The Other Mother--for Moms Who Write

Oh, Italia!

I've never been to Italy, but I was recently invited to a fantastic event hosted by Kim Orlando of Traveling Mom.com, Beth Feldman of RoleMommy.com, and Andrea Sertoli at Select Italy, his Soho loft/cooking school. First, let me say it was like entering a geode; from Bowery and a nondescript entryway and elevator to an open-armed loft filled with lovely company, extraordinary good will and hospitality, a vast square table that seated about 30 of us, and exquisite food. I learned to make a little edible cheese basket for salads (we all did; some of the women writers dancing more fervently than others to cool the cheese/polenta mixture in the pan), red snapper baked in foil, and the adorably-named gnudi, pasta sans pasta--just the filling (oh, the filling!) piped out of pastry sleeves, then boiled, then baked.

Yum! Yum! Not just the food, but the conversation. I knew one woman there when I arrived (though it turns out I knew some from cyberspace...or they knew me, and then meeting them in all three dimensions was a joy), and a whole roomful when I left.

I wish I was having a catered affair so I could hire the charming Andrea Tiberi (it was a night of several Andreas), but if you live in the Tri-state area, I highly recommend that you do. I was also very tempted by all the Select Italy tours--making frescos with your family! Driving a Ferrari on the Italian roads! (okay, maybe not that one, though it looked scenic) Hiking in the Italian Alps! Definitely on my someday to do list.

MEANWHILE.

Write about a place you've never been. Write for twenty minutes.

As a bonus topic, make a list of trips you've taken--disastrous, fabulous, enchanting, nauseating...choose one to write about for another twenty.

And if you feel like sharing, that is, about a nonfictional trip, go visit Traveling Mom.

You might just publish an essay with her, and inspire (or warn!) the rest of us. Happy Spring, writers on and all!

Lost, Found, Mother's Day

Oh yes indeedy, MOTHER'S DAY is coming up. Of course, I highly recommend The Other Mother as a gift (and if you email me at ggross@optonline.net I will send you a handy signed bookplate "to Elizabeth's Mom," etc.), I am also happy to make some other suggestions.

If your mom likes a good read and already has TOM, check out the lovely Allison Winn Scotch's freshly out in paperback The Department of Lost and Found. It's touching and warm and wonderful, and Allison herself seems to be, too. She has a very writer-friendly blog, Ask Allison, with all kinds of insider advice on writing, especially for magazines, but fiction as well. She's a writer's writer, as they say. Pick up her book today, if not for Mom, for yourself!

If Mom's nuts about knitting (how did this happen? I'm nuts about knitting. Next comes knit-lit, as my husband says, or, if you're joking about skeins, knit-wit. Oh dear.) and your budget's a bit bigger, how about stopping by here?

Or if you're in northern NJ, I just went to the most amazing yarn store on my way back from a book group (this list will end soon): The Stitchery. OMG, the colors! The kind and helpful staff!

Don't get Mom this, or this (it won't ship in time).

Maybe this: write her a letter. That's this week's topic after all:

a letter to Mom, trying your very best to write specific details--and not the usual ones, either--the you-changed-my-diaper ones. The conversation about worms, the letting me pick out anything in the toystore (I chose Misty of Chincoteague the plastic horse model) after the pet catfish died, if you can remember them. Spend 18 minutes. I can't wait to read them!

workshops!

I don't know these folks, but they wrote and asked whether I'd share the following:

(I'm all for mothers writing together, as you know, and started a course called Writing Motherhood right here in town some years ago!)

MotherVerse Magazine, a journal of contemporary motherhood, is launching

an exciting new addition; mother writer workshops. These virtual

workshops are designed to help facilitate mother writing by encouraging

mothers to come together to learn and guide one another. MotherVerse

will be offering two workshops "Writing Motherhood" and "Publishing a

Blog" with will begin at the end of April and early May. The workshops

will feature experienced published mentors and are a great opportunity

to grow your current writing, develop something new, or begin that blog

you have always wanted to start. If you are interested in joining a

workshop sign up as soon as possible as each workshop has a limited

enrollment. Visit http://www.motherverse.com/workshops

If you go, let us know what you think! Meanwhile, here's a topic:

WRITE ABOUT NOT BEING A MOTHER

for 9 minutes. That could be nine minutes of not being a mother, or before you were a mother, or what you are other than a mother..........

I'm just back from visiting MY mother, which was wonderful. And spring has sprung, the flowers riz, I wonder where the birdies is......

knit a little, talk a little, cheep cheep cheep!

What is it about knitting? I finally broke down and bought The Friday Night Knitting Club to take on vacation—and have to admit, the skeins on the cover are probably the most compelling (I’m not slamming the book—I haven’t read it yet!) book jacket I’ve seen in a while. Dogs and yarn. Note to self: next book should have dogs and yarn on the jacket (instead of whistful women--though I have loved my book jackets, too (thought Luft und Liebe's hilarious).

