In celebration of the memoir.
What can I say, I love knowing about strangers’ internal MIND journeys.
Hello wonderful members of the indomitable WEEKEND WATER substack!
In anticipation of the September podcast episode of STAY F. HOMEKINS coming at ya this Friday (that pesky second Friday of the month snuck up on ya, huh!), here is a wonderful episode of a pod called FEMINIST FREQUENCY RADIO, in which I got to have a wide ranging chat with host and writer Kat Spada last week.
What is this conversation about, you ask ? Some recently read, notable memoirs! WE LOVE THE DANG GENRE!!!
Hope you’ll have a listen while staying tuned for a BRAND NEW episode of the monthly, after-dinner conversation podcast, known forevermore as STAY F. HOMEKINS, with Janie (me) and eternal master of ceremonies of all podcasts near and far,
.And - in quick updating fashion: both entertainment unions the WGA and SAG-AFTRA are still on strike, therefore, we have BANKED our bonus recap podcast episodes of AND JUST LIKE THAT, as well as a bonus movie watchalong podcast episode - TO BE RELEASED AFTER OUR CONTRACTS GET SETTLED WITH OUR DISMAL CORPORATE OVERLORDS —
In addition, Paul is performing LIVE this very Sunday with the enormously talented Nicole Parker at Lodge Room in Highland Park (hope to see you there!), as well as planning more LIVE upcoming Varietopia with Paul F. Tompkins shows in October in Brooklyn and November in Charleston, SC (check out his LIVE button above, right here on our WEEKEND WATER landing page- ha! I got you to visit our landing page, I’m sneaky like that, bookmark it BBs!)
In the meantime, thank you for being a part of this community. Since this post is about memoir, sound off in the comments below to share what memoir writing means to you? Do you like it, too? Think it’s for the birds? Maybe a particular memoir moved you a specific way and you’d like to share your experience . SO please weigh in! It’s fun!
Thank you and good day.
Exes and ohs,
Janie
Ah, and if anyone is looking for memoir-adjacent entertainment, I recommend 2 podcasts: Wiser than Me by Julia Louis Dreyfus and Sam Bee's Choice Words. The latter has Bee asking guests about a choice they made that changed their life. The former consists of interviews with women who are older (and thus wiser) than JLD. Easily the best addition to my listening recently.
I can't think of many memoirs that I've read, but I listened the episode of You're Wrong About that covered Jessica Simpson's and it left me wanting more.
From a writing perspective, I'm working on one that covers the time I lived in Spain, and it's in Spanish because what's funny is how much of a ding dong 17yo Claire was when she arrived, but only to Spaniards.
Some (I think excellent) advice I've gotten:
- don't worry about who's in it. Just write it and worry when you have a publisher. So few memoirs get finished that adding another reason to not do it is wrong.
- remember your truth and your story and write it for you. Maybe you want people to find solace or relate, but you don't control that. This one is for you.
- if you can call people and talk through what happened, do it. I'm writing this comment from Spain where I'm with my host family, friends, and teachers, and it's blowing my mind hearing things that I didn't remember, and they are really loving when I remind them of the ridiculous shit I did (like the time I mistook the word for "begging" to be "lemonade" and yelled at a shop owner for not giving an old lady anything when he had "a whole machine full of begging right there on the counter." Have you ever had a person begging and a shop owner laugh at you so hard that they both cry while you die slowly of embarrassment and confusion?