Angie Marotte is an author who refuses to do this in the third person because the act of writing is intimate to me and, as a consequence, my writing itself is honest and personal. I write a lot about myself because it is how I understand my world and who I am. I write memoir in this blog and process the difficult job of being a caretaker and use my words to preserve and bring to my own attention all that I am thankful for. I am also a Horror writer with an almost finished draft of novel #1. It’s called Dissonance. There is even a growing pile of short stories, to my pleasant surprise. There are many more half formed characters and brewing ideas that sit up on shelves in my room or lurk in doorways, staring at me. Their eye brows are slightly raised and arms are crossed. They are impatient. They want me to create them, already!
Not that long ago, I quit my job as a teacher to write and care take full time. I am at the cusp of this new career as an author. Thank you for taking the journey with me.
transcribingmemory 
Hi Angie,
I am across your blog looking old photos. I, too, have 80-100 year old diaries; also thousands of pages of letters. 25 bankers’ boxes of family archives. I couldn’t tell if you have a twitter account or how to get updates of posts. I think you’ll like my blogs, all found at my website: LindaGartz.com. Family Archaeologist is where I shared my finds that I thought made good stories. I’ll be publishing my book 4/3/18 “Redlined-A memoir of race and change in 1960’s Chicago. Congratulations on your writing! A long road to completion, but keep at it!
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Hello and nice to meet you! Thanks for your encouragement and I will certainly check out your website. I look forward to it. My twitter in thewoolsuit. Congratulations on YOUR writing!
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Angie, you might wish to read my comment on down a bit. I have collections much like yours and am thrilled. I am interested in what you’re doing and will look you up for further info. I do lots of genealogy as well as being the family archaeologist myself and sometimes feel a bit overwhelmed with what’s the best way to handle so much history.
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Oops. My comment meant to say, “I CAME across you blog…” Auto correct gremlins!
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oops… I said Angie instead of Linda Gartz in one reply.
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Hey, Angie, not sure if I got the twitter handle right because it didn’t come up. Is it: @InTheWoolSuit ? or something else. Thanks for the congrats. In the throes of all publishing details now. Lots of work, like any endeavor worth pursuing!
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Just thewoolsuit no “in” and I appreciate you looking me up. Despite how crazy that process is I’m living vicariously through you! #ProblemsIdLoveToHave haha I just feel like saying congrats again! It’s big!
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Such a lovely idea that I can totally see myself piggybacking off of: free-writing about certain memories that lurk up to the surface of your consciousness. I guess that’s their way of saying that they want out!
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thank you for both the visit and the follow; I will happily reciprocate. Here’s to a bonny 2018 and your 100 year party…
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Yay!!!!
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I’ve just touched the surface and I’m smitten already. How special this time with diaries and the person who wrote them. We should all be so lucky to have someone read and want to discuss about our lives when we’re 99 and too old to be ashamed of the life we’ve lived. I’m excited for you both. Also, I am the caretaker of my husbands letters from his grandfather to his father. There is some juicy stuff, some sad stuff, and since I knew the date he died, as I read them in chronological order, I sat and cried as I read his final letter, knowing his ending but he did not. I never met the man but feel like we were good friends after reading his life in letters. I’m a letter keeper as well and so is my husband so we put ours together in order while we were miles apart for a year. Placed together in chronological order, its like a journal of both our lives. So fun when we thought of doing this. Anyway, I write mostly essays, memoir and humor. Some medical pieces and parenting triplet/then empty nest sagas. I look forward to getting to know you ladies.
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Oh I am very moved. Thank you so much! I’m jumping more into your blog now and enjoying greatly what I’m reading. And yes, I think Babu’s lucky to have some one who is interested in her stories, but truly, truly, I am the lucky one who gets to read them and have her in my life.
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Thanks so much for reading. I think it would be great to do what you’re doing with some of my history items. We’ll see. I do t have writers block. The opposite. I want to write about everything and have trouble choosing. Tell your Babu hi from me. My mom is 89 and I treasure all the time we can spend together.
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You are welcome but it has been my pleasure to read. As far as the writer’s…flood????…have you written about the letters that you are the caretaker of? (By the way, what a beautiful way to phrase it. You are the caretaker of those letters. It’s true. You hold a person’s life – their story – in your hands!) I’m not sure if you’re open to advice or feedback and I haven’t read enough of your blog yet to know the answer to this question but, have you written at all about the letters themselves? I am also blessed to have the artifacts of Babu’s journals and I will share what worked for me. The transcribing process, although it takes so much more time, was important for me. I write to learn and to process what I have learned, so in transcribing Babu’s journals, not only have I made them them more preserved and accessible, but I have been able to really process them and find patterns and meanings. If that is something your interested in doing with the letters that you have, I’d suggest it. I also suggest posting about it bit by bit as you go if it’s something your willing to share. That way you only have to tell the story of each letter and the bigger picture develops. It would be more than possible to weave in the stories you are learning through your genealogy research. I highly suspect that it will reveal itself to you as you write where those stories would fit in and how to tell them. Best of luck to you. <3!
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Thanks so much. I hope to do something with the letters but perhaps I need to wait a few more years so nobody mentioned in there gets their feeling hurt. He told it like it was. I have a feeling many a book has waited till some older folks pass on.
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I hear you. It’s a tightrope walk. You can write and not publicize it!
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Hi Angie,
We have been connected through our blogs for sometime. I really like your posts on your Grandma.
I am reaching out to you to ask if you would like to post links to amazing articles from web on needull.com. It could be in area of your interest like education, writing, storytelling, anything..
Please let me know if you are interested. It is completely voluntary and I would understand if you don’t have time. However, even if you can post one link every month that would be fine.
Regards
Team Needull
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Thank you so much for the offer. I will look into it!
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i like your gumption and your blog. i am a teacher and wannabe writer myself and you are actually doing it. amazing – best, bet
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Thank you but I do not feel worthy of what you’ve said!!
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The image of half-formed characters and brewing ideas waiting impatiently for you to create them brings to mind Liz Gilbert’s vision of ideas and creativity (articulated fully in “Big Magic”). Wonderful!
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I have not heard of Gilbert. I will have to look up “Big Magic.” it sounds very interesting. Thank you for the compliment!
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I’m only five posts in and I am hooked! I’ve laughed and cried. This is an amazing project and I won’t be able to pry myself away from devouring the rest of the passages. Thank you for sharing!
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Oh my. Thank you so much.
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What a kind and thoughtful way to interact with Babu. I’m sorry to read that you can no longer share her diaries with her. I think it is wonderful that you are learning about her through her own writing!
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Thank you. Aging is what it is but we have many beautiful things we do together.
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What a kind and thoughtful way to interact with Babu. I’m sorry to read that you can no longer share her diaries with her. I think it is wonderful that you are learning about her through her own writing!
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Nice to meet you, Angie! Thanks for following my blog. 🙂
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Hey I’ve never seen a blog with what you have; its beautiful, honest and so real I want to read every bit. Thank you for the perfection of honesty, and haha about the third person … I never quite get why they ask for third person bios???:) Looking forward to reading more here, just wow
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“Wow. Thank you so much. That means a lot to me.” She said 😉
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🙂 Aye ! Lovely
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Greetings, Angie. It’s been years since I’ve stumbled upon your blog. Needless to say, Transcribing Memory is beyond inspiring! It’s been a while since your last post but I hope everything is going well.
So apparently I’m trying to practice my translation skills and I was wondering if I could translate some of your blog posts to Indonesian and share them online on my blog (with references of course). I’d love to hear back from you. Let me know what you think. Thanks!
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