Who Am I writing to?

St. Ignatius, Montana

“Who are you writing to?” Joe Bunting, founder of The Write Practice, asks, “Have someone in mind when you’re writing your novel.  Write to that person.” 

And I wondered, who should I write this to?  Rubbing my temples in contemplation, I envisioned my daughter as I typed about my sister, Nancy, and me climbing our favorite Ponderosa pine.  My fingers hovered over the keyboard as I used an image of 5-year-old Stephanie’s curls and amber eyes for motivation.  But for some reason, it didn’t feel right.

When I portrayed my father as the sun and the moon to describe his battle with Jim Beam, Joe’s words came to me, “imagine that you're reading your story to someone special.”

What’s more precious than a daughter?  This had to be for her.  But still, my heart did not answer.

When I wrote about “not being Indian enough and being erased from my heritage. And I thought, I realized that this was no children’s story. But I was still writing to a child, but the wrong one.

This is for me.  For myself.  And it’s for all the little girls who were told they were not enough.

Writing this memoir helped me understand what I went through when I was 5.  And I wanted to go back in time and reassure 12-year-old Darla.  To tell her that she was lovely and loveable.  That it wasn’t her. That she was good enough.

And I sobbed when I wrote about Ma Austin and Sue Quinn and realized when I was seen. That I was immersed in a community who cared and knew how to show it. And I called my high school best friend when she was finally introduced as Nancy’s counterpoint.  “Jerri, you and I have a beautiful love story,” I told her, “What color of your eyes? Are they brown?”

“Girl, my eyes are green, not brown,” Jerri replied.

“But they have warmth to them.  So I thought they were brown.  They’re not a cool green.”

“Nope, they’re green.”

So I wrote that she had eyes the color of Ponderosa pine needles.

Now I properly see young Darla, and I think she's wonderful.  And I’m proud of her. And I’m proud of myself.

I wrote this The Moon Loves Me, Breaking the Silence for me. 

This book is for anyone who’s ever doubted whether they were good enough, whether they deserved what happened, whether their survival made them complicit.

What I learned:

·      Even if you have experienced trauma, you can find a voice

·      We no longer have to protect imposed silence

·      When silence protects secrecy, it erases who we are

·      We have a choice of what heritage we accept.