It’s Personal

I rose early, eager to get out for a little stroll in this secret space of time, the light just beginning to gild the hills, everything still hushed and pending. Pretty soon there came a parade of silly quails shouting out their three-syllable mantra. A canyon wren spilled its tiny tumble of liquid notes, a mourning dove murmured, and the world began to awaken with a mighty yawn and stretch. I'm sure Mary Oliver said it in a hundred different ways, but each new morning is a miracle and a gift and a new chance to witness wonder.

I had a lot to think about. For one thing, England is apparently about to open up to vaccinated American travelers without requiring quarantine, and suddenly the possibility of meeting our grandson looms near. It’s not an uncomplicated bliss…there’s a lot to plan, and we’ve also learned to be skeptical of good news, and to be honest, I’m nervous about meeting Felix. I’m supposed to be Nonna, but I don’t know how.

But I was also troubled about something a friend told me the other day. This friend can’t relate to the way I openly talk and write about bereavement, and about the people I have loved and lost. They––yes, I’m using plural pronouns so as not to reveal gender, and I’m told that this is now correct usage, although the English teacher in me is finding it confusing––anyway, they are on their own their grief journey, and it’s a profoundly difficult one, but their choice is to be private about it. Talking or hearing about their loved one is painful. Maybe it makes the absence more excruciatingly real. Or maybe my friend’s loved one actually feels very present, and my friend doesn’t want to break the spell. I don’t know. But the comments made me feel as though I had tread clumsily on a private path of sorrow. And it made me wonder if the writing I do is cringeworthy to some, undignified, embarrassing.

Many years ago, a casual acquaintance picked up one of my books by chance and read it. I wondered, of course, what she thought, and finally ventured to ask. “It’s so personal,” she replied, and I knew that wasn’t a compliment. Is being personal a bad thing? The kind of writing I do is innately personal. It’s written by me, a person, in the hopes of reaching you, other persons, maybe even one person, but someone. Why? Because I think we might connect in some way, and each feel less alone. Because life is strange and mysterious, and if we don’t compare notes, we are just fumbling around in the dark without benefit of shared clues.

I write for many reasons, and I’ve lately become sort of evangelical about the importance of writing. I write to keep people I have loved alive on the page. I write to document the wonder of bearing witness. I write to remember and recreate and sift through the clutter to find the glint of truth and balm of meaning. I write to transcend. I write to question, teach, and learn. I write, as Naomi Shihab Nye expressed it, to place lights in the window of my house, letting others know there’s someone home. I write to explore, to process (I’m doing it right now), to discover. I write because I love words, especially nouns, and they are the coinage we are given, and I want to choose them carefully but spend them lavishly and see them shine. I suppose I write in order to exist.

And so my bereaved friend’s reaction to my writing about loss made me uneasy. Don’t be offended, they said. And I take no offense. I just felt disconcerted, misunderstood, a little sad. Am I an emotion exhibitionist? A grief showboat? Do I trot my tender feelings out to garner sympathy, or unhealthy attention? When I speak of the mistakes I have made, am I scripting some sort of soap opera? Does my telling you about the people I have loved diminish them in some way?

I know. Everyone does sorrow differently. And each of us will navigate our infinitesimal slice of eternity as best we can. But for those so inclined, let’s keep talking, please. As Elizabeth Alexander asked, “Are we not of interest to each other?”

I’m going to keep sending out my words, and they will often be personal.

Naomi said it best:

It suggests the windows of the house are still open. One by one, in quiet corners, we will turn on a small light, read a poem, and feel our own soft wings spreading out into the dark. They will carry us. We have so many places to go.