The Process for Producing My Memoir

Three weeks have passed since I posted the announcement that I’d asked nine readers to assess my recently completed convent memoir. I’ve heard from four of them. By the end of the month I hope to know what the others think about the story. Today I’ll detail how I got to the fourth draft that I sent them.

      In my last posting, I explained that I began the memoir back in July 2014. By October, I had a first draft of 65,000 words. Everything was there, I thought, except for the ending. It didn’t share itself with me.

      I decided to take a month off. In that way, I might come back to the manuscript as if the words didn’t belong to me. Then I could see more easily how to edit it into a second draft.

       In fact, three months passed before I returned to writing. During that time, I experienced a severe allergic reaction to medication, deepening concern about my rising glaucoma pressure, and two bouts of pneumonia. None of this was conducive to assessing that first draft.

     By mid-February 2015, I felt healthy enough to begin work on a second draft. As I mused about those long-ago convent days, I added newly remembered anecdotes. However, my work was sporadic because within six weeks, I was in Emergency with a back problem that left me unable to sit at the computer for more than ten minutes at a time.

      In May, I completed that second draft. It was now 92,000 words. Once again I planned on taking a month off and then beginning a third, and possibly, final draft. However, new health problems waylaid that plan.

      By mid-August I began to feel equal to writing again. To begin, I read the second draft. It was ponderous and repetitious. I realized then that I could spend many more months, maybe years, fooling around with the memoir. It might never get done. So I decided to impose a deadline on myself. To do so, I contacted readers to ask if they’d have time during the month of November to read the memoir.            

      With that self-imposed deadline, I began the proposed third draft in which I hoped to rid the manuscript of repetition. By mid-October, I had cut 10,000 words and was down to 82,000. That still seemed long to me. I wanted to get in the 70-75,000 range.

      Now I had only a week to clear my mind before I began a final pass-through. I spent the final two weeks of October working on the fourth draft. That eye-opening experience revealed haphazard writing. I found countless extraneous words. Rambling sentences. Poor transition and organization.

      Also, because many sentences gravitated between who I was in 1958 and who I am now, readers would be torn between two time periods. I wanted to draw them into the world of 1958-1966 and keep them there for the duration of the memoir.

      With these problems in mind, I ruthlessly cut the third draft to create a fourth one. By October 31, 2015, I had a 74,000-word manuscript that represented what Dee Ready/Sister Innocence thought and felt nearly fifty years ago. It was as authentic as I could make it.

       Now I need to trust my readers to tell me if I’ve succeeded in my attempt to capture that young woman’s joy and angst. In my next posting, I’ll let you know how those readers have responded to the memoir.  

Waiting Is—I Tell You—Hard

Over a month ago, I posted for the first time in ten months. My plan was to begin posting and reading blogs again on a regular basis. What I’ve learned in a rather long life is that plans “oft go awry”! What I hadn’t planned for is the time necessary for completing a memoir.

I began this memoir—one centered on my years in the convent—back in July 2014. I’ve now written four drafts of it. And as Wordsworth would say, “My heart leaps up when I behold” a completed manuscript!

Sister Innocence. Age twenty-three. 

This particular 74,000-word memoir originated with a request from an agent way back in June 2014. I’d sent her a query about my cat fantasy manuscript—The Gift of Nine Lives. While exploring my blog, she discovered I’d been in the convent.

The same day I e-mailed the query, she responded, asking me if I’d ever considered writing a convent memoir. If so, she said, she’d be interested in looking at it.

My friends in Minnesota call me “no-grass-grows-under-her-feet Ready!” That was never truer than with this memoir. I sat down at the computer and for two weeks didn’t even brew my daily shots of tea. By the end of that time, I had twenty polished pages to show her.

I pasted them into an e-mail and sent it to the agent. I never heard from her again.

Recently, I looked at those twenty pages and could see why she’d expressed no interest in pursuing the idea. The writing was amateurish. Wordy. Dull. A lot of telling and not much showing; a lot of explaining; a lot of philosophizing. A lot of boring detail. You got it—Lousy!  

Despite the agent’s lack of interest, a friend who knew quite a bit about publishing encouraged me to continue. “Dee,” she said, “you want to get published. A convent memoir just might get an agent’s attention. More so I think than your first-century Palestine novel. Or the one about Bronze-Age Greece.”

