For this project, I worked through four memoir-writing exercises using real memories from my life. I wanted to practice more than simply telling what happened. I wanted to look at how voice, memory, emotion, perspective, and what I understand now can change the way a story is told.

I started with a story about shaving my hair down to peach fuzz after being told I couldn’t cut it. That exercise helped me think about voice and how the same event can sound different depending on who I am telling it to.

My second piece, “Watermelon on the Bridge,” is a childhood memory about a truckload of watermelons spilling across a bridge. What looked like a funny family memory also had other things happening underneath it. I practiced using the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and little details I still remember.

For the third exercise, I returned to that same watermelon memory and worked on interiority. I looked at what I understood as a child, what was happening inside my mind even during a fun moment, and what I understand differently as an adult. I also wrote about what I wish I could tell that younger version of myself now.

For the fourth exercise, I went back to the shaved-head story but wrote it from my husband-at-the-time’s point of view. That forced me to step outside my own version of the story and think about how completely different the same moment could have looked from the other side.

These exercises showed me that memoir is not only about remembering what happened. It is also about deciding where I was standing then, where I am standing now, and whose eyes I am looking through when I tell the story.

I am still working on a much larger memoir project, so these exercises also gave me new ways to approach memories that I may eventually develop further.