Rummaging Through the Tough Stuff

by Patricia Cates

What makes rummaging through drawers tough? I'll tell you. It's the memories found therein.

Bittersweet they are.

This past week I was sort of compelled (forced) to rummage through my home's kitchen junk drawers. Normally I can find misplaced items here. When that didn't do the trick, I continued to dig through every dresser in the house. I overturned every stray corner and pile possible, down to my cookbook shelf. I emptied out every pretty little storage box and basket. Twice!

You see...I desperately needed to find a thin soft-backed book that my grandmother had put together back in 1979. It holds all of the family pictures, critical dates and personal stories of my father's family history. I refer to it often. My 15 year old daughter is doing a large project to earn her medallion and it's vital she have this resource.

I soon became frustrated with myself as I have never let this book leave the house. I was also irritated at how disorganized I've apparently become. I was angry at the thought that someone might have cleaned up and put the book somewhere without my knowledge. Although that would be a rarity. Mostly I was (am) freaked out that it has gotten lost in a pile of paper somewhere and been recycled!!!

Our "office" is my library, but it also serves as a homework area. We have a long solid surface countertop laid over the top of four miniature filing cabinets. That means three workstations and plenty of computer space. Over the years the space hasn't been used much; as kids like to do homework in the kitchen, living room, family room, or in their own room, and PC's are somewhat obsolete. So the office has really just become an extra room in the basement that no one goes in, or so I thought.

When I decided to search the office for the book, I opened some of those filing cabinet drawers and I became even more annoyed. Household members had obviously been storing (shoving) all sorts of things in there for years. There were random bags of old crayons and coloring books mixed with scrapbooking paper, glue, tools, folders and receipts. I found lost eyeglasses and keys and hundreds of pictures my 21 year old daughter had taken in junior high. In the bottom of one drawer a portion of my pristinely kept Ensigns were laid bent into a shoebox too small to hold them, along with my best (lost) travel magazines. I also found a whole cabinet my husband took over when he moved in. It was riddled with unopened mail, stuff his kids made for him in grade school, and tidbits from his former life, which I totally respect. Sadly the cupboard above holds the photos and albums of my family members long passed away, as well as my former marriage. The kids can have some of them when they are older. I don't dare open one now. Knowing what's inside the pages bring about emotions I cannot face while trying to clean. Totally counterproductive.

There were too many things found in these drawers to mention here. But I will say that I fully understand why I have been avoiding them. I am reminded of my children not being little anymore. Reminded of wonderful family vacations and a failed marriage. Reminded my wonderful husband was once married to his high school sweetheart. Reminded that my kids are messy and that I hate paperwork. Maybe subconsciously I wanted to hold on to more than coloring books. I have a tough time facing the past without falling apart and I know that. Thinking of it all makes me want to cry in utter defeat, not only for the mess at hand, but for the lost hope and the former me. The former me was ultra organized and totally unbeatable. I miss her.

So this precious book may be lost for now, but it will resurface. In the mean time I am cleaning it all out. Once I got going it wasn't so bad. We (me and the former me) are about half way through now. I recycled about 15 pounds of paper from my husbands desk. His was easy. It was all unemotional business stuff he was holding onto for taxes, prior to 2008, and held no connection for me. He is grateful I did that for him, as it needed to be done. I also very neatly put his mementos safely away in a box, as I know it would be equally upsetting for him to be reminded of how sweet his ex was before she upped and left. They were really cute in high school. I cry for him too.

I have chosen to let my kids decide what to do with the coloring books. Some of them hold their best work inside the pages. The Barbie Princess one especially. I can't let it go. Hopefully they can catch a glimpse of their own sort of nostalgia and learn about families and pitching in along the way.

Beating the Biography Blues

What does one get for the father that has everything?   I’m serious, he really has everything.  Looking for a 57/83 inch drill bit?  Yep, he’s got it.  How about a nice copy of the June, 1985 edition of National Geographic.  Yeppers!  A left-handed socket wrench only for fixing blenders.  Oh, yes…that too. 

            So, getting something at Christmas or birthdays for a man in his 80s that is a card-carrying member of the ‘Hoarders Gold Club’ has been a challenge.  I want to honor my father, but not empower the man to add to his stash.  My mother has threatened arson more than once.