“But those two grabbed me. Doing something about the convent sounds boring.”

“It won’t once you get into it.”

“It’s ancient history. Who’d be interested?”

“Your blog readers liked your convent stories. I bet there’s lots more readers out there who’d read it.”

“But what about the novels?”

“Get the memoir done and published. Then readers will want more from you. That’s when you’ll get the novels published.”

“You think?”

“It’s worth a try.”

She was right. It was worth a try. And I did have some basic questions niggling my inquisitive brain. I’d been twenty-two when I entered the convent; nearly thirty-one when I left. Who was I then? Why had I entered? And more importantly, why had I left when so many stayed?

I opened myself to memories. Welcoming my summons, they came. With some came tears. With others, a great lassitude. With still others I felt the wonder of being young and in love with the idea of monasticism.

Next Sunday, I’ll write more about the months that followed. Today I’ll close by saying that nine readers—of various ages and background—are now reading/assessing the manuscript. I hope that before the end of November, I’ll know their thoughts. The big questions are, of course, does the story have an audience? Is the writing strong enough to interest that audience? Does it grab the reader?

In writing for all those months, I got lost in a thicket of words. I no longer have an objective view of what’s in that manuscript. I hope by the end of this month I will.

Waiting, my friends, is hard!!!!!

Peace.

Seesawing in the Convent

St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican

When last I posted a story from my life in Dayton back in the late ‘60s, I shared with you several perceptive comments that Dr. C., a psychiatrist, said to me as he discerned the patterns of my life. During that time I also tried to officially leave the convent.

When I’d asked to leave in early December of 1966, the Mother Superior thought that my taking a leave of absence rather than being released from my vows would be best for me. I can’t remember exactly how she proposed this, but she must have been thinking that I often acted impulsively and that I’d changed my mind more than once about leaving.

In June of 1965, after teaching high school students in Baileyville, Kansas, for a year, I’d arrived home at the Mount and immediately asked to leave the convent. The Prioress called and asked my mom to come and persuade me otherwise. Mom came, talked about how she’d stayed married to Dad despite his drinking, and said, “Dolores, when you put your hand to the plow, you never look back.” I stayed.

But a year later, in June of 1966, after teaching another nine months in Baileyville, I’d once again entered the Prioress’ office, knelt down, and asked to leave. My second request startled her even more than the first. After all, only a handful of professed nuns had left the convent in its previous one hundred years and so my persistence was historically atypical.

Vatican Two, an ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church, had taken place in Rome between October 1962 and December 1965. Pope John XXIII had encouraged the prelates to open up the Church to renewal. I knew little about the council, nor what this renewal implied. Nor did I know any professed nuns who’d left the convent. To leave after making final vows just wasn’t done at that time.

But I had become so desperate that leaving seemed my only recourse. I can’t remember how or when that drastic option—actually leaving the convent—occurred to me. I can’t stress enough how in December 1966 that was a radical idea. A year later leaving became more widespread.

I attribute my decision to that deep down survival instinct in me. It was leave or endure a breakdown. At the time, nuns who suffered from extreme mental illness were sent to a hospital in Council Bluffs, Iowa. My fear was that I’d be sent there and would spend the rest of my life sitting by a window, facing the sun’s warmth, totally incoherent.

The Prioress suggested that I take part in the convent’s June retreat and then make my decision. I did this, and sure enough, because at heart I love the idea of monasticism, I went into her office afterward and said, in my usual dramatic and grandiose way, “I’m staying. And if I ever again ask to leave, remind me of this. I’m committed to staying.”

St. John’s Abbey Church at Saint John’s University in Collegeville

Within a day or two, I traveled to Collegeville, Minnesota, where I had been pursuing for two previous summers a graduate degree in Benedictine Spirituality. When I returned to the Mount in August 1969, I began teaching religion and English literature in the Mount Academy attached to the convent.

But summer school had only bandaged the woundedness of my spirit. Once again, it began to fester. Once again I seemed to shatter into shards of myself. And so late one evening in early December 1966 I walked down the shadowed halls, entered the Prioress’ office, and asked to leave.

