0:00:00.580,0:00:02.670
So I know TED is about

0:00:02.670,0:00:04.806
a lot of things that are big,

0:00:04.806,0:00:08.150
but I want to talk to you about[br]something very small,

0:00:08.150,0:00:11.284
so small it's a single word.

0:00:11.284,0:00:13.537
The word is "misfit."

0:00:13.537,0:00:17.554
It's one of my favorite words,[br]because it's so literal.

0:00:17.554,0:00:21.919
I mean, it's a person who sort of[br]missed fitting in,

0:00:21.919,0:00:24.473
or a person who fits in badly,

0:00:24.473,0:00:29.744
or this, a person, who is poorly[br]adapted to new situations

0:00:29.744,0:00:31.370
and environments.

0:00:31.370,0:00:34.474
I'm a card-carrying misfit,

0:00:34.474,0:00:37.330
and I'm here for the other[br]misfits in the room,

0:00:37.330,0:00:40.233
because I'm never the only one.

0:00:40.233,0:00:43.019
I'm going to tell you a misfit story.

0:00:43.019,0:00:45.968
Somewhere in my early 30s,

0:00:45.968,0:00:50.333
the dream of becoming a writer[br]came right to my doorstep.

0:00:50.333,0:00:53.398
Actually, it came to my mailbox[br]in the form of a letter

0:00:53.398,0:00:58.437
that said I'd won a giant literary prize[br]for a short story I'd written.

0:00:58.437,0:01:02.222
The short story was about my life[br]as a competitive swimmer,

0:01:02.222,0:01:05.449
and about my crappy home life,

0:01:05.449,0:01:11.487
and a little bit about how grief[br]and loss can make you insane.

0:01:11.487,0:01:16.711
The prize was a trip to New York City[br]to meet big-time editors and agents

0:01:16.711,0:01:18.406
and other authors.

0:01:18.406,0:01:22.284
So kind of it was the wannabe[br]writer's dream, right?

0:01:22.284,0:01:26.347
You know what I did the day[br]the letter came to my house?

0:01:26.347,0:01:28.066
Because I'm me,

0:01:28.066,0:01:30.039
I put the letter on my kitchen table,

0:01:30.039,0:01:34.219
I poured myself a giant glass of vodka

0:01:34.219,0:01:36.889
with ice and lime,

0:01:36.889,0:01:39.211
and I sat there in my underwear

0:01:39.211,0:01:41.115
for an entire day

0:01:41.115,0:01:44.854
just staring at the letter.

0:01:44.854,0:01:47.849
I was thinking about all the ways[br]I'd already screwed my life up.

0:01:47.849,0:01:50.868
Who the hell was I to go to New York City

0:01:50.868,0:01:53.840
and pretend to be a writer?

0:01:53.840,0:01:55.349
Who was I?

0:01:55.349,0:01:56.928
I'll tell you.

0:01:56.928,0:01:58.855
I was a misfit.

0:01:58.855,0:02:02.060
Like legions of other children,

0:02:02.060,0:02:04.451
I came from an abusive household

0:02:04.451,0:02:07.981
that I narrowly escaped with my life.

0:02:07.981,0:02:12.184
I already had two epically[br]failed marriages underneath my belt.

0:02:12.184,0:02:15.527
I'd flunked out of college,[br]not once but twice,

0:02:15.527,0:02:18.987
and maybe even a third time[br]that I'm not going to tell you about.

0:02:18.987,0:02:20.821
(Laughter)

0:02:20.821,0:02:24.978
And I'd done an episode[br]of rehab for drug use.

0:02:24.978,0:02:30.458
And I'd had two lovely[br]staycations in jail.

0:02:30.458,0:02:32.757
So I'm on the right stage.

0:02:32.757,0:02:36.170
(Laughter)

0:02:36.959,0:02:40.349
But the real reason, I think,[br]I was a misfit,

0:02:40.349,0:02:43.461
is that my daughter died[br]the day she was born,

0:02:43.461,0:02:48.337
and I hadn't figured out[br]how to live with that story yet.

0:02:48.337,0:02:53.585
After my daughter died,[br]I also spent a long time homeless,

0:02:53.585,0:02:57.045
living under an overpass

0:02:57.045,0:03:00.388
in a kind of profound state[br]of zombie grief and loss

0:03:00.388,0:03:02.362
that some of us encounter along the way,

0:03:02.362,0:03:06.240
maybe all of us, if you live long enough.

0:03:06.240,0:03:10.535
You know, homeless people are some[br]of our most heroic misfits,

0:03:10.535,0:03:14.924
because they start out as us.

