My fifth grader thinks she’s slick when we are getting ready for school, that if her lip gloss is subtly applied, or combined with a lighter shade, I won’t notice her slightly rosier lips as we are heading out the…
Browsing: MER Online
This story does not have an ending, I am unfolding as a mother, as a writer, as a friend, as a wife, as a daughter and as an individual every moment. There are things that no woman tells another about…
I’ve been birthing a collection of poems about raising a gay daughter since she came out at fifteen. That was four years ago. I didn’t realize I was writing a collection on this theme but my role as mother had…
My mother and grandmother are on their way to visit. My house is not ready and neither am I. After moving into a “new” ninety-year-old, 3200 square foot, brick house six months ago we still have things in boxes and…
When was your last colonoscopy? the tidy, compact gynecologist inquired, a man so devoid of sexual aura that he can stand fully clothed over your naked spread-eagled body without a hint of inappropriateness. Um, never, I answered as he fondled…
Hope springs eternal –Alexander Pope The question of hope. Who carries the hope in the family? My old friend Tal who lost her son in a botched surgery says, “If you don’t have hope, you have nothing.” Sophie broke…
It takes months for me to find a good therapist. When I finally do she tells me my family is too “enmeshed.” As if I didn’t know this already. Still, I try the label on for size. I use it…
Because our son, Benjamin, is already four years old, because we’re not sure if there are going to be other babies, and because we don’t know just how to explain this to him, after midnight, we’re pulled to his bedroom,…
The hardest thing I’ve ever done is be a single mother. It saps almost everything and takes the rest—your energy, time, creativity, hope, and . . . did I say energy? Parenting is hard work. Single parenting is hard work…
“Where are we going?” Her every morning question. “Miss Patty’s house today.” “But I don’t want to go there! I want to stay home. Hmmp.” “Put on your socks—please!” “I can’t do it. I’m little.”…