Next week I’ll explain a leave of absence and how that worked out in the two and a half years I lived in Dayton. Peace.

Postscript: This past Monday I completed the first rough draft of my convent memoir. I’m putting it aside for several weeks. Then I’ll read it to discover exactly what I’ve written. Editing and polishing will follow, through probably two or so more drafts, until I have a final manuscript. I’m feeling a real sense of accomplishment.

Photographs from Wikipedia. 

An Update on Agent's Request

Hello on this final Thursday of July. I’ve been away from reading blogs and posting on this on-line memoir for a whole month. Today, I’d simply like to share with you what I’ve been doing.

         As you know, in late June an agent expressed interest in seeing three of my manuscripts: the Palestine novel, the cat fantasy gift book, and the convent memoir. The first and second manuscripts are completed and I sent them as attachments in late June.

         The convent memoir, however, is a work in progress. So for the first two weeks of July, I continued to write stories for it. I then sent the agent a partial that presents an introductory arc of those eight and one-half years plus stories about the novitiate and my first two and one-half years in the scholasticate—so four years of my convent life.

Dad, Mom, and me as a postulant in 1958.

         I’m pleased with the partial. I asked a friend, who used to be in the convent, to read it. After she read the 37,000 words of this submission, she e-mailed and said the following:

I just finished reading the opening part of your memoir and it is very moving and interesting and so well written. I think this is going to be a "best seller" because you are setting the record straight about why we entered and why we left. 

Your writing is clear and focused and your examples are wonderful. 

Sister Madonna and the Good Samaritan analogy was right on about how we are good Samaritans to others and others have been our own good Samaritans, binding up our wounds. 

It is wonderful and I would not change a word of it if I were a copy editor!!!

Of course, this review pleased me mightily. She later sent another e-mail with her final thoughts on the partial: “Dee, It was like I was reading my own years in the convent.  I could relate to everything. Keep on writing.” Her words are just what I need right now to continue and complete this memoir.

         I’ve gotten no farther than the partial because after those first two weeks of July, I flew away for a vacation with friends. I’m home now and recuperating from vacationing. You all know how that is.

         Next week I hope to begin reading your blogs again. If there are any postings that you especially want me to read, please let me know via a comment or an e-mail.

         Next week also, I’ll continue posting on my life after the convent. I want to share with you my three sessions with the psychiatrist who catapulted me into feminism.
        Finally today, I want to thank you for all your encouraging thoughts, visualizations, vibes, and prayers for me as I work on the convent memoir and as I await word from the agent. I haven't heard yet, but I continue to be hopeful that she will choose to represent my writing. Please do continue to send me your support for I can feel it as if it were, as the song says, "the wind beneath my wings." Peace.

The photograph of the red kite was taken by James Barker for FreeDigitalPhotos.

        

A Week's Worth of Happenings

Hello All,

My company arrived last Friday, celebrated my birthday with me, and flew home yesterday. So today is devoted to doing the laundry and getting everything back to normal. You all know how that is.  

  

     

         Also, I’m responding—by phone and e-mail—to all the birthday greetings I received. Then there’s the catching up with six day’s worth of e-mails and the postal mail that came—junk, bills, catalogs—during that time. I’m sure you all know how that is also.

         Here’s another piece of news that many of you—maybe all of you—will appreciate and understand because you, too, have received good news at a doctor’s office. Last Thursday I saw the dermatologist who prescribed the light treatments for my CTCL and is monitoring their effectiveness. She carefully examined my arms, legs, and chest on which, six weeks ago, were displayed many large pink blotches.

         “Everything on your left leg is in remission,” she announced. Then she looked at my chest. “Same thing here.” Only a single blotch on my left arm, a swath on my right arm, and quite a bit of my right leg—from the knee to the ankle—remain stubborn. But all were changing color, which is a sign they are going into remission.

         She agreed that two days a week instead of three were sufficient and concluded, “Dee, if your skin continues to respond this way, I think you’ll be able to stop coming after the next six weeks.”

         Hurrah and Hallelujah!

         Another piece of news today concerns your comments for last week’s posting. I haven’t had time to respond to them, but I will return to responding with this posting and from here on out. I enjoy responding to your comments, which always make me consider new aspects about what I’ve written.

