How I Lost My First Book

I spent over a decade not writing my first book.

Imagine twelve, crisp young officers sitting around a large oak table with a sharp, eager, full bird Colonel at the head. He is leading a mentoring session, and sincerely wants to help us ‘make rank’.

Eleven of us are taking notes.

He asks, “Where are you with your educational development?”

“Sir, I am finishing my MBA, Sir, I am finishing my MBA, Sir, I have a master’s in applied mathematics, Sir, I have recently started an MBA in engineering management…”

My back is soaked as we go around the room, and I then shout, “Sir, I am starting my Master of Arts in Critical and Creative Thinking.”

All eyes are on the Colonel.

Eventually he nods and says, “That’s interesting. I took a class in creativity once.”

What I hear is, “McNiff is getting a degree in underwater basket weaving. Who let that happen?”

I went for the degree in underwater basket weaving because I wanted to become “A reflective agent of change.” That’s what the brochure said.

I wanted to write a book, and I had no idea how to do that. I didn’t know people like that. I knew people that flew airplanes and got really practical degrees.

I wanted to compile a book of stories about how we find our purpose — a book of facts, from real life people that had found it.

I wanted to speak directly to you, and to me, to the seekers. I wanted to show that what we seek exists — using stories from the many inspired humans on this planet.

I also really wanted to find my purpose.

This program seemed like a place to start.

And it was.

I’m not sure if that book was never meant to be, or if I missed my chance, but in trying to write it I paid attention, and I took notes.

I gave myself permission to take risks, beginning with that bold move to study creativity.

I wrote, a lot.

I interviewed a mentor who told me, “It’s not what you do, but who you become that matters.”

At the time, I didn’t get it. This was frustrating to hear. How could this be true? I remember thinking, but what we do informs who we become! What we do matters. And of course, this is also true. What we do matters.

What I can see now is that I was desperate to find something, something I could do, that would alleviate my angst. The tension was very uncomfortable. I wanted it to stop, but the best thing that happened, is that it didn’t stop.

Thirteen years later, what I’ve learned the hard way, from not writing that book, is that creative tension — in any form, is a good thing. It’s what keeps us going. The discomfort gives us the courage we need to keep going.

The point is to keep going.

Photo by Scott Schell

And one day, something really interesting happened. The tension resolved. I realized that instead of writing the book, I had lived it. I have what I’ve been seeking. I am, and have always been, and have become, one of those inspired humans.

Trying to write this book has shaped me, and now I get it. I’m not seeking a purpose any more. This isn’t a destination. It doesn’t work that way.

Whether we write the book or not, the tension resolves when we get the lesson. That’s how it works.

And hopefully, if we are lucky, something else grabs us, and the process begins again.

I’m ready, and it’s time now, to make space for the next great endeavor, but I will never forget you — my first creative love affair, my first book, that never really was.

Thank you for being so loud and entertaining, especially when I needed you the most.

Thank you for helping me to leave that job. That was scary.

Thank you for helping me to leave that marriage. That was hard, and I couldn’t have done it without you.

Thank you for inspiring me in those moments of panic when I felt like I had ruined my life.

Thank you for keeping me company when I couldn’t sleep.

Thank you for the trip to Australia. I loved that.

Thank you for inspiring me to ask that terrible roommate to move out so I could use her room for writing. That was a great decision.

I bid you farewell, dear friend, and I thank you for your service.

*****

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I grew up with a Dad who came home with candy in his pockets.

What I didn’t say, is that quite often, he was also drunk.

He would walk through our door, take off his shoes, and hang his coat and hat in the front hall closet.

Somewhere in this process, my sister and I would attack — like sharks that could smell the candy through his suit pants. We would reach right into his pockets, where we were certain the candy was hiding. He would lose his balance with the thrust of our clumsy little paws.

Every once in a while we would find nothing, maybe some lint or a golf tee, but nothing sweet that we could put into our salivating mouths. On these occasions, when we found nothing, we would give him spankings.

I would stand behind him and swing my arm around like a windmill to get as much force as I could muster. I was never really spanked so I wasn’t clear on how one was supposed to issue a spanking, but the windmill method seemed pretty good.

He would laugh, and stumble a bit, and with a twinge of guilt say “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

I remember thinking, “Good, feel bad, and next time remember the candy!”

Now I know there was more to his guilt than remembering to grab a handful of mints before leaving the bar.

Now I get it, but for his eulogy it seemed okay to leave it that I grew up with a Dad who came home with candy in his pockets — because I did, I did grow up with a Dad that came home with candy in his pockets.

