
I’ll be back in May š
I’ll be back in May š
My first blog post was āWhy I Refuse to Judge Any Mother.ā In it, I describe my observations of a friendās mother, juxtapose her mother with how I felt about my own mother, and then explain how I hope my own daughters will see me as a motherāwhen they eventually begin to reflect.
Out of all the texts I received, I appreciated my journalist friendās the most.
āKathy, this is good,ā she said. āYou have what they call voice. In grad school, they used to always talk about how you should have voice in writing. You have it.ā
In literature, āvoiceā refers to the rhetorical mixture of vocabulary, tone, point of view, and syntax that makes phrases, sentences, and paragraphs flow in a particular manner.
https://www.masterclass.com/articles/how-to-find-your-writing-voice
Whenever I write, I want the reader to experience exactly what I was thinking or feeling.
But how do I do this?
Brace yourself.
I may tell you something that goes against what you’ve been told before:
I pretty much write how I talk and think. Even that last sentence is an example. I promise you a grammar program will tell you to remove āpretty muchā because itās unnecessary, but I left it in because thatās how I talk and think. If we were together, and you asked me how do I write? Iād say I pretty much write how I talk and think.
What is also helpful is my brainās duality. I was raised in a family that valued so-called standard English, so I grew up learning the syntax appropriate for news personalities and job interviews. However, I was also raised on the west side of Chicago, which by all accounts is the hood. I quickly learned how to switch the verb āto beā around or to insert a cuss word so as not to be accused of talking like a White girl. Iām not special. Many Black people know how to codeswitch in this way.
What this means for my writing is I can create a sentence that appeals to White folks and Black peopleā¦or should I say Black folks and White people. You see how just interchanging those two wordsāfolks and peopleāshifts meaning and tone?
I also want my writing to be accessible. I want to have a conversation with you. In order to do that, I have to write how I would talk if we were together having a latte, green tea, or Caipirinha. So, sometimes I stop, and address you directly. Maybe Iāll add a question, like what do yaāll think to invite you into this conversation weāre having, while also throwing in the Southern dialect Iāve acquired from living in Florida for over two decades.
Most of my in-real-life friends who read my blog say, āGirl, I could hear you sayingā¦ā And thatās what I want.
To reiterate, if youāre concerned with developing voice in writing, then you have to determine what āvocabulary, tone, point of view, and syntaxā you want to use and why. Only you know what that is.
And remember, voice, kind of like personality, cannot be imitated because itās something only you possess. (Full disclosure: I sat here for five minutes flip-flopping between the word possess and own).
Do you worry about voice in writing? Does it matter?
Ever since I graduated with a PhD in August of 2010, I felt like a failure. This isnāt to say I awoke every day and beat myself up about my lot in life, but rather, every time the academic year would begin, Iād be in a physical and psychological slump. It was an energy thing.
It began when I attained my first job at Georgia College and State University in Middle Georgia. Though the actual job was ideal, the location and circumstances were not. Middle Georgia is racist, both explicitly and implicitly; living there was like a step back into the 1950s or 1850s; take your pick. Also, my degreed and experienced husband was never able to get a job there, so we agreed to live apart and see each other on the weekends.
Two years later, a colleague sent me a temporary job at Florida State University, which I applied and interviewed for and took. They āloved me so muchā there that they eventually hired me for what I thought was my dream job, a tenure track, assistant professor position in English Education. The problem was again two-fold: institutionalized racism existed and Iād chosen to commute 360 miles so that our family could live together.
Some people can deal with blatant institutionalized racism; I am not one of them. Three years later, Iād decided all of it was too much. I accepted a job elsewhere making twenty thousand dollars less and teaching more classes that werenāt in my niche. The first day of orientation I sat in the bathroom stall and cried. Then, I went to take my ID photo. To this day, my picture shows me as a red, puffy-eyed, hot-ass mess.
Iād failed. But I kept doing all things academic.
At first, I presented at conferences and published in academic journals just in case. I knew Iād need to show my scholarly worthiness just in case I wanted to attain another job at a different type of institution.
āAre you sure youāre done with academia?ā one of my colleagues emailed after asking if I wanted to be nominated for some national platform situation.
