I got a little lost the other day.
I was reading on the couch when my daughter came in and asked me if I could buy her a particular book, which had been recommended to her by a teacher. My eyes lit up. "Be right back," I said, dashing out of the living room. I hastily pulled down the attic stairs, swatting stray bits of insulation away from my face as they drifted to the floor. The moment my head surfaced in the attic, I saw it, tilted sideways in a clear storage bin as if presenting itself at my daughter's request: Wayside School is Falling Down. "Yes!" I exclaimed, pleased that, for the first time, one of the objects I hoarded as a child "so my kids can use them one day" was actually going to be used by one of my kids. I climbed the rest of the way into the attic and unclasped the blue plastic lid for the first time in years. Must and childhood wafted up into my nose. My hand slid down the side of the bin, past Babysitter's Club and Christopher Pike books, one-off teen dramas from the Book Fair and even some Saved By The Bell fan merch. I plucked the book out and moved to cover the bin once more. As I picked up the lid to replace it, though, a worn navy-blue binder caught my eye, its unassuming matte cover contrasting with the glossy paperbacks. What's this? I thought. Here I was going through a bin full of other people's books, but inside the binder must be something of my own. I hunched over for a better look, careful not to smack my head on the rafters above. Some white Avery labels, hastily written with markers and rolling up at the corners, advertised a school council election long past. Eddie 4 Treasurer! Courtney 4 President! Frayed cardboard peeked out from where the seams had split. I opened the cover with a thumb and forefinger, half-expecting to find nothing more than a bunch of notes from math or science. More things I saved, in case they became useful later, and never looked at again. But the stack of papers that confronted me was much more than mindless class notes. I recognized the handwriting as my own, though there were at least a half-dozen different styles. I could identify my curlicue phase, my small-print phase, and the unusual every-letter-is-the-same-size phase. Pages and pages that, despite the fact that I wrote them, I didn't recognize at all. "Here," I called absently down the stairs, tossing the Wayside book onto the floor below. Scurrying steps approached and then faded. I lowered myself to the makeshift plywood floor and took a paper in my hand. "Hello, my childhood / I'm leaving you today," it began. I picked up another, titled A Single Tear: "Tracing the path of your existence / a river through your soul..." There were poems, unfinished short stories, semi-autobiographical narratives, and one story with multiple chapters that looked like it might have been a collaboration between me and someone else. Curiously, there was also a completely intact notebook with nothing inside but handwritten lyrics to entire albums by my favorite artists: Toad the Wet Sprocket, Green Day, Gin Blossoms, and so on. I only found dates on a few of the pages, but best I can put together, the work ranges from grades eight through ten. The poetry was pretty depressing. I shook my head as I read my words from a quarter-century ago - stories of lost love and self-harm, of resentment and a desire to escape - straining to remember what was precisely true, what was embellished, and what was pure fabrication. The prose was much more interesting. I produced a lot more writing than I ever remembered doing, and I was impressed at how teenager-me used foreshadowing, multiple points of view, and unexplained events to create a feeling of suspense. The last line of one page read, "And so began his obsession with Samantha Keller," and I flipped to the next sheet, disappointed to see a different story in different handwriting. What happened with Samantha Keller?! Now I need to know. Another story used dreams to connect two different characters: what happened in one character's dream manifested in the other's reality. I might even pick that one up again some day - seems like a fun premise. I spent an hour sitting there, old and tattered binder splayed open in front of me, poring over words I'd forgotten I'd ever written. When at last I sealed the bin, I realized that, along with the scent of home that still lingered in my nose, there was also a feeling at the pit of my stomach - a mix of nostalgia, restlessness, and validation. I don't miss those days, but it was as if all the hours I spent writing as a young person were preparing me in the background for what I would eventually do. Storytelling is storytelling, I realized, no matter the age. When I was younger I wrote about a boy who fell in love with a girl jumping rope at recess, or about what I called love but what was actually an attempt to figure out where I fit in my little microcosm within my tiny hometown. Now I write words that help me and others try and make sense of the world at large. Commentaries on beauty and fitness and other issues affecting and connecting people around the globe. The content is different, the scope is different, but the craft remains the same. By the time I swung the ladder back up into its hiding place in the hallway ceiling, my daughter's nose was buried deep in the Wayside book. I slipped past her room, hugging the binder to my chest, and put it on the shelf next to my desk, a reminder that I've been a writer longer than I've been pretty much anything else. And maybe, one day, when I'm short on ideas, I can pick it up for some inspiration.
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I've been meaning to do this for a really long time.
Ever since I started writing what would eventually become a full-length novel, I knew I'd need a web page. Books are a product, after all, and in order to sell products, it helps to have a website. But there's no book to buy - not yet, anyway. While I'm hopeful that soon I'll have an agent and a publication deal, so far I have neither. And even if everything follows according to my most optimistic fantasy, it could be 2023 or later before my books will assume their place at libraries, bookstores, and book clubs across the country (or around the world, since we're in fantasy mode). That's a long time to wait. Why bother with the website, then, if I don't have anything to sell? Simple. So I can connect with you. Yes you, the eventual reader of my first book, The Other Women, and hopefully all the subsequent ones, too. And this blog is the way to do that. Nothing much else will change about my site - I've settled on a theme I like, a color scheme and font palette that fit the vibe I'm trying to go for. All the other sections are likely to stay static. But this blog - this is where we can hang, just me and you. I've known all this for quite a while now. The what and the why have been crystal clear to me. I'm bought in. So why didn't I start before today? Because the how kept escaping me. How do I connect with you? How do I create a world that offers you something you want? We already know I don't have a book yet. And creating fiction is hard work. I'm not likely going to be able to write short stories with any kind of regularity. So I had to figure out what else I had to offer. And, finally, I think I've done it. I've been reflecting on the kind of writing I do, the kinds of elements and themes that appear in story after story - from books to short stories to personal essays. They're all so different - addiction, supernatural forces, grief, cross-dimensional travel, reproductive autonomy - but they all have one thing in common: Connection. A parent and a child, separated but able to communicate across unimaginable expanses of space-time. A boy, abandoned by those who are supposed to be most connected to him. Lovers, connected despite one partner's sudden and unexplainable death. A girl and her childhood dog whose relationship endures across the decades. Reflections on women's relationship to the society that gives us life and then abandons us at our most vulnerable. The connections that bind you to me as a human, even if we've never met before. These last few years of writing, I am realizing, has provided a window through which I can examine connections and relationships I'd never seen or considered before. And that is what I can offer you. It might be in the form of a book list, a reflection on a current event, or a short story. I might offer a poem, a photo, or a story from my childhood. But as I present these gifts to you, these tiny musings from within me and without, I will be thinking about connection. How our family units are inter- and intraconnected. How you connect with me and with your fellow readers, how we're all connected as humans, the relationship between our feelings and actions and the society that brought us up. Looking at it this way has given me a ton of awesome ideas. I think I've finally figured out the how. Thank you for coming with me on this journey; I'm excited you're here. See you soon! |
Nicci KadilakI'm the boss around here.
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