Ekphrastic Mama

Ekphrastic Mama

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I am the mother of three daughters, each born in a different decade, and three sons in a somewhat closer clump. One "hub" hold us together. This is not what passes for wise family planning in American culture, but as the beat poet Alice Notley wrote, “I didn’t plan my pregnancies. I’m an experimentalist.” When I was writing Ekphrastic Mama for Mothers Creating/Writing Lives: Motherhood Memoir, I took stock of our family span: with one child married, one in college, one in high school, one in junior high, an elementary schooler, a toddler, and now a grandbaby, I was experiencing all phases of motherhood simultaneously. Years later I'm still experimenting with ekphrasis- art that speaks out- and hoping to inspire others in their writing ventures.
Whose pants

Whose Pants Are Those?

Marriage

My friend thinks I wear the ‘pants’ in my family, but she says it’s okay since the man-of-the-family is not angry. But I see her trying to get at a bigger question, or underlying issue: Who’s in charge? So much comes down to that, the underpants. So I’m thinking about these pants and how they fit– what kind of ‘pants’ are they anyway? Are they Spanx, an undergarment so elastic they suck you svelte, but then slap you silly when peeled off? Or are they more like sweats– loose and accommodating, good for a Saturday stroll or Sunday lounging? Or are they work pants– chino style, somewhat serious, yet unassuming, in traditional khaki-tan so they don’t show spills? Personally, my style is more of a pedal pusher– you can dress them up or down, great in the garden or the classroom, very versatile. I like mine with some stretch to accommodate shape-shifting–…

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Self-Regulating Children

Motherhood

Isn’t that the dream? Children who just do what they need to do when it needs doing, and we just get to enjoy them? We’re on child #6 and I have to say, this is as good as it gets. She turned 11 on May 1, and she’s fairly self-regulating, other than the fact that she hasn’t mastered picking up after herself. She makes up for this with a willing cheerfulness most of the time. And by #6, let’s just say we’ve gotten less picky. In fact, according to some of the children who came before, a whole lot less picky. I guess that’s what happens when you get the chance to learn from your mistakes over a 25 year period (#1 & #6 are separated by a quarter century, but same father…). We’ve run the gamut of parenting styles during the last 35 years, but one thing has emerged…

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Impostor Mom

Adventure Mom

Do you ever feel like you’re making it up as you go? On a good day, I like to think I’m throwing myself out in front, then seeing if I can catch up. But sometimes I just end up stressed. Maybe I’m throwing myself in too many directions. Things look ok on paper–the to do list–but so many items we do as parents, and just plain people, never actually show up on the list. And then there are all those distractions, like putting away stuff so we can actually get to the stuff that really needs doing. So when something fun comes up, I often feel as though I should just say No. Get the work done, especially if there is a deadline. And yet… we all need breaks. So I went to mountain bike camp. For the past 5 years I’ve worked for REI, the outdoor co-op. But, can…

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You're the main author of these journals, but you can ask others to add to the story- the doctor who did open heart surgery on our youngest son drew his picture and wrote a message (meant for the nurses on the bandage) in our son's journal for posterity

Journal for Your Child

Motherhood

After I wrote The Power of Journaling I got this response (see http://www.motivation.com/posts/48/the-power-of-the-journal) Hi Lori, I read your blog on motivation.com regarding keeping a journal for your children. I absolutely this idea so much! I have a few questions though: How often do you find that you have time to write in it? Sometimes only a few times a year. Other times daily, maybe even more than once a day- not because I have the time, but because something pressing needs to be said and I can’t trust myself and my voice to say it in a way that will be well received. Ideally, if you wrote twice per month and didn’t even start until they were almost 3, by the time they turn 18 you could have 365 entries. As they leave for college you could hand them their own personally written devotional of sorts. I feel so stumped at…

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May Day- another birthday

Adventure Mom

Two years ago today I wrote: My youngest turned 9 today. Halfway to 18… all she wanted for her birthday was a kitten. We have not had good luck with cats for this little girl who loves cats more than anything in the whole world, and she loves a lot of things, mostly animals. She was offered the chance to go back to Wizarding World in Orlando (since we’d bought year long passes last year when we went). “That would be #2 on my list,” she said. No.1 was visiting a vet. Could she see what a vet does and just hang out with him or her for the day? My friend arranged a trip to a llama farm where there are new baby llamas. That will have to do for now. And a kitten. I drove 2 1/2 hours each way to get this kitten. I would do almost…

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Hawk's concepc
Conception by Rich Hawk

Where You Begin

Writing

May is Motherhood Memoir Month–You don’t have to be a mother to write motherhood: it’s where you begin. You had a mother, or someone who gave birth to you (or are you an alien?)… Write about that. Ideas for getting started: Download your thoughts onto paper or a screen- Ask yourself a question or simply record a thought you have on motherhood, mothering or being a daughter, or child of your mother. Or the absence of a mother. Or abandonment. Or Joy- what is the best memory you have of or with her? Or the earliest? Any or all of these can take you to a place where your story starts, or continues. Enjoy.

