Where the Story Begins: Writing Home into Your Memoir

In Class 1 of our Memory to Manuscript: Memoir writing series, we took it back to the beginning by laying the foundation of our writing and going back to the root of our stories.

Home. Where it all began. 🌱

Memoir writing isn’t just about recounting memories; it’s about shaping those memories into a narrative—one that reveals not just what happened, but who we are because of it. It’s a way to gather the puzzle pieces of your life, arrange them with care, and offer both yourself and your reader a deeper understanding of your story’s arc.

Home can look like many things, and mean even more.

For some, it’s a physical place—a house that held us, raised us, maybe nurtured us, maybe not. For others, home was never about a structure. It was a person. Someone who grounded your experience in this world, who held space for you.

As you prepare to write your memoir, pause to reflect:

What does home mean to you?

Where was it?

Who was it?

How did it make you feel to be there—or to be with them?

The first place I called home was the first house my parents bought: a 1935 Craftsman bungalow in Atlanta’s West End. I don’t remember everything—like what we ate for dinner or the exact layout of the kitchen—but the memories I do have are vivid and pure.

I remember swinging on our porch swing, We had a beautiful porch, which as a child felt really big, but when I went back to the house a few years ago, the porch actually looked small. But I remember spending a lot of time on that porch with my mom and my brother. My brother and I would write and draw in chalk on the porch, the steps.

I also remember my bedroom being in the very front of the house. I had these beautiful glass white french doors that I loved, but at night, they scared me. It seemed like through those doors, every shadow from outside the house, would appear on my bedroom walls. I often had the same nightmare in this room and was scared to sleep here, despite how beautiful it was in the daylight.

I remember waking up from a nap one day and catching my mom watching Holiday Heart. I wanted to stay up and watch it with her. She warned me that it was a sad movie, but I still wanted to stay. I ended up watching it with her and crying my eyes out when Alfre Woodard's character died.

We only lived here for about two years, but it was the first home I knew, though not the first one I lived in.

The spaces we call home—whether they’re houses, people, or even ourselves—shape us. They hold power. They carry meaning. They are the sacred ground where our stories take root.

So return there.

Write. Reflect. Remember.

Again and again.

Because your story lives there.

Summer J. Robinson

Publisher. Filmmaker. CEO. Building Silver Bangles Productions, a multidisciplinary storytelling agency committed to telling and elevating stories that inspire Afrikan diasporic intergenerational healing. We do this through book publications, TV, Film, and Documentary productions, programming, and education.