Anyway, I started knitting back in the ‘80s as part of a winter term project at Oberlin College. My other projects that winter included a Swingle Singers residency and learning microtonal music. My brain was still growing back then. I learned to knit a basic fair aisle sweater, and made about a dozen, designing

my own within the basic pattern. I had two pairs of needles. Then after college, my boss (I worked on nursing textbooks) adopted a baby, and I started knitting sweaters for babies, designing my own and branching out into all types of yarn.

But now, now it’s a revolution! I started up again after having bone graft surgery, and I can’t stop. There’s so much locally and online (oo, click me! or me!) and the yarns are glorious, and knitters are ubiquitous. I have friends who hide their stashes (an interesting choice of jargon to begin with) so no one in their family knows how much they spend on yarn. It’s cheaper, in my friend Cindy’s words, than crack.

The other day my friend Kim called to tell me about a knitting event at her local library; my friend Linda left a message about a knit-in at Barnes and Noble, but the strange thing is, I really like knitting alone. Maybe it’s partly that I still can’t get the kind of all-out exercise I used to before the ankle surgery (it’ll take up to a year), but knitting calms me, helps me focus. It’s kind of like the reverie of writing, though not the same kind of almost physical mental effort—more like meditating, perhaps. Anyway, I’m glad it’s this new public festival, I’m glad it’s IN, I’m glad I can lust after glorious yarns  and click on handmade skeins and notice a hand-knit a mile away. I don’t know how long it’ll last. Maybe until I can start taking the other kind of spinning class again. Or maybe my whole house will be covered in lace, knit and purl. Making something out of raw materials, straw into gold, we like making things, whether it’s babies or blogs or books or blankets, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Original New Jersey Moms Blog post. Cross-posted. THAT IS: SOON TO BE LAUNCHED NEW JERSEY MOMS BLOG--watch here for more info. MEANWHILE:

All that said, here's your new topic:

WRITE ABOUT MAKING SOMETHING

(think Tillie Olson's As I Stand Here Ironing, or building a house, or being pregnant....)

Write for 14 minutes.

Hooray for spring!

Boiled Peanuts

It's hilarious, actually, if you say it over and over. Maybe even if you say it once. We went to visit Mom in Florida, northern Florida, so far north it's almost Georgia and you can get boiled peanuts and honeybells at a roadside stand.

Live oaks, Spanish moss, saltmarsh and egrets. I walked on the beach too much and my ankle ached but I loved it. This was the kite trip--I got one for each kid and they took them out on the beach (my husband, too) and flew the rainbows up over the sand.

I don't know about y'all, but I've been able to work only if I make shorter deadlines for myself. Maybe it's the lack of sunlight, but I need to feel accomplishment after, say, 10 pages. After, say, three loads of laundry. After, say, six emails and a single page of writing. It works, though, the small deadlines. It keeps me going while March marches in and there's still snow on the ground. Speaking of which,

read your rules. Do some small ritual of writing (invent one if you don't have one--I don't) like touching the silver elephant (Ganesh?) you wear around your neck or turning once clockwise or looking out the window for a full thirty seconds. Then write, for 11 minutes, about

MELTING

Heartland, NJ

Did you vote? did ya, did ya? Don't forget to vote when it comes around again, okay?

I'm listening to the new Jack Johnson cd, looking out at the crystal chandelier of naked rained upon dogwood and Japanese maple. And thinking of all of you, so here's a new topic:

WRITE ABOUT THE LAST TIME YOU SAID GOODBYE

and just to show I'm not all blues (I'm not, really), send someone a valentine, someone who might not get one otherwise, someone who isn't expecting that sweet cheek-kiss of elementary school wish fulfillment.

XOXO!

I owe some comments,

but fresh from a panel event at the White Plains Library with Jane Green, Pamela Dorman, and Role Mommy Beth Feldman (if you were there, thank you for coming, and for the fabulous questions!) I wanted to offer up a fresh topic.

I've been thinking about wishes, about how they change over time, about how close they can be to prayer, how selfish, how light.

So here's your topic. Take a piece of paper and draw a line down the middle. Using your dominant hand (say, right if you're a righty) make a list of wishes on the corresponding (in this case right) side. Then put the pen in your nondominant hand and write on the other side. Make a list of secret wishes. This could be in code if it's easier to admit to them that way (of course, they can all belong to a character anyway!).

Now choose one wish from each column and start to write. Don't forget the sounds, textures, taste of it all. Write for nine minutes.

I hope your wishes smell like just peeled oranges.

JANUARY, the cold grey sky,

the squirrels raiding the birdfeeders, the incensed nut hatch pecking the window with displeasure.

Thank you all for well wishes! I'm more mobile every day. Let's have a quick, quiet moment in praise of excellent physical therapists, now (not that they're all excellent; I've heard horror stories, but I'm feeling very lucky for the careful attention of the past months...).

I feel like I live at the PT office.

Here's a new topic for you this week--it give you the option of hope or collection or a good cathartic demolition. Have at it!

