Lost in the Comma Grove

Where Sentences Stumble, Stories Begin

 (Or: how “writing a memoir” became a badly planned jungle trek—with imaginary coconuts and one very judgmental semicolon.)

I didn’t set out to write a book.
I set out to remember.
And like most things I begin with misplaced confidence, it quickly spiralled out of control.

It started innocently—my daughter asked a simple question about my childhood. Maybe about school, or what I ate, or whether electricity had been invented yet. I don’t remember the exact question. But I remember the pause it created.

That one pause cracked a door.

Through it came memories—bright, blurry, insistent—like guests who didn’t wait to be invited.

One pause became paragraphs. Paragraphs turned into chapters. And suddenly, I was deep in a memoir.

That’s when I got lost.

Not emotionally—though yes, that too.
Grammatically.

I wandered into The Comma Grove.

Looks innocent from the outside. Step in, though, and the commas swing down from branches like hyperactive monkeys, pelting you with clauses, screeching for attention. You try to swat one away and suddenly three more appear, arguing about whether they belong before or after “and.”

I once lost an entire afternoon battling a particularly aggressive comma that wedged itself between two very ordinary words.

I zoomed in, rephrased, double-checked the rules, and still it clung on… grinning like a coconut thief. By the time I crawled out of that scuffle, I’d learned two things:

1. Oxford comma forums are scarier than Twitter.
2. I had officially forgotten what my chapter was even about.

Naturally, I armed myself. A crisp new copy of The Elements of Style—that joyless little manual that treats adverbs like illegal substances. Then, The Situation and the Story, which promised to help me “find my narrative voice.” Instead, it helped me find anxiety and a sudden urge to shave every sentence bald.

At some point, I became a kind of punctuation monk… shaving my sentences, meditating on em-dashes, and completely ignoring the real chapters: the cousins who were equal parts hero and menace, the boarding school biscuit tins that never closed properly, the silent battles at breakfast tables. Those chapters waited, tapping their feet.

And I ignored them.
Because, obviously, the commas were louder.

At one point, I even thought: Forget this. I should go walk in a real coconut grove. Fewer commas. Possibly fewer monkeys.

But I stayed.

Sweating. Spiritually dehydrated. Pelted with punctuation.

And here’s the truth: I wasn’t editing. I was hiding.

Because when you write about your own past—the half-remembered, embarrassing bits—you grab onto tiny details. Was it June or July? Red shirt or maroon? Did she say “Don’t be silly” or “Don’t be stupid”? You chase them like fallen coconuts after a storm, hoping that if you get it exactly right, the story won’t feel so fragile.

But memory isn’t a courtroom exhibit.
It’s a mood.
It’s the smell of chalk dust.
It’s a half-smile in a faded photograph.
It’s the sound of rustling leaves when no one is there.

Eventually, I realised: a memoir doesn’t need perfect commas. It just needs feelings that ring true… even if the grammar occasionally swings at your head.

So I let a few commas run wild. I stopped rearranging the same sentence for the seventh time. And finally, sunburnt and humbled, I staggered out of the Comma Grove… still swatting at punctuation monkeys, but carrying a finished manuscript.

Now, whenever I feel that itch to spend an hour debating one microscopic pause, I remind myself:

Not every leaf needs pruning.
Not every monkey needs chasing.
And sometimes, even a coconut knows when to drop.