One
When my wife learned that her cancer had metastasized, she picked up the pen again. Realizing the difficulties ahead she wrote:
Talking is necessary as the means of vital human connection but talking is not a discipline; not for me anyway. Writing is the spiritual discipline that keeps me grounded. And it has good science to back its claims to stress reduction and trauma healing. Writing forcibly imposes boundaries on thinking. It reins in anxious thoughts that would run off down numberless rabbit trails; causing untold feelings of misery, fear and confusion.
– Dona Eley See The Clarity of Ink – Dona’s Blog (donaeley.blog)
Two
Three days after Dona’s funeral, an empty journal was left on my doorstep with following note:
Dear Dave,
Your text the other day has stuck with me – that you wished you could call Dona or write her a letter to tell her about Saturday….. It got me thinking: what if you did just that? What if you wrote to Dona and told her about all the things that were happening around you and inside you? Mundane events. Profound thoughts. Intense emotions.
Who knows, it might be a good way to process. And will provide a record for you of this hard road you’re on now…
This journal is for you in case you want to write to Dona. And if you think this is a completely daft idea; well, you got yourself a new journal! Or you can set it aside and regift it when you need a present in an emergency.
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.
– John 14:27
And so, I started writing. I filled that journal, then my son-in-law gave me another, and a friend gave me another. Sometimes I write to Dona, sometimes to God, sometimes using journal prompts suggested in my bereavement group’s workbook, sometimes I just write. Nearly all of what I write would not be useful to anyone else. But I read and re-read them. In a house fire, I would grab my journals before I fled….along with my golf clubs.
Three
Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.
– E.L. Doctorow
Four
The act of writing is drawing a fence around something wild and untamable, and suddenly it is linear and coherent. The people that write their stories are some of the calmest people that you will ever meet. It might be chaos in your mind, but it will be orderly on the page. Suddenly, all those things banging around in your skull will be put in order as you tell your story. It is going to have a beginning, middle, and end. It will be right. And that creates a sense of calm. I have tamed the chaos, and now I can do whatever it is next.
– Dave Eggers interviewed on TED Radio Hour, May 11, 2023 TED.npr.org
Five
I can shake off everything as I write; my sorrows disappear, my courage is reborn.
– Anne Frank
That short sentence, written by a teenage Jewish girl hiding from the Nazi’s, succinctly states the benefits of lament, a practice so often employed by her ancient ancestors in the Psalms of the Old Testament. More on that in another post.
Dona's Blog 