Do You Type with Eyes Closed?

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"I felt a sense of outrage that people started to look for newspaper reporting when they picked up memoir...." ~Susana Sonnenberg 
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Perhaps I should retitle these pieces I dribble regarding the subject of memoir as sequels with stately Roman numerals.  This is the IIIrd piece coming off my keyboard about thoughts on memoir.

I find that the first time I put something to paper (or screen), it may be fragmented, details askew, dates a bit off.  On the virgin voyage, I don't look up dates, etc.  I might later, look up certain details.  I have corrected some details in some pieces.  If ever these strokes of pen get put into bound 'permanent' ink on page, I will check details; I think I will, won't I?

If a subject I am approaching is complex, it seems to come out more fragmented.  Why is that?

• Webs.  Webs of relationships, past, incidents that overlap and entertwine. It's like a maze.  One doesnt't necessarily want to deconstruct it, but rather follow it to discover that corridor or that strand.
  

•  Oceans.  Thoughts and memories whirl in my mind, heart, body.  Sometimes they are an undercurrent; sometimes they erupt like a typhoon, sometimes they rock me gently; sometimes they are a wild, adventurous surf.  Each is true, even if it involves the same incident, the same context.

• Doubt.  I doubt my thoughts, my memories, my feelings.  I am becoming more confident in embracing what it is - what I think, I feel, I recall.  I am seeing that even if that changes, for the moment in which a piece of memoir is written, in that moment it is true. I sometimes even doubt if experiences happened; yet I know they did.
  

•  Protection.  I have this tendency to protect others, sometimes even at the expense of myself. Yes, there are times I want to protect myself; but more so it seems I want to protect others.  I like Fred Poole's phrase, "I tend to oppose protecting the guilty."  I too often think of myself as the guilty party; and sometimes I am.

•  Accuracy.  A bane.  I'm all for accuracy, but it can go way too far.  It can stifle the creative process, the flow.  Fear of not seeing another person's point of view, fear that if my recollections are not completely precise that I am lying.  God, does that cut me like a knife.

WODPA.  It is the age of acronyms.

I started writing this snippet with something else in mind, something about puzzles and memoir that I've been thinking about for a few days.  Yet, it would be puzzles that have no edges or frames.  But alas, this piece took a different shape.  Perhaps it is more like clay than puzzles,  or a mixture of both.

Let the fragments surface.  Allow the currents to rise.  Let the memories and stories live - to be embraced, not embalmed. 

I regularly type with my eyes closed, one reason I like to compose at a keyboard.  I wonder if others do the same?

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Click here for more thoughts on memoir: I: "Journey through Memoir - Introduction" & II: "Ink Not Dry"
Click here for memoir index.
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