Writing, Life

The past week was an exciting one for me in terms of writing. I met with UWO's writer-in-residence, Tanis Rideout, to go over some of my recent poems. She was so warm and encouraging and gave me some really helpful pointers for tightening up my work; suggestions that seemed general at the outset ("get rid of everything you don't need!") but that just clicked for me. I've been reworking everything I've written recently with these things in mind, being ruthless, looking at my poems line by line rather than just as a whole. Questioning each word, what does it do for the poem, what tone does it set, is there a better way to say this? I love the way a little nudge like that can just open up a whole new way of seeing. I'm going to submit these revised poems to another round of literary magazines, hoping to find them a home.

Over the weekend, London had its 2nd annual Words Fest, a festival celebrating all things wordy. I was able to take in a reading on Saturday morning at Museum London. It was invigorating for me to be among other writers, and especially to hear some localish authors read from newly published works. My favourite was Carolyn Smart, reading from her new collection of poems: Careen. Her reading was powerful and I picked up the book, a dramatic rendering of the story of Bonnie and Clyde.  I'm most of the way through it already and I'm really loving it.

Through all of this it's become clear to me that I want to connect with other writers, poets, creatives. I desperately need to share that part of myself with others who get it: who get the process, the struggle, the thrill of a new idea. Who can look at something I've written and offer constructive criticism. I think there is a thriving writers community here in London. Later this month I'm going to try to attend a meeting of the London Writer's Society in hopes of finding a critique group, and some day...when I can be away from babies and stay awake past 8 pm, I'd like to attend one of the poetry open mics hosted by Poetry London.

I see it as being a long road, but I feel my feet are firmly planted upon it and if you're still reading this blog, you'll get to come along for the ride. I suppose I see this space as focusing mostly on my journey as a writer. If you came here strictly for the baby stuff, and you don't wish to follow along further, then thank you for coming this far, at least.

I think I've found my writing time, though. In making the best of being up at 5 am with the littles every day, I've started slipping away for an hour around 7, once P is awake and we've both had some caffeine, back up to the bedroom where I write for an hour. I've always loved mornings best, and of all the times I've tried out in the last couple of months, this feels the easiest. I think it's something I can maintain. And having that writing time in the morning makes it easier for me to be present and engaged with the kids the rest of the day, something I've been working on, too.

I started this blog lamenting the loss of myself in motherhood, but over the last 6 months I see myself reclaiming my identity as writer, a poet, and that is inextricably tied to my recovery from PPD. A year ago, I was merely surviving, dreading having a third child, totally overwhelmed and depressed. Today I see myself as being on the brink of thriving, and I am so deeply grateful for that!



One year ago, heading out of the Yukon.

On Rejection

Recently I wrote that I'd submitted a few poems to several different online and print literary magazines. I've heard back from two of those journals already, both kind-hearted rejections. And I'm okay with that. In fact, I was expecting it. It's been years since I read or wrote poetry with any regularity. It's only been weeks, a few short months at most, since I decided to dedicate myself to the craft of poetry again. So it's silly to think that with the first few poems I write, I could be published.

And I understand in a way that I didn't years ago that it's okay to be rejected, that it is absolutely a part of the creative life. It's the risk we take in creating and in putting our art out there. In her book "Big Magic", Elizabeth Gilbert asks: "What are you passionate enough about that you can endure the most disagreeable aspects of the work?" She quotes a blogger named Mark Manson, in asking "what's your favorite flavor of shit sandwich?" Which is to say that rejection is the shit sandwich that goes hand in hand with putting your art out there for consideration. And if you love your art, you'll learn to tolerate the shit sandwich, too.

Through reading "Big Magic" and in considering more deeply my relationship to my writing, I've come to understand an idea that I've flirted with for years, an idea first brought to me through "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron. That is the idea that the practice of any kind of art is a spiritual one. To create is a spiritual endeavour. It's the idea that the work, whether it be a poem or a photograph or a sculpture, wants to be made, and it wants to be made through us. It is a gift from the Universe or God or whatever random creative forces coincided to put us all here, and the best thing we can do is be grateful and enter into communion with our creativity, acting as midwives to bring them into being. It's a beautiful idea, and one that softens the blow of rejection.

Because I want to create. It gives me joy to write poetry, to play with words and punctuation and line breaks, to bring a thought into being, to crystallize it on the page just so. Lately I approach poetry and writing as a form of play. It brings me peace instead of the anxiety I used to feel. I've let go of the idea that to be successful, to call myself "writer" I have to be published and widely read. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to be published and widely read, but it no longer feels like an end goal. I feel like I'm finally learning to feel joy in the process, in the magic of creating, whatever the end result may be. I will continue to hone my craft and I will continue to send my work out for consideration. I find satisfaction that someone, somewhere, read it and thought about it long enough to say "No, thanks. Not for us."

