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I’ve only known Bert for a couple of years, and not well at that. He’s well into his later years, slightly hard of hearing, a little saggy, sluggish and slow of speech. Until recently I thought of him as a bit of an old fuddy duddy. That was before I saw the pictures. A friend showed me pictures of a party she’d attended where Bert was part of the featured entertainment. I won’t describe the nature of the whoopee — suffice it to say that those pictures totally blasted away that fuddy duddy image. This fellow still knows how to get a laugh and enjoy one! His sense of humor is intact. Suddenly I wanted to know more about Bert. He has become a fascinating individual. Facing up to evidence that I think in stereotypes is a bit embarrassing. I have to remind myself that stereotypes are one of the mental mechanisms we use to make sense of the world, and we could hardly function without them. Besides smashing a stereotype, the pictures reminded me of the importance of having both pictures and ...

“My life isn't exciting enough to write about things that have actually happened to me, so I'm forced to make my stories up from scratch. — Barbara Park, author of the Junie B. Jones series This quotation appeared in my e-mail today. I haven’t read any of Barbara’s writing, and I know nothing about her, but my first thought on reading this is that Barbara is rather lacking in creativity. With the right attitude one could write a fascinating paragraph, or maybe a whole story, on a blade of grass. You absolutely don’t need to have an “exciting” life to write fascinating accounts of life as you live it. The only thing between ordinary/boring and fascinating is the ability to think outside the box and see the extraordinary in the ordinary. That’s the purpose of this blog: To help ordinary people write extraordinary stories in about their own experiences in their own way. Circling back to Barbara, surely she jests. Anyone who has written memorably enough to have quotes sent around i...

Writing stories about your life is different from other forms of writing most people have done. Because it’s so different, when you first begin writing your stories, they may sound stiff and self-conscious as you struggle on many fronts. You have many story ideas, but you may be unsure of the details or the importance of a particular story, and you may not know quite how to put the story into words. You may struggle with the act of writing, feeling words jammed in your mind, unwilling to flow forth onto paper — a sort of mental constipation. You may feel awkward about your writing, wanting it to be perfect, but afraid you’ll fall short. You may fear that your family now, and certainly future generations, will read what you’ve written and find you dull, boring, or worse. Perhaps they’ll read three sentences, then fling it all aside in disgust! Take heart! It gets easier with time and practice. When you write regularly, whether two hours a day, or an hour on Sunday afternoons, you’ll fal...

Do you want a quick and easy way to liven up your stories? Give them a voice by using dialogue. Dialogue breathes life into stories in a way that’s hard to match. Think about how you tell a friend about an encounter with someone. Don’t you generally recount the conversation, in a sort of “he said, she said” manner? You probably don’t recite it like you are reading both characters in a play script, but you’ll give the background, then quote a couple of rounds of dialogue, then revert back to description. This same strategy works in writing. For example, consider the following story clip: When I called my sister I told her I’d been sewing this afternoon, and it had made me feel young again because it reminded me of the way Mother always insisted that I rip out seams that weren’t perfect. Compare that clip with the following dialogue and decide for yourself which you’d rather read: “I feel like I’m fourteen again,” I began when my sister picked up the phone. “Oh? And why is that?” she ask...

Those who have known me for any length of time know that I rail against the lunacy of Political Correctness, but grammatical correctness is quite another thing. To be grammatically correct is to display understanding of our basic means of communication versus personal ignorance. What’s that rumbling I hear in the distance? People making the same argument for political correctness? Let’s save that for another day! Lifestory writers are not the only ones who commit grammar infractions. These mistakes are so ubiquitous* that far too many people don’t even realize they are wrong. For the record, here are the guidelines for two of the most common offenders: It’s/its — It’s is the contraction for it is. “It’s raining outside,” is the same as “It is raining outside.” Its is a third person, nonspecific possessive pronoun. “The tire lost its tread.” The confusion comes in because nouns use ’ s to morph into possessive form. “That’s Harry’s book.” Hints: Pronouns do not use ’s to become possessi...

Exactly half my life ago I was thrilled to be included on a Citizen’s Advisory Committee to study overcrowding options for our local school district. When the study was complete, a core group went forth to disseminate our findings. In each case we were accompanied by a district administrator who was available to answer questions beyond the scope of the committee. During my first two reports, I was terrified. My knees knocked and my voice quavered. Surely even listening to me was painful. The third time was the charm. I went to the Rotary Club, and the Superintendent himself accompanied me. He belonged to Rotary, but never had the opportunity to address the group, and he was an on-stage kinda guy. In his introduction, he began telling them what I’d be saying. I was alarmed. He kept talking. I was angry, then furious. I had no idea what I could say. Suddenly, as he neared the end of my material, a wave of calm descended. I knew exactly what to do. I stood and began speaking. “Dr. Noman h...

When I was a middle age kid, I used to think about the house I wanted to live in when I grew up. I still remember the general details of the one I imagined. Zooming in on the most important feature, the back of the house featured a sort of glassed in porch with a view of a totally private yard. Nobody could see in or out. In my dream house that lovely yard was always green and surrounded by all sorts of leafy trees. I don’t recall flowers, although there surely were a few. The important thing was an area of grass surrounded by tall trees on all three sides, with no fence. The trees defined the boundaries. This peaceful, protected, personal porch overlooking my private park would be my retreat. This morning I gazed out the sliding glass doors leading from the kitchen onto our glassed in sun porch. Even though the morning is misty and gray, I noticed the patch of lawn is fully green now, and the tall trees surrounding the yard show serious signs of spring. Within three weeks, they will ...

I subscribe to Daily OM, which arrives by e-mail each day with a short thought for “Nurturing Mind Body and Spirit.” I generally skim it, letting the wisdom sink in on some subliminal level, and move quickly on. Today’s item about keeping a surrender box rang a louder bell than usual. The idea is to write down the items swimming in your head on slips of paper at times of mental gridlock, and sticking those slips of paper in the surrender box. You can read about the benefits on the article’s webpage . The idea especially resonated with me in connection with lifestory writing. While I’m quick to recognize the value of a surrender box for calming my mind, I also recognize a potential gold mine for future story ideas. I think it takes a certain orderly personality to keep a journal on a regular basis. I don’t have that type of personality. I’m generally too involved in the challenge of the moment to take the time to journal. To reconstruct my past I must rely on old calendars, occasional s...

It’s a well-known fact that writing about your memories often reshapes them. The root memory acquires an overlay of the writing experience. This overlay quickly melts into the mix, creating a new blended memory without clear boundaries between the original event, and the new construction. I had a cogent reminder of this phenomenon this morning as I searched through some archive folders for an old document. I found a story of an exotic evening my husband and I spent with friends in Los Angeles more than a dozen years ago. Several years had passed before I began the account (which still isn’t finished — that happens too). Today I have a fuzzy memory of embellishing it somewhat, but for the life of me, I couldn’t tell anyone where the actual happenings leave off and embellishment kicks in. Fortunately, in this case it really doesn’t matter, and the story is true to the spirit of the evening. For such frivolous occasions, I chant a favorite mantra: “Why let a few facts get in the...