her and who she is. She was 28 when she died, so not long on the planet, but her friends and those who have read about her remember her with love and admiration (she was a journalist and fledgeling artist) and sometimes I meet them round and about, or they write to me to say so. What I'm trying to say is, there's an obligation if you're a writer to write. But I guess you know that, and might be why the not-writing is a worry.
Oh my yes. Your Family Life book is a touchstone ...
Sometimes I think of writing as an attempt (mine, anyway) at immortality. To make something good and memorable of this mess of living. I had thought - and have started - to write about my father's death in the context of realizing a great dream of mine as he sagely faced his terminal diagnosis. How music and loss were intertwined in those years. I strive to make it more about life than death, even as my grief was coupled with great joy.
I loved this one, Charlotte. We all suffer, yet there is so much beauty in this world. You write with such grace. Thank you.
Thank you Suzanne ...
Wow. It always takes me by surprise that the universe can be so reliable with offering up exactly the right thing at the right time.
What a lovely comment -- thank you Ed
Beautiful and so sorry to learn about your loved one. I like to think one reason we write is to keep our loved ones alive in our hearts, as we remember them and how their ripple in life intersects ours and makes our lives better, just for having known them.
Yes yes, the way we carry Eleanor with us ...
And everyone else who has passed.
And live life in the moment. It's easy to get caught up in the past or planning the future -- but don't forget NOW is a thing too.