Short Stories, Deep Breaths
It’s funny how a passing conversation can drop a nugget of insight that sticks with you for the long haul. I recently spent time with an aunt whom I spent a lot of time with growing up. We were talking about apartment living. She admired the construction of my building—concrete, steel, and brick, compared to her paper-thin walls and the sneaking suspicions of petty neighbors walking harder than your average human. Somehow, that transpired into us reminiscing about the various apartments she’d lived in over her last three decades in Atlanta, which all happened to be on the same street. She shared a memory of her favorite, with me sitting on her stairs reading one of my many books—or rather pretending to read, as I was too young to understand the words on the cardboard pages.
This nugget stuck with me through the week as I finished a beautiful and reflective dystopian novel, I Who Have Never Known Men, on the hunt for a new read on Libby, and stumbled upon two short story/sci-fi collections— The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories, and On the Origin of Species and Other Stories. I sampled both and found myself intrigued—so much so that both are currently on hold. I knew I didn’t have to deprive myself of a new read, given the forty-plus books stacked in my office, waiting to be cracked open. Luckily, Out There Screaming, a horror/sci-fi short story collection edited by Jordan Peele, was waiting to be plucked from the bottom of the stack. I’ve been turning the pages diligently over the past few days, thinking about the power of a short story.
As an adult, my love for short stories started with none other than Ted Chiang’s Exhalation. One story, “The Great Silence,” recounts the design and desire of hearing and understanding extraterrestrial intelligence. However, the story is told from the perspective of a parrot— an Earth-dwelling creature with the ability to listen to, mimic, and communicate back to humans… something they are desperate to find a great distance away rather than starting in their local terrain. I picked up this book again to revisit this concept of ignoring the extraordinary within our reach to pursue what may or may not exist well out of our grasp and understanding. My trip down literary lane presented itself as a sacred mirror to my recent reflections on my personal storytelling aspirations.
Up until this point, I have fashioned my career on telling stories that are meaningful and impactful… sure. But they aren’t MY story—stories I am deeply passionate about, that resonate with my lived experience, passions, or personal interests. My work has been measured, managed, and hyper-specific in scope. It pays the bills and also allows me to hone my skills. And yet, I don’t feel fulfilled. Not yet, anyway. Recently, I have reflected on how I could find fulfillment—what stories I want to tell, where I’d get the funds, and who I want to talk to (this one is the most obvious). In my reflections, I kept hitting a roadblock, getting started. Of course, I took my dilemma to therapy. I discovered that the delay in starting somewhere wasn’t for lack of talent, desire, or commitment but rather my relationship to creativity and self-expression. I have poured all my energy into creating for others, and I have lost sight of and inspiration for what motivates me to create for creation’s sake. If the work wasn’t tied to KPIs, predetermined budgets, and the needs of others, I didn’t know where to start. To be even more vulnerable, I haven’t thought that creating for myself with no specific outcome had any value—so it didn’t get done.
My lord! How did I get here? If it (my creativity & expression) wasn’t being shared, consumed, or critiqued somehow, it didn’t deserve to be made? Now, who in the hell told me that? When did I agree to this? All rhetorical questions, because the truth of the matter is I told myself this at some point and committed so hard to the bit that it became an agreement I didn’t think twice about. And here we are seeing the lie, naming the lie, and finding the truth that creating just for me is more than enough and is actually my best work.
Let’s just take a deep breath at the revelation, yes?
Now, how does all this soul-searching relate back to short stories? Well, in my younger, more unevolved years, I thought short stories were just incomplete thoughts and concepts. Perhaps ideas that a writer had to get down on paper as quickly as possible—lacking the time and space, maybe even the inspiration to fill the page. Weird take, I know. However, evolved more mature me knows that it doesn't take 300+ pages to tell a good story. Sometimes three pages leave us sated and yearning for more. And I looooooove a good yearn.
My creativity needed inspiration. Luckily, there is no shortage of books I can pick up and put down. No shortage of video essays to consume to get these neurons firing. No shortage of time to spend on my balcony contemplating the trees or noticing how the summer breeze feels on my skin. Even a good scroll on Pinterest shows me an endless supply of beauty to ogle and save for later use. Short bursts of inspo have led to more writing, more pastel drawings I hang on my fridge, more reading, and journaling. All for me—just for me. My current agreement? I am the ultimate audience, critic, and authority. Just for me is enough forever. When I am ready to share, the receiver will be waiting for me. Perhaps on Substack?
I have just one more thing to share. A note on aspiration that we should both meditate on as we find our way back to whatever we think we’ve lost.
With Ease,
Lauren
“It’s no coincidence that “aspiration” means both hope and the act of breathing. When we speak, we use the breath in our lungs to give our thoughts a physical form. The sounds we make are simultaneously our intentions and our life force. I speak, therefore I am. Vocal learners, like parrots and humans, are perhaps the only ones who fully comprehend the truth of this. ”