0:03:14.924,0:03:20.079
So you see, I'd missed fitting in[br]to just about every category out there:

0:03:20.079,0:03:25.675
daughter, wife, mother, scholar.

0:03:25.675,0:03:27.997
And the dream of being a writer

0:03:27.997,0:03:32.780
was really kind of like a small,[br]sad stone in my throat.

0:03:32.780,0:03:38.585
It was pretty much in spite of myself[br]that I got on that plane

0:03:38.585,0:03:40.930
and flew to New York City,

0:03:40.930,0:03:43.090
where the writers are.

0:03:43.090,0:03:47.130
Fellow misfits, I can almost[br]see your heads glowing.

0:03:47.130,0:03:49.034
I can pick you out of a room.

0:03:49.034,0:03:51.495
At first, you would've loved it.

0:03:51.495,0:03:53.214
You got to choose the three[br]famous writers you wanted to meet,

0:03:53.214,0:03:56.929
and these guys went[br]and found them for you.

0:03:56.929,0:03:59.437
You got set up at the Gramercy Park Hotel,

0:03:59.437,0:04:02.339
where you got to drink Scotch[br]late in the night

0:04:02.339,0:04:04.754
with cool, smart, swank people,

0:04:04.754,0:04:08.260
and you got to pretend you were cool

0:04:08.260,0:04:09.468
and smart and swank too.

0:04:09.468,0:04:12.626
And you got to meet a bunch[br]of editors and authors and agents

0:04:12.626,0:04:17.664
at very, very fancy lunches and dinners.

0:04:17.664,0:04:19.801
Ask me how fancy.

0:04:22.308,0:04:24.143
I'm making a confession:

0:04:24.143,0:04:27.835
I stole three linen napkins

0:04:27.835,0:04:30.621
from three different restaurants

0:04:30.621,0:04:33.369
and I shoved a menu down my pants.

0:04:33.369,0:04:35.087
(Laughter)

0:04:35.087,0:04:38.315
I just wanted some keepsakes[br]so that when I got home,

0:04:38.315,0:04:41.543
I could believe it had really[br]happened to me.

0:04:41.543,0:04:43.563
You know?

0:04:43.563,0:04:45.560
The three writers I wanted to meet

0:04:45.560,0:04:48.648
were Carol Maso, Lynne Tillman,[br]and Peggy Phelan.

0:04:48.648,0:04:51.574
These were not famous,[br]best-selling authors,

0:04:51.574,0:04:55.962
but to me, they were women writer titans.

0:04:55.962,0:04:59.956
Carole Maso wrote the book[br]that later became my art bible.

0:04:59.956,0:05:03.927
Lynne Tillman gave me permission[br]to believe that there was a chance

0:05:03.927,0:05:07.085
my stories could be part of the world.

0:05:07.085,0:05:09.871
And Peggy Phelan reminded me

0:05:09.871,0:05:11.659
that maybe my brains

0:05:11.659,0:05:15.212
could be more important than my boobs.

0:05:15.212,0:05:18.439
They weren't mainstream women writers,

0:05:18.439,0:05:20.808
but they were cutting a path

0:05:20.808,0:05:24.453
through the mainstream[br]with their body stories,

0:05:24.453,0:05:29.515
I like to think kind of the way[br]water cut the Grand Canyon.

0:05:29.515,0:05:32.719
It nearly killed me with joy[br]to hang out with these three

0:05:32.719,0:05:35.181
over 50-year old women writers,

0:05:35.181,0:05:37.921
and the reason it nearly[br]killed me with joy

0:05:37.921,0:05:40.405
is that I'd never known a joy like that.

0:05:40.405,0:05:42.588
I'd never been in a room like that.

0:05:42.588,0:05:44.747
My mother never went to college,

0:05:44.747,0:05:47.464
and my creative career to that point

0:05:47.464,0:05:52.758
was a sort of small, sad, stillborn thing.

0:05:52.758,0:05:56.868
So kind of in those first nights[br]in New York I wanted to die there.

0:05:56.868,0:06:01.187
I was just like, "Kill me now.[br]I'm good. This is beautiful."

0:06:01.187,0:06:03.788
Some of you in the room will understand

0:06:03.788,0:06:05.158
what happened next.

0:06:05.158,0:06:09.477
First they took me to the offices[br]of Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

0:06:09.477,0:06:13.703
Farrar, Straus and Giroux[br]was like my mega dream press.

0:06:13.703,0:06:17.418
I mean, T.S. Eliot and Flannery O'Connor[br]were published there.

0:06:17.418,0:06:21.992
The main editor guy sat me down[br]and talked to me for a long time

0:06:21.992,0:06:26.752
trying to convince me I had a book in me[br]about my life as a swimmer.

