I still want to talk about my goals for this year. In the last post, I mostly talked about my medical crisis that reshaped my life. Nothing is too hyperbolic to state about that experience. And it’s not something I can talk about with many people because it’s just not relatable at all.
The more time that passes, the less it stays in the front of my mind. Don’t get me wrong. I’m always aware of it, but it’s slowly become just a part of me. I don’t need to think about it as it’s embedded in the fabric of my being. As I would say that I’m Taiwanese American, bi, agender, and bisexual (not to mention areligious), I would add that I died twiec and came back to life, better than even. Sure, there were a few netgative side effects, but for the most part, I’m fine.
That’s what blows my mind when I think about it too much, but I don’t do that these days.
I want to write about the experience, but I’m grappling with how to do it. Sure, others can relate to having a life-changing experience K thinks I can focus on that and the history behind it rather than the actual experience.
But here’s the thing. The actual experience is the attention-getter. Sure, other people have had had near-death experiences, but I have yet to find anything similar to mine. I would definitely have to rely on other hooks–dysfunctional family, how I overcame it, etc.
But it’s been burning in my mind since it happened. I want to write about it; I just don’t know how to do it. Part of the problem is that at the time, my mother was pushing me to write a movie script about it. When I demurred, she got upset and almost angry, saying it would be such an inspiration to other people. As if that was my duty–which in her mind, it is. My duty, I mean.
Ever since I was a child, she never considered me a person in my own right. I was supposed to be a mini-me of her–but it’s worse than that. I wasn’t supposed to be like she was as a person; I was supposed to be the ideal version of herself.
So all of that would have to be in the memoir in order for it to make any sense at all. I have no problem writing about my past, but I don’t know how to structure this memoir. That is my isuse.
Obviously, the medical crisis is the big event. Logic says to start with it and then weave the story around it. When I get down t othe nitty-gritty, though, that’s when things start to fall apart. There is so much to the backstory. I don’t know how much of it is relevant. I mean, it’s all relevant, but I don’t know how much I should include. Are most people going to care about that?
Here’s the thing. Many people have dysfunctional families. Not many people are willing to talk about it. I’ve heard people talk about their monthers (famous people, I mean) and couch it in terms that are meant to be amusing and/or humorous, but are just sad if you read between the lines.
The taboo against speaking frankly about mothers is strong. My brother asked if I was going to wait until our parents died before trying to publish my memoir. I said no at first, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized it might be better that way.
It doesn’t really matter, though, because it will take me time to actually write it and edit it. My parents are in the last leg of their journey so most likely will not make it past the point where I finish my memoir. That’s not me being bleak, but me being realistic.
I know that the way I write is to just dump everything on the page and sort it out later. But I’m getting stuck in trying to make sense of the story/events as I write it/them.
I do wonder if there’s something in my brain that got knocked about because it’s harder for me to write than it used to be. Not the actual writing itself, but the ordering of the writing. I have always had the tendency to go off on tangents and the like, but it’s gotten even worse since my medical crisis.
The other thing I want to write is–something that I have not seen done before, I don’t want to talk about it in too much details, but it has to do with a murder mystery. That’s what I primarily wrote before my medical crisis, but I have not been able to write fiction very much or well since.
I truly do wonder if something in my head got bonked while I was going through my medical crisis. I hope it’s something I can overcome beacuse I love writing fiction. I have said in the past that I would not want to live if I could not write fiction. Obviously, that isn’t true, but I don’t like not being able to do it.
I feel lost without it, honestly. I’ve been writing fiction since I was ten or so, and the absence is like missing a limb. I have tried. It’s not like
I haven’t. I have tried so many times, each attempt has petered out in a whimper.
In addition, my mind is silent of stories in a way it hasn’t been in decades–if ever. I have an idea of what I want to write, but it’s not coming together in the way I had hoped. I tried during the last NaNoWriMo to write a mystery novel, but it was just fifty-thousand words of nonsense. I know that sounds like a humblebrag, too, but it’s just facts.
I can write thousands of words and then decide they are worthless. I have a luxury of words when it comes to writing, and I have no qualms about tossing something in the trash.
My advisor in my MA writing program said that I can’t just throw away a short story of thirty pages or so. I sure could and did. He was the type who agonized over every word whereas I treat them as a dime a dozen.
I need to buckle down and get serious about writing again–if I can still write fiction the way I used to. I j ust don’t know if I have it in me to do it any longer.