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 Each day feels new, and my memory of the one before is faint. I’m learning to adapt. |
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In September 2019, a seizure revealed a lime-sized meningioma pressed against my hippocampus—the part of the brain that governs memory and language. The doctors said it was benign, but benign didn’t mean harmless. Surgery removed the tumor, and three days later I opened my eyes to a new reality. I could walk, I could talk, but when I looked at my wife, her name was gone. I called her Precious—the only word I could find. A failure of memory, yet perhaps the truest name of all. Recovery has been less cure than re-calibration. Memory gaps are frequent. Conversations vanish. I had to relearn how to write, letter by halting letter. My days are scaffold by alarms, notes, and calendars. When people ask how I am, I don’t list symptoms or struggles. I simply say, “Seven Degrees Left of Center.” It’s not an answer—it’s who I’ve become. |
| I’ve been thinking about permission lately. Not the official kind. The quieter version you give yourself when no one is watching. I don’t match the picture I had of a writer. I failed English 101 and 102 multiple times before I finally got my degrees. I can’t spell for sh*t. My typing is… tolerable on a good day. None of that looks impressive on paper. And yet, here I am. Writing anyway. There’s a myth that writers earn the title through struggle. Through pain, credentials, or some shared suffering that proves you belong. If the work doesn’t hurt enough, you must be doing it wrong. If it comes too easily, you must be cheating. I don’t feel that kind of struggle. The work feels quieter than that. It feels like thinking things through. Like returning to the same ideas and seeing them a little differently each time. Like sitting down early, before the day has opinions, and following a sentence to see where it goes. Sometimes I wonder if that ease disqualifies me. But then I notice what I actually do. I show up. I revise. I question my choices. I finish things. I come back the next day. Not because I have to, but because this is how my mind works now. Maybe being a writer isn’t about how clean the sentences are, or how fast the fingers move, or how many classes you passed the first time around. Maybe it’s just about the habit of paying attention, and the willingness to try again. I’m not making a declaration here. I’m not claiming mastery or authority. I’m just giving myself permission to keep going without apologizing for how it looks. |
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