Each week, like a locavore finding the finest ears of corn in a farmer’s market, we choose our favorite Six-Word Memoirs among the thousands that grow in the fields of SMITH and SMITHTeens. Here are six six-worders we love from the week ending August 6. Click on each author’s name to check out more memoirs.

Best Imagery: “Black sheep bleached while family dyes.” —Wench
Quickest Narrative Arc: “Man of Steel. Starting to rust.”–steve_anthony
Most Positive Attitude: “Had chemo. Really cleared up pimples.”–oopsalittle
Deepest: “Everyone has scars, Everyone has stories.” —HearUsNow, from our newest Six-Word Project, “Six Words on Hope and Pain”
Best Pillow Talk: “We slept together over the phone.” —TheCatsPajamas, from SMITHTeens
Least Likely to be Mentioned in AARP Mag: “Spontaneous nocturnal orgasms post-menopause. Yeah, baby!” —Jebcrg

Plus: Turn these or any six words into a T-shirt over on our shop at Spreadshirt (check out filmmaker Sam Zalutsky modeling his own six, above). Follow us on Twitter one Six-Word Memoir each day that will surely make your day just a little more interesting. Join our Facebook group, which is like therapy, at just a fraction of the cost.
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Memoirville recommends… an interview with Mac McClelland on The Rumpus.

McClelland is author of the memoir For Us Surrender is Out of the Question, a story about her time spent abroad in Thailand. Her book moves outside of a personal journey story, where most memoirs remain, and into the history and current atrocities committed by the junta in Burma, specifically against the Karen, an ethnic minority living in Burma and fighting for autonomy since 1948.

In this interview with Jeremy Hatch, McClelland talks about how she learned about the Karen and the refugees along the Burma border, a bit of history about the conflict, and how she ultimately decided to write a memoir detailing her short stay in a distraught community.

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In our loftiest literary dreams, all poetry would be written in the great outdoors with an antique typewriter resting atop a small wooden desk. Following composition, the author would read the work aloud with passion and conviction to an eager and captivated audience.

Photo by Nick Vagnoni

In South Florida, this utopian vision is a reality—but not without a fee! (If a very small one.) Once a month, the Miami Poetry Collective runs an outdoor, public event called the Poem Depot, where the organization’s resident poets set up shop with tables and clacking typewriters on a busy Miami street to crank out fresh, personalized poetry, starting at $2 a poem. (more…)

“We need to start reinventing the memoir, like the novel, so that it’s its own medium, not just something novelists write when they don’t have an idea for a novel. We need to interrogate the form, as pretentious as that sounds. It’ll no longer be the dentistry of the literary world!”

There are tens of thousands of young, hip, dirty-mouthed, pop-culture-saturated writers out there (meaning in Brooklyn). Many of you are even named Rachel. Rachel Shukert’s Everything is Going to Be Great: An Underfunded and Overexposed European Grand Tour is the book you want to write. Just recount all the crazy shit that happened after college, when you were poor, drunk, and horny, then throw in the year you traveled and lived in Europe. Comedy, cross-cultural insights, and wise life lessons will flow from your fingers. Before you know it, Diablo Cody and Gary Shteyngart (”If you read only one memoir by a disaffected, urban, 20-something Jewish girl this year, make it this one”) are blurbing you. (more…)

Maybe it was the heat, but this week you had issues—hilarious and heartbreaking alike—and expressed them with the genius we’ve come to expect, in just six words. Here are six six-worders we love from the week ending July 30. Click on each author’s name to check out more memoirs.

Best Narrative Arc: “Achieved confidence through nudism, waitressing … separately.” —CBeth
Worst Sense of Self: “I’m not schizophrenic. Neither am I.” —GoddessRock
Best Sense of Self: “I said to myself, “Self, WTF?’” —ctgood2 (profile pic, above).
Best Reason to Keep your Pokerface: “I never had a full deck.” —Passerby
Most Dubious Use of Technology: “Accidentally hit ‘Reply All,’ lost job.” —Valhallarie
Most Moving Use of the Dictionary: “Athazagoraphobia: The fear of being forgotten.” —Missmae, from SMITHTeens.

Plus: Free shipping from July 30-Aug. 1 if you’d like to turn these or any six words into a T-shirt over on our shop at Spreadshirt. Follow us on Twitter one Six-Word Memoir each day that will surely make your day just a little more interesting. Join our Facebook group where the sixes swing and hum, like a free jazz show in the summer. (more…)

When we created the “Harvey Heads” T-shirt drawn from the 120+ portraits that an incredible collection of artists/Harvey enthusiasts made as a surprise for the late Harvey Pekar’s 70th birthday, we knew it was cool, but had no intention for it to be a collector’s item. Now with Harvey’s passing wearing the T-shirt takes on a new meaning (and every time I wear it, it sparks a conversation about Pekar with a stranger; a lovely thing). This weekend Spreadshirt is offering free shipping for its partner shops such as SMITH (on the Pekar shirt, a Six-Word Memoir shirt, or any SMITH apparel), so I thought it would be a good time to let everyone know about the Pekar tee again. It’s wearable tribute to a master storyteller, one we miss an awful lot. Use these coupon codes when you checkout: FREEWEEKEND (U.S.), CADFREEWEEKEND (Canada).

You can order your Pekar tee or hoodie here. For more on the making of the Harvey Heads (spearheaded by Pekar Project editor, Jeff Newelt), and a list of the nine artists who contributed to the T-shirt, read an earlier post. Above: a postcard I received from artist Rick Reilly. Rick’s Pekar tee had just arrived and he was moved to record that moment in the best way he knows how.
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This week Hephzibah Anderson spoke with Stephen Colbert about her recent memoir, Chastened: The Unexpected Story of My Year Without Sex.

Anderson’s memoir tells the story of her self-assigned year without sex, with the intention of gaining insight into the increasingly emotionally frustrating world of dating, love, and intimacy. (more…)

If you’re a collector of vintage clothing, you know that more often than not, an old item can give you a glimpse into the life of the previous owner. A lingering smell of perfume, a sewn on patch or a cigarette burn, these relics have the power to change a common place garment into a mysterious, wearable story. The unpredictable and (sometimes) fascinating narrative behind vintage clothing has been complied together on Sentimental Value, an ongoing blog that showcases endearing stories of clothing and accessories found on eBay.

One of our favorite submissions, “Coach Kirby Sateen Tennis Shoes–size 7.5,” tells the story of a beautiful nurse (happily married too!) who has been the object of a relentless romantic pursuit by a fellow doctor. His latest attempt to woo her was a pair of stylish coach tennis shoes, which she immediate gave away to a friend of hers. With size 9 feet, the friend had no choice but to sell the shoes on eBay. How’s that for some sentimental value!?

To learn more about the blog and these noteworthy stories from eBay, check out this amazing Ignite video the site’s creator, Emily Spivack.

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