0:06:26.752,0:06:28.726
You know, like, a memoir.

0:06:28.726,0:06:31.211
The whole time he was talking to me,[br]I sat there smiling and nodding

0:06:31.211,0:06:35.692
like a numb idiot

0:06:35.692,0:06:37.712
with my arms crossed over my chest

0:06:37.712,0:06:44.121
while nothing, nothing, nothing[br]came out of my throat.

0:06:44.121,0:06:47.511
So in the end,[br]he patted me on the shoulder

0:06:47.511,0:06:49.786
like a swim coach might,

0:06:49.786,0:06:51.644
and he wished me luck,

0:06:51.644,0:06:54.105
and he gave me some free books,

0:06:54.105,0:06:57.588
and he showed me out the door.

0:06:57.588,0:07:01.141
Next they took me to the offices[br]of W.W. Norton,

0:07:01.141,0:07:03.672
where I was pretty sure[br]I would be escorted from the building

0:07:03.672,0:07:06.366
just for wearing Doc Martens.

0:07:06.366,0:07:08.316
But that didn't happen.

0:07:08.316,0:07:11.219
Being at the Norton offices[br]felt like reaching up into the night sky

0:07:11.219,0:07:16.768
and touching the moon while the stars

0:07:16.768,0:07:19.949
stitched your name across the cosmos.

0:07:19.949,0:07:22.062
I mean, that's how big[br]a deal it was to me.

0:07:22.062,0:07:23.734
You get it?

0:07:23.734,0:07:26.404
Their lead editor, Carol Houck Smith,

0:07:26.404,0:07:30.770
leaned over right in my face[br]with these beady, bright, fierce eyes

0:07:30.770,0:07:34.160
and said, "Well send me something[br]then, immediately!"

0:07:34.160,0:07:36.644
See, now most people,[br]especially TED people

0:07:36.644,0:07:38.618
would have run to the mailbox.

0:07:38.618,0:07:41.660
It took me over a decade

0:07:41.660,0:07:44.678
to even imagine[br]putting something in an envelope

0:07:44.678,0:07:49.067
and licking a stamp.

0:07:49.067,0:07:50.576
On the last night,

0:07:50.576,0:07:51.784
I gave a big reading

0:07:51.784,0:07:54.501
at the National Poetry Club.

0:07:54.501,0:07:56.242
And at the end of the reading,

0:07:56.242,0:08:00.886
Katharine Kidde, of Kidde, Hoyt[br]and Picard literary agency,

0:08:00.886,0:08:03.370
walked straight up to me and shook my hand

0:08:03.370,0:08:07.875
and offered me representation,[br]like, on the spot.

0:08:07.875,0:08:11.776
I stood there and I kind of went deaf.

0:08:11.776,0:08:13.657
Has this ever happened to you?

0:08:13.657,0:08:16.025
And I almost started crying

0:08:16.025,0:08:19.973
because all the people in the room[br]were dressed so beautifully,

0:08:19.973,0:08:23.270
and all that came out of my mouth[br]was, "I don't know.

0:08:23.270,0:08:26.869
I have to think about it."

0:08:26.869,0:08:33.115
And she said, "Okay then,"[br]and walked away.

0:08:33.115,0:08:39.594
All those open hands out to me,[br]that small, sad stone in my throat.

0:08:39.594,0:08:43.680
You see, I'm trying to tell you something[br]about people like me.

0:08:43.680,0:08:47.697
Misfit people, we don't know always know[br]how to hope or say yes

0:08:47.697,0:08:49.276
or choose the big thing

0:08:49.276,0:08:51.389
even when it's right in front of us.

0:08:51.389,0:08:53.038
It's a shame we carry.

0:08:53.038,0:08:56.126
It's the shame of wanting something good.

0:08:56.126,0:08:57.403
It's the shame of feeling something good.

0:08:57.403,0:09:01.606
It's the shame of not really believing[br]we deserve to be in the room

0:09:01.606,0:09:04.671
with the people we admire.

0:09:04.671,0:09:07.620
If I could, I'd go back[br]and I'd coach myself.

0:09:07.620,0:09:11.986
I'd be exactly like those[br]over 50-year old women who helped me.

0:09:11.986,0:09:15.585
I'd teach myself how to want things,[br]how to stand up,

0:09:15.585,0:09:16.676
how to ask for them.

0:09:16.676,0:09:20.623
I'd say, "You! Yeah, you![br]You belong in the room too."

0:09:20.623,0:09:23.147
The radiance falls on all of us,

0:09:23.147,0:09:27.304
and we are nothing without each other.

