Hillmer’s Art of Persuasion

Final Draft for Memoir

Rachel Hillmer
Memoir Essay
W.C. 2494
11/17/08
The Author's Daughter

I'm sitting, pencil in hand, my paper blindingly bare of any thoughts from the past hour. This is a familiar scene for me. It's one that I've become accustomed to and expect each time I'm given an essay assignment, especially a creative writing project such as this one. I stretch my arms high in the air, as if there might be words or characters floating in the space above me that I can grasp. Nothing ever happens. I rise from my seat and amble through the library, picking up books as I go, glancing at the covers and replacing them, then moving on. Inevitably, I end up back in my chair, pencil in hand, paper still mockingly void of thought. I'm fighting the same battle that always emerges when I'm writing. It's a battle against myself and the ceaseless questions and fears that plague my mind when I try to compose. I try not to let those feelings of doubt or the worry of judgment hold me back from telling my story. I always have thoughts about what I want to write about, but that's not the difficult part. It's clarifying and expanding those thoughts and allowing them to transform into words, into a presence. It's permitting those ideas to form and collaborate with one another and, therefore, create a voice in my writing.
I struggle endlessly when attempting to use my voice to convey written ideas. Voice seems like it should be the easy part of writing. Voice is, after all, the ability to speak honestly in telling one's own story. This unremitting search for voice often feels like the equivalent to my quarter life writing crisis. Yet this analogy is also problematic because the word "crisis" implies
Hillmer 2
that my struggle to find a personal voice will eventually end. However I don't think that it ever will. Voice is one way of connecting with an audience by being honest, even if this sincerity elicits my own fears. It's a fear of judgment, the possibility of rejection, the permanence of my words in the world, and, perhaps, most unnerving of all, the failure to meet the audience's expectations. It's always been scary for me to write what I really think and feel because, once the words are down on the paper and read by others, they serve as an everlasting testament of my most intimate thoughts and experiences. If I change my mind or encounter judgment and criticism about an aspect of my writing it means I can't ever take back or fix what I wrote. If I suddenly realize I revealed too much about myself and can't cope with the reader's scrutiny, it's irrelevant because the words have already been written and read by others. That permanence is the most terrifying thought I can't ever completely shake from my head while I write.
If I can actually say what I want to say then all of these struggles make the challenge of employing my own voice in written work the most daunting and potentially liberating writing experience. For those fears habitually try to prevent me from accessing that completely honest voice that connects me to the reader. Sometimes my apprehensions are less overwhelming, but they're always there, urging me to quit, put down my pencil, and walk away.

The struggle to find my writing voice began in middle school, specifically eighth grade, because this is when the expectations of my teachers and peers first emerged. My father is a well-respected teacher and author of two published novels. Despite my dad's critical success as an author he still humbly chose to continue working as a teacher because he believes in the value of education and its ability to change lives. To him, teaching is a more urgent calling than
Hillmer 3
becoming a famous author and making money. This choice, in my eyes, made my dad a local unsung hero to our family as well as to the rest of the Boulder Valley community. He is a role model and eminent figure not only in the school district but also as a father to my sister and I.
Yet my dad's success was both a blessing and a curse for me as a young writer. I was so proud of him, but it was assumed by my teachers and peers that his strengths and abilities were mine as well. Due to these expectations, I began to feel increasing pressure to create exemplary writing in order to fulfill their expectations.

School was always challenging for me, especially in math and science. Although I have always loved reading and writing and been fairly strong in these areas, any prior confidence in my English abilities suffered because of feelings of inadequacy in those other subjects. As a result, the combination of personal doubt and the pressure from those around me hindered my ability to find a writing voice. Therefore, in high school, I decided that if I kept any "voice" out of my writing, I would be able to conceal my "weaknesses" and, therefore, be less likely to disappoint those with preconceived notions of my writing abilities. It was hard enough in school to keep a positive attitude while trying to succeed, but now I had to meet the impossibly high standards of teachers and peers regarding my writing, an area that I had previously reveled in.
As a result of these expectations, I began to fear my own voice in writing. It wasn't that I personally was afraid, but more that I was scared of letting people down. Everyone seemed to see my writing identity as that of the author's daughter. If I did not live up to their standards then they'd be disappointed and lose faith in me as a writer. Worse yet, they might disregard my writing completely if I failed to produce the brilliance they envisioned. This feeling that I had to
Hillmer 4
persuade everyone into believing that my writing was flawless and the result of an effortless process was exhausting. I was afraid of the possibility of failure if I were to reveal my most honest, and potentially flawed voice, and it didn't connect with my audience. This fear made it nearly impossible to produce a sincere and honest voice that my writing desperately needed. Therefore, I gave the audience what they expected from me as the author's daughter.
I've always been very self sufficient and guarded. I believed that if I accepted guidance from anyone, then it meant I would not be doing the real work. Even when my father would try to help me with my work, assuring me that his writing was not effortless and that struggle was a part of the writing process, I still couldn't believe him. As a dad, he had to say those words of encouragement even though they weren't true.  I had a romanticized idea of what a writer should look and act like. I still thought that in order to be a great author, I had to be capable of sitting down, free writing for a while, and creating a work with a strong voice. This passion towards my subject as well as a desperate desire to communicate my thoughts to society would propel me forward toward the "perfect paper". Therefore, the more I struggled to create such an effortless writing process, the more despair I felt when I failed to abide by these fantasized rules of the writer, and the harder I fought to conceal those real weaknesses from everyone. I was a writer's daughter and there were far too many expectations on my work. This left no room for error of any kind.

