Selena Writes: Six Word Memoir

Everyone has a story.
Can you tell yours in six words?

From the SMITH Magazine website:

Six-Word Memoirs: The Legend

Legend has it that Hemingway was once challenged to write a story in only six words. His response? “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” Starting in 2006, SMITH Magazine re-ignited the recountre by asking our readers for their own six-word memoirs. They sent in short life stories in droves, from the bittersweet (“Cursed with cancer, blessed with friends”) and poignant (“I still make coffee for two”) to the inspirational (“Business school? Bah! Pop music? Hurrah”) and hilarious (“I like big butts, can’t lie”).

I can not lie: I love the concept of a six word memoir. I was first introduced to the concept when a classmate in a Santa Monica College Extension writing class I attended with my sister Romi brought the book Not Quite What I Was Planning to class. I was hooked and immediately began writing six word memoirs in my spare time. When I went on my meme quest this past weekend, I came across the concept again and it reignited my passion.

What I like is the absolute challenge of finding the right words to string together to tell the story. My problem is that, since I feel like in the past 43 years I have lived several lifetimes, I can't settle on just one six word memoir to sum up my life in its totality. But maybe that's the point: you'll have enough perspective to choose the right words the closer you get to the end of you life.

For now, here are the ones I have come up with and want to share with you. Rest assured, I am still coming up with more and find this to be a great activity for those moments when I have time on my hands, nothing to do and another activity isn't feasible: like when I am in the shower, driving the car, falling asleep, walking the dogs, in the waiting room, etc.

• Cancer made me who I am.
• Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. Repeat.
• Made plans. Shit happened. Changed plans.
• And I was never the same.
• Forced onto the road not taken.
• Overcame many obstacles throughout her life.
• Was all downhill after beating cancer.
• Kept struggling, kept hoping, kept praying.
• Woman with house attracted a spouse.
• Took some risks; met some challenges.
  

By the way, I think that these six word memoirs would make great epitaphs on a tombstone or plaque or whatever grave marker will be in vogue by the time I get around to kicking the bucket. I am definitely including an epitaph on my grave marker ... maybe even one of the ones above. I guess that's one of the advantages to funeral and burial pre-planning: you get to choose this kind of stuff for yourself and not leave it to chance, your children, your relatives, etc..

Oh, and before I forget:

Submit yours to be considered for SMITH's next six-word memoir book. The first book, Not Quite What I Was Planning, and the second book, Six-Word Memoirs On Love & Heartbreak are out now.

As with the other posts this week, this is a meme and follows these rules:

*Copy and paste these rules to your blog post.
* Link back to person who tagged you.
* Write your six word memoir.
* Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs.
* Let each person you tagged know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Since I am not going to officially tag people in this post, if you happen across it and decide to complete this meme, I just ask that you link back to my post on this subject.