Topic 2: Face Forward!

Carol:

About Face Forward

I knew that I would eventually experience “brain freeze” with some of the topics taken from a 1927 book on essay-writing, but I had hoped it would be later than Day #2 of our Daily Theme writing experiment. We even cheated, drawing three different topics before we decided that “Face Forward” had the most potential. Yeah, right! Why am I struggling so with this topic?

Well, one reason may be that I have been doing a fairly intensive “about face” for several months. As a newly retired person, I have been working on a family history project that I began two years ago but knew I couldn’t finish until I retired and could become completely absorbed in it. I have spent almost 4 hours a day pouring through family letters, photographs and genealogical records collected from generations of family members and spanning 300 years. Truth be told, it is sometimes more than four hours; I easily get lost in the past and forget what time it is. What have I learned from facing backward? My family history represents all of the threads of the American experience: immigrants from England and Denmark who settled in New York and New Jersey; Mayflower descendants with gravestones in old Connecticut and Massachusetts cemeteries; German families migrating to Mifflin and Somerset Counties in Pennsylvania; slave owners farming in Tennessee and the Carolinas; hardy pioneers moving to 19th century Texas and early 20th century southern California. Most of the obituaries mark the passing of people who worked hard: shop-keepers and teachers, railroad workers and ministers. They were the trail blazers and hearthkeepers we 21st century family members can learn from as we “face forward” to make our own family history stories.

So, why else am I struggling with the topic? Looking at life “face forward” on a personal level is learning how to create a meaningful retirement after working hard and happy for 34 years as a teacher. Yesterday at a medical appointment, I found myself staring at the line for “employer.” It was a small space, but I squeezed in “retired from Yavapai College.” I could have put “none” or “retired” or even “retired teacher,” but it was like I wanted that receptionist to know I had worked for Yavapai College, my primary community for 24 years Sometimes I mentally follow the patterns that mark any school year, learning the students’ names, the start-up employee meetings we often dreaded, sharing ideas about new writing assignments. But, I am surprised at how little I actually miss those academic rhythms as I learn to create new ones as a retiree. Just as I can get lost in the family stories of my American roots, I now get lost in a book without thinking, “I should be grading papers.” I am now a reader, not a teacher of literature, and I am a writer, not a teacher of writing.

As I finish Topic #2 and get ready to face (forward) the day, Granite Mountain is in full alpen glow, Milo is leaping and whining downstairs in anticipation of The Daily Walk. I am excited What am I going to learn today? And so ends my My Daily Theme about Face Forward.



Megan: Recently I visited a friend who returned to me all the letters I had written her over the past decade. I was excited to read them again, and see what my thoughts and ideas were however many years ago, but it’s turned out that revisiting them just makes me uncomfortable. I have similar issues when I re-read old journals. My biggest problems at the time, now seem small and insignificant – not compared to my problems now, but compared to what I’ve seen in the world. I was hoping to mine these letters and journals for The Book I Intend To Write, but instead they just remind me of a time when the world seemed smaller, and my spectrum of emotion was much more dramatic.

I’ve been thinking about the different paths people follow through life. There’s the planned and the unplanned. There are stepping stones and pot-holes. There’s prison or freedom, England or America. This was never going to be my life – and there came a point where staying put seemed like the easy option. I was going to give up on the person I was meant to be – that I meant to be – before I started working in the prison. Giving up my job and leaving England after 7 years was the first time I’ve had to make a choice between what I wanted and what was good for me. But rereading those letters reminds me that I’m still not the person I meant to be.

When I look back and read what I had planned for my life, it is easy to feel frustrated that I am nearly 29, unemployed and living with my parents. I have moments of regret, moments of ‘I could have made it work ‘and been able to stay in England. I could have made 15 billion changes and then maybe I would have been happy. This train of thought is dangerous with all it’s what ifs and maybes and then I start to wonder if I made a Big Mistake.

So, instead of dwelling on the past, I’m trying to adjust my attitude. Instead of feeling like a failure, I am grateful that I get to spend so much time with my family. Instead of losing my confidence every time I get turned down for a job, I remind myself that I’d rather be a writer anyway.