Memoir Revision Diaries (Week 5)
Busy return to work, memoir progress, and a long overdue Quill & Cup reunion
Happy New Year! I hope you had a restful and festive holiday season. For those of you who returned to work this week, I hope it was a smooth transition back.
Ours started like that, but by Tuesday afternoon (our first day back), we had a timely project drop in our laps, leading us to “hit the ground running” prepping marketing materials before the week was out. It was NOT the ease back into work mode I was hoping for.
But you’re not here to read about my insane, albeit short week at work. Let’s jump into how my memoir revision is going.
The end of this week saw this memoir draft reach over 7,000 words. I’m adding a lot more “in-scene” moments. This is something my coach mentioned a lot throughout my first draft, stating more in-scene moments would help set the tone and setting for the reader.
And she was right. Already, the scenes I’ve added gave me more room to bring in deeper internal dialogue.
This is where my love for creative nonfiction comes into play. It’s that balance of story, narration, and information that intrigues me but also teaches me something valuable.
I’ve also pretty much settled on how I want to break the book into “chapters.” It may change once I see it all together, but as of now, I like how it looks and reads.
Musical Interlude
This week’s song comes from one of my favorite artists: MARINA (previously Marina & the Diamonds). Her songs are both poppy, catchy, and her lyrics are incredibly powerful. Her first song that makes my memoir list–because there is more than one–is called “Forget.”
The song is primarily about growing up, but its main message is looking after yourself. A major theme throughout my memoir is that once I discovered my asexuality, I felt confident that romance, relationships, marriage, etc., would not be in my future. And so the main person I need to look out for is myself.
Though I live with a “never say never” mentality, this is something I come to terms with early in my discovery and so this song helps represent that.
This week also marked my first week back in Quill & Cup, an all-female writing community I joined way back in 2021. Financial problems led me to leave the community in 2022 and now that I’m getting back on my feet, I made a plan to return.
The original plan was to come back in spring, but one of the “hedgies” (a nickname for writers in the Hedgie House/Quill & Cup) gifted me a free membership for the month. And since I am dedicating January and February to digging into this revision, I was glad to accept.
Last week, I joined three Prickles, which are essentially writing times. It’s there I got the majority of my word count up.
I’m excited to be back with these incredible, supportive women and to continue to see this new draft taking shape. There are a few things I’ve noted that I want to add to the next draft before sending it off to my agent.
Outside of that, I am eager to see where 2024 takes us, yet I’m continuing to take things one day at a time.
Thank you for being here, my friend. I look forward to hearing all about your journey as we move through this new year together.
Until next time,
💜 J
How was your first week of 2024?