I’ve been meaning to explore this memory for a while and the first task in the Write a memoir course gave me the perfect opportunity to give it a go. The first part of the task was to draw a mindmap of our life and then write 300 words about one of those events or memories.
I chose this moment because it’s such a strong visual memory, but like a lot of the moments on my mind map, scratch the surface and there’s a lot more to it. So here goes, it’s part of a longer piece but I’ve tried to condense the essence of it into these words without losing too much context. This honestly started out as a happy memory…
I remember a time when…
I’ve sat here for the past couple of days trying to write honestly about that moment on Durley Chine beach in April 2014. But it’s taking me a while to unpeel the layers and move beyond the clichéd picture-perfect postcard view I saw that morning.
Because in that moment, looking out to sea it seemed obvious. After more than a year of leading separate lives, kidding ourselves that we could lead a harmonious, happy family life split between two locations I thought I’d found the answer. We needed to move.
I’d walked with Bella, our yellow labrador down the shaded woodland path to Alum Chine. Turning left to walk towards the pier I stepped off the prom onto the beach, sinking into the fine, golden sand. Bella darting in and out of the sparkling blue sea, a line of red, green, blue, yellow painted beach huts to my right. I smiled.
I stopped to grab a takeaway tea at Durley Chine and sat on a bench staring out to sea. My shoulders relaxed, I closed my eyes and thought, ‘What the bloody hell am I doing?’
We were struggling. Andy leaving Bath for Bournemouth at 7am every Monday, returning Friday evening. Me at home with the children, then aged 4, 8 and 10, but barely functioning. I had ME, was housebound and barely coping. I spent most days in bed, sleeping. Limbs heavy, brain scrambled, unable to process information, form sentences. Words floating away from me. The overwhelming need to sleep.
I hated it.
But as I dig into this memory, I start to see why deciding to move south – an easy sell on paper – was in reality so emotionally complicated.
In my overwhelming need to pull our family back together, I underestimated the importance of our roots in Bath. The first place I’d ever been able to call home and mean it. Our children’s home. Surrounded by friends, family. Loved.
Would we have coped any better with what followed had we stayed put? Would mum, dad and grandma’s deaths the following year have been any less traumatic if I’d been in my home of 13 years? Would the friendship that exploded a few months before we left, have survived?
So this is what I shared with the rest of the memoir writing group and our reader. I was nervous, waiting to hear what people thought. What they heard in my words.
Not only was this the first time I’d written about this specific memory, but it was also the first time I’d put myself in a position where my writing was going to be critiqued. We are a supportive bunch, all trying to do the same thing – write our story – or at least a part of our story, but you still feel nervous and vulnerable.