We Can Write It Out

Whenever I’m faced with one of many difficulties life tosses my way, I tell myself to simply write it out. While not everything I write is purely autobiographical, issues I’ve dealt with do find their way into poems, stories and novels eventually. And if it’s not something I’ve dealt with directly, I’m not above stealing from the lives of my friends. A cousin once read something I wrote and then spent weeks stewing about it, feeling I had stolen a little too much of her life for others to read.

However, isn’t this how we often cope? I got through a horrible first marriage by reading fiction about others who got through horrible first marriages. The librarian in the small town I lived in then saved books for me after becoming familiar with the theme I seemed to select. I didn’t even realize that she eventually selected books for me about women who found their ways out of horrible marriages. I should have thanked her.

It helps to write it out. There are some things we never make sense of, such as the death of a loved one before we’ve had time to say all we wanted to say or do all we’d planned to do. Still, writing about it dulls the pain momentarily, or connects us for a second with someone else who remembers what that felt like, making us feel not so alone in our grief.

I read for pleasure and escape and also searching for connection. Instead of focusing on the differences between me and my neighbors, especially at first glance, I long to know what experiences we may have shared. Reading helps me learn about others who feared walking into a first grade classroom as the new kid in town or being a young mother afraid she’d end up screaming right along with her howling infant if someone didn’t lend her a hand or being that wife trapped in a marriage that seemed impossible to escape.

That’s why I write, too. If I can write it out, write what I’ve gone through, what I might have learned along the way, what I’m still trying to figure out, maybe I’ll connect with someone who can find their own answers through my words. Maybe I can help someone else write it out for themselves. We can work it out, if we write it out. Honestly.