Hi, I’m Esme Rose Marsh

I’m a writer and artist from Nottingham, U.K. I started this newsletter back in April of 2019 to suss out the things — big and small, that matter in the making of a meaningful life.

I called it Bet You Rue the Day You Kissed a Writer in the Dark after the Lorde lyric because I rarely leave the things that have touched my life without claw mark indentations.

In over two years of contemplating what it means to live a meaningful life, I found that my words would, again and again, unearth questions surrounding the same three things: truth, reality and memory.

What is truth when the truth is a malleable thing? What is real when there is as much to learn from stories as in ‘real’ life? What is memorable when memory itself is an amalgamation of our choosing?

If meaning is in truth, then is truth something we perform or is it something we bear witness to alone, in the quiet humility of night? If meaning is in what is memorable, then how do we choose what stays and what gets left behind?

I’ve Been Meaning to Say… is a monthly newsletter that untangles these ruminations through stories told from my own life. Though I do not believe there is a direct route to discovering meaning, I do hope you’ll gain something from me asking the question…