When I started down the path of writing my memoir, I felt compelled to follow a linear progression of events in telling my story. This worked up until the point when it no longer did. I was able to crank out multiple chapters following what seemed like a clear structure in my head until the process seemed to go off the rails and I became mired in confusion and indecision as to how to proceed. For a while I despaired of ever being able to regain what little momentum I previously had on the project.
My most recently completed chapter, "Exit Stage West," which I allude to in my previous blog entry "It's all in the rewrite..." marks a turning point in my process where I consciously allowed myself to deviate from my self-imposed structure and simply allowed memory to rule the flow of the work. I'm now continuing down this memory "tributary," revisiting the period in my life just after I had relocated to Seattle and claimed my freedom from the soul-crushing familial bonds I had left behind in Ann Arbor.
In 1979 I was a starving student artist living independently for the first time in my own tiny studio apartment, rubbing elbows with new creative friends who lived in my building (which included an actor, an urban photographer, and a political cartoonist, all of whom would become well-known in their respective fields). I passionately applied myself to completing my undergraduate degree in Technical Theatre with the goal of moving immediately into the graduate MFA program in Set Design at the University of Washington.
It's an odd feeling, this immersion in my memories of those frenetic days after landing in Seattle when so much seemed to happen in so little time. Revisiting those high-octane days makes me catch my breath and wonder how I ever had the energy to do what I did back then. Attempting to encapsulate the memories of those days on the page is akin to drinking from a firehose. I haven't felt this excited about the work in some time. A little overwhelmed, maybe, but so glad to have found the motivation to continue.
With no journals from that time period, I have my letters to my mother, my mother's letters to me, and all kinds of photographs and other artifacts from that time period to coax my memories to return. And returning, they are!