Here I am, an almost 72-year-old writer, lesbian, and wife of 40 years. Tanya and I have been hibernating in our home in Berkeley for the past year due to the pandemic. Cocooned with us are Tanya’s 92-year-old mother, Laura, and our 18-year-old great-niece, who ran away from her father and step-mother’s home in North Carolina to live with us until high school graduation in May. She Zooms to her classes in North Carolina, starting at 5:30 a.m. most mornings.
Our son Cooper, 34, lives nearby in Oakland. Last December, he quarantined in his house, got a clean covid test, and joined the four of us for a week during the holidays.
I hugged him for the first time in 10 months. Ahhh…..
Years ago, before I started writing words on paper, I made a sculpture on 2” x 4” tiles of pine into which I etched:
Take seriously my own voice
My power
My experience
Vivid clarity
At the time, in the early 90s, I was writing about my speaking voice. I wanted to stop being “nice.”
to speak my own mind
to stop accommodating
to express all of myself
to be a real presence, not just receptive
After being pent up for too long, I must admit that my voice emerged as a roar at first, just like it did when I became a feminist in the early 70s.
I’m a two-time cancer survivor: Lymphoma in 1986 when Cooper was three months old, and a terminal diagnosis of tongue cancer in 2008-2009.
Lucky me: I failed to die on time. And despite the fact that I lost part of my tongue, my voice is just fine.
Just before the tongue cancer emerged, I began to take writing courses. I began with fiction, then turned to creative nonfiction because I actually like writing real stories better.
Inspired by what seems to be my own natural writing style and by Lydia Davis’s flash fiction, I began to write flash memoir in 2013. Book 2, Ebb & Flow, a compilation of flashes from 2013-2020, is ready for final edits.
Now, in early February 2021:
I still have things to say.
I have experiences to write about.
I have thoughts about life and death and living with a terminal diagnosis.
I have moments of joy to express.
So, I ask, why not blog now?