Letting the Words Come

I never thought I could be a writer. But then again, there are a lot of things in my life I was sure I couldn’t do—and then I did. I didn’t think I could be a soldier, but I was. I didn’t think I could be a mother, and I am. I didn’t think I could be a wife, and I was. I didn’t think I could be a teacher, yet here I am. I didn’t think I could be a pilgrim, but I laced up my boots and walked across Spain. All those things I thought were beyond me, I did anyway.

So when I finally sat down to write, maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised that I did that too. This time, something changed. The words didn’t resist me. They poured out—quick, steady, insistent. It wasn’t my first attempt at writing, not even my fifth, but this time I couldn’t stop the words, and more importantly, I didn’t want to. I let them come. In less than a month, I had written a memoir about my life. Not the whole story—there’s still more to tell—but enough to call it complete. And I’ve already begun the next one.

This second memoir is slower in the making. It’s about harder things. The kind of things that don’t come easily. The kind of things you have to wade through, carefully, courageously. If you’ve found your way here, chances are you know about those things too. You know how hard they are to voice. You know how much they take from you just to remember, let alone write down.

But still, here we are. Writing them. Reading them. Facing them.