Strange irony is that what we most want in life is often the one that is not there. Rebecca Solnit, feminist writer, says that often it is the desire we have for the object of our desire that fills the gap with the blue of longing.My debut novel, The Imposter is about a protagonist who struggles with the blue of longing Solnit describes. She rides on the bus top deck in her hometown, looking out at the cozy living rooms filled with happy families.In that sense, there is much I share with my fictional character: the desire to belong. It is our first place to belong. If we don't feel like we are a part of the jigsaw puzzle pieces made just for us it can leave an impression. This can lead to a desire and a need to recreate the same unit as our parents when we are older and have children of our own. It did for me.Although my childhood was not as difficult as others, I felt often like a cuckoo inside the nest. When I was five, my parents divorced. Both of them had new marriages and had more children. I felt like I was being shuffled between two different families and never felt that I belonged to either. My stepfather was a workaholic who I seldom saw, and my father was a drinker who made our lives difficult at times. My step-parents would never feel the same way about me as their offspring. I was aware of the stark contrast between the family I imagined and the one that I got. Instead, I turned my attention to the outside world and spent a lot of time at my nextdoor neighbor's house as a child, hoping to blend in with their furniture and be among their children so that I would never have to go home.I longed for something perfect, something that would last, but somehow, I created the opposite. Clearly, my neighbours wouldn't feel the same way about me as they felt about their children. That blue of longing settled in my bones.In my 20s and 30s, I was a journalist and editor for national newspapers and magazines. Journalism offers a feeling of being inside, whether it's in national newsrooms that were pre-internet first to hear news or sitting in cozy living rooms listening to secrets that hadn't been revealed to anyone else.I didn't want to share the difficulties of parenthood, but the joysI switched from newspapers to books and found intimacy in my work as a ghostwriter. When I am working with someone to write their memoir I feel like an imposter, and I find myself occupying their I instead of mine. I see the world through their eyes. Their voice is what I use to write. It is impossible to feel like you are looking in from the outside. I am transparent, I am a ghost. There is maybe a wisp in my touch but I am there, tucked between words on the page.Some people believe that parenthood will guarantee us in something lasting, but I don't think this is true for me. I was too busy working to have a child. Then I met my husband. Motherhood gave me a different sense of belonging. It was not the same one that I had hoped for. I'm not the only woman who has been disappointed by the promises of men. Let me just say that I took my baby girl home from the hospital alone and stared at her in the car seat as I wondered how I would make it work for us two.Over the years, there were both arrivals as well as departures of my daughters father. I have photos of my three children, snaps of us on holidays, where we look like the perfect family. This is the image of the family I longed for, the family that would make me envy the woman in my novel. However, I've had to remember how hard I worked for those moments, how often they were fleeting seconds, and what reality was behind those smiles. It is hard to see the same families you envy on social media when you are the sole caregiver and provider. It is amazing how easy parenting can look when you see it through this lonely lens. I can still remember the nights I watched my dinner cook in the oven as my baby slept through the night. Strangely, it was not the struggle of parenthood that I wished I could share with someone, but the joys of the first steps, first day at school, and the delight in your child's eyes when she rides a bicycle without stabilisers.Single parenthood has its downside. You spend more time with those families you have lost; those little safe units you long to be your own. The simple pleasure of being able to sit in silence with your child in front of the TV is more appealing than the quiet of your house after you have put them to bed. You feel exhausted and they suddenly make a ghost out of you. You wake up after putting your child to sleep and realize that you have lost your purpose in life.I didn't realize how precious this little unit of 2 was.For many, many years, I felt like an imposter and it was impossible to not feel that way. In some ways, I felt like I wasn't up to the standard of other families doing things right. It was strange to feel like I was missing something when I had made two people from one. I was both Mum & Dad.That was all I could see for a while: the space that the other parent should have had. My baby years passed, and so did my toddler years. I suddenly realized that I was too busy living in lack to appreciate our small unit of two. I was not focused on what we had accomplished: the traveling we had done, the trip to Japan that we took; the house we lived on while renovating our home; the seven books I had written between bathtime, bed routines and school runs. My child and I were not imposters.Realizing that I was living in regret over my childhood and longing for the perfect family, I realized how much I had missed out on. Living there made it possible for my daughter to feel the same loss. I needed to get rid of those ghosts from the past. The only way was to see the world differently.My friends were the same people I envied. I realized that there wasn't a perfect family. I saw the units that tried to protect their children from the addiction of one parent; I also heard the stories about the cheating husbands and the people who lived in fear for the future. What was that? It was something like the one my daughter and me had?My novel is the first time I have admitted that I am obsessed with belonging. But I've found my belonging in small intimate moments with my daughter. These are the moments that only one parent or child can see, and when you're the only ones against the world. I feel connected to the words that I write, no matter if they are mine or others. Perhaps belonging is not what I thought it was. It is the journey.Although I can't say if the protagonist of my novel finds her sense of belonging, I will tell you that it wont look like the traditional ideal of perfect. It is a dream.Mantle publishes The Imposter by Anna Wharton at 16.99. You can purchase it at guardianbookshop.com for 14.78