I see this shift in my mind touching other aspects of my life, too. Last week I tried a new recipe, a variation of shepherd's pie, for dinner. I put a fair amount of time and effort into the meal, first roasting, peeling and pureeing sweet potato for the topping, then chopping all the vegetables for the filling, sauteing them and making a sauce. The dish was bright, colourful, and I was excited to try it. But my boys declared it was "yucky" before they even had a bite (though Colm did eat some of the sweet potato topping) and my husband bravely ate most of his portion, though I noticed all of the kale pushed to the side of the plate in a soggy green pile. And my initial reaction was one of disappointment, and even a bit of embarrassment to think I was going to pass this very different dinner off on my currently picky bunch. I bit back tears as I cleared the plates in a huff.

But then I remembered these ideas about creativity I've been turning over. I remembered the grace with which I accepted the rejection of my poems. I realized that I took joy in preparing the meal. I myself thought it was quite good. So what if my critics disagreed? I probably won't make it again, but I'm glad I tried. In that moment my mind shifted from feeling personally offended to just observing the reactions with curiosity. I realized that I can take pleasure in preparing a meal, but I can't control peoples' taste. Just like with my art.

If we're to live a happy creative life, we have to learn to deal with the inevitable frustrations, too. I'd rather write poems that nobody else likes than not write poems at all. And the same goes for my cooking!

A Mother's Writing Life Version 2.0

The only thing constant about my writing life is that it is always changing. If I try to set myself up into some kind of routine, it inevitably falls apart within a week or two. When I think of the oft-given writing advice to schedule your craft for the same time every day, so that your muse might follow, I feel despair. Because that just ain't happening. I thought my time would be early mornings, up with the baby. But then she started sleeping a little later, and, thankfully, so did I. Then, I thought it would be during Colm's nap, but Charlotte doesn't reliably sleep for that and it leaves Aedan alone in front of the t.v. for an hour or more. Then, I thought it would be an hour several times a week in the corner coffee shop, but that's only happened twice, because life with three littles is crazy and unpredictable.

My muse must be fast and ready at all times, prepared to leap into action whenever I find 30 minutes or an hour alone. I have to trust that she is just the muse I need at this point in my life. It encourages me, just now, to imagine this spirit: she is wiry and tough, sharp-eyed and always listening. She sees the opportunity coming before I do, and she begins to hum in anticipation. And I hear that hum, hear it steady and low beneath the constant (and I do mean constant) chatter around me. Together we snatch up a pen and paper, or fire up the computer, and we create something. We put words together, or rearrange them on the page. We build my writing life new each day.

I've been drawn to poetry over these last couple of months, both because of its compressed nature and because it's my first love. I've been writing and rewriting several poems, polishing them til they gleam, til I can't look at them anymore. Yesterday, I sent them out to several online literary magazines for consideration. I'll try not to think about them and how they might be faring out there as I move on with new poems.

This morning over oatmeal and green tea, I emailed a local writer's society to inquire about their critique groups. And I joined the mailing list for the Ontario Writer's Conference, which I hope to attend in the spring.

So, even though this seems like the worst, most ridiculous time to be building a writer's life, I'm doing it. Because, like I said in this post back in July, this is the only life I can save. And as Elizabeth Gilbert points out in her inspiring new book, Big Magic, this life is temporary, so why not use it to create?

This post is part of the #WhatImWriting link up. Please visit Writing Bubble to see the other linkers!

Heart in Two Places

It's been almost a year since we left our Yukon home. We left with plans to spend the darkest part of winter visiting family in Ontario and exploring the beaches of Costa Rica. But our beach plans changed mid-vacation, and soon after returning to Ontario, we began talking about moving our family cross-country. It has been the easiest, and also the most difficult thing I've ever done.

Here in Ontario, my kids get to experience the connection to their extended family that I enjoyed growing up.  We see my sister and her son at least once a week, and we usually spend our weekends with my parents. P and I are free to go on dates occasionally; Aedan enjoys sleepovers at Gramma's; we visit my grandmothers regularly.  I didn't realize how important all of this was to me until I had kids on the other side of the country, 2 day's travel from our family. Seeing pictures on Facebook of my family's gatherings, with all of that distance between us, was heartbreaking. Watching my sister get married via FaceTime because I was too pregnant to travel, was heartbreaking. I no longer felt like living in the Yukon was a gift: it felt like an exile, self-imposed. But we had a home there, a business, and roots put down over a decade, longer for P.

We made the decision to move in distress.  From the safety of my parents' house, I felt intense anxiety at the thought of going back to our little cabin in the woods. I was dreading having another baby so far from my mom, and from all of the support of extended family. So we scraped together our resources, we made it work, somehow, and we bought a house here. What started as a trip "out" became a huge move. P has been back regularly, for work, and I've had one brief visit. The boys have yet to return, though.

