44 Comments
User's avatar
Wendy's avatar

Didn't have a map. Arrived anyway. : )

Kelly Rubingh's avatar

Started boring but got much better.

(my life, not the article!)

Irena Smith's avatar

Love that! And thank you for the clarification :-)

appleton king's avatar

this quote from a poem (i forget author and also adore parenthetics and trust thats a "word") seems appropriate for someone who holds a delicious grudge (and well played by YOU 🫡)

"The book of my enemy has been remaindered and I am glad."

Irena Smith's avatar

Oh, that is GOOD

appleton king's avatar

its not the Drive By Truckers singin "THE Sands of Iwo Jima" but will do in a pinch 😉

Eileen Dougharty's avatar

Lifelong people pleaser cured by Parkinson’s.

Irena Smith's avatar

Oh, SNAP, Eileen, you freaking genius.

Wendy's avatar

🔥

Eileen Dougharty's avatar

Hey, chronic illness can work wonders 🤩🤩🤩🤩

Jess Chermak's avatar

Abundant opportunities: seized what I could.

Ilene Angel's avatar

I love this piece and your writing! Okay, I’ll play along - “Seemed like a good idea. Wasn’t.” Or “I laughed. I cried. I ate.” I could do this for hours!

Irena Smith's avatar

Thank you—and love both of these! I also feel like this one is a good one-size-fits-all: It'll be fun, they said. Nope.

Pearl Arden's avatar

My entire career was built on brevity: ad creative. And oh the time it takes to distill the words! The most reduced was always six words or less, to be digestible at 70+ mph on the freeway on a billboard. I will ruminate and be back with my life story. Already thinking of several contenders.

Irena Smith's avatar

Can't wait to see the life story, Pearl! I have always marveled at the creativity/out-of-the-box thinking required to get exactly the right words into a teeny tiny box.

Lucy Climans's avatar

The ghosts want to be part of the story: that's the whole tension, isn't it. The travelogue version is safe. Car, rain, road, hotel. The moment you let the past in, you've lost control of the narrative and gained something better.

My six words: Knew the rules. Rewrote them anyway.

Irena Smith's avatar

SUCH a great interpretation, Lucy. And your six-word memoir is genius. ❤️

Lucy Climans's avatar

That means a lot coming from someone who just made frozen peas literary. 😊

Irena Smith's avatar

Hahaha, as much as I would love to take credit, that's from Beth Fennely's Heating & Cooling: 52 Micro-Memoirs.

Elizabeth Beggins's avatar

So fun, Irene -- and I had a pompous pendant of a young English prof who took all the joy out of writing for me with his ding-danged red pen. "Cows are raised. Children are reared," he wrote in the margin of one of my first assignments to tell about our home town. Asshat.

Here's my six words:

Forever running late but born early.

Irena Smith's avatar

Ugh, I can absolutely see how that would take all the joy out of writing. Asshat indeed. And I love your six-word memoir!

jsonderling's avatar

Starting again sanguine evolving always stronger

Irena Smith's avatar

Love that!

Leslie Carter's avatar

Fifty years with my soul mate.

Irena Smith's avatar

Fifty years is a long time! Love this. ❤️

Lorraine Yglesias's avatar

Btw I am reading Troika (slow reader). Will leave review soon. Loving it so far.

Irena Smith's avatar

Thank you so much, Lorraine! So glad you're liking it.

Lorraine Yglesias's avatar

Curiosity didn’t kill the cat, thriving.

Irena Smith's avatar

LOVE that. ❤️

Justine's avatar

I LOVE this idea!!! We are all so distracted, it's good to distil things sometimes. This is going to be my next dinner party trick. As for me:

Sought friendly connection(s) across the world.

Irena Smith's avatar

SUCH a better way to break the ice than "So, what do you do?" And I love your six-word memoir—it's exactly how we met!

Aviva Schultz's avatar

Early baby, talks lots, never stops

Irena Smith's avatar

❤️❤️❤️

Lori Knoll Harrenstien's avatar

Forever frozen on ice, won't let it go. ( 8 words; apparently a lifetime of figure 8s are firmly woven into my DNA)

Irena Smith's avatar

Awww, I love that. And the "Frozen" reference!