He and others ignored my answer and continued to co-write and push me on the path weād all begun.
I published at least once a year and eventually became the chair of a special interest group.
You may be wondering, like my cousin, how someone like me could feel like a failure. Let me tell you. Itās easy to do when you have a strict plan for your life.
When I graduated in 2010, life was laid out. I would find a job as an English Education professor at Prestigious X University. Five years later, Iād be associate professor. Five years after that, full professor. All the while, Iād be publishing my ass off and presenting research all over the world. Itās easy to let yourself down when youāve got your whole life figured out.
So, each year I wallowed in a slump, while preparing for a just in case situation.
Life became clearer around November 2018. Thatās when I met three ladies at a conference in Houston. We each presented our work, which was related to sports media, critical literacy, and diversity.
Afterwards, one of the women said, āWe should write something together.ā
In January 2019, Lexington Books emailed me with interest in turning my presentation into a book idea. I want to repeat that. I didnāt seek them out. They emailed me. Consequently, I suggested to the other three women that this be the āsomethingā we write together: a book. That led to us creating a call and inviting others to join us.
This month, our book, Stories of Sport: Critical Literacy in Media Production, Consumption, and Dissemination will be released.
Here’s what I’ve learned: Everything is made up, and we can do ourselves a disservice living within made-up rules. Part of the reason I felt like a failure was because I couldnāt see any other way to be a scholar other than what I was told and shown. Those made-up rules clouded my judgment and created my own idea of so-called failure.
Everything is made up, and we can do ourselves a disservice living within made-up rules.
kegarland
I didnāt need to work at X University to attain a book deal. I didnāt need to follow a specific trajectory to publish as a scholar. All I needed was to trust my path and do what I enjoyed…writing.
Oh, and I secured tenure at my current institution. It turns out thatās not as important as I thought, either.
There are many ways to study the craft of writing. You can earn a bachelorās degree in English. You can attain an MFA in creative writing. You can even take a few classes here and there to learn from experts.
But what should you do if youāre like me and have no intention on setting foot in another university as a student?
Read. Thatās what! Writers read, and it’s important to read books in the genre in which you intend to publish. For me, that’s memoir.
Writers read, and itās important to read books in the genre in which you intend to publish.
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So, in 2018, I read ten memoirs to learn what bestsellers are made of and to understand what the pulse of a āgoodā memoir is. Hereās what I found out.
A āgoodā memoir focuses on one theme. My favorite memoir that demonstrates this basic principle is Jesmyn Wardās Men We Reaped. The overarching question is why have so many of the men in her community died? The quick answer is the interrelated nature of racism, poverty, and gender. The long answer is her 256-page memoir, where chapters are written in a seesaw fashion. One chapter is devoted to understanding one manās in-depth story, while the next chapter reflects Wardās life as it was related to each man. By the end of the memoir, Ward has clearly made a case for how systemic racism affects human beings.
A āgoodā memoir has to present a bigger purpose. A bigger purpose doesnāt mean theme, necessarily, but it should answer the question: why is this author telling these stories? In My Dead Parents: A Memoir, Anya Yurchyshyn spends the first half of her book describing how much she disidentifies with her parents, how much she hates them, and how much their deaths donāt affect her. Part two digs deeper and explores who her parents really were prior to marriage and children and how this showed up in her life. This is ingenious. Anyone can write a book about why they dislike their parents. But she researches their histories as a way to see their identities, and then analyzes their lives outside of being her parents.
A āgoodā memoir weaves back and forth through time. This is a skill. Tara Westoverās Educated is superb at showing how to write a linear/not-linear story, which is important. While the overall story should be a cohesive narrative, it should travel back in time and then snap or slowly crawl back to the near present. For example, Westover remembers one of her brotherās violent acts from when she was an adolescent and then moves the story forward to a more recent memory of when she planned to visit home. The memory of the violence is important for how she will return and interact with her family in the bookās present.
A āgoodā memoir fits into a clear subgenre. Issa Rae uses humor for The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, which is a coming-of-age memoir. Kenan TrebinÄeviÄās The Bosnia List: A Memoir of War, Exile, and Return is obviously a historical memoir, and so is The Girl Who Escaped Isis (Farida Khalaf and Andrea C. Hoffmann). Celebrity memoir is a thing, but more literary leaning ones, like Trevor Noahās Born A Crime demonstrate sociocultural lessons. Finding Your Creative Muse explains more about these categories.