            It occurred to me that people in my father’s age bracket are focused on legacy building; financial legacy, Church service legacy, and of course, personal history legacy.  And it was in this last category that I chose to focus my efforts.  I’m so glad that I did because what came out of the experience of recording, transcribing and writing what would someday be a nice softcover family ‘must read’ (along with the blues associated with some things not going so smoothly) have been priceless for me as well as my family.

            Along the way, I’ve learned a few lessons that I would like to share about writing a person’s biography.  It does not matter if the person you are writing about is a relative or just an acquaintance, the methods are still the same:

1.     Before you do anything, find your objective center.  To retell the life, the whole life, of an individual accurately and fairly, you must approach the project as if it were a paid job assignment.  Kicking back and sharing a few laughs and memories is nice, but it lacks strategy and organization.  If you are interviewing and writing about a close family member and you think you might become overly emotional (sadness, gratitude, anger, joy, etc.) then make a list of those topics that need to be dealt with separate from the biography process. 

2.     Create your universe.  In other words, take the time to outline the direction that the interview will take.  Try to strike a balance of chronological continuity without getting bogged down in the details too soon.  You can always add sub-topical areas as desired after the initial interview. 

3.     When you and the subject are ready, arrange a meeting time.  Set a limit of an hour for the first meeting, followed by more at later times.  This will allow you to demonstrate to your subject that you are interviewing them with a clear plan and that it won’t be an endless meeting.  Most adults, even relatives, have a limited attention span. 

4.     During the interview, tell the person what topic you are about to question them about.  Then, ask open-ended questions.  Make sure the recording device you are using is unobtrusive; it can stress the subject when they see it in front of them.  Do NOT take notes; the subject will feel obliged to let you catch up on your scribblings, which will often break their train of thought.

5.     After transcribing the recordings, edit the first script for writing conventions and send a copy to the subject.  It may seem odd to edit so soon, but you don’t want the subject to fret about these annoyances.

6.     Do a quick genealogy of family and friends.  Get the contact information of these individuals.  Create a document in which your subject gives authorization for any relative or friend to share personal information with you, the interviewer.  Sometimes, relatives and friends are reluctant to be candid unless they have the subject’s blessing to do so. 

7.     Once a complete interview has been conducted and transcribed, read over the script several times.  Glaring questions or topic areas that need deeper exploration should be identified.  Send these questions to the subject prior to the ‘details interview’, along with a current copy of the script.  This will give the subject time to do a nice memory jog on what they've already said and hopefully spark deeper memories that could prove invaluable to the overall biography.  Then, make another interview appointment, but do not set a time limit.  At this meeting, it’s time to ask the hard questions and press the subject a bit.  It’s at this point that my questions would be more like: ‘How did that make you feel?’ or ‘What do you wish you had done differently in that awkward situation?’ Remember, if you still have unanswered questions when reading the biography, then so will everyone else that reads it.  You want to close as many open-ends as possible.

8.     Edit several times and get a ‘buddy reader’ to give it a once over.

9.     Believe it or not, now comes the hardest part of the whole biography process:  Obtaining photographs.  Sometimes, getting people to find pics of their early life can be a difficult challenge.  You might want to prompt what kind of pictures you are wanting so the person doesn't get bogged down going through endless boxes or albums and trying to decide which pictures they think you might want.  Of course, their opinion plays an important part.

10.  Assemble and self-publish.  There are numerous self-publishing websites  to choose from:  Lulu is very popular, as is Create Space and Completely Novel.

            This 10-step process may seem tedious, but it works.  If you write a biography using these steps (or your own amalgamation) you’ll actually find yourself having fun and getting the creative release we authors are all hooked on. 

            Back to my father’s biography.  I've really enjoyed the process, bumps in the road notwithstanding.  My father rolled out a story one day that nobody in the family had ever heard.  Apparently, he and a teenage buddy hopped a train from Arizona to Los Angeles so that they could ‘go to the beach’.  They nearly died of dehydration as they crossed the brutal desert and didn't count on the truancy officer (For the more youthful MMW among us, a truancy officer was a type of law enforcement officer that patrolled the neighborhoods during the school day looking for kids who were ditching school.) arresting them.  So apparently, the beloved patriarch of our family was a youthful jailbird.

            The hardest part of this process was the accumulation of photographs.  There have been numerous hurdles: The house fire of 1948 destroyed a lot of them; the box that has some pics is out in the hot shed;  or worse, ‘I don’t know where some of the photographs are’.  It’s made me get creative and ‘think outside the box’ in order to get what I believe will help make a great biography to honor a great man.