This post is about the closest I will get to a Halloween-themed post this month, given that I will be very busy in the next few weeks, and, of course, NaNoWriMo is approaching - the real holiday for writers. That all being said, I did want to talk a little about some stories that stick with us, for better or worse, and we are left with them seared into our brain. There is no one definitive way to say how this is done, since it is a very unique effect and no one story will resonate with everyone. However, analyzing the story that haunts you might be an insight as to what pulls at your personal heartstrings; what can make you a better writer.
The story that won't let me go is a heretofore unpublished work called, "The Taste of Milk." It sounds simple enough, perhaps even so much so that this is part of its allure. The story is also very straightforward - a woman tells the story behind why she will no longer drink milk. This might just seem like a teachable moment about lactose intolerance, but the author has no problem with other dairy products. The problem goes much deeper.The author tells a story from when she was seven - put yourself in a rural, southern, post-WW2 mindset - and enjoyed the fresh milk brought to to her house in the morning. The morning milk was a regular event and innocent enough, until the author's mother had what could best be described as a psychotic break. The story gets dark fast as the mother insists milk is only for babies, that the little girl wasn't a baby, and would never be allowed to drink milk again. In an uncontrollable rage, the mother takes all the milk bottles into the backyard and smashes them with a broom handle, spraying the yard with the milk the girl loved so much. The girl, traumatized, could not drink milk for ages, and whenever she tried to, she was repulsed by the taste of milk.
I wish I could drop a link to this story, but as I mentioned, it is unpublished (for now - I am working on getting it into print). This story stayed with me for a long time - easily ten years running - and it genuinely haunts me (this is part of my drive to get it published somewhere). However, what really stuck with me went beyond the words, and that's when the writer in me decided to figure out just why this story had traction. For the author it was obvious - she was expressing some painful childhood trauma. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized that what really haunted me about it was that the story was honest and upfront in dealing with a terrible situation that a child could barely understand. The honesty and confrontation of the story had moved me. Now I just needed to know why.
At that point, the writer in me had the answer. Everyone has had their fair share of traumas in life to some degree. One of the reasons I write is to process my past trauma, and in some ways I am successful with this. However, "The Taste of Milk" stuck with me because it had an honesty I had not yet been able to achieve. I wanted to reach that point where I could take the most damaging moments in my life and put them on the page with dramatic, painful honesty. "Just sit in front of the typewriter and bleed" as Hemingway said about writing.
So when a story, a poem, an essay sticks with you; when it lingers long after you've read it and put it away, don't think about what the writing did for you. Think about the content and purpose, and how you connect with those elements. Think about how that author walked in shoes that you want to wear. The real lesson in a good story comes from finding out what parts of you connect with it, then exploring that in the stories you decide to write.
And thank you, Linda Berry, for "The Taste of Milk." If I ever find the copy you wrote, consider it published.
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