MOB on Mother's Day

When Sara was four and I wrapped her in a towel from her bath, held her up to the mirror and sang, "Here, she is Miss America," I had no idea of exactly how beautiful of a woman she would become. Not magazine cover beauty but rather the type of woman who is beautiful to the bone.

Mother's Day found me in New York City with my daughter, Sara, celebrating her bachelorette weekend. Most parents will understand that this is a miracle. My daughter and her bridesmaids (Gretchen and Bridget) also invited my sister, Pam, and my sister in law, Debra. A true bonding of generations of strong, smart, independent, loving women gathered to rejoice that one of us has found a wonderful partner, a man suitable and worthy of her amazing attention and affection.

I could provide an itinerary of events, funny moments, remarkable moments. But the moment that will follow me is not her surprise on seeing our matching tee-shirts, or her shock that we were taking a knitting tour, or the subtle blush of viewing Le Scandal burlesque show. The moment was small, minor, easily missed by most.

When I was a young woman, my mother would take my hand and hold it out next to her hand, telling me how beautiful, unlined, and lovely was my skin, my fingers. As I aged, I witnessed my hands slowly become her hands; the raised veins and sunspots, the nails with exact same weaknesses. At first I was appalled to see her aging hands at the ends of my wrists; and then after I lost her, I realized the beauty there and how I would now comfort myself, mother myself, with her hands discovered in my own fingertips.

My daughter, without explaining or speaking, took first my left hand and spread it out and looked at my fingers, my nails and then I held out my right. Foolishly, I wondered if she worried how I would look at her wedding with my unvarnished and uneven nails. I was wrong. She was looking at my hands with love just as I have looked at her unlined, strong hands that constantly create loving meals, beautiful crafts, efficient work. Sara did not see my hands through my own critical veil but rather just as the continuation of capable women's hands in our family.

As a mother, seeing my children successful and happy would have been enough, but to be invited into her world for such a milestone event is something mother's do not even imagine.

This mother's day, I was a very fortunate mother.

Silence

"Silence, according to scientific study, is the most terrifying thing for people." Bob Dylan

I've just finished a poem titled Silence that will appear in The Light Ekphrastic next issue.

Many silent days occur in my life between semesters. It makes the transition back a bit difficult; accustomed to quiet (except for Sally barking at the planes), accustomed to no one expecting anything, not expected anywhere -- returning becomes difficult. But maybe it is good preparation. In the end, all will be silence, quiet, solitary.

Checking In

That is what we ask -
just give me a call to check in -
oh, no. too much. Well just an email
or even a txt. When you get
home.

Nothing more. Just a
nod. So I know, my
world has not ceased
while I was walking the dog.

Just a comfort to
stave the 3:24 AM clutch.
Nothing more. While I am
checking the weather for your trip.

Which begins at 8:30 AM
on the same day. And the Atlantic
so unpredictable, like Omaha and
Kansas; or today, Missouri.

Just checking. Always
checking.

As a poet . . .

I wrote this recently after receiving the word "wormwood" in my Word-of-the-day email:

Fragrant Wormwood

Pungent flower dying
on the dining room
table. Wednesday and

the world is
blanketed with wormwood.
Death stinking of

regret, remembrance, and
rind. Rejection nuzzling my
pocket, trigger finger
twitching.

Name this quote

"Freedom isn't the position that the world supports. You have to wear a suit of armor to defend it."

The Importance of Tone

Tone of voice is important in both written and spoken word.

I am currently enrolled in a class on Wimba (a voice over internet protocol that enhances online learning). As one of my projects, I decided to record a podcast on the topic of tone in Flannery O'Connor's short story, A Good Man is Hard to Find.

To learn more and to listen, just enter a screen name below (you don't have to pre-register and you can use any name that suits you.

"Eat" of Eat, Pray, Love

So at age 32, Elizabeth Gilbert had what every writer dreams about; a successful career as a writer. Paperback copies of her latest success, Eat, Pray, Love, are available for as little as $2.29 (plus shipping) on the internet. Which raises the question that vexes most writers (and musicians, photographers, etc.); how are we to make a living when our creations are so readily consumed and made available for free or near to it?

Printed matter mounds on the mortician's table and music has been pirated without remorse for over a decade (unless you count those mix tapes that are featured in Eat, Pray, Love invoking a nostalgia for simpler times. All the writers of my acquaintance testify to their devotion to the printed book; the lure of the printed page. the scent of pages enclosed between leather or cloth book ends. Well, few of us recall the scent of the mimeograph but it had an allure also and, yet, is long expired. Like them, my collection of printed matter is extensive, and much of it is housed in boxes in my basement for lack of shelf space in my busy life. And unless they hiding their collection in the attic, I might guess the same is true of them. Not that their affection and devotion to printed books is any the less. And is it only the musicians who long to collect vinyl? I am not certain of either group of artists but I do know that I can purchase Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon for $11.88 and my guess is that it would have cost me a bit more than that to buy it when it was first released. The value of art and artistic expression does not exist in the product. Yet, Elizabeth Gilbert was supporting herself, her husband (for the most part) and entertaining a lover at age 32 when she ditched it all equally. Or perhaps not so equally.

Certainly, the husband was gone forever, and the lover as well. But writing a memoir of a trip to three provocative locations and selling the movie rights and then having Julia Roberts as your doppelganger goes a long way toward thinking that perhaps she was walking away from a successful career as a writer. Rather that taking the writing career with her was the one thing she never abandoned.

I tend to agree with Maureen Callahan's review in the New York Post that the spiritual aspects of the book are superficial in the face of "the worst in Western fetishization of Eastern thought and culture, assured in its answers to existential dilemmas that have confounded intellects greater than hers." However, the movie provoked a bit richer response. In the book, the reader gets the sense that the author is skirting and skirting in memoir is a breach of contract. Movie audiences expect a bit of subterfuge from film; viewers are accustomed to reading the actors' actions and expressions, to filling in the blanks with their own experiences to a greater degree than with memoir. I did not approach the movie with an expectation that motivations and outcomes would be explained and found myself, in a few scenes, revealed.

However, few writers' work end up on the big screen. Most of us work in solitaire, without much hope of publication, with little hope of film adaptation, and while asking if you'd "like fries with that" or nursing, teaching, soldiering, etc.

So how will any poet, writer, musician put food on the table, shoes on their children, rhinestone collars on their dogs? I'm not sure. I do know that I am perfectly willing to make travel arrangements for executives, take minutes, file, walk dogs, edit, design a logo, or detail your car if it will support my writing habit.