It’s been a great and growing week for me. I’d string a green bead for just about every day this week.
If you don’t know what I’m talking about, flash back to this story from Baddest Mother Ever, “A Blue Bead for Boston.”
This is a Mike Letter, complete with photo montage and watercolor. Rufus the cat is completely unrelated.
It’s my turn to host the blog hop! Our theme this week is “The Last Letter I Wrote By Hand.” Mike Miller, if you’re reading this, it’s in honor of you and the exquisite letters you’ve sent my way over the last 28 years. Y’all seriously. Mike not only writes REAL letters, he writes them on paper he has made and/or painted by hand.
Letters are dear to me but have faded from my life for the most part. There’s a Heineken box in the basement filled with all the letters I got while in high school and college. When G and I were decluttering the den this weekend, he found a “To My Wife” Valentine stuck in a cabinet drawer…signed by Fartbuster. Yeah, it was time for a cleaning! I remember writing a letter on mint green paper to give to Fartbuster on our wedding day. I wonder what happened to those promises I meant so deeply that day.
Well, that was then. This is now. I do still write some letters, about two a year.
I keep a little journal for each of my children and I write letters to them about what’s going on in their lives at this date and how they are growing and changing. I’ve been writing these letters since before they were born.
The first letter in Vivi’s journal is addressed to “Dear Pollywog,” because we didn’t even know then if we were having a boy or a girl. That letter was composed in my cozy compartment on a train trip across Canada with the Cowboy Junkies. Yeah, that was a cool letter. A few months later, I wrote Vivi a letter from a beach in Puerto Rico before she was born. I was watching a pelican dive and dive and dive for its dinner and it made me think about persistence. I wanted her to know that it’s important to know that it sometimes takes 100 tries before you get what you’re aiming for. There are letters about her first step and first word. Her favorite knock-knock jokes and a picture she drew for Santa on a napkin we left next to the cookies and milk.
Old journal, new media
The last letter in that journal was written a year ago–I’ve had less impetus to write now that she and I TALK so much. The letter described a typical Saturday morning, the games we played all piled in the big bed together and the mango she and Daddy shared for breakfast. The pirate game we made up on the playfort and her favorite Octonauts shows.
On the page behind that letter is a little note she wrote to Daddy when she and I were on an adventure: “I mist u som uhc dad. I luov u. Thak u.” One day, she’ll meet herself in these letters.
I guess that’s why we hold on to letters. They capture those moments in the folds of the paper, the people we were on those days.
What’s the last letter you wrote out by hand? Want to read more stories about handwritten letters? Follow these links to read more!
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This moment happened on my deck tonight. I’m grateful I got to witness it. I was sitting still with a glass of wine and dinner in the oven. The first word that slipped into my mind was “gloaming.” That’s the tiny sliver of time between sunset and night.
Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight I wish I may, I wish I might I wish to have this wish tonight.I’ve got this wish that I’ve been working on for a year. In February, this blog will be one year old. It feels like something I’ve wanted to do for a long time and I’m finally doing it. Now I want to set some goals and own them.
Goal #1: 1000 Facebook followers
Terribly close on this one. 788 at last count.
Goal #2: 100,000 page views in a year
Striking distance on this one. Last count was around 76,000.
So, I’m owning it. Expressing my dreams has always felt like a risk, as if dreams must be pounced upon instead of worked on diligently. But I can either focus on the stars or dwell on the darkness.
When you wish upon a starI’m nervous about this goal. It’s time to make a plan. When I think about the dream, I see the star in this picture–the thing that keeps me looking up. When I think about actually getting there, I think about the river that’s in the picture, invisible in the dusk. It’s the thing that changes the landscape through persistence, not sheer power.
I’m writing over at “Work It, Mom!” today. This post addresses the learning curve I faced when starting a new job…and the awesome advice I got from Vivi about how to step up to a challenge. It’s called:
Click on over and check it out!
I’m excited to share the news that I’ll be writing two columns each month for Work It, Mom! I’ll be writing there about the challenges and joys of being a mom with several jobs…we can all relate to that, right?
Today’s column is called “That’s ENOUGH.” It’s about those times when you do everything and it still doesn’t feel like enough. It includes three mantras that I hope you’ll tuck away in your heart for those gray days. Click on over and read something that will lift your heart and spirits!
So have a wonderful Monday, Bad Muthas, no matter where you are working!
