May 15, 2016

I’ve always liked this passage of Anne Lamott’s from Bird by Bird, but as I’m plunging into the fourth revision of my memoir and finally realizing what my whole book (and really, my whole problem) is about, I find myself understanding and embracing the hard but incredible truth of her words even more: “The great writers keep writing about the cold dark place within, the water under a frozen lake or the secluded, camouflaged hole. The light they shine on this hole, this pit, helps us cut away or step around the rim of the abyss, holler into it, measure it, throw rocks in it, and still not fall in. It can no longer swallow us up. And we can get on with things.”