Pep Talk

Because I'm a Writer

Hi, Friend.

I’ve been thinking a lot about why we do what we do. To be clear, I’ve been thinking about my work because I’ve been answering questions about it. What inspired you to write a children’s book? Why did you write a memoir instead of grappling with the same material in a collection of poetry instead? What’s next for you? At a book festival last year, after I’d read fromYou Could Make This Place Beautiful and talked a little about it, someone in the audience asked, “Why write an emotional memoir?”

I think my eyes widened. I mean, I genuinely didn’t understand the question. So I asked, for clarification, “You mean, why take the heat? Why put yourself out there?”

“Yes, why did you do it?” This person wasn’t being confrontational. The question seemed to come from a sincere curiosity.

What might you say, if someone asked you why you wrote about your life?

I answered in the most succinct way I knew how: “Because I’m a writer.”

I didn’t say much more at the time—there were other hands raised—but I’ve been thinking about it. I could unpack the question the way I unpacked several anticipated questions in You Could Make This Place Beautiful:

I could say that I don’t write things just for me. I don’t keep a journal; I don’t write morning pages for my eyes only. If I write something down in one of my many, always-at-risk-of-being-misplaced notebooks or legal pads, or in the Notes app on my phone, or on a scrap of paper I have handy, or in the margins of a book I’m reading, my hope—and more than that, my intention—is that this idea, phrase, metaphor, or scrap of language will someday make it into a piece of writing I share with other people.

I could say that when I write, even if part of the purpose of to grapple with or puzzle over something myself, I’m always writing to the reader. For you.

I could say that writing is how I make a living. I could say that I can’t imagine anyone asking a professional baker, “Why not just bake things for yourself?” I could say that writing—whether it’s a book, an essay, a poem, or this newsletter—is how I keep the lights on, the water running, the fridge reasonably full. It’s how I pay for my kids’ clothes and shoes and extracurriculars. And it’s how I can afford to fix things in this hundred-year-old house when they inevitably break. (Most recently, my ancient dryer died, then my old fridge. Shout out to my neighbor Wendy, who if you’ve read my memoir, you know as my rollerskating, train-traveling friend. She’s also the friend who lets me walk laundry across the street to do in her basement, and the friend who moves food aside in her fridge and freezer so I can store my own groceries there temporarily. That’s real friendship. Thanks, Wendy.)

The side of the new fridge. A lot of life & love on display. (Yes, my son “revised” a note I wrote to my kids on the dry-erase board; he made it from him to me instead.)

I could say that sharing our experiences, our struggles, is a generous offering to others. I believe that. When we read about someone else’s life, we’re invited to see ourselves and our own lives in new ways, to make exciting discoveries and breakthroughs. And we’re made braver and bolder in the process. Braver and bolder and less inhibited, less isolated, by shame. If they can do it, we think, we can do it. If they can tell their story, I can tell mine.

But above all, I write because I’m a writer.

Maybe, if you’re an essayist or memoirist, or someone who writes candidly about your own experiences in poetry, you’ve been asked questions like this, too—questions about why you disclose intimate details about your life. People might ask, “How did you find the courage to tell your story?” Others might ask, “Why didn’t you just keep this private?” (Let’s be clear: this second question is a judgment phrased as a question.) Maybe some people don’t understand why you write about your life, and they genuinely want to understand.

You can tell them whatever you like. You can give them the short and sweet answer or the extended dance mix.

Because you’re a writer.

With solidarity, from my desk to yours—
Maggie