Preface Why Write - 908 Words

Preface: why write? One of the first things, if not the first thing, that anyone is asked when writing an autobiography is why? Why write about your life? What makes it worth reading about? What makes you different from everyone else? While I don t have the answers for most of those questions, at least not yet, I m fairly confident about why I m writing this down. It s the reason why most people write anything down: to have something to leave behind. Whether it s a set of laws or instructions, a timeline of global events, or a chronology of a life, people want to leave something behind; something that says I was here, and I did something. And even if it s just writing about someone else, the author s name often ends up being†¦show more content†¦Then there s family stories, any information I get from asking questions, and home videos. These sources will most likely cover the time from before I was born to around the time that my first memories pop up. The last key is of cour se my memories, which technically start when I was a baby if you count sensory memories, and around 3 or 4 years old if you don t. I ll be taking from all these sources, paraphrasing when needed, and quoting when appropriate. I m planning to make this as straight a narrative as possible, but you shouldn t be too angry at me if I do a bit of backstepping every once in a while. Life is, after all, a chronology of things, but it can also form a narrative. If it was 100% chronology, then it would start to sound like a textbook, and I wouldn t want that for anyone. I m not sure what to expect from this exercise of self-discovery, and while I m sure that it won t reveal some cosmic explanation of the universe, I ll have at least sorted out my life, gotten some perspective, and hopefully helped impact someone else in a positive way. Even if it s just one person that s been affected, I would consider this a victory. And here s where we get into the deep, dark, touchy feely part of the intro duction: motivation. What motivated me to write this? I m not even 30 yet, I haven t really done anything too important, and don t have any answers for people. Occasionally I don t even