In November of 2012 I had the good fortune to hear Anne Lamott speak at a church in Pennsylvania, and she signed the book I had brought with me (Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers). Her pen was giving her trouble, but on the title page she eventually managed to sign her name and also write, “the last of the ink.” I knew that night those words would have some kind of special meaning for me; I just didn’t know what that was.

Fast forward a few years. My crumbling life has fallen completely to pieces and taken with it every ounce of pretense that my marriage and family and life were in good working order. Every secret I had ever kept was done for. And somewhere within that mess, I finally understood that sometime in the near future, my frustration as a writer who doesn’t write very much would meet its end. Because I began to understand that by swallowing my secrets, I was swallowing all my words. I couldn’t write because I wasn’t free to tell even my own self the whole truth. But now I can, and I plan on writing until I come to the last of the ink.

 

About Nina Taylor

Writer. Editor. Mother of boys. Chief wrangler of dogs and cats.