10.19.2011

Condolences, You're Having a Baby

...so i never thought i'd be a mom...not that i don't like kids...they're great when they're already potty trained, have jobs, and can drive...if they came out that way, i'd probably have a dozen of them...but for years i was told it was impossible for me to reproduce...imagine my shock and my complete lack of preparedness when i found out i was pregnant...

...in "Condolences, You're Having a Baby" i try to make sense of a future i never dreamed of having...

...this essay first appeared in Damselfly Press...

10.11.2011

This is Why I Hate Ole People

..so first i should define "old": of the elderly group; generally, but not always, between the ages of 70 and 90 (after 90, old people become sort of like furniture and tend to go unnoticed unless they have a broken leg)

...next, let me define "hate": i don't usually use this word to describe my feelings about something...okay, maybe a little (as in, "i hate my hair today," but not in the "i want you dead" sort of way); as this word pertains to the title of this post: i wanted some partying geriatrics to drop dead...

...and now for the "this is why": some good writer pals and i spent this past weekend at a writers retreat onJanisse Ray's Red Earth Farm...Janisse and her husband Raven have 49 acres where they grow nearly everything they eat, and live in a turn-of-the-century farmhouse complete with detached kitchen/oh-my-god-i-want-this-room-in-my-house-is-that-a-trapese-bar-overhead?

my time there was magical...not like "magical: i now fart rainbows" but as in something has been awakened...i think i can finally finish the memoir...

so there we were, enjoying our solitude, when by chance we ran into town for a break...everyone else was up for another hike, but we decided some more writing would suit us...as we pulled into our quiet B & B (a victorian home that had been converted) the small manager met us on the back porch with some news...