In Memorial- This week's task!

How fitting that the day after Memorial Day when we take time to think about the lives lost and sacrificed for our country that we also begin to compose selections for our personal memoirs. First, a bit of clarification. A biography or autobiography means to tell the whole of a person's life from beginning to end, or as much as the author knows. In a memoir, the author has the discretion to write about certain segments or moments in one's life, as opposed to the whole. For example, Augusten Burroughs, "Running With Scissors" is a memoir based on his childhood and adolescence. Susanna Kaysen writes in "Girl Interrupted" about her time in a mental institution. Furthermore, in memoir writing, there's an element of storytelling and description that- to my way of thinking- makes the writing more vivid and fiction-like.

Assignment- Compose a series of memoir moments (or one of greater length) that invite readers into your world. Your goal is to compose somewhere between 600-750 words.

Here's a sampling of what I might write:
"My brother's and I sat perched on the couch, while my Dad took his customary spot on "his" chair, a textured brown creation with a foot stool. The fabric on the chair was far from soft and I would never sit on it if I had shorts on, or back in that part of my life, a nightgown, Still, the gruff chair matched my father's personality to a T. While my father assumed his position of power in his chair, my mother sat on the stair that led from the dining room to the family room. Our rambler style home featured the bowling alley look that contained in one long space, a kitchen, the dining room and the family room. Separating the dining room from the family room was a hideous and enormous macrame hanging my Pop's had made and the lone stair my mother sat upon. The conversation began with my father's voice, but instinctively, my brother's and I looked to my mother for clarification and a more soothing voice. Surely, this irked our father, but our response to his voice was the result of too many scoldings and his irrational anger. My mother explain in calm tones that she and my father were separating and that it was only for a trial 6 months. At what point in a child's life do they begin to distinguish between truth and lies? For how long do we avoid having that critical thinking process so we can maintain our ignorance and innocence?

I knew that 6 months would turn into years, just as I knew the timing of this announcement- the day before my 10th birthday- was poor timing for such an announcement. There were no tears during the announcement or at least none that I can recall. It may be because even Matt, the youngest of us all at just 6, had already asked my mom over lunch one day when Mom and Dad were going to get a divorce. Years later, Matt's instinct would be right on about yet another major announcement from our father. The only words I managed to ask my parents as they described my father moving out and how we'd still see him (another lie) were, "Who is going to take what car?". Why I decided to be practical and pragmatic in that moment, I will never know. Perhaps I just needed to know what was "ours" and what was his because I certainly didn't feel like "his", at least not in the way that I saw my friends with their Dad's.

OK- So, there's what you want to do. I'm doing my best to get in the moment, but I'm also allowing for some present-day reflection. I'm being as detailed as possible about environment because it adds that element of, "she's an expert on her life". You may find that as you write, your first inspiration will take you far. Other times you will find that a different moment is better material for this kind of writing. Experiment, play and have fun!