Memoir is for ME.

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It just occurred to me as I lie here on the couch, still recuperating from my dazzling, yet depleting trip to Los Angeles, duly rocking my latest thrift store find, that M-E are the first two letters in MEMOIR.

ME!

(Nope! Not just a pretty face, my friends!)

Some days, when I overthink my literary adventures, I realize, “Heck yes, Hen, there’s a whole lotta ME in your memoirs!” Suddenly, I’m swamped in a cold sweat, and my stomach churns with nail-biting concern.

Is writing memoir ick?

An ego trip?

Am I a narcissist?

Why DO I need to write about stealing my husband’s medication? Masturbating in public? Telling God to F-off when I was in chronic physical pain? Resurrect my father’s brutal alcoholic death? Or explore my perilous addiction to my first love?

Why?

Well…

When I was in rehab, a sober alcoholic came to speak one night. He talked about beating up his mother so he could get money to buy crack. I flinched, but found myself nodding. I understood why he would do that. This might sound shocking to those who aren’t trapped inside the hell of addiction, but his words were salve for my soul. And infused me with hope.

I was not alone inside this insanity.

Like all the ME’s of the memoirs I love, I come away connected to their story. Trevor Noah’s Born a Crime educated me to the South African social structure and the near-impossibility of its escape. David Lynch’s Catching the Big Fish enlightened me to the magical fruit born from meditation. And Ann Marlowe’s infuriating How to Stop Time: Heroin A to Z reminded me that everyone’s experience with recovery must be their own.

Memoirs have taught me that the ordinary person can have an extraordinary story, and the extraordinary person is actually pretty ordinary.

We are all ME.

What I know to be true (Yes, I’m channelling Oprah!), is that people’s stories didn’t just change my life. They saved my life. Which means my story might help someone, too.

So I’m gonna keep on being ME. :)

H xx

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