Meeting "Sassy Pat"

A little less than a year ago, I became acquainted with Pat Richards. While visiting in the Adirondacks, she had read an article about the Adirondack Mountain Writers' Retreat, and emailed to congratulate me on having been awarded a 2008 Poets and Writers grant to help fund it. We exchanged more emails and struck up a friendship as we talked about our respective writing projects. She was on the brink of debuting her memoir, "Sassy Pat Knitting" at Autumn Leaves Book Fair, hosted by "The Chronicle" in Glens Falls. I was unable to attend the book fair, and missed meeting Pat, but we continued to correspond. I learned that her book had been inspired by none other than her mother-in-law, Thurman native M. Frances Ingraham Richards, who, like Pat, was an avid knitter, and who disciplined herself to faithfully journal about her knitting. Pat offered to read from that journal at a meeting of the John Thurman Historical Society, and a plan was made for her to do that on June 2nd. That's this coming Tuesday! I'll finally get to meet my friend, and I know that all who attend will enjoy hearing bits of Frances' journal. I hope we'll get Pat to read from her own writing, "Sassy Pat Knitting," as well.

See you soon, Pat!

Writing History Using Old Diaries: Roles of Honesty , Respect, and Kindness

I'm mulling over a problem about which I'd value input. The John Thurman Historical Society was given some diaries, which I've been transcribing for possible use somehow in our quarterly magazine, cleverly named The Quarterly. As I read these diaries, which were written in the 1930s by a woman now deceased, I was entranced. I must have a voyeuristic streak (there, I've said it!), but I love peeking into the lives of other people in this way. Tucked into the tedium of entries that typically began, "Home all day..." was tragedy. The woman's life was changing, and not in a way to her liking. The children, despite her efforts to cling to them, were growing up and away. Her parents were aging and becoming more dependent. Her marriage was unraveling,thread by thread. It's a poignant story, one that is not new and will never be old. It has started me thinking a great deal about the lot of women in that diarist's position in eras when women's options were so much more limited. I'd like to use these diaries as a centerpiece in a discussion about that issue. It's believable and dramatic. It would work well.

But what about respect? What about the woman's assumption of privacy as she wrote? What about the feelings of her descendants? What about the fact that this is just her side of the story? As a caring person, I feel the itch to censor, to be selective in what I publish.

What's right? There are no simple answers, but your ideas will help me arrive at a decision I can live with.

Perky