I have a great Sunday morning routine: for several years, I’ve been meeting my friend and fellow author, Marion Ann Berry, at a coffee shop where we chat about life and writing, and then we buckle down and do some actual writing.

Today Marion Ann has agreed to be my guest and share her thoughts on being a writer and hotelier with a memoir she plans to self-publish in the very near future. 

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MEMOIRS – A WAY TO MAKE PEACE WITH OUR PAST

JN: Hi, Marion Ann and welcome to my blog—a blog you helped inspire me to create! Tell us more about your memoir.  

MAB: It’s a memoir about my hospitality experiences when I worked in the Canadian Rockies at a Luxury resort and hotel. The working title is Behind the Kitchen Doors – Summer 1. I would like to share a few summers within a series of memoirs, well that’s the plan for now.

JN: I’ve always wondered what might be behind those doors! What kind of experiences can we expect to read?

MAB: Where do I start?

How about when I arrived at the resort to move into my staff accommodations, my boss (who was my cousin’s husband) asked me to unofficially help my first night. I was hired to be a dining room busser, but my training was scheduled for days later. I had no clue what a ramekin or carafe of wine was.  I thought I was in the movie, The Shining because the hotel lobby and ballrooms were just as grand as the Overlook Hotel. 

Or how as an only child how I had to share a seven-person loft with six other girls. We also shared one and a half bathrooms and all had to be at work at the same time. There were many life lessons along the way.

JN: You must enjoy your time in resorts because you’ve been in the hospitality business for over twenty years now.

MAB: I’ve loved every moment of my time in hotels and resorts. The experiences were endless. Hotel life has provided me with what was (and still is) needed to get me where I’m meant to go. I write morning pages every day. I write my gratitude for the life I have been given to maintain and excel my creativity. Being in the hospitality business has not only given a roof over my head it has provided me with a plethora of stories to share. It’s amazing how many people I have come in contact with and I always wonder what their story was. I was in the right place each time.

JN: Why do you write memoirs?

MAB: Memoirs give us a chance to make peace with our past lives. I feel like I have been called to write stories. It seems natural to share my experiences.

For me, writing is healing. I have experienced a few not so great moments in my life. Writing gives me a chance to see what I didn’t see when those events happened. Writing and sharing an experience is not only healing for me but for others. I hope that whoever reads my stories will find their own healing. We all have similar stories and may think we are the only one who has a crazy mother or family. But, it gives me great comfort when I read other memoirs about a similar experience and how they overcame the obstacles in their life. I know I’ll grow from those shared events.

I am haunted (in a good way) by the stories I have experienced. By writing and sharing them, I can let go. When I release the past, I make room for other stories I want to write.

JN: What other stories do you have on the go? Tell us about the other genres you write.

MAB: I have many ideas floating around my numerous notebooks. I have several fiction stories that are waiting to be written. Some based on hotels of course. The hotel life keeps providing me with interesting stories and for that I am grateful. I wrote my first story when I was eight years old after watching the movie Annie (the one with Carol Burnett). I went home and wrote what happened to Annie after the happy ending. I always questioned, What’s next? What happens now? What if? My imagination was and is constantly in overdrive.

JN: When can we read Behind the Kitchen Doors?

MAB: The plan is early May 2018. I will be posting some of the chapters on my blog starting in October or November as a preview. Here’s my Blog Page. Any feedback is welcome. You can find my contact information here.

JN: You have a great blog so readers are in for a treat now and when your previews appear this autumn. Thanks for taking the time to share your writing journey with us, Marion Ann! 

MAB: Anytime – I love to talk and write about writing!

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