Write a memoir at your hazard. It is a precarious activity. One that makes you prone to embarrassing yourself. All the awkwardness, the idiocy of youth come flooding back, and, believe me, you suddenly really are fourteen. You do stupid things, you act weird, because it’s like you’re half your forty-nine year-old self and half- your fourteen year-old self and you lurch around in your harlequin garb, unable to stand. One moment you’re tongue-tied at the edge of the dance floor, the next you’re pitching to the torrents, pulses, surges, and swayings of first love. In the course of the writing, when operating under the influence of my mixed selves, I have put three feet in my mouth (the urge to self-humiliation was so great, I needed a spare), acted mentally ill, become a lovesick puppy, and delivered lectures, mature as Athena, all at once.
Originally poster on Monday, November 26th, 2012
Sara Mansfield Taber 