On my desk this week: a few in-progress illustrations for my thesis project.
Hi, friends.
Thanks so much for all of the support towards my accordion book, elegy/a crow/Baand for the warm reception to the Craft series! Most of you enjoyed a look into the process behind my work, so I’ll plan on continuing that series. I’m excited to.
A year from now, here are five things from this week that I'd like to remember:
MONDAY
This simple photograph that T took of me and N a few weeks ago, newly clad in my third-generation hand-me-down from B, and before her, J. Prior to this photograph I was living my slovenly existence in too-big sweats and T’s old tees, since nothing fits and I have no time (or desire) to shop.
Nothing makes me feel quite as cozy or cared for as a hand-me-down. I think of all each garment has seen: the laughter and tears housed inside the body it hugged, the hands that carefully held and washed it, the wear-and-tear that adorns only the most well-loved. Like a heart, a hand-me-down shows the signs and strengths of all it’s been through—and all it’s willing to take on.
There haven’t been many photos taken of me since N was born over 2 years ago. I’m still uncertain of my own appearance, and now with baby #2, I know it’ll still be some time yet before I feel comfortable in my body again. But this photo, taken randomly by afternoon sunlight in my parents’ temporary apartment, captures much of what I’d like to remember: the walls that sheltered the people who cared for me and my family during this pregnancy, the littlest heart who is so excited to become a big sister, and the hands that insisted on capturing this moment—because he believed it was important to.
TUESDAY
“My daughters have pulled back the curtain to see that I am the false wizard, that I can offer no promises to them other than to point out the courage and wisdom and heart they already possess. All parents face this moment at some point, but I would have hoped to wait.
My worries hover in the back of my mind, keeping me awake in the dark hours poetically called madrugada in Spanish — the time before the dawn, when the world is quiet. I try not to share those worries with my daughters. That is not the honesty they need. Instead, they bubble up when I break a glass or burn dinner or stumble in any one of a million ways; then I am the kettle screaming to be removed from the heat.”
—My Child Is in an Impossible Place, and I am There With Her by Sarah Wildman, a beautifully-written and heartbreaking read about life, impossibility, and parenting
WEDNESDAY
“If you take a moment to really look at any of the ‘State of Children’ studies, it can be overwhelming. You could easily be thrown into spirals of hopelessness or “overwhelming I’m just not-enoughness”. Heck, just look at your local school and it’s easy to feel the weight of the work there is to be done right in your own backyard.
There’s so much work to be done. There’s so many kids. There’s just one you. There’s just one me. This is a great place to start.
Our best hope forward is not in using our imaginations to escape reality, but using our imaginations to create a better reality. There’s the world that is and there’s the world that could be. There’s also a you. There’s also a me.”
—State of the Children Address from Brad Montague’s newsletter, The Enthusiast
THURSDAY
“Part of it is observing oneself more impersonally… When you go out into the woods and you look at trees, you see all these different trees. And some of them are bent, and some of them are straight, and some of them are evergreens, and some of them are whatever. And you look at the tree and you allow it. You see why it is the way it is. You sort of understand that it didn’t get enough light, and so it turned that way. And you don’t get all emotional about it. You just allow it. You appreciate the tree.
The minute you get near humans, you lose all that. And you are constantly saying, “You’re too this, or I’m too this.” That judging mind comes in. And so I practice turning people into trees. Which means appreciating them just the way they are.”
—How to Be Less Harsh with Yourself (and Others) by Ram Dass, via The Marginalian
FRIDAY
On Earth, just a teaspoon of neutron star
would weigh six billion tons. Six billion tons.
The equivalent weight of how much railway
it would take to get a third of the way to the sun.
It’s the collective weight of every animal
on earth. Times three.
Six billion tons sounds impossible
until I consider how it is to swallow grief—
just a teaspoon and one might as well have consumed
a neutron star. How dense it is,
how it carries inside it the memory of collapse.
How difficult it is to move then.
How impossible to believe that anything
could lift that weight.
There are many reasons to treat each other
with great tenderness. One is
the sheer miracle that we are here together
on a planet surrounded by dying stars.
One is that we cannot see what
anyone else has swallowed.
—Watching My Friend Pretend Her Heart Isn’t Breaking by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer
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xx,
M
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