Week 5: Embarrassingly a true story

When I think about writing a memoir I think about my senior year where I wrote a memoir called "How to write a memoir when you have no memories". It ended up being a piece of writing I was proud of and as I read Stephen Kings memoir it felt similar to my own as I am someone with few small memories that I just dumped on to paper. Fluidity plays a very important role in my memories as I have trouble remembering them. Although I believe its important not to lie to your audience I think its okay to add a detail here or describe something as more important then it was. Growing up I always wished my life was a movie, have the perfect relationship, have lots of friends, get into trouble but get good grades. But our lives are not movies, mine in particular. There is not perfectly timed plot twists or perfectly flawed characters. This is why movies based on true stories always have to spin the story slightly to create more drama. When the script sticks too close to real life it becomes boring. I am not the same person in my stories as who I am in real life, because if I was,

no one would want to listen!

I spend most of my time watching movies in my room, going to work and doing school work. I eat chicken and rice for three dinners out of my week and I hang out with one friend about once every two weeks. These are bad things but they are also not interesting for a reader. Myself in my writing is inquisitive, always talking as though she is outside of situations, she's hanging out with friends, and is slightly nervous but she always grabs someones hand first and always says the right thing. She is genuine but she is not real. I have come to appreciate that line as long as the girl I claim to be me in stories is genuine then she is as real as my reflection in the mirror. But once she loses that then I have lost my creditablilty.

One of my favorite memoirs is We Should Hang Out Sometime: Embarrassingly a True Story by Josh Sundquist.  https://www.teenreads.com/reviews/we-should-hang-out-sometime-embarassingly-a-true-story This is a link to a blog that talks about the main premise. But in short it's about Josh who at the age of 25 realizes he has never had a girlfriend so he decides to conduct a science experiment where he goes back to each girl who he could of had a potential relationship with and ask them "what went wrong"? He gives background on his memories with each girl, creates a hypothesis, and then meets up with them and asks for their side of the story. It's extremely funny and retells what many have experienced, the almost relationships and how much those can shape you. I think he is good at using fluidity as he recalls these girls as perfect in his mind, beautiful, funny, smart but the ones who ruined everything. And then he meets up with them again and they are human, they had imperfections and more importatnly he realizes that what really went wrong each time was him, and his lack of confidence in himself. To be honest it wouldn't bug me if this story was completely fiction, because it felt so real and the message it conveyed to me was enough.

This would have been a great blog series as recalling old people you liked is one of my favorite things to write about. And putting it on a blog would be a great way to get feedback but could also be hard to have people comment on your relationships and choices. It is tricky trying to share your life with others because your memories can never be fully for them. But we still try as without sharing our memories we keep them alone. Which is far too sad to think about for too long.