LOST

What does it mean to be lost? It’s that disorienting sense that everything around you is unfamiliar. All of my books speak to that feeling of being lost. This can mean lost in the geographical sense, or, in the emotional sense. In my novel, Miriam’s Dive, Miriam loses her father shortly after her mother has passed. What gives her the strength to go on when she is encumbered with such deep personal loss? I think the answer lies in how she is found inside her reshaped family; that is, in the way her Granny Meg takes her in after her parents are gone. Granny teaches Miriam to her mind her manners, to eat her veggies and go to church on Sunday. She sits with Miriam on the front porch day after day and shells peas with her. She shows everyone in that little mill town: I am Miriam’s family now. Although Granny never says the words, her daily behavior shows that she loves Miriam, that she has someone to depend on. In the light of her grandmother’s continued presence Miriam begins to repair the foundation of strength that will enable her to leave home and keep growing on her own. She is lost, then found, then moves on to dare getting lost again.

In Aubrey’s Light, Aubrey gains a wealth of knowledge about remedies but despite all her learning, she, too, becomes lost.

In Maine Inside Me, I will reveal places and times when I, too, have felt lost.

So, the feeling of being lost is a familiar one, although often not a comfortable one. But I think something is gained in being lost. For example, when I travel to an unfamiliar place, at first I have a feeling of being adrift. Everything – the language, the architecture, the tastes of foods, even the skies – all are different, unfamiliar. I begin to feel disoriented, to be lost in clouds of uncertainty.

But then, in the midst of loss of when we dare to keep going, new beauties reveal themselves. I learn to savor the darkly bitter taste of coffee in Istanbul, to enjoy the intricacies of a medieval Italian village, to hear the melody in a new language, to recognize that lovely scent is lavender. As I let myself meld with this new place, I lose the sense that I am lost. In some mysterious way I shed the skin of my lost self and wrap myself in the rich cloak of a new knowing.