“Poverty, starvation and drunkenness are ugly subjects to choose. We all admit these things exist. But one doesn’t write about them.” (Teacher)
“What does one write about?” (Child)
“One delves into the imagination and finds beauty there. The writer, like the artist, must strive for beauty always.” (Teacher)
“What is beauty?” (Child)
“I can think of no better definition than Keats’: ‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty.’” (Teacher)
–A Tree Grows In Brooklyn
I love to read, always have.
I wish I could say I love the classics, but I don’t. It probably has something to do with the fact that we read them in school, and I hate being forced to read—and write about—stories that don’t interest me. (If there are any teachers out there, please don’t throw your books at the computer. LOL!) If you’re looking, you’ll typically find my nose stuffed in fantasies, romances, suspense/crime thrillers, and, more recently, historical fiction, which I’ve sorta become obsessed with (think Outlander).
But about a month ago my husband and I were rummaging through a bookstore in Midtown Manhattan. We were in New York for a Josh Groban show at Radio City and had some time to kill before the venue’s doors opened, so we found ourselves in the underground mall at Rockefeller Center. It was a simple store with tables covered in all sorts of books and I stumbled upon A Tree Grows In Brooklyn. Obviously, I’d seen and heard about this book before, but I’d never read it. Yet suddenly I wanted to. Why? Maybe because I like the title. If you know me well, you know I have a passion for trees, solitary trees. I’m drawn to their quiet beauty and solemnness. And for some reason I see myself in them. Then, of course, my husband is from Brooklyn and that’s where we began our life together. So … there you have it.
Anyways, I didn’t buy the book that day because those types of bookstores are too expensive, so I waited. A few weeks later I found myself at the local library staring at a shelf of old books that were on sale for $1. And lying among these books was … you guessed it! A Tree Grows In Brooklyn. Of course, I took that as a sign and snatched it up. I’ve been reading it now for the past week and I’m enjoying it immensely. But this isn’t a blog to review the book. Instead, it’s about the conversation quoted above. This exchange between the main character, Francie, and her eighth grade English teacher really hit home, considering this “ugly” time in which we’re all living. Francie is a talented writer who started out writing on the beauty of life. But things quickly turned for her following her father’s death and she began writing about life’s “ugly” truths as she knows them, which her teacher obviously didn’t like or appreciate. Hence the conversation you see above.
Now, this may sound hypocritical considering how positive my posts have been over the past week. And I, too, find it ironic that amid all the terror, anxiety, loneliness, and despair we’re experiencing, this is probably the most positive I’ve ever been in my life. I still have my moments of fear and paranoia and disquiet, of course (is it a coincidence that as I’m writing this sentence, Ryan Stewart’s song “Autumn” just came on Pandora?! HELL, NO it’s not. OMG, I just adore this song…bring me to my happy place, Ryan Stewart!!!), but every time I start to travel down that road, I remind myself to look for that silver lining, as small as it may be.
I’ve been wondering if my recent posts have been a little too positive for those of you who have praised the “ruggedness” of my usual writings. All I can say is that my focus on positivity has been my lifeline through all of this. It’s the only thing that’s been helping. I’ve so far managed to keep my head above water—cheerfully—and for as long as my mind allows me to pen the good, the beautiful, the happy, I’m going to go with it.
But writing the “ugly” is cathartic, constructive, and critical, too. Maybe even more critical than writing the beautiful. I love writing about the chaos, the tears, the anger, the depression, the struggles that come with parenting and being a stay-at-home mom and life in general. Oh boy do I love it, LOL! It feels so good to release those nasty feelings. And when those bad moments hit—as I know they will in the coming weeks—I have no intention of masking the grisly truth or my negative feelings and reactions to those truths. Because life is both beautiful and ugly. Love is beautiful and ugly. Hope is beautiful and ugly. Anger is beautiful and ugly. Grief is beautiful and ugly. We cannot have one without the other. Because that’s how we learn. That’s how we grow. That’s how we adapt. That’s how we move forward. And I don’t know about you, but I’m desperate to move forward from where we stand today.
So, no matter where my mind takes me over the next few months, no matter what story I tell—the beautiful or the ugly—I hope someone out there will read it, ponder it, and take comfort in it, at the very least to know they’re not alone in this lonely time. Just like I’m doing with this lovely book about a girl who sees herself in the solitary tree growing in her yard in Brooklyn.
(If you’re interested, here’s the blog I penned almost a year-and-a-half ago about my beloved solitary trees.)