I Begin to Write My Memoir on the Sidewalk with Kids’ Chalk

It just feels right.

I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with kids’ chalk. Someone left a box on the grass, and it just feels right. I begin to write my childhood inside the rickety hopscotch squares, willing windows for glimpses of roller skates, dislocated shoulders, and being picked last.

I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with kids’ chalk. Someone washed the hopscotch and my childhood clean way. It might have been the rain. It’s just as well. I begin to write my teen years down the driveway, on a raked angle, a rough surface for Daddy’s yelling, my crying, and not being asked to dance. I hope it rains again.

I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with kids’ chalk. Someone has erased away my teens. It might have been the cars coming home from work, going out again to shop. Tires can do that if there’s enough of them. It’s just as well.

I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with big letters this time. Letters that spell marching, sitting in, skipping classes with my teachers, making love, not war. People walk by stepping carefully around my anger. A dog sniffs, pees, moves on.

I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk in cursive, which is faster, but harder to read. Somehow my thirties fit between the lines of my twenties, which are still there. Somehow I squeeze it all in, marriage, moving out here, another marriage, and in really tiny letters that flatten into a bumpy line, the unraveling of my marriage. Finally, I just scribble in a mess of colors, on top of each other in a big mush.

I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with kids’ chalk. Someone’s dog has shit on my scribbles. Someone else has slipped, skidded, and smeared the shit across my marriage. Besides me, I mean. I nod and grab a bucket. I can’t change what happened, but I can clean the sidewalk for the next ones passing by, including the children I didn’t have, who’s cries hide under the crap I made of my life. I can’t see them, but I can still hear them. I pour the water, and they fall silent. There. I scrub. Hard. Now there’s room for recovery.

I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with kids’ chalk.

Marilyn Flower writes political humor and satire to delight socially and spiritually conscious folks. She’s a regular columnist for the prison newsletter, Freedom Anywhere, where she writes about faith and prayer. She’s the author of Ninja Writers Guide to Character Development: Creative Blogging! Clowning and improvisation strengthen her resolve during these crazy times. Stay in touch!