By Paul Bishop
Western
writer Louis L'Amour once created the wonderfully romantic
notion of a heroine who scattered her poems across the frontier
by using brightly colored ribbons to tie them to uprooted
tumbleweeds. Wandering cowboys were constantly on the lookout
for these scraps of verse, finding both comfort and campfire
conversation from their creation. The heroine’s audience
was miniscule, but her writings still had a powerful effect
on the individuals who discovered her gifts.
Most
of us who subscribe to writers’ magazines, buy how-to writing
tomes, and participate in writing workshops do so with the
objective of getting our writing out to the widest possible
audience. While this is an admirable goal, it can sometimes
blind us to the special blessings our writing and storytelling
abilities can bring to a much smaller audience.
I’ve
been fortunate over the years to experience the highs of
having nine novels published, numerous scripts produced
for episodic television, and am poised for the release of
my first feature film. None of these wonderful writing
milestones, however, have compared to the joy I’ve received
from far more personal writings designed to be read by very
small or singular audiences.
Bedtime
Stories
When
I married my wife, I also inherited a seven-year-old son.
Trying to find a way to smooth the blending of our lives
together, I spent many evenings making up stories for him
about Inspector McCaw, a parrot recently retired from the
Brazilian Parrot Police and now living in London’s Chessington
Zoo. Over the course of several evenings, Inspector McCaw
solved The Case of the Elephant Who Lost His Memory,
The Case of the Empty Snake Skin, The Case of
the Solar Eclipse, and other activities related to zoo
life. My wife encouraged me to put these stories on paper
and bind them, so as not to lose them for the generation
of grandchildren she was planning for even then.
I
thought the notion was silly until I realized how much my
wife’s father’s stories concerning the adventures of Chirpy
the Cricket and Hoppy the Rabbit meant to her. These simple
tales were an important legacy that needed to be preserved
for the small audience of just our family.
Collecting
and putting these stories into prose was, of course, an
effort. But the labor of love — for that is truly the essence
of this type of storytelling — was infinitely repaid when
my son and wife unwrapped their own copies of the stories
as part of our tradition of giving homemade Christmas gifts.
Memoirs
In
talking to writing groups and other gatherings interested
in the creation of memoirs, I am always struck by the restrictive
and apparently overwhelming human need to start with the
line, "I was born..." This instinct to assume
nobody will understand the juicy parts of your life without
the full story for background is just plain wrong. Not
only that, it’s boring.
I
have found the best way to preserve the precious memories
of your life for future generations is to concentrate on
specific events. What are the seminal experiences that
shaped your life? What specific incidents were you involved
in that are substantially different than the like events
of other individuals?
In
my own attempts to create these event specific memoirs,
I first wrote about an extended ping-pong tournament played
in our living room against my father when I was fifteen.
For me, the culmination of the tournament changed the balance
of our father/child relationship in a heart-rending way.
When I gave the story to my father on his 73rd
birthday, it immediately brought back warm memories, laughter,
and yes, tears — an experience much more precious than any
monetary return.
When
creating these memoir moments, look for events that are
unique to you. Once, talking about memoir writing to a
group of residents at an assisted living home, an elderly
woman kept attempting to interject stories from her youth
in Germany. All of these were generic and of little interest
to the group until she informed us that she had once dated
Adolf Hitler! Now, true or not, there was a story unique
to her experience that everybody wanted to hear — a memoir
moment she needed to put on paper to save for the posterity
of her family.
Humor
Using
humor in your personal writings can often make a special
impact on your select audience. For a golfing friend's
40th birthday, I created a tale featuring my
friend as a mad scientist intent on stealing DNA samples
from the world's greatest golfers in order to create an
unbeatable Frankenstein-type golfing clone. In the story,
“Night of the Frankengolfer,” I cast myself as the bumbling
detective Sherluck Jones out to foil the plot.
