Telling your hardest stories

The hardest memoir pieces to write are those that make you feel vulnerable, "out there," naked. They are also the best, the most interesting. Just think about the stories you've heard that get your attention, that hold you right there until the story is finished. Many of them, I want to say most of them, take a risk, take a chance on telling something that has never been told before, because it so personal that we've kept them under wraps for years, maybe most of our lives. If we're married, we may not even have told a spouse. If we have close friends, we may never have taken the risk of telling that story.

Bette Bao Lord, a Chinese woman who married an American, returned to China with him when he became United States Ambassador to China. She has written several books on the Chinese, Chinese culture, Chinese ways from an insider's point of view. In her book, Legacies: A Chinese Mosaic, she writes a short chapter on the masks that the Chinese wear. Now she is writing this at a time when the Communist regime wielded a much heavier hand and when it was simply not safe to let anyone know anything personal. Consequently, she wrote, the Chinese wore masks--not real masks, metaphorical masks. They'd put on a "happy face" or a "serious face" or a "sober face" depending on what the occasion required. Never did they disclose themselves. She writes that the Chinese developed so many masks that if you were to peel them off, like peeling an onion, you would find nothing at the core. The masks had replaced the Self.

We wear masks too. Dozens of them. We have church masks, when we put on our best clothes, smile, shake hands, say, "Oh how are you?" (Don't tell me, I don't want to know) or "Do you need any help?" (I'm too busy to help you, and I wouldn't if I could) or "I just love you soooo much." (You dork). Often, of course, we are sincere. But if you are in a foul mood, you may just put on those masks to hide yourself from the people around you. Put on a mask. The same goes for work, for play, for parties with friends. We have literally dozens of masks. We have make-up masks--put on those eyelashes, that lipstick, that after shave. We have funeral masks, "Oh, I'm so sorry." (I'm not really). I'm not suggesting we are always a lying bunch of insincere people, but we all know when our mask is "masking" what's really underneath.

And it doesn't feel safe to tell other people how we're really feeling. Trust comes slowly. When can you trust someone? Who can you tell the real truth about yourself? Who will listen sincerely?

Today, try writing about one of your masks, one of your secrets that almost no one--maybe no one at all--knows about. A little secret life that you've covered for years and years, maybe most of your life. A moment so humiliating, possibly, that you can barely allow yourself to think about it.

You might want to try this as a rush write, just to get the ugly truth (we all have ugly truths, don't we) out on the table. Square off with it--in writing--you can put it away in a locked drawer after that. But you'll be surprised how cathartic it feels to face that monster.

Just take a piece of paper, sit down, take a deep breath, and write. Remember, you don't have to show it to anyone. But you can at least hit it head on yourself.