I have been stretching myself pretty thin for about a month and tonight, it caught up with me and bit me in the tail. Between launching projects at the new job, the fundraising for Leukemia Society, the mothering, the blogging, the board presiding, the pool vacuuming, the home construction projects, the feeding of the children and the balancing of budgets and setting up play dates and remembering to wash my hair…I am OUT.
Tomorrow at 11:ish, I get to don academic regalia in the Burden Parlor at Wesleyan College, along with the President of the College, the Chair of the Board of Trustees, the Provost, the college Chaplain, the President of the senior class and the President of Student Government. I am the President of the Alumnae Association. I love it. I love love love love love this convocation. Fall convocation, the formal beginning of the school year at the first college in the world chartered to grant degrees to women. We started in 1836 and haven’t missed a year since.
Wesleyan College Fall Convocation 2012
We will line up in a double column according to the instructions pinned to either side of the wide doors. A Junior Marshall will nervously guide us out the lobby and down the steps of the Porter Building, where we will link up with the grander procession. We will fall in with the faculty, who walk draped in the velvet and satin they have earned through decades of study. We will walk between the senior class in their new black robes and plain mortar boards. We will be led by 30 students from 30 different countries who carry the flags of their homelands.
The Candler organ will make the air shake with joy. We will march down the aisles, through the crowds of first years, sophomores, juniors. We will take the stage and stand as the seniors file in and take their seats. A fanfare from the organ and the ceremony will begin.
And in those first few minutes, I’m supposed to stand up and say a few words–bring greetings on behalf of the 8000 alumnae who have gone before this senior class. And I. Got. Nuthin.
Last year, I realized during my drive down there that I had written a speech with lots of references to the WRONG class. The seniors were Red Pirates and I thought they were Golden Hearts (I can’t even begin to explain right now). So I improvised a little talk about “ships” like scholarships and internships and fellowship. It was PERFECT. This year’s senior class is a Purple Knight class–my own class! I know their traditions inside and out. I know the words to the song, the rowdiest of cheers, the hand signals.
But inspiring words? Nuthin.
So tonight I was in a swivet. A tizzy. A kerfuffle. And it was just making my panic worse.
Then I remembered a piece of advice from my friend, Jean. “Do the next right thing.”
I don’t have to figure it all out at once. Just do the next right thing. I can’t sit here and know that everything will go perfectly tomorrow. I can’t nail it down. But I can do the next right thing.
And that right thing is going to bed.
I’m going to bed with that phrase in my head, and I’ll think of something to tell those young women tomorrow morning. I’ll see my friend, Virginia, in her professor robes. I’ll see my friend, Auburn, at her first formal convocation. I’ll see Annabel and Parrish and Lauren and Cathy and Ruth and Vivia and Susan and I will remember that I am one of them. I am a Wesleyanne.
Wesleyan Women, 2011
College didn’t teach me how to do everything. It taught me how to discern the right thing. It taught me how to dare. It taught me how to improvise. Wesleyan taught me to believe in myself back then and it reminds me to believe in myself now every time I step on the campus.
So I’m going to rest and tomorrow I will do the next right thing.
Preach on, preach on. I believe I used that quote in the story “The Doormat.”
I’m dipping my toe into the Pinterest pool, mostly to find inspiration from great women. Because let’s face it, I’m never going to make any of those artistic recipes or handmade paper crafts. Hell, I can’t even look at the home decor ideas because that eats into my not cleaning the house time. I enjoy the curatorial aspect of Pinterest–flitting about like a magpie picking up lovely shiny things and pinning them to my board.
Pinterest is the third largest social media platform these days, behind Facebook and Twitter. I’m trying to learn how to use it to spread the word about Baddest Mother Ever with pins like this one of Maya Angelou. So I’ve got a board of Quotes for Bad Mothers, where you’ll find funny and inspiring “You Go, Girl!” kind of stuff. There’s a board called “Stories From Baddest Mother Ever” with….well, you guessed it…stories from Baddest Mother Ever! I’ve made a board called “Share Some Baddest Mother Ever” with shareable images and quotes from my stories.
But by far, my favorite board is “Baddest Mothers In History.” There you will find a gallery of women who blazed trails, explored depths or simply dared to be bold. Please join me on Pinterest and help me learn the ropes!
So what do you do on Pinterest? What kind of content delights you? Tell me in the comments!