How real life reflects in our writing

They say we should write about what we know. Most of us know a little about a lot of things. With me, it’s motherhood, reporter, writer, and educational advisor.

Motherhood, writer and advisor are a lot alike. Why? With your children, you scold them and give them advice. When I write, I tend to put lots of people—family, and their problems—in my stories. 

When I put my educational advising hat on it’s like being a mother to a lot of people. Again, it’s scolding them when they do poorly in their classes, praising them for doing well, and kicking butt when you know they are going to fail their classes again.

Reporting is a little different. Sort of. You get to be nosy, ask a lot of questions and sometimes tick people off. Most of my reporting was at school boards and farm news. My favorite part of working as a reporter was feature writing. I found it fun to ask questions, to be nosy, learn things I didn’t know about and write about it.

There was a time when I was asked to attend a meeting for a dead president whom I’ll leave nameless. This was a small town newspaper and everyone knew everyone. This dead president had a groupie following. I knew there would be several people at the meeting and took my tape recorder. They tended to talk at the same time. I tried to keep the names straight. But after the story was published I got a phone call from the leader of the group. He said I did a nice job, except for one thing.

“You listed the president’s supposed mistress as the name of the person to contact if they’d like to join our group.”

Whoops! The woman was dead, so I did a retraction.

The one story I wrote that made a front page headline was about farmers losing their farms. It was a heartbreaking story to do, listening to four and five generation farms being lost. I learned a lot about farming and farm animals when I was farm page editor.

As for advising, I retired from the college, but still return during registration times—anywhere from six to nine weeks. Lately I’m hearing a lot of personal tragedy stories. Students whose parents have died or deserted the family; students who need food (we have a food bank); student returning from wars; and students who have been incarcerated or their parents are serving time. With these students, I believe the best thing to do is to listen to them, let them talk. They are hurting inside and need a dose of kindness.

For those students who I know are just attending for the financial aid and then fail, I put on my mommy face and give them a lecture, telling them I am not speaking as their advisor, but it’s my mommy talk, the same one I would give my children. To my surprise, some of them actually thank me.

When I write stories, I tend to have my characters deal with the same situations I have had to deal with in life. These are things we all deal with and a reader can identify with them.

How does your life reflect in your writing?