Book Talk: Live Through This by Debra Gwartney

Book Talk is back and I'm happy to present Clover Cohen, who is a long time student in my Master Class and fine, fine writer. Cloie is one to watch! Enjoy her insights on memoir. She's a hard working writer who is paying her dues.

By Clover Cohen

Being honest on the page is hard. Being honest with yourself and others is even harder. Our brains hide the truth, mask the memories, twist and re-construct our experiences to make it possible for us to live another day. If a writer, even when her work is non-fiction, knows where the story is going, then she does not leave her ears open to the boundless possibilities that hover between her brain matter and the universe. Knowing the destination blocks the channel that will guide her ideas and impressions down to her fingers where they will write or type them into existence.

I was drawn to Debra Gwartney's memoir because of the title, Live Through This. Badass, feminist, punk rocker Courtney Love had titled her 1994 album the same. It was actually her band, with the vulgar and ironic name, Hole, who made the album. To me it was just she and her husband, Kurt Cobain, who I heard singing in those songs. The lyrics were raw and brutally honest and hit spot-on the way I felt in 1994 as 21-year-old girl. They articulated my cynicism and darkness, voiced my distrust and contempt, yet they also captured my deep-rooted hope and optimism.

Courtney and Kurt lived my version of the modern fairy tale. They were talented, rich, and passionate for each other. Their fairy tale was rooted in reality though, not the sticky sweet pink fluffy Disney version. Their tale was made imperfect by heroin addictions and mental instabilities. But these two were out there. They were unguarded. They told the truth.

When I picked up Live Through This: A Mother's Memoir of Runaway Daughters and Reclaimed Love, I was eager to find out what the author had "lived through". For me, the title intimated survival. I was looking for an inspirational story to keep me company on my own journey through memoir.

I didn't know I would read the words that sounded like my own mother's story of divorce and struggle with her adolescent daughters (my sister and I). Reading this book was like being inside Mom's head. Both the author and Mom were foolish, brave, instinctive and terribly flawed. The author chose the wrong man and the wrong life, and as a result, her daughters suffered the consequences.

Debra showed us when she failed as a mother to her teenage daughter,

Stephanie reached out to me in small, calculated ways—and I reached out to her in small, calculated ways. But I couldn't find enough strength in myself to make something big or important happen between us. Amanda was closer, and, stuck as she was with the ranchers, I was convinced she needed me more than her sister did—an opt-out that would haunt me for years.

When you have four daughters as the author does, it's inevitable that one will take priority either while they are in infancy or addicted to heroin or need to get to their horseback-riding lesson.

Debra showed us her strength and resilience.

[image error] I couldn't have her coming and going whenever she wanted from our house anymore. I couldn't let her do that to Mary and Mollie. And though I'd given her a variation of this ultimatum many times before, this time I meant it. And this time she heard me.

Debra's unconditional love for her daughter made it possible for them all to survive, and one day, come back together and heal,

Stephanie and I walked the streets of her town, hiked in her woods, swam in her river, cooked in her kitchen, drank cold beer in her favorite cafes, and somehow we found our way back to each other without the explanations I once thought would be required. I've not asked why and she's not said why, and month after month, the why of our once–separation becomes less important.

Here, the resolution they have is not tidy or how the author had envisioned. A bond between mother and child can just do that sometimes, rebuild.

Live Through This makes me want to tell the story from the flip side. From the troubled teenage daughter's point of view, who did not run away from her mother, but suffered and survived like Debra's girls had. Live Through This reminds me to show the story, show Mom and myself in our full forms. Live Through This also inspires me to seek honesty and the truth and to welcome the surprises.