Person on the Page

Several years ago, I read Abigail Thomas’s memoir Safekeeping: Some True Stories from a Life.  A member of my writing group at the time recommended the book, explaining that Thomas offers snapshots from a life in chapters that are often less than a page long and saying that she thought I might like it. I did.

So, when I recently ran upon one of Thomas’s later memoirs, What Comes Next and How to Like It, I decided to include it in my summer reading. This book captures Thomas in her late sixties, writing about her lifelong friend Chuck, who suffers from cirrhosis, and her daughter Catherine, who is being treated for breast cancer. Readers learn that in the past Chuck and Catherine had a brief affair, a circumstance with which Thomas struggles.

The events of the portion of Thomas’s life that she recalls in this book supply the makings for a complex, interesting story.  And there are indeed intriguing moments.  But much of the book describes Thomas’s daily life at the time—her interactions with her dogs, her compulsion to paint when she doesn’t feel that she can write, her arthritis, what she’s cooking from day to day, her contemplations of death, memories of herself and her friend and daughter.  

I found myself resistant to what Thomas was choosing to include in her narrative.  For instance, at one point early in the memoir, she writes

I have been trying to remember being young, which is hard because I don’t feel old until I try to get up from my chair. . . . I think, but, oh well, I was once young and slender and pretty and I made the most of it.  It’s somebody else’s turn now. 

My initial reaction was, does anyone want to read this?  Is this worth anyone’s time?

She also writes this.

I used to feel about king-size beds the way I do about Hummers and private jets and granite countertops, but over the past several years I gained three dogs and thirty pounds, and my old bed, a humble queen, just didn’t cut it anymore.  It was either lose the weight, lose the dogs, or buy something bigger.

Again, who cares about that?  Or this?

A winter afternoon spent in bed, the arthritis in my hip hurting and me too lazy to find the Advil.

Reading this, I began to feel as if I needed a nap.

Then I stopped.  I said, What a minute.  What am I doing?

I had been scoffing at the life and thoughts of a woman in her sixties as if they were irrelevant, worthless.  Not worthy of paper and ink.  Not valuable to an audience.

I, a woman dedicated to defending and supporting women.  I, a woman who has fought against many odds to have her own legitimacy, her own value, acknowledged.  Here I was dismissing the thoughts of a mature woman who was writing honestly about her experiences.

I’m ashamed.  I fell into the youth-focused trap that I have railed against.  I devalued the very kind of woman that I have, in other circumstances, rushed to defend.

Okay, I get it. My resistance is probably due to the fact that I know what is ahead for me, and it may be very much like the life that Thomas describes.  Some few years from now I, like Thomas, may look forward to naps with my dog as the highlight of my day.  I, too, may find it noteworthy to track my bodily discomforts.  And I, like Thomas, may begin wanting to drink beer at 10:30 in the mornings to ease the pain and boredom. 

Abigail Thomas, I am sorry.  Mature women out there, I apologize. A mature woman’s thoughts and concerns are valid and should be taken seriously.  Mature women are valuable. They can write meaningfully about their experiences.  And their writing should be taken seriously.

Yesterday, I discovered that Thomas has written a new memoir.  Still Life at Eighty: The Next Interesting Thing.  Congratulations to Thomas for reaching the admirable age of eighty and still having the will and ability to write and publish a book.  And my best wishes to all mature women who continue to make and share their art. 

Not as a penance for my former dismissiveness, but out of true interest in the next interesting thing, I will read Thomas’s new book.