Posts Tagged ‘mother love’
on empathy
I’m wondering what would happen if we could—and would—regularly imagine the lives of people, real people in our country and in our world, who live lives beyond our own experience. What would happen to our public policy, and foreign policy, if we didn’t seemingly lack the ability to imagine lives? It’s impossible, it seems, to…
Read Moreforever acknowledging
A few days ago, I took Stella in for her 4-year-old check up. She was all shy smiles, and passed the little developmental tests—drawing circles and triangles, hopping on one foot, balancing with her arms out, identifying the colors on the nurse’s smock—with flying colors. She proudly held out her arm for her blood pressure…
Read Moreweary
I had a very long weekend. It was the USA Cup, which is (for those of you who don’t follow youth soccer) a week-long tournament in Minnesota that draws kids from all over the world. They descend on the National Sports Center by the thousands to play their little soccer hearts out and bake in…
Read Morepining
Yesterday Stella and I were running errands and I mentioned that Gahgee (what she calls my dad) was going to baby-sit because D. and I were going to a party. She got all teary and said that she didn’t want us to go and didn’t want Gahgee to come over. And then she said, “Are…
Read Morewillow room
This morning I woke slowly, to the sound of birds and wind in the trees. D. and Stella brought me breakfast in bed, one of my favorite things. I held Stella in my lap as we waited for her new clothes to come out of the drier. A bowl of oranges in her hand, she…
Read Morehave you hugged your hygienist today?
Yesterday afternoon Stella and I went to the dentist. Earlier in the morning, as Stella was getting dressed she said, “Mom, I don’t need to sit on your lap today.” “Oh?” I said, not really knowing what she meant. “At the dentist,” she said, exasperated. (How a 3 1/2 year-old can be so exasperated with…
Read Morebrooks and my failure with form
I just read Gwendolyn Brooks’ Selected Poems for one of my book clubs. I’m actually embarrassed to admit that this is the first time I’ve read her work. Maybe I read the poem “We Real Cool” in high school, but I’m not even sure. It felt familiar-does that count for something? There were a couple…
Read Moremother love and Snow Flower
I just finished a wonderful novel: Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See. It’s a story set in nineteenth century China about enduring friendship, footbinding, and nu shu, women’s secret writing. It’s also a story about motherhood and mother love. Aha! The dialogue between different pieces of writing continues. Just two weeks ago,…
Read MoreI love teaching
I love that moment in class when a light goes off for a student or when someone tells me that her writing is going in a completely different direction than she expected. I love being a part of that discovery. (And yes, I do realize that I sound like a sap.) Yesterday we read “Mother…
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