Magical Memoir Moments

Every Day Is All There Is: Defining a Good Day

Have you ever found yourself thinking about a subject and then discovered that lots of other people are doing the same? For me that topic is: what is a good day? Joan Didion’s words “Every day is all there is” came into my life via my daughter Kate’s business partner, Emily Levenson. She’s the one…

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Happy Birthday, Bill Moyers! Eighty Years Young

I first met Bill Moyers while working at The Fetzer Institute, which helped to sponsor Bill Moyers Journal. What a pleasure! We’ve stayed friends even after the Journal went off the air. I’ve been watching Moyers & Company online. But last week, Stuart and I stopped in to see Bill and Judith at their offices…

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Returning Thanks: An Annoying Duty to a Child, A Profound Memory for the Adult

My father’s father, David Paul Hershey, figures large in my memory of growing up. That’s primarily because the relationship between him and my father was complicated. Daddy bought the family farm (called The Home Place in my memoir Blush). Enough said. For now. But despite the differences of opinion between the two patriarchs who ruled…

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Ubuntu: A Philosophy of Memoir Writing

Welcome to the new look for 100memoirs.com! The old site still exists and has migrated to the new location, shirleyshowalter.com. I have now met the original goal of reading 100 memoirs! I discovered over the last three years and 315 posts that readers love lists of top memoirs for their own reading selection. So you…

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Voice and Place: A Resonant Connection

These mountains in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia are teaching me about voice. The picture on the left  represents a small slice of the panoramic view we first saw from the window of our new house when we were seeking a place to call home. The mountains and farmland called us and we came. Just…

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Facebook and Memoir: 25 Things About Me

Every day some new memoir breeze seems to sweep through our culture–or so it seems when the memoir windsock is in place.  I have already commented on the six-word memoir, on memoir in the political campaign, and memoir controversies (see categories on the right-hand side of this entry).  Now there is the 25 Things About…

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