Around this time last year, I finished what I thought was my final edit on my book before starting to figure out how to get it published.
Not only did I finish it, but my friend Segun shared the first 5 chapters of it with his advanced graphic design class and gave them the assignment of developing a book design. I visited the class and was shown more than a dozen versions of what the book could look like if I brought it into print. It was a thrilling moment. I even reserved the url for the book title, confident that I would get it into print one way or another.
I was close… so close… and then life got in the way.
It’s tricky, this business of writing a memoir. Life is messy and unfinished, and it’s difficult to tie it up with a pretty bow at the end.
Last year at this time, the book was called “Butterfly at the Grave”. Now I wonder if I should call it “The Unfinished Business of Living, While People around You are Dying”.
The book has been growing in me for more than a dozen years. It’s the story of my stillborn son Matthew and the huge impact his short life had on my life. It started growing even before he was born, when I was sitting in the hospital waiting for him, on an unexpected sabbatical from my life. During those three weeks, I wrote in my journal “some day I will write a book and it will be called ‘The Journey of a Woman’.”
The problem is that while the book was gestating in me, other deaths happened that changed my life just as much. When I started writing it two years ago, I was pretty certain it would focus solely on Matthew, but then one day I realized that I couldn’t ignore the impact that my Dad’s sudden death had on my life.
And then… while I was trying to wrap it up… well, Mom got cancer. I wrote this in the last chapter, just before finishing the first draft a year and a half ago…
“On Mother’s Day this past year, I was having an especially horrible day. After spending the afternoon with my mother who was experiencing the ravishing after-effects of her first chemo treatment, I came home completely spent and emotional. It finally hit home just how devastated I would be if I lost my Mom. Our relationship hasn’t always been an easy one, especially in recent years when I and my siblings had to get used to the idea that she married again after Dad died and things shifted fairly significantly. And yet, despite the challenges, I love her deeply and I don’t want to lose her.”
You know the rest of the story. I lost her. So… how can I now end the book on that note when I know just how much her loss means to me?
I’m not sure. This book still wants to be born, and at some point I just have to say “finished”, but I suspect it’s not finished yet. I think a few more chapters are going to emerge before I finally see it in print.
Life is unfinished, imperfect, and messy. I suppose that, even when it’s in print, this book will always be unfinished.
Grief is a class we never get a final grade in.
“Grief is a class we never get a final grade in.” Indeed.
After reading your piece in Sprout, and now reading this…I think we are kindred spirits. My daughter was stillborn 1.5 years ago, and her life and death have changed me, made me better, and given my heart a sacred work that is similar to what you talk about in Sprout. This work is so needed. Thank you. I’m so sorry about your son, but so grateful for the way he has given you (and, as a result, many others) life.