Writing While Living

I haven't written for a week. Not a word and I feel like I can't breathe, like my skin is stretched too far across my bones. Simply uncomfortable. Maybe I feel like I'm not worthy to breathe.

I've been working on a long piece of writing, almost five years now. Literary non-fiction. The journey in writing this memoir has been the most promising part. I mean, I love the layers of piecing together sentences that matter. But the uncovering of oneself in writing--that is the best part. A week ago I sat in my closet and cried. I cried because I realized as much as I have tried to not be like my mother, I am like her. I have followed in her crusty steps down a crooked path of surface and meaningless events that I can barely recall through my life. I cried because I am thrilled that I can see this side of me as well, shameful as it may be. I cried for the chunks of my life wasted and I cried for the pieces I know I've forgotten and buried, never to resurface again.

I'll write here about this journey, the completion of a "master piece" of one's life, the final revision of non-fiction, the struggle to make each sentence sing and the story to come to life. But most importantly, the attempt to capture the truth of one's journey with abandonment and fear.