This Picture Makes Me Laugh

every time i see it
l to r: ever, evan, dakota and ian

A Dream Come True: Published on Amazon 'Welcome To My World'

A dream of mine has come true in one more step: I've been published on Amazon in this e-collection Welcome To My World, edited by Sarah Bryden-Brown, an extremely social media savvy writer, editor and curator. The collection is as its subtitle indicates: essays written by mothers about being stay at home moms or working moms, and despite the 'vs' in the title, this isn't a clash between us but an honest and interesting look at how 13 modern day mothers make their lives work.

For the price of a cup of coffee and a bagel, you can read this collection on Amazon's Kindle, Barnes and Noble Nook, or if you don't have this options, download a free application:

Kindle for PC
Kindle For Mac
Nook

It is because of this blog that I have been able to doggedly and persistently attempt to turn my writing into something more closely resembling a career, and I am thanking all of you most sincerely for coming here and reading what I write, and for (mostly:) keeping up your own blogs so I can continue to learn about your lives and read your writings.

A big shout out to the awesome GIGGLE, the book's sponsor. Their clothes and toys are really, really cute. One of my favorite baby shower gifts for Ever came from Giggle- a pink and orange striped footy sleeper.

Feed the Writers

via Wendy MacNaughton @ New York Times

The Things That Come Out of That Child's Mouth

Mom you can't be naked except for your bra in suburbia. And eating watermelon!

When I was doing my homework you guys would not stop talking. Married people!

The world can be a hard place. That's why we're so lucky to have our family.

When I nurse my baby, I'm going to get one of those bras that pops your boob open.

Sometimes I fart so hard my underwear bunches up in my butt.

love you Lola :)

Architect

Dakota 17, Ever 8 months

I try to focus on the larger issues, and instead I see toes. Baby toes. His baby toes. The curse and blessing of a parent: we see the vulnerability, innocent core, love, the challenges and hardships that have landed their blows one by one, carved their place and carved the face of a child into a young adult- we struggle to squint and find the place where the soft skinned hand of a teenage boy comes to rest on the door handle of our house and say I'm going to Grandmas, and I'm not coming back for a while.

Some of you know what is going on with my oldest son. Some of you do not. But all of you, I'm sure, know what this agonizing feeling is: helplessness in the face of your child's suffering. We can fix, mend, comfort, argue, provide supports, guidance, there is so much we can do, and much of the time, I'm in that place. But sometimes, I look at Ever's little self, and I see Dakota's littlest self, and I am crushed with my love for him and all I cannot do- the letting go to do. It is a labor in it's own right.

The panicked worry that you, the centre of everything that happens to your child ( via society and your own secret beliefs ), are responsible for what is happening can be either completely reinforced ( by the angry teen, a scared loved one ) or quickly negated ( an emotionally detached therapist, a loving husband ) but ultimately you have to come to terms with yourself, not your child, the therapist, the loved ones.

Did I do the best I could? Can I do better?

Yes, and surely, life's work, yes.

The age old question that strangles me is that perhaps my best was not enough.

I have always been a fiercely felt believer that parenting is absolutely exhausting work that pushes you to the brink of your personal end zones, if done well. Perhaps this is a self flagellating American belief, but even if that is part of the truth, it's not the whole. A 'hands off' approach works well with a small particular of littles. Benign neglect is a concept that even if it is to work well, requires a smooth and humming engine of parenthood running underneath the nonchalance, one that still requires effort and thought and discipline. Nothing good comes easy. Even ease requires a graceful architecture.

I have done nothing since the day Dakota was born more than I have worked on myself as a human being and mother. And still I cannot say that I do not doubt myself deeply as he struggles so hard.


The beauty of "spacing" children many years apart lies in the fact that parents have time to learn the mistakes that were made with the older ones - which permits them to make exactly the opposite mistakes with the younger ones. ~Sydney J. Harris

Published: Far Away Literary Magazine

Visit the beautifully rendered Far Away magazine and read the wonderful essays,
including our own Mary Moon
I'm happy to have my essay included!

If you have anything better to do, You probably should do it

Everything is just grunt work this year. Like the Army. Life is about Getting Through This and reminding myself This Won't Go On Forever or assuring myself You Will Figure This Out even though I have no idea if I will, or won't, or what. I knew that going to work after Ever was born was going to be hard. I had no idea what kind of hard. I though it would be ' the house is such a mess ' hard, and ' noodles for dinner again! ' hard. Hard like a funny movie where your hair is crazy and your husband lazy and lalala. It's not hard like a funny movie. It's just hard.

It's not about just working full time, it's the particular brew of ingredients- the particulars of our family life- that are making this so exhausting. I feel spiritually, mentally, physically and emotionally exhausted. Even this screen: Mr. Curry pulled out this old computer screen and attached it because mine was blinking on and off at a rapid pace, and this new/old screen is huge and strange and makes me feel different when I write. See. I know my life is careening beyond my reach when so many things in my mind start with makes me feel.

____

I'm nursing my baby, and I'm sleeping with her, and I wake up and shuffle around and get everything done and we speed out of the house, just like a million other mothers in the world. I drop the kids off, and go to work- usually on my lunch break I'm taking Ever and picking up a kid or two and taking them home- and then at 5pm I'm home, and I have between 5 and about 7:30 which is when Ever goes to bed, ie gets nursed for fifteen minutes. But lately she won't go to bed at 7:30, it's more like 8. Usually Mr. Curry picks up ee from my work around 3pm, so I get home at 5pm and she wants to nurse, and Mr. Curry is making dinner. In this time between 5 and 7:30 I'm supposed to Look over Lola's homework, (even if Mr. Curry did xyz I need to stay in the loop, see what she is doing) Eat Dinner, Bathe Ever, Spend Time With Lola, Clean Up, Take Vitamins, Make Lunches, Go Through My Mail/Sign Shit, Answer Emails? And that isn't counting all the many things that pop up every day, uncatagorized, and demand to be attended to. It's those extras that especially push you over the brink. And the thing that I didn't count on

was that

I'm not and can't be the kind of mother I need and want to be doing what I'm doing.