What I’ve learned the hard way is that life is messy. We get Dad’s that are messy, and magical, and terribly human. And we love them madly any way.

*****

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What Afghanistan Taught Me About Love

I lived and worked in Afghanistan for eight years. I worked on programs that gave rural communities access to water, basic health care and education. I saw the country gain access to electricity, and programs change hands from international to Afghan leadership. I saw streams of girls raucously swarm the streets every morning and every afternoon, light heartedly getting access to an education.

I still hold hope that what we did will be enough, and that this generation can make it. But I also saw the security situation deteriorate. I saw people get scared and leave. I felt the lock down, the loss of freedom, hope, and control.

I’m not the same person I was, and I’m so glad.

I left the population of Americans that can hear fireworks and not jump. I joined the global population of people who feel a pulse of terror and assume bomb blast, before realizing their neighbor is lighting fireworks to celebrate the super bowl.

I wrote this story in the fall of 2013. This is not journalism, this is a love letter. This is my truth, and my story. Names have been changed to keep this account anonymous.

When I read the email that my travel was approved, something dropped in the pit of my stomach, and I started to cry.

I imagined myself walking onto an abandoned stage. Like in a bad dream, where I knew I was dreaming, but couldn’t wake up. I was wandering around, looking for my friends. The stage looked mostly the same, but the cleaning crew was lazily sweeping and taking down the props.

Infuriatingly, I could hear Amena, but I could not find her.

Her LAUGH was echoing in the background, but all I could see was this old fat man in his loose baseball cap sweeping the stage floor. What I wish I didn’t know — is that he can’t clean this up.

I should have gone home, or moved on, to anywhere — like nearly everyone I know.

I was here when things were exciting. When James was aspiring to write for the Times. When he was aspiring to get that French girl to stay over AND sleep with him.

I want to retell the story of how Jack endeared himself to me, after drinks at the French restaurant, when I had my “Welcome to Kabul” fall in the ditch. Covered in the kind of human mess that only Afghanistan can provide, how he laughed and pulled me securely onto his lap any way.

I want to sit on Franny’s lattice covered patio, drowning myself in wine and enjoying my “I don’t know why, but I only smoke in Afghanistan” cigarettes, listening to What’s-his-name gush his admiration for the beautiful and committed Ida. How her work brought her to tears, and what he would give to feel that way about anything.

I want to be the newly married 28 year old intern, working behind the bar with Elle as she describes her surprise at being single at her age, wondering if she missed her chance to have children, if she has stayed in Kabul too long.

I don’t want to be the old hand consultant, closer to 40 than 30, divorced and uncertain of the future. I shouldn’t be the one to turn out the lights.

Johnny wants to do that. He earned it. It was his fiancé that was shot in the head for delivering medical aid to children in Nuristan, not mine.

I wanted to leave when Fridays meant playing sponge bob with William at the UN pool, when leaving meant I still had friends to leave behind.

But here I am, and tomorrow I will meet with the Institute of Health, and the man who is running the women’s health program.

I will broken-heartedly inquire about the quality of the education program, but he won’t notice my demeanor, and I will hold no hope or confidence in his answer.

I will ask about the tracking system for graduates and pass this information on, with no hope that this will actually happen or that anyone will notice when it doesn’t.

The bursting, passionate hope I once held for the future of Afghanistan, fled to Sweden and India and Australia in the handbags of my friends. They didn’t leave because of a lack of education, although that is what we will tell the donor when trying to get funding.

She left because of her abusive husband — because she didn’t want to marry that old man — because they couldn’t live with the shame of not being able to protect their sisters from their mother-in law’s beatings.

They left because they could, and for that I am proud and grateful.

Years ago — I cried as I hugged you goodbye. Wondering if I would ever see you again. It was after all, probably my last trip to Afghanistan. Amena left the room, saying she “Couldn’t bear to see my tears.”

The oil buchari that gave us such bad headaches has been replaced with an electric heater, but there is no warmth.

I’m sitting where your desk used to be, and I miss your mess. I miss the way you always wanted to sit together to work on the report. I miss telling you to stop cleaning your teeth with the sharp point of the paper clip that still makes me cringe.

I miss being asked to keep it down.

The door is shut, but there is no laughter to be quieted. You aren’t here to see my tears, and I wonder why I still am.

What I LEARNED THE HARD WAY, is that only love can break our heart.

