Triggering Memories Workshop

Story ID:	987
Written by:	Gail Lee Martin
Organization:	Kansas Authors Club
Story type:	Musings, Essays and Such
Location:	Salina Kansas USA
Year:	2001
Person:	Gail Lee Martin

Triggering Memories Workshop

This year’s Kansas Authors Club’s annual convention hosted by district four in Junction City did just that, triggered my memories of the convention this district held several years ago in Salina. The program planning chairman asked me to do a memoir writing workshop. Oh my what an honor!

Would I do a memoir writing workshop before my writing peers and friends from across the state of Kansas? Did I dare share my passion for writing memories? I did and it was a high point of my life. No more being bashful or hanging my head thinking no one would want to read what I wrote let alone listen to me talk about something so dear to my heart as writing memories.

My audience was so overwhelming in their praise and enthusiasm for going back home to start writing, I was even proud of myself. I would like to share my workshop with all of you, my newest audience.

I was introduced by the room monitor, who handed out a blank sheet and a lined sheet of paper to everyone, at my request. There was a frightening moment as I stood in front of a room full of people I didn’t know but my many hours of practicing my script kicked me into saying”

Good Afternoon
(held up blank sheet of paper)
This sheet of blank paper can have several meanings to a writer. First it can intimidates many people. To overcome this I prefer writing on lined paper unless I use a typewriter or computer.

But this blank sheet of paper can also be a path to your memories. I want each of you to think back to your school days and fold something with this paper. It could be a paper airplane, paper hat or boat or whatever. What do you remember making back then with a sheet of paper? Did you make snowflakes & valentines.
(wait a few minutes as the audience does this)
I use plain paper to make lists of what to do or memory triggers of what to write about!!!

OK everybody hold up your creation.
What? no paper wads? What about paper cups? Do you remember when you used to make them? What school were you attending? Did you pass notes using slips of paper and who did you pass them to? Were you caught & reprimanded? by who? This is a great way to generate memories of school days. Or you could use this piece of paper to draw a room you remember from your childhood. This could be your classroom or a special room at Grandmother’s house or your own home.

Your memories are unique to you but will often spark a memory for someone else. So share your stories with others.

I am constantly reminded of something from my past. For instance when Halloween invades the local stores. I do “Window shopping” down the aisles of masks and costumes that reminds me of Halloweens we had when I was a kid. Bobbing for apples or using our imagination to make our own masks & costumes, knowing no one else would look just like us. This predates the current craze of ‘trick or treat’.

I have a picture somewhere of my older sister and I dressed in clowns costumes our mother made us. This made a good story to pass on to my children and grandchildren that was made even better with the addition of a picture of my parents in gypsy costumes that same scary night. For this Halloween story published in Kanhistique using the title of Looking Back At Halloween Fun I added other Halloween pictures.

Use this same concept to bring back memories of other holidays and special occasions like the first day of school, Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas, the list is endless. When writing Thanksgiving or Christmas memories add a favorite recipe of two you remember from your past. In my Thanksgiving story I included the whole menu. I added pen & ink drawings by my daughter, Shannon.

That little touch triggered my memories of her always drawing horses and her sister Virginia who doodled women in fancy dresses on the margins of her papers. That is another memoir that needs written.

Look through your picture album for family photos to include. I like to make a picture board to use while writing a certain memoir.
These memories wouldn’t be complete without stories of preparations for the big event. You could do these stories in short-short story form. Write about decorating, write another story about special gifts that stand out in memory. Write about holiday celebrations at school, church and family traditions. You can even write about sending greeting cards, including types of cards, stamps even the changing address list will tell a story of life back then.

You will find, as your memory clicks into a certain story, that memory will trigger more stories. Write them all or make them into a list to write about later.

