Writing Every Second I'm Alive

The notebooks from Doris

"How do you write every second you're alive?" -- Lin Manuel Miranda in the Hamilton song Non-Stop. 

Well?

My answer?

How can I not.

Last week my parents headed out on the second leg of their road trip. They'd been with Angela and I on Abbey Place for just over two weeks. It was a wonderful vacation -- for all four of us. We had adventures every day. One day we went wine tasting in east Los Angeles. One day we watched a baby hippopotamus sunning herself by a cement pond. One day we watched a silly movie about gnomes while laying in leather recliners. One day we explored a pier and ate ice cream while shivering and trying not to be too upset at ourselves that we'd gotten us lost and driven an extra hour away from where we were meant to be (that last part might have just been me). But every day was wonderful. Every day was something new. Every day was putting together jigsaw puzzles and watching new television shows and discussing current events and eating new foods and fixing the toilet seat and doing seventy-two loads of laundry. It was life. All of it. It was our best life.

When my mother first arrived she asked if I had to work the next day. I quickly answered nope. The next day she inquired again, and I expanded my answer a bit. I didn't need to sit at my desk and write that day. I had known of their arrival and our stay-cation in Los Angeles. I had planned to turn in a draft of a screenplay the day before they arrived and I did. I had let people know I'd be away from email a bit and taking some time away from the keyboard. Just as I do whenever I go to Michigan or on any other trip.

I wanted to be in the moment with my family. I wanted to be downtown riding the funicular and at the Getty looking at the Monets. I wanted to be shopping at the mall with my mom and getting pedicures with dad and not worrying about work. Yes, a luxury. Yes, a privilege. Yes, a reality since I'm underemployed at the moment.

But I also knew that I would be writing every single day they were here. Just as I am writing every other day of my life. In the song the question is asked of Lin's Hamilton how do you write every second you're alive. Every second.

And my answer is how can I not. Because every single thing that happens to me, every choice I make, every emotion I experience, every piece of food I taste, every sip of wine I savor, every person I communicate with is all leading to the stories I tell. They are all a part of the stories. They are all the stories.

I grew up hearing the phrase "write what you know". And as a young writer, and an aspiring professional writer, this was not good advice. This was ridiculous advice. I knew nothing. I'd experienced nothing back then. Still today -- it's not enough. I need to know so much more in order to tell stories, to do my job. Because if I were to only write what I know, then I'd write about a woman who sits in front of her keyboard and daydreams and taps on keys.

But there's more to unpack in that phrase. If I don't take it so literally, that I should only write about teaching and volunteering and watching TV and cooking and doing laundry, I come to understand that writing what I know is writing about the experience of being me. It's writing about the people in my life, my connections with them, it's writing about the work that I do, and how it affects myself and others, it's writing about my emotional life, my life.

And so, every day that I got up and ran to the fancy donut store early to surprise my family or sat down in the living room while my parents did the dishes because I'd cooked, I was writing. I was having experiences in being me. I was having experiences to draw from. To use to color my worlds. To use to create my worlds.

Yesterday I started a big rewrite project on my SEAL team pilot. I'm creating new characters and fleshing others out. I'm exploring new worlds and delving into relationships I've never had. I don't know what it's like to be the President of the United States or a CIA agent or a father. But I'm going to write about all of those things. And I feel confident in doing that even though it's "not what I know". I feel confident because of all of the experiences I've had in my 40 years. In the last few years. In the last few weeks. Every day I pull from my life. From the life I live, from the life I watch others live, to write the best stories I can.

A year ago today Angela and I were on our spring break trip in San Francisco. It was the last night of our stay and we sat in floor seats in the Orpheum Theater and watched Hamilton. It was one of the most amazing nights of my life. Here was Lin Manuel Miranda taking everything from every single day of his life and creating this musical. This movement. This masterpiece. Yes, Hamilton is about Alexander Hamilton, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America. But it's also about being an immigrant. Being a father. Being a son. Being a scholar. Being a husband. Being a friend. Being afraid. Being strong. Being weak. Being unafraid. All things I know Lin has experienced in his life.

Being a writer is a 24 hours, 7 days a week job. It's not something I turn on and off. I may go days without putting fingers to keyboard, weeks, months even. But I don't even go a few hours without writing. Other creative types know this. And the people in my life know this. And I love that. I love the encouragement I get, to keep writing. To keep going, Non-Stop.

This past fall I got a package in the mail from one of my favorite people in the whole world, my cousin Doris. In it was an assortment of beautiful notebooks. Small, large, colorful, practical, perfect. She'd seen them in a store and knew immediately that Angela and I needed them. We needed them to write down the experiences of being us. Because we all should. I love that. So much.

We are all writing every second we're alive. We're writing our lives. We're writing our existences. We're writing our relationships. We're writing our stories. And I'm so thankful I get to write my stories into other stories for the world to hopefully one day read, and see. And I'm so thankful to open a brand new journal from Doris today and start taking notes.