Other
family members and friends put in semi-veiled appearances
that distorted their best known foibles. The story ended
with the mad scientist pushing his horrid creation off the
castle ramparts and being arrested for making an "obscene
clone fall." Silly? Absolutely. But when read aloud
to much laughter at the 40th birthday party,
it became a cherished gift and a family event.
Being
self-deprecating in the humor of these stories — making
gentle fun of yourself as much as the others involved —
is generally a smart tactic. In creating the tale of the
Frankengolfer, the humor was exaggerated because it suited
the nonsense style of a completely made-up story.
In
telling the true tale of our family's first adventure
vacation, the humor of the situation only needed to
be slightly exaggerated to make its point. Specifically,
this tale involved what my very safety and security conscious
wife and son would refer to as river rafting. In
actuality this event was little more than a gentle tub float
down Arizona's Salt River. This difference in perception
between my wife and son and myself became the heart of a
story we now cherish as a family heirloom.
A
Life of Its Own
The
joy of writing for an audience of one can sometimes take
on a life of its own, becoming a family story within itself.
Going back again to when my son Greg was seven, his enjoyment
for picking up the mail, coupled with his disappointment
that there was never anything address to him, provided another
special writing opportunity.
In
a letter addressed to Greg, I wrote from the point of view
of T.H.E. Kat, a feline who lived with a seven-year-old,
red-headed boy, at a veterinarian's practice in England.
I placed English stamps on the envelope (steamed off letters
from relatives) and popped it in the mailbox after the postman's
visit. When Greg picked up the mail, he was delighted to
find a letter for him, and amazed — as only a seven year
old red-headed boy can be — that a cat would be writing
to him.
Surprisingly,
his first impulse was to get his mother to help him write
a return letter to T.H.E. Kat, full of questions and observations.
This became the beginning of a bi-monthly correspondence
between Greg and T.H.E. Kat. that lasted until Greg was
in his early teens. By then, of course, he had figured
out it wasn't a cat writing to him, but he was still surprised
when he found out it was me writing the letters and not
one of my extended family in England.
At
first, Greg would get me to read the letters aloud and then
get mom to help him write a reply. However, as the correspondence
continued, Greg would read the letters aloud to us and then
sit down to create his own response. This activity became
a family event, drawing my wife and me close together as
we watched our only child's reading, writing, and creative
skills expand. Obviously, we kept all the letters and responses,
and can't wait to pass them on to Greg's wife and family
as they give a telling window into Greg as a maturing child.
Presentation
When
creating a piece of writing for a singular or selective
audience, its presentation as a gift can be given in the
form of a simple printout or a more elaborate handmade book.
Now,
don’t let the words handmade book throw you into
a panic. I use the term to refer to creations as uncomplicated
as stapled pages taken directly from your printer, or pages
placed in plastic page protectors and secured in a binder.
More sophisticated efforts can include covers secured with
spiral bindings, script pins, brass fasteners, or (my favorite)
decorative bachelor buttons found at the local fabric
store.
The
options for designing and making handmade books are limited
only by your imagination. For my part, I’ve never used
anything to create my presentations beyond scissors, art
papers, a ruler, a hole punch, a paper cutter, spray adhesive,
and a variety of items available for free at every local
copier store. I’ve produced more elaborate handmade books
with ideas from how-to volumes borrowed from the library,
and a constant search for legitimate ways to procrastinate
starting the next writing project (just kidding — well,
sort of just kidding).
Remember,
it is not the binding or design of the homemade book that
is important. It is the words inside that are going to
have the impact.
The
most valuable writing I've ever done was a fairytale about
a poor jester entitled “The Richest Man in the World.”
There was only one person for whom this was written — only
one person who ever read it — the woman who is now my wife.
Many years later, it is still part of the foundation of
our enduring love. No wider audience could have been more
important.
Whether
you're dropping scraps of poetry from your car as you travel,
writing memoirs for those closest to you, or making up personalized
stories for friends, know these efforts will endure longer
and mean more than any mass market bestseller. Yes, write
to succeed with the wider audience, but don't neglect the
impact and power of writing for an audience of one.
Next:
The Key to Your Personal History
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