When I first began writing, I attended a workshop taught by the award winning poet and memoirist Judith Barrington. I had read a number of her books and was thrilled when I learned she was teaching a workshop on the craft of memoir writing. Her class didn’t disappoint. And, I learned one invaluable lesson that has stuck with me as my writing has evolved over the years: the gift of distance. She lectured on the importance of letting our stories linger, on giving them the chance to shift with the passing of time. In the workshop we dissected a variety of popular memoirs and without fail the ones written through the lens of a backward glance were richer, layered, and lasting.
The week Luke first trotted down the street to preschool over three years was the same week my mom died. The brightly colored primary walls of his initial preschool experience were the backdrop for a dreary, drawn-out death. I remember a myriad of scents blending together those days - play-dough and peanut butter infused with the scent of my mother’s decaying body. I remember watching the top of Luke’s baby fine blond head bound into the classroom, and how my feet felt like lead as I turned to leave him that day. I remember his chubby two-year-old hand waving goodbye while I lingered by the classroom door trying to summon the courage to say a final goodbye to my mom. At the time, I was convinced that the intersection of death and grief with Luke’s formative years would leave us both forever tainted.
