On Autobiographies

I’ve been an avid reader most of my life. When I was younger, if the weather was nice, my mother used to have to force me to put down whatever book I was reading and make me play outside. Some of my favorites as a child were the Curious George series, the Bobbsey Twins series, and many of Judy Bloom’s young adult books. Even before I could read, I loved books. I still remember hearing on a regular basis The Poky Little Puppy, The Teeny Tiny Woman, and A.A. Milne poems. 

Cover of The Poky Little Puppy. (Flickr/National Museum of American History)

Most recently, I’ve become interested in autobiographies. I’ve read quite a few over the years, more than I can list here. They’ve ranged from political figures (George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Hilary Clinton, Barack Obama, Nancy Reagan, Malala Yousafzai), to musicians (Bob Dylan, Michael Jackson, Carly Simon, Paul Simon, Tina Turner), to sports figures (Andre Agassi, Dorothy Hamill, Phil Jackson, Nancy Kerrigan, Al Michaels, Jerry Remy), to actors (Drew Barrymore, Ellen DeGeneres, Tina Fey, Michael J. Fox, Valerie Harper, Florence Henderson, Shirley Jones, Diane Keaton, Steve Martin, Dick Van Dyke), and more.

What strikes me about all these autobiographies of famous people is how much in common they have, no matter the career path they’ve followed. They’ve faced mental health challenges, like the anxieties, isolation, and stress Scott Kelly describes in his autobiography Endurance: A Year in Space, A Lifetime of Discovery. They’ve dealt with traumatic experiences, such as the gang rape Cyndi Lauper describes going through in her self-titled memoir. And they’ve had plenty of joys as well, including the love for her husband Julia Child describes in My Life in France.

My high school AP English teacher, Mr. Andrew, would tell me that this is a trite observation, that the commonalities that occur across diverse human experience is old news. So be it. Can I help it if sometimes the tried really does turn out to be the true?

Here’s a case in point. The other day I finished reading John Kerry’s autobiography Every Day is Extra. He explains that the title comes from his experiences serving in the Navy during the Vietnam War, when he witnessed the early deaths of friends and came away feeling gratefully lucky to still be alive. He describes striving to live a life of purpose after this experience, trying to put to good use the extra days he’s been given.

Kerry also shares some words of wisdom gained during his many years of service in government. He notes the tendency to bemoan the difficulties of the present time, as if everything in the past was wonderful. He writes, “It’s easy to put on rose-tinted glasses, look back at earlier days and say ‘those were better times’ or easier times, when the truth is, they weren’t” (581). He’s talking about American society in general here. He’s reminding us of our tendency to romanticize, for example, the post-WWII era, with its economic boom in the US and its nation building internationally, at the expense of remembering the legalized racism and Cold War fears that also existed then.

I think many of us could apply his words to our personal lives. It’s easy to become nostalgic as adults for what seem like the simpler days of childhood, but if we look at those childhood days with a critical eye, we can probably see that they weren’t so simple after all. Maybe our parents struggled with money, or maybe we had to deal with a teacher who didn’t seem to like us, or maybe our classmates didn’t want to play our favorite games at recess. Whatever the particulars, Kerry’s observation about our tendency to romanticize the past resonated with me.

It seems to me that if we can keep a more realistic perspective about the past, we can be more likely to face current challenges more effectively, for we’ll feel better equipped to draw on strategies and techniques we used in the past to deal with whatever issues we face now or will face in the future. To draw on the trite or cliché again, the old saying “whoever does not remember the past is doomed to repeat it” seems to apply. (Sorry Mr. Andrew.)

I also appreciated Kerry sharing with the reader some insights into why he wrote his autobiography. He explains, “…I wrote this book…to share with you…the abiding truth I’ve learned in my journey….You may fail at first, but you can’t give in. You have to get up and fight the fight again, but you can get there. The big steps and the small steps all add up. History is cumulative” (583). Kerry is speaking here about public diplomacy and government. However, again his message seems to apply to everyday life as well.

I have the impression that too often we think life should be smooth sailing. We think that to be successful, we should never face setbacks. Many say this impression is even more heightened in these days of social media, when people see on a daily basis posts from friends featuring happy photos of wonderful vacations in beautiful places, news of awards won, and reports of uplifting milestones like births, graduations, and weddings.

Kerry reminds us that life is not all about the good times. It’s about bad times, too. He encourages us not to give in to the bad times but rather to keep trying. What matters is our overall effort at the end. Some might say that’s easy for Kerry to say, considering his privileged background that perhaps gave him a head start in the competitive game of life. When he fell down, they might ask, how far did he really fall in comparison to other people? While I acknowledge this point of view, it’s not my own.

Sure, Kerry describes attending prestigious prep schools as a boy, but he also lived away from his family as a boarding student from a young age, suffering from homesickness and emotional distance. Along with the good comes the bad, I think. So although his background might be different than mine, and some would say more privileged, I don’t think that means his observations about striving to get up again after falling, or just trying to put one foot in front of the other no matter how small the steps, are irrelevant. In fact, I try to live them every day. I appreciated the reminder from Kerry about this life philosophy.