Writing in high school English classes proved to be even more difficult. Monarch was a new school at the time and my dad had helped to open it during the first year. He'd been the chair of the English department, contributed a great deal in establishing the program and also
Hillmer 5
hired a large percentage of the instructors that were currently teaching when I arrived at the school. These ties made it nearly impossible for me to escape his writing presence. Every English teacher knew my father which meant every instructor knew me as well. From the first glance of my name on the roll call sheet, my connections and expectations were known.

"Rachel Hillm... Wait, are you Tim Hillmer's daughter?" my teacher would say, looking uncomfortably hopeful.
"Yeah." I'd had this exact conversation too many times.
"Really? I used to work with your dad! Great teacher. Is his new book due out soon?" The instructor says, employing that same hopeful eager face.
"Yep. Just came out actually," I would say, annoyed that I might once again be writing in the shadow of my father.
"Wow, that's wonderful. I can't wait to read it. I loved his last one."
Then the teacher would stop talking to me and turn to the class.
"Did you guys know that Rachel's dad wrote a published book? Two now actually. Did you guys know that?"
The majority of students, with the exception of close friends, didn't know. However, after this exchange I would spend the rest of the class answering questions about my dad, his books, and hearing comments about how simple it must be for me to write all of those easy English papers.
Due to my dad's prominent status at my high school, expectations only grew. I was placed in all of the honors English classes and, to my own surprise, proved to be a good writer. I
Hillmer 6
had powerful ideas, content, and a good sense of what facts and details would be most valuable to my papers. However, I was weak in areas such as grammar, organization, and creating a strong voice to convey the substance of my work. My father and my teachers could see me struggling and wanted to help me, but I refused. If I was to break away from my dad's overshadowing presence, I had to do it myself. However, as the English classes got harder and the assignments became more rigorous, I was forced to either receive sub-par grades or to accept guidance in the areas I struggled with. Soon, after receiving help my weak composing areas, my writing grades began to steadily improve. Nonetheless, I still lacked a deep and personal connection to my writing. The passion, energy, and voice I craved was still absent from my work.

During junior year, I was placed in Mr. Weber's AP Literature and Composition class. Initially, I was disappointed. My first impression of Mr. Weber was that he was serious and bland and not at all the kind of colorful, passionate teacher that I was hoping would inspire a unique voice in my writing. However, the more time I spent in Mr. Weber's class, the more inspired I felt. He was the first English teacher that didn't cater to me because of my dad. He knew him (Dad had mentored Mr. Weber in his first year of teaching), but he never mentioned his name except in the rare one on one meeting between the two of us. I respected and appreciated Mr. Weber's lack of favoritism and worked all the harder to prove myself to him.
One of the final assignments for Mr. Weber was an in-class paper. Students were able to choose their topic prior to composing day, write a brief outline containing only single words, no full sentences, and bring it to class that day for him to sign off on before students began to write.
Hillmer 7
These were the kind of assignments I dreaded because the time restriction of one class period left one no time for editing or additional thought. However, due to both Mr. Weber's and my dad's encouragement, I was determined to use this specific assignment to successfully prove my own writing abilities to not only everyone else, but to myself as well.
I was nervous and anxious the day of the in-class writing. Yet, when I sat down at the computer, the words came rushing out, flooding my head and the page. It was in no way an essay that was easy to write. My topic was female body image and the media's effect on young women. This was a sensitive and personal issue for me, but also an important subject that I felt passionate about. I'm not sure whether it was my connection to my topic or some other element, but I could sense a new voice interwoven throughout the paper. Where I used to feel the presence of my father and the weight of expectations from others as I wrote, I was now able to push those voices aside and hear my own thoughts and feel inspired by my own ideas. The information no longer stood alone in my paper, but my passionate opinions were now the foundation supporting the facts. The words were not empty of feeling and enthusiasm as they had been in past papers but had morphed into transmitters of my most unabashed and gloriously bold thoughts. As I finished writing the paper, I felt a sense of pride that I'd finally written everything I thought in the way I wanted to. The essay gave me the boost of confidence I needed in my own abilities as well as a newfound awareness of the power of voice.

So, I still sit in the library, waiting for the words to come and for that voice to be inspired. I feel more capable and calm than I used to. I know that finding voice in writing is an ongoing battle that I will face every time I write something new. Each essay or story that I sit down to
Hillmer 8
write is different. Sometimes I feel a stronger connection or sense of confidence when writing about one topic than another. This naturally affects the strength of my voice from work to work. Therefore, voice is a challenge I have to coax out each time I sit down to write. There will always be doubt. However, when I start to distrust my abilities, I remind myself of all the past struggles and how far I've come. It's always difficult to communicate an intended point through voice, but it's never easy to be completely honest and vulnerable regarding your most intimate ideas and opinions. The more I write and am able to successfully identify my presence throughout the work, the easier it is to feel more confident and capable of using my voice effectively in any writing. The surer I am of the power of voice, then the more I will use my voice as well. So I sit and continue to think, outline, cross out, and start over. This is the process that I've created to fit my own writing. For now, this is how I find my voice.