Meet Alexandra Dane

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Alexandra Dane a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Alexandra, really happy you were able to join us today and we’re looking forward to sharing your story and insights with our readers. Let’s start with the heart of it all – purpose. How did you find your purpose?

First of all, I am an example of ever-evolving purpose that depended on where and who I was at the time and what time was available. For the last fifteen years I have been developing my writing, but before that — as a daughter, granddaughter and mother — I was a caregiver when needed for my extended family, a mother that raised three babies, a Hospice volunteer, a choir soprano, a volunteer at schools, churches and an historic garden.
These experiences built to what I finally decided was my next direction: to put all the dialog and words in my head onto paper. I literally wrote on my application for a writing workshop that “I had no idea if I could write but I needed to try.” The rest fell into place with hard work, many classes, many mentors and the point in my life when I could leave home and explore this possibility.
“Try” is an operative word for me.
I had early success and solid support when I began writing. I wrote what I knew about: cancer, caregiving, death and dying, the ugly parts and the beautiful parts of helping people at end of life. I began a manuscript and published pieces of the story. When cancer found me and I woke up on the other side of the bed as a patient I knew I had to start over and weave the caregiver and patient stories together, my skills and my own journey part of the story now. So today’s purpose is the make this work on paper, find an interested publishing venue and go to the next level.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

I write four hours or more a day. If there are no other interruptions other than food I can write from morning to night. A lot of this is rewriting, editing, submitting pieces of my story to literary journals and publications. The more I hit the ‘submit’ button and people can read my words, the more at ease I have become with sharing and getting feedback.
There is no money in this writing for the most part and I am very lucky there is outside support. My blog, flash nonfiction and essays are written to disclose a lot about end of life but also getting on with life — positiveness and information. My bio states: “Alexandra Dane writes about coming of age twice in her life, once as a caregiver for her dying mother and then as a patient herself.” I write about the little big things in my blog and not too many words. We are barraged by words. I strive to leave you with something to think about for the rest of the day in very few paragraphs.

( I believe I can put these links at the end of this questionnaire, if not I can add them in here when noted)

I also use another side of my brain with a small, on-demand baby sweater knitting business. Knitting is an important outlet for me — knitting is meditative and colorful and unlike the solitude of writing I can sit with other knitters, talk and create together. Heirloom, cashmere items that are getting passed down now in families to other siblings. It brings me great joy to work with families, create and then see them all bundled up in this tiny sweetness. It breaks up my writing and I feel like I have babies now all over the world. I love the balance between my two passions.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

My mother, an artist, and my grandmother, a state Senator, were intense role models for individualism and action. They imprinted on me the need to do what I am good at and not to care what any one else thought. So I would say it is important to write what you know, practice doing it well and care passionately.
Writing is like walking down the street naked; it exposes you. My advice to writers is put in words what means the most to you. Get feedback from other writers, not a friend down the street (time for that later). Find people for a writing group. I even like zoom meetings. Keep writing.
For the knitting piece? Remember different colors bring joy to different people. And as I write this, I think my two audiences are not that much different. Metaphors, sorry.

Alright, so before we go we want to ask you to take a moment to reflect and share what you think you would do if you somehow knew you only had a decade of life left?

Well I might have only a decade or less to live, that is the fact. I am still on a cancer watch, ten years in total, and have three years left until the oncologist stops watching. So the clock ticks. And I am spending it doing what I have given myself permission to do: write about life’s ups and downs. Share the best and the worst. I prioritize family and my new grandson and staying as healthy as possible. I have a close group of friends. I chose quality time over obligation. I make the time to read, a lot. I drink a double espresso every morning with bliss.
I also have writing space both on the east and west coast and where I write by the sea. When I need a break I walk along the water and take selfies to capture my existence. It reminds me that I am still here. I don’t spend time justifying anything: there are people in both places that make me write better, make me creative, make me as whole as I can be. Seize what works and do not doubt yourself.
Because if there are only a few years ahead, don’t you want to look back and say you smelled the lilacs, held the baby, wrote the words, felt the love, grabbed each day?

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.alexandradane.com
• Instagram: @alexandradanewriter @adaneknits
• Facebook: Alexandra Dane
• Other: Blog: www.alexandrdadanewrites.com
  Substack: alexandradane.substack.com