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Long and winding road tuscany
A long and winding road in Tuscany painted by the author

How This Began

Writing

I’ve done NaNoWriMo for several years- I was introduced to it by my sons in their early teens, both of whom finished novels- quite inspiring. I was in grad school then, and had a toddler, the youngest of our six kids. I wanted to write a novel but didn’t feel like it was feasible. The irony of getting a Masters in writing while watching my young teen sons each write a novel was not lost on me. I did NaNoWriMo for several years, but instead of writing novels I was really writing memoir. And then it occurred to me that memoir, especially memoir that focuses on the stories around motherhood, where we begin- even if we’re not mothers- is where I wanted to head. So hear it is: MAMOMEMO- May is Motherhood Memoir Month. Last May (2017) was a crazy month– we put our house up for sale to move…

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Help for Lighting the Christmas Tree

Adventure Mom

Putting lights on the Christmas tree has been the seasonal job I detest most. It never goes well, but I finally figured out the problem: we don’t have enough lights for the tall trees we like. And I tend to do it myself without much help. The help I do get is usually in the form of advice, like “You need more lights over here… Could you just move some of these down?” In the past I’ve moved lights. That is a mistake. Once the lights have been carefully woven on each branch it is a disaster to start moving them and increases the work by at least three-fold. So the answer now is NO, …Could you just go get more lights? Generally I try to decry “more”… but ’tis the season… Now, finally, we have something of a formula. It takes about 100 lights for every 1-1 1/2 feet…

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Of Winning with Daughters

Writing & Motherhood

Sometimes the most powerful words are your own, recited back to you. Lily is a poet. At 16 she won the Central Oregon Writers Guild poetry award. She won it again this year and I won an award for non-fiction so we each read our pieces at the awards ceremony, mother and daughter. My story started as a letter to her, wrapped around one of her poems, a collage of sorts, hoping to be a collaboration. Here’s the story: Such Unkind Things  The way your dark mascara dripped and blurred under your eyes when you peeked out from behind your pink blankie made me think of a Pierrot doll, and I asked if you were okay. Your whispered response turned into a sobbing storm when I encircled you with outstretched arms, and I thought, How much are you willing to put up with? I see you reaching for this mechanical…

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Marking Milestones

Childhood

Life is good, as it should be at 17. But it’s also scary and uncertain at times.
She wants to save the world, but she’s starting to see how difficult that might be. Yet she still wants to do her part, so she created her own internship with the Global Immersion Project. Read what she writes about crossing the San Diego/Tijuana border: http://globalimmerse.org/embers-silent/

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Whose Pants Are Those?  

Adventure Mom

My friend thinks I wear the ‘pants’ in my family, but she says it’s okay since the man of the family is not angry about it. The bigger question, or the underlying issue: Who’s in Charge? So many issues come down to that, the underpants. So I’m thinking about these pants and how they fit– what kind of ‘pants’ are they anyway?  Are they Spanx, an undergarment so elastic they suck you neatly in, but then slap you silly when you peel them off, gasping for breath?  Or are they more like sweats– loose and accommodating, good for a Saturday stroll or Sunday lounging?  Or are they work pants– chino style, somewhat serious, yet unassuming, in traditional khaki-tan so they don’t show spills? Personally, my style is more of a pedal pusher– you can dress them up or down, great in the garden or the classroom, very versatile.  I like…

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The Gum Graft

Childhood

I sat in the chair breathing deeply, calmly trying to relax since I opted out of sedatives, thinking novocaine should be enough. After all, it wasn’t much of an area that needed a gum graft, just a small nick at the top of number 8, my right front tooth. I fell down a waterfall when I was 8, more of a chute actually, but to my 8 year-old self the water fell down an expanse of cement and was therefore a waterfall. or more possibly a waterslide. What can be slid down begs to be climbed up, and slid down again, and again. It was at the end of Wildwood park in Vista where we used to play as kids, circa 1967. On one end of the park this steep cement flume led down into a tunnel under a bridge. We thought of it as a waterslide made extra slippery…

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