Thereās nothing wrong with taking classes or seeking degrees; however, if youād like to see what works for published authors, then I suggest reading in the genre you plan to write. I am also in no way advocating that you imitate the style of your favorite author. To me, thatās a no-no, but studying and learning about how others put words together? Thatās a win for you and your growing body of work.
Are you intending to publish a book one day? Whoās your favorite author? Whatās your favorite genre? What makes a book good?
Tupac had a song called āBrendaās Got a Baby.ā I remember when I first heard it. I was alone in my dorm room.
It starts like this:
I hear Brendaās got a baby
But Brendaās barely got a brain
A damn shame, the girl can hardly spell her name.
I donāt know if it was the soulful harmony that preceded these words or the actual rap, but I was captivated.
The song goes on to describe how she didnāt know her parents. One of them was a drug addict. But hereās the kicker. Her cousin became her boyfriend and she ended up pregnant! And guess what? Brenda was twelve.
I remember being glued to the black and white video. Tears streamed down my face and I hadnāt even gotten to the worse part. Brenda had her baby, threw it in the trash, and then became a prostitute.
What in the entire…
Anywho, it was too much. And I remember it all. I sat on the edge of my bed and cried as if I knew Brenda personally. Even though I didnāt know anyone remotely close to a āBrenda,ā I remember feeling the pain of being a twelve-year-old, who was pregnant with her cousinās baby. And then I felt the pain of being a baby thrown away in the trash.
Thatās how Iāve been my whole life.
Some may say Iām an empath. Iāve never claimed it. But I do admit to being empathetic. It comes naturally.
It doesnāt matter if I know your backstory or not, I have the ability to listen to what youāve told me, recognize, understand and share your thoughts and feelings.
My problem, until recently, has been realizing that not everyone has this ability, which coupled with my (sometimes) judgmental nature, caused problems.
For example, when my father died, my cousins wanted my stepmother to pick them up from the train station. It was remarkable to me that they would ask a recent widow to do something more equipped for a Lyft driver. I couldnāt wrap my brain around why they couldnāt put themselves in a grieving womanās place and sense she may be a bit too sad to function normally.
I recognized it again when my goddaughter brought her godson, Mark to our house a couple years ago. We were decorating Christmas trees.
Mark bounced around helping each person with their ornaments. He danced when we turned on some music, and when we watched Frozen, he belted out a song as if he was Anna herself.
But when it was time to go, he shriveled up like a roly-poly pill bug and sulked around the house until it was time to go.
And I felt his sullenness.
Without my goddaughter telling me parts of his homelife, I sensed that wherever he was going, there was no joy. For some reason, he was crying on the inside. He was more than just disappointed because he’d had a good time at our home. His sadness held an untold story.
āI feel sorry for him,ā I said out loud.
āYou always feeling sorry for someone,ā a friend of mine replied.
I couldnāt understand how she or any other adult who witnessed the same Mark I just did, didnāt feel similar. Aside from my goddaughter, why didnāt anyone else feel his sorrow?
But now I get it…kind of.
For some people, empathy is a learned behavior that can be developed by reading fiction or purposely practicing how to walk in othersā shoes. Itās a skill, like active listening.
Iām not sure where Iām going with this information, though. On the one hand, I understand we canāt all go around crying over music videos and lyrics. On the other hand, I do wish people were more empathetic. It seems more empathy might create better families and communities…somehow.
So, Iāll end with the above thought and let you decide. Will empathy weaken or strengthen us?
More often than not, I have a little bit to say about a lot of things. I thought Iād share a few in the month weāve reserved for love.
If we treated our girlfriends half as well as we do men, then women relationships might improve. Three years ago, I visited a friend in Sarasota. After the four-hour drive, I did as I sometimes do, stopped by her home first to pick her up for lunch. When I got there, sheād just finished her workout.
āAre you about to take a shower?ā I asked, giving her athletic gear a once over.
āNo! All I did was walk,ā she said.