I went back to Afghanistan, again and again. I couldn’t stay away, and I hope I never do.

I didn’t get to save Afghanistan, but I did get to love it.

At my very first going away party, a colleague said that I “Built a home in his heart.” And it’s like that. Part of me will always live in that house. I left that piece, and I will never get it back.

And I don’t want it back.

One of the great treasures of my life — is that I get to carry an Afghan home in my heart.

*****

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How to Make Chicken Stock (…and grow up)

You can simmer that pot for days, but it won’t make chicken stock until you take the damn lid off!

In my early thirties I lived in Boston, while traveling a lot for work and pleasure. In between trips, while home, I sheepishly explored domestic undertakings. Having dinner parties was one of my most favorite things to do. Only snag is that I really don’t know how to cook.

I insisted on hosting many nights at my house, and forced my friends to endure chopping root vegetables with cheese knives while I set the table, lit the candles and played my favorite music to set the mood.

Luckily I have great friends.

One night we roasted a chicken. Afterwards my friend said, “Now you can make a really great stock.”

“Totally,” I replied, as if I were a normal person and knew what this meant or how to do it.

As the youngest of five I wasn’t allowed in the laundry room. My jobs included unloading the dishwasher and occasionally folding the clothes, which I’m sure was eventually taken away because I only remember trying to trap the cat under the laundry basket. And competing over who could fly the underwear farthest across the room — using only the ceiling fan.

I sometimes like to say I was raised like a boy because, you know, I ampretty sporty. But I think the truth is, I was raised like the youngest of five — by parents who liked things a certain way and found it easier to do it themselves. I was allowed, and in fact told, to go play video games while my mom and older sisters cooked thanksgiving dinner.

I’m thirty-eight, and when I go to my mother’s house — it’s better to ask my fifty-two year old sister to do my laundry, than to watch my mother’s anxiety.

I went to college not knowing how to use an iron. My college was the Air Force Academy, and we learned weird things to do with an iron. We strapped down the sheets with shirt guarders (funny little contraptions that attach your socks to your shirts — to keep your socks up and your shirt down) and then ironed the sheets, after the bed was made.

A friend of mine still has a scar on her neck from ironing her shirt collar,after she was dressed. Of course we also had an extra iron on hand for the in room grilled cheese delicacy.

I absolutely took advantage of the laundry service privilege. This didn’t give me away exactly. Many of us used it because we were so sleep deprived. No one had the energy to stay awake long enough to wait for the dryer to be done.

Freshman year a friend of mine actually fell asleep while he was explaining a math equation, in the front of the room, at the chalkboard.

I remember watching my college boyfriend do his laundry. We were seniors and had more free time to do things, like sleep. He didn’t know it, but I was taking notes.

His friend asked him,

“Do you want me to separate the whites?”

“No, just throw them all in together on cold and use the permanent press setting.”

I’ve ruined a lot of clothes since then, and picked up a few other tips along the way, but hallelujah. I was free. I knew how to use a washing machine.

You might be wondering how I learned to use a tampon. And luckily the box comes with very explicit instructions and pictures.

So when my friend told me, “All you have to do is boil the bones with the all of the left over vegetables scraps for a few hours.” I thought, I think I can do that.

And then I called the next day for more details.

“Bay leaf, right?”

“Yes.”

“Salt. Pepper?”

“No salt. A few pepper corns.”

“Anything else?”

“Plenty of onion, leek and fennel scraps. You definitely need a few carrots and celery stalks, but you have that, right?”

“Oh, yea, got it!”

Hours went by and I kept eagerly checking. It smelled good, but man did it taste watery.

“So it’s been five hours, and it still doesn’t taste good? What am I missing?”

“You’ve been simmering it for five hours?”

“Ya, I even turned it up a little bit for the last hour.”

“Hm, that doesn’t sound right.”

“Right, I had to turn it down again because it was boiling over the lid and making a mess.”

“Wait, the lid? You have to simmer it with the lid OFF. The whole point is to boil it down.”

In our own ways, big and small, we all have to learn how to be adults. Depending on how you were raised, you can probably choose to mindlessly live out the habits you were raised with — and get by just fine.

We each have the choice to keep our perspectives long and skinny, and live life looking through the straws of our youth.

Or, we can have the courage to let life break us open. We can actively explore our blind spots, because no matter how perfectly you were raised, you have them too.

WHAT I’VE LEARNED THE HARD WAY, is that these lessons will probably keep sneaking up on me.

And I choose embarrassment over ignorance.

*******

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