Goodbye Comfort Zone!

Here’s to walking toward what scares you . . .

“You should rewrite this as a novel.”

That’s what my father-in-law said when he read a very early draft of my memoir in 2009. I dismissed that idea out of hand, because fiction — that realm of Toni Morrison and Thomas Hardy — that was too heady for me. Non-fiction, anchored by facts and memories, has always felt so much more accessible to me.

I started seriously writing again in 2017 (that 2009 draft memoir sat in a drawer for eight years). Whenever anyone suggested that I try fiction, I snorted and said, “No f***ing way!”

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So here we are in 2021. I’ve been feeling lost as a writer. When I complained to a friend about my stuckness she said, “Why don’t you try fiction?” At this point I was desperate enough to try anything, sort of like an aging NFL wide receiver who decides to try ballet to increase his agility.

So here’s a tiny attempt at fiction — an 86 year old woman looking in her mirror:

Eleanor used to tell me when I had hairs sprouting from my chin. Now I need a 15x magnifying mirror and bright sunlight to see them. Unlike Gloria Swanson, I abhor a close up. Eleanor, who planted the Magnolia Japonica I can see through the bathroom window, has been gone…