Life in the rear view mirror

Rediscovering myself by looking to the past and stumbling around my memory palace.

I’m in the process of writing my next book.

Another memoir.

Yep, here I go again.

Why this and not something else? Because after Dispatches from the Cowgirl carefully made its way into the world, the questions began. Why did you write this? Why did you think it was necessary to share your life? What did your husband think about you writing this? What did your son think about you writing this? And on and on. So many questions. But one in particular kept coming at me…and continues to come at me. One that’s more complicated than the rest and that I’ve found hard to answer. The question of “What happened next?” Dispatches was essentially left open ended and now readers want to know what happened to me—to the cowgirl—as I moved forward.

What is the rest of the story? What’s it like to reinvent yourself so many times? What it’s been like to move “home” after two decades away? What it’s like to be a foreigner in your own land? What is this new life I’m embarking on? Where am I headed? I have more to say. More about how crazy life as a modern military spouse can be. More about the bonds we have to our roots. More about the sacrifices we make, especially those we make for love, for country. And that’s when I decided there had to be a follow-up.

However, in order for me to answer “what happened next” properly—and to write a book worth reading—I realized that I had to look in my rear view mirror. The answer to all of those questions can’t be summed up in a linear fashion. I can’t write another memoir where I say “well, I did x, then I did y, and then I did z.” What happened next started a long time ago and has deep, twisted roots. I need to dig into who I used to be to make sense of who I’ve become. Long story short, I’ve spent a good chunk of time lately focusing on my past.

Photo by Taylor Siebert on Unsplash

Psychiatrists would call what I’m doing self-introspection. Most of the people I know would call it navel gazing. I like to think of it as daydreaming. I’ve done a lot of that over the years, daydreaming about how I’ve ended up where I am, but this time I’m daydreaming with a purpose. I’m ruminating on years I’ve long since encased in amber and cataloged under nostalgia rather than history. As I told my son, I feel a bit like Sherlock (the version from the TV series) as I wander through my memory palace, except a lot of the lights are out and I’m stumbling around.

Some memories come back in a flash, crystal clear, in full technicolor. Others present themselves slowly, as if they are giving me time to prepare for what they hold. It’s all just a bit of a trip.

Also, I’m approaching my stories differently. Before, when I’d set out to write something that happened in the past, I often did it in a very social media sort of way, as if I were viewing an Instagram carousel curated solely to highlight the best parts and not dig too deep into feelings or the total reality that surrounded that specific time. It’s such a human thing to do, isn’t it? Wearing blinders to filter the past and taking only what works for us now. Nostalgia. But what about the real past? All of those cotton candy days AND everything else?

History versus nostalgia is a fascinating thing to ponder.

The original navel gazer? Photo by Kenny Eliason on Unsplash

Anyway, for this new book, I’ve started a deep dive into the history of Julie—specifically my early adult years—and, man, I’ve forgotten how much I’ve opted to gloss over! But with the help of photos and music and the internet and a lot of just sitting quietly, I’ve taken myself back to 1992. Me at nineteen. That particular version of me because she holds the key to the answer. She’s bold. She knows what she wants. She knows who she is and takes no prisoners. But at the same time, she can’t see the future and doesn’t yet know who she’ll become.

So that’s where I am, looking backwards to complete my story and answer the question of what happened next. Or as my husband so succinctly put it: Dispatches was chapter two, what I’m writing now is chapters one and three. Filling in the pieces, patching the plot holes. For the me now, it’s pretty darn cool and I’m thoroughly enjoying the journey. For that wild and high-minded nineteen year old, well, I can’t wait for you to meet her…and for her to meet me.