A panoramic view of the Delphi valley in mainland Greece.

         Also, I wanted you all to know that I’ve decided to work this year on a novel that takes place in Bronze Age Greece around 1300 BCE. Last year I wrote 62,000 words of a first draft that is not yet completed. I’m hoping that the first book of this proposed trilogy will be about 70,000 words after it goes through several more drafts and a final polishing. I hope to have the manuscript in good shape by the end of the year. But I will listen to my body. Go with the flow. Live day by day. So nothing here is written in stone.

         Finally, I’m wondering if you have any preferences for what part of my life you’d like to know more about. As I summarized last week,

1.    “Of the years between birth and entering the convent after college graduation, I’ve reconnoitered only my childhood up to sixth grade at St. Mary’s Grade School in Independence, Missouri.”

2.    “I’ve shared with you the convent novitiate years as well as my first two years on mission in Omaha, Nebraska, after making first vows. But there are other stories yet to tell about teaching in Seneca, Baileyville, Atchison, and Kansas City, Kansas.”

3.    “Back in 2012, I spent several months posting about getting involved in social justice issues when I was in my thirties. That leaves four decades yet to explore of my life as a single woman who established a career after leaving the convent and then retired to write and enjoy friendship.”

I’d appreciate your commenting and letting me know any preference you might have among these three time periods.

I want to end by thanking all of you for your good wishes last week when I posted about the CTCL appointment. On my birthday I found myself deeply thankful for your continuing and continual support. Peace.

All photographs from Wikipedia.

A Commitment to Myself . . . Please Hold Me to It!

Hello All, on this overcast day here in western Missouri where the cold is always a “wet” cold that creeps into the bones. Those of you who are regular readers of this blog know that since May 2011 it’s been my on-line memoir. Beyond these memoir stories, however, I also try to write other genres.

         Right now I have completed a novel—The Reluctant Spy, which takes place in first-century Palestine; a slim gift book—The Gift of Nine Lives, an illustrated fantasy for cat lovers; and a second gift book—Angelic Psalms, an illustrated book of lyrical verse for our troubles times.

         In addition, I have completed a first-draft for a novel about four ex-nuns; a partial for a novel that takes place in Bronze-Age Greece; and another gift book that is halfway completed. Much of this writing dates back years as I have a strong tendency to begin something, work steadily on it, then get bored with it, and put it aside for later.

         As I’ve worked on these various manuscripts, friends have encouraged me to try to get a memoir published. They believe it has the best chance of getting agent representation and publication. You may wonder why publication is important to me. Why isn’t simply writing enough?

         I believe that each of us is an artist in some way: some of us bake artisan’s bread; other listen with such sensitivity that they bring peace to our troubled waters; some of us dance or sing, compose music or create beauty in our gardens; some of us enjoy the stories, anecdotes, and jokes of others so that friends feel welcomed in our midst; some of us are great storytellers.

         And as artists we all seek an audience: someone to eat the bread; to dance through life with us; to wear the sweaters we knit; to enjoy the potato soup; to gaze upon the watercolor; to listen to the song that we can’t resist singing.

         You see what I mean. I think of myself as an artist whose way of connecting with others is through writing. I’m not saying that I’m a good writer or even that I have anything to say that others might want to spend time reading. What I am saying is that my deepest heartwish is to communicate and it’s through the telling of stories that I can do that.

         Thus, blogging has been a gift to me. I have been able to share stories with you and you have responded with interest and support. And in the past three years, I have indeed come home to myself—the name of this blog—in that I have embraced my whole life. Your comments have helped with that as your words have often put into perspective some aspect of my life with which I’ve struggled. Thank you now and ever for all the help you’ve given me. You have read my stories with nonjudgmental sensitivity.

         You’d think that being read with such understanding by all of you should be—I’ve never liked the word should by the way—enough for me. But it isn’t. I want to be published. I want my stories to be read beyond the Internet. For an artist, life is about connection. Our art—be it gardening or baking, writing or listening, photographing or painting—wants to connect with others. For me, this is evidence of the Oneness I find in all creation.

         And so I am devoting this year to three aspects of writing: 1) following your blogs; 2) finding an agent to represent my work; and 3) completing the convent memoir.

