Tag: ghostwriting
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it’s not possible to make a mistake
There’s a scene in Kurt Vonnegut’s book Breakfast of Champions where John meets Mona, a woman from the fictional religious group the Bokononists. John acts shy at first, so Mona says, “It is not possible to make a mistake.” That’s the customary greeting given by all Bokononists when meeting a shy person, she tells him.…
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to be a toddler
When I first came to Peru three years ago, I found a community of language learners: some learning English, some learning Spanish. I was learning Spanish, armed with high school vocab and an impressive Duolingo streak (250 days!). Yet it was not past experience, nor commitment to an app, that indicated anyone’s success. Nor was…
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deep sea creatures
“Mia’s teachers want her to skip a grade,” some guy named Tim was saying about his daughter. This was a friend’s house, maybe five years ago. “But we’re gonna keep her in first.” “Why?” I asked. Several people turned and looked at me like I was an idiot. “Um, because it would be really hard…
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compromise, vicarious
Sometimes I think about what I learned in school. It’s hard to quantify, exactly. Yeah, I learned about cells and rhombuses and World War II. Mostly, I learned how to get good grades. I learned this quickly, so I did well in school, so teachers said I could “be anything.” But the older I got,…
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and that makes you hard to see
After college, I worked as an AmeriCorps volunteer in Rochester, New York. My friends and I spent a lot of time at dive bars, namely one where we could spin a wheel to win cheap beer and hog the jukebox all night with our laundry quarters. We talked about anything and everything, and one night,…
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on keeping the channel open
I just counted, and I have 37 houseplants. I only bought about 10–the rest came from propagating, cuttings, and lately, now that my compost is the ripe old age of six months, from the soil itself. In fact, so many seedlings have sprouted that I just scooped some compost into a tin can and am…
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on self-trust: or, how to scare the muse away
Two weeks ago, I had to tell a potential client that I couldn’t commit to the project we’d been discussing. I really didn’t want to have that conversation. They were expecting me to sign a contract soon, and I knew they’d be disappointed. But if I didn’t say something, the gnawing feelings would only keep…
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when writing gets boring
The other day I asked a client how his memoir was going, and he told me he was thinking of quitting. “It’s getting boring, reliving the same events over and over,” he said. “I’ve already told the story a hundred times; it’s not new anymore.” This struck me because I often talk about writing as…
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an epiphany at church
A snapshot of a memory: I’m seven or eight, at church, sitting in a short pew with my mom and sister. The choir is to our left, where my father stands with about half the teachers from my school. Sunlight streams in through the skylights onto the wooden altar steps. The choir sings—pretty, polyphonic, a…
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how to learn a language
When I moved to Peru, I had some basic Spanish—a couple years in high school, some streaks on Duolingo. I hoped that might be useful, but I understood nothing. Now, more than two years later, I’ve improved somewhat. There are days when I feel bilingual. Other days I’ve still just arrived. It’s not linear. It’s maddening and hard. But it’s…
Kimberly Bunker, MFA 