When I think of our Northern home, I remember the total hush at our cabin. Even in town, there is a resounding lack of all the background noise of a larger city. No sirens wailing, no trains shunting along the tracks, no traffic hum. Rarely, a helicopter's blades cutting through the air. Instead we hear the wind in the spruce, the leaves of birch and aspen tremble, the shush of the river coursing by. Quiet so complete you can hear a raven's wings beat overhead. And the community in Dawson is like a huge extended family, looking out for one another. There are the dark parts, too, like any family. But overall, it's a caring place and an exciting one, too. There are so many possibilities there, and chances to affect real change in the community. In the Yukon it's easy to raise kids with an appreciation for nature, because you're surrounded by it. And kids who grow up there are often a little different: independant, enterprising, creative.

Choosing to leave all of that behind was horrible. But when I see Aedan playing with his cousin or when I send the kids to my mom's when I need a break, I know beyond a doubt that it was absolutely the right choice.  My heart is here, with my family, but it's back there, too. Robert Service wrote of it in his poem "Spell of the Yukon". It gets under your skin, that place. It runs in your blood and it beats in your bones. I still identify as a Yukoner; it is such a huge part of who I am today. And I know we'll return to our hushed cabin in the woods. We'll find a way to honour our two hearts.


Home.

Identity Crisis

I've been silent here these past few weeks. In that time I've been writing poetry; I've reconnected with my university creative writing professor, who has offered to serve as my mentor; I've continued down a path of healing from PPD, taking good care of myself and, in turn, my family. It's been good to be somewhat offline, but I haven't forgotten about this blog. In the back of my mind, I've been wondering what I want for this space.

I started out wanting a creative outlet, but since finding my way back to poetry and deciding to take myself seriously as a writer, I feel like what time and energy I can spare for creative writing is better directed elsewhere. And although I'd like to use this space to connect with other writers and to talk about the intersection of writing and mothering, my posts solely about mothering and how difficult it can be have also been well received. And I feel like it's really important to talk about the hard, ugly truths of parenting. That being said, I sometimes want this to be a baby-free zone, a place to guard those parts of myself that are more than "mama."

So. Where does that leave us? I love blogging, with its possibility for connection and peering into the lives of others. I'm not ready to take a permanent step away from it.  Maybe I see the answer here in this post. Maybe I don't hold myself to any one topic, and continue to write what's in my heart. I guess I just feel like I owe the writers a post about writing, the mamas a post about moming, and those who are just curious readers a post more interesting than this one!

What would you like to read more of here? If you blog, have you ever had a similar blog identity crisis? I'd love to hear how you moved past it in the comments!

This post is part of the #WhatImWriting linkup. Please go to Muddled Manuscript to visit the other participants!

Self-Care is Hard

I'm sitting in a corner coffee shop, near my house. I am alone. I drink a green tea as I type this post, trying not to listen to the conversations taking place around me. My back is to the door: I'm determined not to be distracted from my hour of writing time. Weeks of mental preparation have brought me here, a morning of talking myself out of it, talking myself back into it. How is it possible that 4 years ago I did this kind of thing without a second thought? Now, I sit here nervously, expecting at any minute for the Mom Police to come up behind me, clap a heavy hand on my shoulder and take my tea away, spilling it across my lap and burning me. They wouldn't take me to jail, no. Just back home to the babies.

If there are myriad blog posts and magazine articles and forum conversations dedicated to the importance of dad's self-care, I apologize. I've missed them. Self-care, the very intentional practise of putting oneself first every once in awhile, is the realm of women and mothers. We are socialized, particularly as mothers, to put everyone BUT ourselves first, all of the time. Then we read that the key to staying sane is to care for ourselves. To put the oxygen mask on ourselves first. Enjoy a cup of tea, they write. Take a long bath. Go for a run. Practice yoga. And these things all sound wonderful and simple, but the truth is, they're not. Taking care of yourself after not doing that for several years is SO HARD. I expect it will take several weeks of regularly coming to this coffee shop, sitting at this same table with this same mug of green tea, before I feel good about this. Before it feels easy and my cup truly feels full.

Why? Why is this so difficult?

Maybe it's wrapped up in my own failing self-worth. If I don't feel like I deserve even this, a couple of hours spread out across the week, then of course this time would feel stolen from the laps of my children, prised from their grimy little fingers. Of course I'm waiting for someone to call my bluff, send me packing back to dirty diapers and the endless loop of making snacks and cleaning them up.

Maybe I take some kind of sick pleasure out of being a martyr. I will spend all my time with these kids if it kills us all, dammit. But nobody really likes a martyr, they're worshipped only after they're long dead. Living with one: not fun. And I am worth so much more to my family if I'm living, and happy to be doing so.

