Wrangler Dani

The pears and apples, after 15 hours on low heat, soften and turn a comforting, caramelized brown. We blended them with an immersion blender, a first for me, until they were creamy and spreadable. Then we ladled them into hot jars and measured for “headspace” and screwed on lids and put them back in boiling water and Miss Paula was self-assured and confident and I watched them nervously like a new mom watches a sleeping newborn for the rising and falling of his little precious chest.

We chatted and drank our tea and Isaiah asked 50 million questions. And before you know it we had pear-apple butter in pretty glass jars and I couldn’t believe I’d been scared to try canning.

Yesterday I canned a dozen pints of applesauce by myself, in my own tiny kitchen, given courage by my successful pear-apple butter adventure. I added vanilla and cinnamon, I blended with conviction, I set the warm, wet, golden-hued jars gently on my countertop and waited to hear the “pop, pop” of sealed jars as they cooled.

In 2004 I had a professor who told me I could write. In 2011 I won a memoir contest. I keep writing, keep submitting, keep trying. I write because I can’t help myself, because as Joan Didion says, I write to know what I think. But I also write because I was told I could. I write because somebody bothered to read those early, stumbling pages, because I was given critique and sometimes told to get my act together but I was never mocked for my dream.

I’ve been writing a book since before Adelay was born. I started writing about how much I wanted motherhood and then I wrote about the whirlwind of her appearance in the world and her tiny squishy nose and then I wrote about being an unusual mom who had never been pregnant and then I wrote about wanting another baby and then I wrote about the wild ride of Isaiah’s raucous entrance and another round of heartache and hope and redemption and motherhood. I just keep writing. I want it to be a book, but more than that I want to share the story of hope and family, of our definition of lived-out faith.

Maybe someday I will write here about a publishing contract or an agent relationship. Maybe someday I will tell you that you can buy my little treatise on love and family wherever fine books are sold. I want the professional support of an agent, a publisher and an editorial team now more than ever – sometimes it’s hard to wait for that dream to come true.

But Adam bought me canning supplies for Christmas even though I had absolutely zero knowledge of how or what to can in the sparkling glass jars I’d been given. A college professor highlighted one good phrase in a sultry swamp of overwriting and said “this has promise, cut the rest and try again”. Miss Paula let me and my rowdy three-year-old ask too many questions and be amazed by the process and invade her house for two days, just to give me a chance at canning on my own someday.

Memoirists talk a lot about permission – the permission to write and share, the permission to create and birth ideas in the world. I think permission is a piece of the creative process, but honestly it’s not that hard to find. These days it seems there’s permission for almost anything, harmful or not, powerful or pedantic. I think what matters more is gracious coaching, kind belief, assistance for trembling beginners and hopeful practitioners alike. I probably would be writing but not aiming toward publishing unless multiple someones told me I should, I would keep cooking but would’ve left my canning pot on the sturdy shelf in the garage without an invitation to do it together.

I want to be a coach and a guide with my words, as so many others have done for me, so many times. I want to write a book on motherhood that tells our story, but more than that offers a redemptive view for the longing not-yet-mom, the grieving mom, the one who feels different, the one who can’t mom. I want to tell you that your love matters, it is essential. This is why I write; more than my own satisfaction, more than to give mere permission.

You aren’t just allowed to dream, to exist, to hope, to try: we need you to.