to taste life twice

I took a writing class, once, with a (semi)famous Canadian writer.  She said that she wrote a story about an abusive father; her own father had since passed away.  She said her mother chided her for writing this character, said her father was not so harsh, making the assumption that the character was based upon her real father.  And of course, he was.  But not entirely.  And that is the wonderful, terrible thing about publishing fiction.  People who know you look for themselves in your characters --  and are hurt when they do.

When my mother wrote her book, I did not have to look very hard for myself, because her work was categorized as non-fiction, and the character based upon me bore my name.  Memoirs (and memories) are strange the way they anchor themselves in the non-fiction section, but drift toward fiction in the bumpy parts.  The way we fill in the parts we cannot quite remember so seamlessly that even the writer does not know she has deviated from the facts.  The way no one can be sure they know the facts any more than anyone else does, no matter how clear the memories seem.

When I write, I do not publish anything using my real name.  I do not want anyone to recognize fragments of conversations we have had, or how my mind has dissected and reorganized these things.  I do not wish you to know that I was always thinking about your hands when you were talking to me.  I do not want you to know that I put my hand inside your coat pocket when you left the room for a moment - because I wanted to put my hand some place I knew your hand had been.



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