         All of you know the time that’s involved with following blogs. What you may not know is that the second goal requires a lot of research beyond the writing of query letters. (I’ve written about this before on my Sunday writing blog.) The third goal requires that I establish a daily routine of writing in order to complete a finished memoir by Thanksgiving—the deadline I’ve set for myself.

         To do that, I’m going to set aside two to three hours each day for writing new convent stories and weaving them together with the ones that have already appeared on this blog.

         While I’m doing that, I will continue posting, but I won’t be adding to the convent stories I began last August. Instead, I’ll return to my pre-convent and post-convent years and share with you additional stories about those times.

         I’ve been dealing with health problems recently that have stymied my efforts to follow blogs, seek agent representation, and write. With my somewhat obsessive behavior, I fell into the trap I have fallen into before. That is, I’ve let myself think it’s all or nothing. If I can’t do these three things each day, then I do nothing. And so nothing’s been getting done.

         But I’m taking a renewed lease on life.

·      I’m going to make every effort to visit each of your blogs once a week. Your words keep me grounded.

·      I’ll send out an agent query whenever I have twenty to thirty extra minutes to get that query ready.

·      And I’ll set realistic goals for myself each week so as to move forward in completing a first and then a final draft of the convent memoir.

I know that all of you wish me success with my three goals. All of us are artists; all of us have goals. Let us then support one another as we find and fashion our heartwishes. Peace.

All the photographs except that of Eliza are from Wikipedia.

Guest Post: Homeless in Hawaii

Hello All.

Today, I’d like you to welcome a guest poster—EC Stilson. Last week, Wayman Press published the third book of her memoir trilogy. The first in the series is Bible Girl & Bad Boy, the second is Homeless in Hawaii, and the third is The Golden Sky. Wayman Publishing did not publish the books in this order, but if you are new to EC’s work, this is probably the order in which you’ll want to read the three volumes.

         What follows is an excerpt from Homeless in Hawaii in which a seventeen-year-old Elisa flees her past and finds herself homeless on Waikiki strip. With her is a friend whose main intent seems to be to protect her from the misfortunes that might befall someone who’s left family and friends behind and now lives among strangers. As time passes, Hawaii works its magic. Elisa matures and finds herself letting go of the memories that haunt her. 

            I’ve guest posted on EC’s blog several times, and so I’m grateful to return that favor. If her excerpt piques your interest you’ll find Homeless in Hawaii on Amazon as a traditional trade paperback and as an e-book.

A Turning Point for Street Performers in Hawaii

That day, playing music on the street with Cade, our musical capabilities transitioned from merely playing, to performing. I’d stop in between songs and talk to the tourists. We laughed and joked. I knew what I was doing because during our slow times I made myself remember the notes of the “A” minor scale as numbers. When I talked to the tourists I had the whole thing planned.

         “Do you want your own song?” I asked a darling little girl with curly blonde hair.

“Really? Yes!”

I stood up straight and looked her parents right in the eyes. Sure I was homeless. Sure, some people thought that made me scum, but they were wrong. God and I both knew that. “Can you give me ten of your favorite numbers? They can be random, or part of a phone number, part of an address.”

They gave me their phone number and I played each one as they fell on the “A” minor scale. It only took one short time through and I knew what the song would be. I switched to a major, added some fiddling double stops and danced around the girl. She danced with me and for a moment it was just her and me—two free creatures of God, enjoying what life had to offer.

When they left, Cade pulled me toward him. “Elisa, that was brilliant.”

“It taught me something. I want to stop judging myself by other people’s standards. I had so much fun.” Then I turned the tables on him. “Now I’m dancing and playing ‘phone numbers.’ You’re singing! What’s become of this world?”

For days after that, every single time we played on the street, people would leave tips. Kids would come up and ask for their very own songs. Word spread and people viewed us as regulars on the strip. An elderly couple who lived in town came to see us each night. A mysterious stranger with a lump on his neck continued coming.

         But nothing really scared me anymore because we had a routine. We owned that strip, and not even the intimidating locals, who started watching us frequently, could discourage me.

Click the picture to see it LIVE on Amazon!

Postscript: On Wednesday, I'll be posting another on-line memoir story from my growing up years. We've reached fifth grade now and lots happened.