“Why can’t I just say it was awful?” I asked.

“You can start there.

Then describe the parts you can truthfully document.

You don’t have to turn yourself into a dramatic character to make what happened matter.”

I wrote about missing Dad’s last months of life.

He had died while I was incarcerated.

I wrote about the nights I couldn’t sleep after release, the work I’d lost, and the family relationships that had not survived.

I wrote about the small, ordinary discomfort of not knowing how to choose toothpaste in a store because I’d become accustomed to having so few choices.