Write for 11 minutes (don't think, don't worry, and don't stop):

about planting flowers, picking flowers, or ruining flowers

3 Tips for ankle surgery recovery

Hello, hello! I feel like I've been away forever. On the plus side, I have a new talar dome (well, slightly used, but still) and I can now lurch around in a delightful and only sometimes painful manner. Actually, that's pretty much the whole minus of it, too.

Thank you all for the well-wishes--and hope your holidays were full of festivity, joy, and kindness. Oh, and writing. But if you haven't written yet, I'll give you a topic at the end of this post.

Some great news for THE OTHER MOTHER: Star-Ledger columnist Maureen Berzok has listed the book, along with THE LAST THREE MILES: Politics, Murder, and the Construction of America's First Superhighway(Steven Hart), THE BRIEF WONDROUS LIFE OF OSCAR WAO (Junot Diaz), and EXIT GHOST (Philip Roth) as one of the Best Jersey Books of 2007. WAHOO! Thank you Ms. Berzok, for placing me in such esteemed company.

THE OTHER MOTHER is also one of ROLE MOMMY's (http://www.rolemommyevents.blogspot.com/) favorites of 2007. If you're near White Plains, NY on January 23rd, you can come to the White Plains Public Library to meet me, as well as Pamela Dorman and Jane Green, at the Role Mommy Books and Authors We Love event. I can't wait! I might even been lurching a bit more smoothly by then!

So, here are the three tips as promised:

1. Become completely obsessed with knitting. I'll try to post some pictures. I've made 3 hats, 6 scarves, two cable couture bags (check out www.loopsknitting.com Shelley has a gorgeous store, gorgeous site, and Loops Scoop, with free patterns and ideas; I won a kit for the cable couture bag, which is what got me back on the knitwagon...), a sweater, several purses to felt (once I can get down to the laundry again), a wrap, two stuffed animals...I'm done bragging. Let's just say knitting keeps me thinking about things other than pain, and it feels productive, even if, as my husband pointed out, my kids look like people whose mother has a little too much yarn on her hands.

2. Ask you surgeon to lend (or rent?) you a Roll-A-Bout. You put your knee on this sort of modified skateboard with brakes and wheel around when you need one free arm (not so easy with crutches).

3. GET DRESSED EVERY DAY, even if wonderful friends and relations have taken over the driving/cooking/and other items on the endless parenting list. It just feels better, even if it takes a few hours to get pants over your cast.

SO, here's the writing topic. Come write, one and all! It can be a New Year's Revolution: write every day!

Make a list of three tips. Three tips for surviving divorce, three tips for shovelling your driveway (don't use a leafblower on snow, for example), three tips for avoiding writing, three tips for feeding a picky eater. After you have your list, take it from there. You know how it goes: don't think, just keep the pen moving. You can do this: write for 7 minutes. That's all. It takes longer for me to get a sock on my left foot.

Welcome back!!

filling the feeders, setting the jam

Not that I'm doing the latter. And I think it's putting up the jam, which is beautiful. Anyone know the correct idioms here? Okay, so what I'm really doing is packing up a little backpack as if I were going on an expedition (expotition, said Pooh), but in fact (dental floss, notebook, eyedrops, pens, knitting project, etc) I'm getting ready to have ankle surgery. All this is to say I might not be posting as frequently as I might like for a little bit, though I imagine after about two days I'll be very, very weary of recovery time. Knitting seems appealing, but so does not showing up for the bone graft and ligament reattachment bit. Hey, that's not entirely unlike knitting. So I'm going to give you three tips, spontaneous in nature and not necessarily directly related to writing practice, but yes, to the practice of writing. Then I'll give you three topics, just in case it takes me three weeks to come back. Post, though, tell your friends; I'll come back and drink up your words.

1. Fall in love with revision. It's your chance to reinvent the universe. And if you want to publish, you'll be asked to revise; it's best to enjoy it as much as you can.

2. Don't worry about what other people will think. In fact, don't worry at all. If you don't suck the marrow out of your material, it'll be dry bones. Worry, editing, vetting is for later (see number 1).

3. Write as much and as often as you can. Don't save yourself, your ideas, for writing. I'm a firm believer in writing practice (as codified by such greats as Natalie Goldberg). I also have written at least 400 extra pages for at least of my novels. They live in purgatory files on my computer, and I'm not sorry I wrote them, or that I had to cut them. They helped me find what I really wanted to say.

AND THREE TOPICS!

1. Write about family photos. You can even use one if you like, or find someone's online, someone you don't know. Write for 8 minutes.

2. Write about being out of breath. Start by going into the sensory--the squeeze of empty lungs, the rasp of cold air in the throat, the slowing of blood beats in the ears, etc...THEN give us a why (in labor, running away from a bear, trying to get back into shape, fell off the tire swing, etc). Write for 12 minutes.

3. Open your purse or desk drawer. Take out three items, and start writing about one or more. Where did they come from? Why do you have them? What if you lost them? Bottlecaps, the travel clock your aunt gave you, an unopened letter from your last boyfriend...Write for 11 minutes.

Be well, everyone!