0:09:27.304,0:09:30.206
Instead, I flew back to Oregon,

0:09:30.206,0:09:36.476
and as I watched the evergreens and rain[br]come back into view,

0:09:36.476,0:09:41.491
I just drank many tiny bottles[br]of airplane feel sorry for yourself.

0:09:41.491,0:09:47.621
I thought about how, if I was a writer,[br]I was some kind of misfit writer.

0:09:47.621,0:09:50.407
What I'm saying is, I flew back to Oregon[br]without a book deal,

0:09:50.407,0:09:54.518
without an agent, and with only[br]a head full and heart full of memories

0:09:54.518,0:09:57.606
of having sat so near

0:09:57.606,0:10:00.485
the beautiful writers.

0:10:00.485,0:10:05.175
Memory was the only prize[br]I allowed myself.

0:10:05.175,0:10:09.100
And yet, at home in the dark,

0:10:09.100,0:10:11.584
back in my underwear,

0:10:11.584,0:10:14.463
I could still hear their voices.

0:10:14.463,0:10:18.527
They said, "Don't listen to anyone[br]who tries to get you to shut up

0:10:18.527,0:10:21.058
or change your story."

0:10:21.058,0:10:24.564
They said, "Give voice to the story[br]only you know how to tell."

0:10:24.564,0:10:27.211
They said, "Sometimes telling the story

0:10:27.211,0:10:31.878
is the thing that saves your life."

0:10:31.878,0:10:35.176
Now I am, as you can see,[br]the woman over 50,

0:10:35.176,0:10:38.357
and I'm a writer,

0:10:38.357,0:10:40.632
and I'm a mother,

0:10:40.632,0:10:43.233
and I became a teacher.

0:10:43.233,0:10:46.298
Guess who my favorite students are?

0:10:46.298,0:10:46.902
Although it didn't happen the day[br]that dream letter came through my mailbox,

0:10:46.902,0:10:52.266
I did write a memoir

0:10:52.266,0:10:54.889
called "The Chronology of Water."

0:10:54.889,0:10:59.580
In it are the stories of how many times[br]I've had to reinvent a self

0:10:59.580,0:11:02.877
from the ruins of my choices,

0:11:02.877,0:11:08.310
the stories of how my seeming failures[br]were really just weird-ass portals

0:11:08.310,0:11:10.563
to something beautiful.

0:11:10.563,0:11:15.509
All I had to do was give voice[br]to the story.

0:11:15.509,0:11:20.664
There's a myth in most cultures[br]about following your dreams.

0:11:20.664,0:11:23.334
It's called the Hero's Journey.

0:11:23.334,0:11:26.283
But I prefer a different myth

0:11:26.283,0:11:29.232
that's slightly to the side of that,[br]or underneath it.

0:11:29.232,0:11:32.041
It's called the Misfit's Myth,

0:11:32.041,0:11:33.806
and it goes like this:

0:11:33.806,0:11:36.198
even at the moment of your failure,

0:11:36.198,0:11:39.077
right then, you are beautiful.

0:11:39.077,0:11:44.232
You don't know it yet, but you[br]have the ability to reinvent yourself

0:11:44.232,0:11:45.764
endlessly.

0:11:45.764,0:11:47.901
That's your beauty.

0:11:47.901,0:11:50.524
You can be a drunk,

0:11:50.524,0:11:53.311
you can be a survivor of abuse,

0:11:53.311,0:11:54.495
you can be an ex-con,

0:11:54.495,0:11:55.168
you can be a homeless person,

0:11:55.168,0:11:58.117
you can lose all your money[br]or your job or your husband

0:11:58.117,0:12:00.625
or your wife, or the worst thing of all,

0:12:00.625,0:12:02.065
a child.

0:12:02.065,0:12:04.224
You can even lose your marbles.

0:12:04.224,0:12:09.007
You can be standing dead center[br]in the middle of your failure

0:12:09.007,0:12:11.167
and still, I'm only here to tell you,

0:12:11.167,0:12:13.303
you are so beautiful.

0:12:13.303,0:12:15.625
Your story deserves to be heard,

0:12:15.625,0:12:19.921
because you, you rare[br]and phenomenal misfit,

0:12:19.921,0:12:22.521
you new species,

0:12:22.521,0:12:24.774
are the only one in the room

0:12:24.774,0:12:26.376
who can tell the story

0:12:26.376,0:12:29.766
the way only you would.

0:12:29.766,0:12:32.367
And I'd be listening.

0:12:32.367,0:12:34.457
Thank you.

0:12:34.457,0:12:40.099
(Applause)