More than an essay
When I started writing group, when I started writing all together those many months ago, I knew that I had a particular destination in mind. My group didn’t know it, so it was nice to hear them tell me that I should be heading in that direction anyway.
So far, in three of our four group assignments, I’ve written about a single year of my life, my last year in Fredericksburg, Virginia. It’s a town that I could have sworn had some kind of spooky energy flowing through it. Now, I’m not so sure it wasn’t my spooky energy that drew me to a year so filled with drama.
Each story has been around the same length, and each has focused on a single thing. The adorable apartment where I lived for that first year. My friend Heather. And my birthday just after I arrived. And there are so many more stories to tell. With each assignment comes another essay, with each essay a different voice or style or focus, so creating one cohesive piece still feels a little distant. But more than ever it feels possible.
Especially after last week, when I wrote and recited the story of holding the keys to my friend Anne’s car in my hands just hours before she died in a drunk driving accident. My group, though they were curious about the personal side of the experience, asked some provoking questions about the process of writing the story. As usual, they were in awe of my ability to tell the truth about my life in writing and share it publicly (which continues my craving for some non-fiction writing peers). But more than anything, what they were starting to hear was the beginning of a collection.
What they heard was more than an essay; it was a chapter in a book. They wanted to hear more, and to help to find the thread that would tie that more together.
Two of the other writers in the group also wanted to expand on past pieces, so our assignment this month is to write what we want. Instead of a prescribed style or prompt, we have a prescribed duty: we each have to write every week and collectively report on how much we’ve written so that none of us can have the excuse of “I did this at the last minute”, a common favorite for when we’re feeling uncertain about a given piece.
Hopefully blogging about it first counts as some time clocked in on the process. But to be safe, I’ll have to find some way to get myself started before the first check-in later this week. Like the little sticky note on my computer says, “don’t just sit there, write!”