I said it. Look at it, up there. Doesn't it make you want to cry? Me, I'm crying now.

I'm SUCKING SO HARD AT EVERYTHING.

I'm sucking at being a wife, a housekeeper, a friend, a relative, a mommy. I don't know what we're going to do, but something has to give. I'm not sucking at work, because that's where I get paid, and I walk in there with Ever and the attitude that I'm a professional. And the house is OK. Not great, we have a full sink of dishes usually but we do dishes every day and we have no dishwasher!

When I had the other kids, I didn't work when they were babies, AND I wasn't trying to forge a writing career.

I think my kids want a new mom, one who makes pancakes for breakfast every morning in cute shapes, one who is crafty and cooking and who keeps a pretty home, and I just want to crawl in a corner and cry because my dog Bodie has orange hair and he rubs his gigantic butt up against the walls all around the house and leaves big orange stains.

The thing that is happening is that most things are getting done, because life forces you into its mold, because you are an adult and that is what adults do. So what is giving? My relationship with my children. I'm distracted constantly. There is always something I have to be doing, there is simply not time for me to stop for forty five minutes and play with Lola on a school night. I can do it, sure. And then the things I didn't do will embarrass and upset me to the point where next time I won't do it. The teacher who never got an email. The sign up sheets for sports deadlines that were missed. The dog shit sitting in the kitchen. The laundry that has to be done so people can have underwear! Lola's school alone is like a fucking full time job. Please don't let me talk about the demands of school on a child and on the parents. Suffice to say, the paperwork, homework, computer work at home, MUST SIGN NOW sheets, and extra read these sheets just because eat up an enormous amount of time nightly. And it's not like the kids are going to stop having their problems and stages and difficulties because I'm overwhelmed. If anything, me being overwhelmed makes them worse.

I am at a point where I feel like I forgot how to do everything. I have no creative ideas how to deal with Lola's new penchant for being sassy/rude when she's the slightest bit frustrated, or what I used to talk to Mr. Curry about, or the more subtle things in life. Shades. I know the basics. I'm nursing my baby, I'm trying to pay attention to Lola when she talks (but she talks sooo much!!!) I'm smiling at the kids when I remember to (Maggie! Smile!) as they talk, I'm making lunches, I'm showered, I'm I'm I'm.... fake it till you make it?
Oh my God. This is the most boring, droning blog post I've ever written.

I can't even BLOG anymore.

!)(*&@!


ps
especially anyone new to my blog, please don't worry about me. in any REAL way. i'm not losing my mind totally. i'm in the in between phase, where you know something is really wrong, have clearly spotted the problem, but have yet one clue what you are going to do about it. ok i'm lying. while writing this post/vent i actually came up with an idea about spending time with Lola.
that's one clue.

and while editing this post i came up with another idea. it's brilliant, and it goes like this:

( me, yelling at myself ) MAGGIE IF YOU WANT TO NOT HATE YOURSELF IN A FEW YEARS STOP WORRYING ABOUT THE HOUSEWORK AND FOCUS ON YOUR CHILDREN"S FACES
(me, in response) but when my mom comes over she looks around like....
(me, yelling at myself) SO WHAT?!!!
(me, in response) hmm..you have a point.. but what about when the neighbors come over?
(me, yelling at myself) FUCK THEM!!!
(me, in response) well, sometimes you do have to get more...assertive minded to accomplish a goal
(me, yelling at myself) DAMN SKIPPY!!!
(me, in response) well i guess as long as the floors are cleaned and we can find the scissors...
(me, yelling at myself) GIVE IT UP!! YOU WILL NEVER FIND THE SCISSORS! OR THE TAPE! OR THE NICE PENS!!!
(me, in response) oh no. i really liked that pen.

I've Got A Crush On: Philip Roth

Philip Roth is one of my authors. I've been a passionate reader since I can remember being alive, and Philip Roth's deliciously novel-y smelling paperback Portnoy's Complaint was one of the first 'real live grown up' novels that I read. The audacious honesty absolutely blew my mind, impressed on to me that one of the most critical and crucial qualities of a serious novelist is the ability to detail the world in a way that resonates with resounding authenticity. Bullshit must be purposeful. The writing must be painfully true. Philip Roth's writing is intellectual, serious in tone and emotion, ( but not plodding ) even when describing the most perverted sexual act his tone remains- somehow he manages to import both the true life and feeling of the character while always keeping his authority as the conscious of the thing.

Now, the man who has reluctantly and reticently given interviews at only the request of his publishers has let himself become the subject of an hour long documentary. Although not yet released in America, I am thrilled with anticipation of watching and absorbing the words of one of my top ten favorite writers and one of the few American writers left alive with his depth of talent, influence and material.

If you haven't read any Roth, I highly recommend starting with Portnoy, or if you are scared off by novels that open ( and continue! ) with lots of masturbating, try The Human Stain or American Pastoral, both of which completely and totally absorbed my brain in that satisfying way only a great novel can.

Four By The Sea

We cannot destroy kindred: our chains stretch a little sometimes, but they never break.

-Marguise de Sevigne