āIf I was a man, youād take a shower,ā I replied.
She agreed but didnāt shower, and the above thought was born.
Why do we (sometimes) get all dolled up for the opposite sex but show up any type of way with our girlfriends? Is it comfort? Value? Societal teachings? For me, how I arrive depends on the event, not necessarily the company I keep, but in general, I show up freshly washed, with a nice outfit no matter if itās the love of my life or a good friend.
If you love someone, then youāre implicitly saying you accept who they are. You can have acceptance without love, but you cannot have love without acceptance. For example, Dwight fully loves and accepts who I am. He encourages me to be myself, even if that means as he says it, ācussinā a —- outā because he knows Iām fully capable of that behavior. But that doesnāt stop him from loving me.
People mistake how love and acceptance can show up, though. I have a cousin who lives with a mental illness. I love her like a sister, and I accept this part of her, but because I know her mental health can be overwhelming, I carefully choose when and how I will interact and be with her. Sometimes we forget we can choose how to be in peopleās lives, and these choices have nothing to do with how much we love or accept someone.
Why is it we want our partners to have character traits we donāt? Why is that? I know people who desire vulnerability but have trust issues. I have friends who want a specific level of intimacy but donāt seem to know how to cuddle, show affection, or open up. I wonder if, when we seek a romantic partner, weāre seeking to fill a void of something we think we donāt have.
When Dwight and I first met, I wasnāt as self-aware, and consequently, I didnāt know how to be myself. He, on the other hand, seemed very confident in who he was and clear about what he would and wouldnāt do. Did I unconsciously seek someone who possessed the very things I needed to develop? I also wonder if helping one another to grow is more of the point of relationships, as opposed to racking up and celebrating years of companionship…like a prize. Maybe our friends and romantic partners are there to mirror who we are and to reflect who we can be.
Maybe our friends and romantic partners are there to mirror who we are and to reflect who we can be.
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Let me know what you think.
Introductions are important. Just think about your favorite song. Whether itās the way the first note comes in or itās the way an artist says the first word, the introduction to a song determines if youāll continue listening or fast forward to something else.
Writing is no different.
A good first line or paragraph lets me know if Iāll be reading more of what the author has to say.
Letās look at this intro to My Dead Parents:
My mother, Anita, died in her sleep in 2010, when she was sixty-four and I was thirty-two. The official cause of death was heart failure, but what she really died from was unabashed alcoholism, the kind where you drink whatever you can get your hands on, use your bed as a toilet when you canāt make it to the bathroom, and cause so much brain damage you lose the ability to walk unsupported. The case of her death was herself, and her many problems. (Anya Yurchyshyn)
As someone who spends a lot of time reading and studying the writerās craft, I loved this introduction. As soon as I read these eighty-four words, I thought man, if this is how the story begins, then I canāt wait to read the rest of this book!
Therefore, I focus for several minutes (sometimes days) on how I will begin any piece of writing. Letās take āMonday Notes: Seeking Perfectionā as an example. Because this was a blog post, I knew I couldnāt waste time getting folks engaged. Initially, I wrote this:
I awoke in a Northwestern Memorial Hospital bed with two women staring at me, one was the nurse and the other, my mother. They told me Iād been hit by a car.
This wasnāt the most engaging introduction for a few reasons:
Ultimately, the introduction became this:
I was hit by a car when I was fourteen years old. It was a Saturday. Because my father was the youth pastor, we were going to church to pick up teens for an activity. When we arrived, my then best friend stood across the street in front of the building. She yelled out my name, and without a second thought, I darted into traffic.
This first sentence may be a bit of a shocker. Most people (friends, family, or bloggers) donāt know I was hit by a car. So, Iād argue that a reader would want to read more about this. The next few sentences rewind the story a bit so that you can understand how I was hit in the first place. Then, the remainder of the blog delves deeper into the actual topic: A small imperfection, such as chipping my tooth has bothered me since I was a teenager.
There are many ways you can begin your writing. Iāve just described one: beginning with a narrative. You can also ask a question, begin with a quote, provide a statistic, or give a description.
Have you ever thought about how to begin your writing? Do you just start writing? Do you have a favorite first line from a song or book? Let me know in the comments.