A conversion narrative is built into every autobiography: the writer purports to be the one who remembers, who saw, who did, who felt, but the writer is no longer that person. In writing things down, she is reborn. And yet still defined by the actions she took, even if she now distances herself from them. To be hard is to let things roll off you, to live in the present, not to dwell or worry. To become a writer is to have left early no matter what time you got home.