Besides using seasonal reminders, our various senses also trigger memories. Some smells that take me back in time include prairie fires, oil and that awful sulfur smell that some oil wells have, as I grew up out in the Flint Hills oilfields. The smell of home baked bread reminds me of Mother and fresh cut grass recalls the years that my husband and I with some great friends baled prairie hay for hire. Hearing cow bells or church chimes or a new born baby cry can trigger other memories. Tasting and feeling various things also helps.

I started a time line of my life and using the Century Book by Joan Potter Loveless I can relate a happening in my life to something the happened nation wide. Like the year of 1942 when I graduated from high school & W.W.II started and I ended up building B-29 at Boeing in Wichita. Little things remind us to write about our loved ones. An old locket brings memories of my mother & when I gave it to her. Dad’s old pocket knife that he always carried, brings memories of his whittling.

By this time you can see that once your mind clicks in, there are memory triggers everywhere.
I gathered pictures of the homes we lived in since we were married. I looked at each picture closely, noting things in the background, how the people are dressed and so forth. By placing them on this poster board I can easily see each picture to write the story of our lives in this home. As I finish the story, I remove the picture from the board & put it with the story.
Other pictures and even postcards can be used the same way to tell of a certain trip or vacation that you remember.

Make a list of relatives & friends and write short bios. Katheryn Croan Cooper of district 2 of our Kansas Authors Club does this very well in her 24th book, You & Me. She tells of her doctors, Sunday School teachers, friends and yes family, with a mixture of prose, poetry and pictures.

Over the years I have taken pictures of the front and backs of my son’s tee-shirts. He belongs to a hot-rod car club and they go to rod rums around the country. Each town that host this weekend gathering, sells the shirts to commemorate their event, so the shirts are dated. These pictures will help me write about this special time in his life.

Other writers keep precious memories in a journal. I have kept one for many years. Sometimes I just putting in the ever changing Kansas weather. Last week I recorded “today was over 100 degrees again” and the next morning’s entry was in big letters “44 degrees this morning, what happened to summer.”

One young girl wrote not just in her journal but to her journal. Titled it The Great Green Notebook of Katie Roberts. Be creative, be different, be yourself.

Now that I’ve shown you how memories are triggered from everything. Let’s talk about the how to’s of writing. My favorite is this book Nuts & Bolts Guide to writing your life story by Jan Epton Seale. Given to me by the author in 1999.

Some of the topics included in the index are Hang-ups and Bugaboos; Jump-starting; Will the real you stand up?; Making Peace with Spelling and Glamorous Grammar. With Jan’s impute into my writing I have been able to not only write better & organize my stories but gain enough confidence to encourage you & others to record your memories for future generation, whose lives will be so different than ours were.

Preserving your stories: I have stressed the need to write but what about preserving your stories. Recording on tapes is one easy way but with electronics changing so fast that type of saving isn’t safe any more. Only the written word is best. Tape record but write it down as a backup. Best to use archival white paper to write on. The use of plastic sleeves to protect the pages is also a good idea.

Going public: Some writers want to become published. I know for a fact it is a good feeling. I was extremely fortunate in editors when I first tried to sell my type of stories. I picked Kanhistique, a Kansas orientated magazine, and wrote stories pertaining to Kansas and life as I remembered in the thirties and forties. I wrote about Kansas people (mostly my own relatives) and timely subjects. Such as the Halloween and Thanksgiving stories. Cappers magazine is one place that pays for short-short memoirs.

My History is America’s History was an online site for writers to tell their family histories. I put family biographies and early day one-room school stories on this site. But it has disappeared and I can’t even retrieve my stories. Always have back-up copies of your stories. You could just simply put your stories into 3 ring notebooks or do scrap booking, that combines stories with pictures that is the newest craze and makes your memories so much more personal.

Have I mention something that triggered your memory. Let’s take time and write some memories. Later we can share them.

(I allowed 15 minutes for them to write. Believe me that is a long time to wait. I then ask for volunteers to read what they had written.
After everybody that wanted to read have then I closed by saying)

I hope you have had as good a time as I have exploring Memory Triggers.
Thank You