Maybe I like to think that I'm the only one who knows how to care for them properly, the only one they want. Charlotte has started sucking her thumb this past week, soothing herself to sleep on many occasions.  And each time she does, I am surprised, happy, devastated. Already, three months old, she doesn't need me for that one little moment. If all I am is a baby-soother, a milk-maker, a bum-wiper, then of course it feels uncomfortable to be something other.

So here I am, in the world of the living. In the world of adults with complicated beverage orders, with softly playing indie folk music floating on the cool air. And around me, others talk with friends, they do a Sudoku puzzle, they read the news on their laptop. I am incognito, taking care of myself. I pencil it into my calendar: "self-care, 10 am".  It's ridiculous and it's the only way. So if you're like me, and you find it almost impossible to take care of yourself: Do it. Find a way. Be uncomfortable the first 10 times you do it, and then slowly, like I hope to, I hope you'll feel better about it, too.

I'll write my book of poems, my collection of short stories, my novel, one stolen hour at a time.


Image via Flickr user Nina Nelson. Licensed under Creative Commons

Learning to Live with Anger

It's late morning. I sit on the couch in the sunroom, nursing my baby and watching the boys play. This particular day started too early, and my attempt to sneak in some writing before the demands started was interrupted when Aedan curled up beside me, clinging to my arm and resting his head against my shoulder. Now, the boys are playing a noisy game of "you be the lizard and I'll be the dragon chasing you": they roar, hiss, screech with delight. To say I am overstimulated would be an understatement. And I'm tired, and hungry. I decide to do something about that last one. I sling the baby up onto my shoulder, and walk to the kitchen to find something to eat. And the second I am out of the room, Colm's squeals of joy turn to cries of distress. I tense up (if it's even possible for me to be more tense), my jaw clenching, and storm back into the room. Aedan has his brother pinned face-down, and he's gripping Colm's chubby little cheeks, pulling his head back. And I lose it.

With my baby still in my arms I start yelling. I forcefully pull Aedan off of his little brother, pushing him away from Colm. I scream "What are you doing? What is your problem? It's not okay to hurt people!" And as I utter those words, a voice somewhere in my head whispers: You are such a hypocrite. It's not okay to hurt people but you're trying to hurt him.

And then the guilt and the shame set in. I feel like shit, like an awful person. All three of us are crying. I promise to do better but the truth is, now that I've lost it once today I'm more likely to lose it again. This path is so worn I swear I walk it in my sleep.

Anger is absolutely the last emotion I expected to encounter on my parenting journey. So when it began to bubble up, hot and intense and unstoppable, just after Colm was born, I had no idea how to handle it. I had never experienced anything like the kind of anger I've just described. My biggest triggers are Aedan getting too rough with his little brother, and my own over-stimulation: both of these are unavoidable parts of parenting young kids. I hate this aspect of myself. I think it's ugly, out of control, and scary. Over the last two years, I have promised myself and my kids repeatedly that I will not yell. I will not lose it. I will do better, be better. And, inevitably, I break my promises, over and over again.

With the guidance of a wondeful therapist, I've come to realize some key issues with my approach. First of all, framing it as "doing better, being better" implies that what I'm doing now is wrong, and that there is something wrong with who I am today. And saying "I'm going to be better" sets me up for a big let down when I lose it the next time. Because, let's face it, just saying those words doesn't magically make it so. Learning a new way of dealing with explosive anger isn't going to happen overnight. So if I've promised to be better, and then I'm not, the feelings of shame and guilt are even greater. It's a pattern that leads to more anger, more shame, more depression. Instead of saying "I'm going to do better", I now think of it as doing differently. I'm learning new techniques. I am still me: ever evolving me.

The biggest issue I face, though, is that I am trying to live without anger, trying to deny the feeling exists, trying to squash it down. But anger is a very real, albeit a very uncomfortable, feeling. It is physically uncomfortable: we often feel anger in our bodies, the tension and the jaw-clenching I mentioned. Maybe you ball your hands into fists or grind your teeth. Maybe you feel it in your gut. We often feel an intense need to relieve that anger, by yelling or by lashing out: shoving, hitting, kicking. And that may feel like relief, briefly. And then we feel awful for what we've  done. We might feel even angrier then, at the person who "made" us lose it in the first place, and at ourselves, for losing it.  The feeling of discomfort lingers, intensifies.

So what if we just sit with our intense feelings? What if we just give those feelings space to be? Over the past month or so I've been trying this. Noticing when my anger is being triggered. Acknowledging it by saying, either in my head or outloud: "I'm really angry right now!"  I feel it in my whole body, I feel that urge to strike out, and it is so uncomfortable. I feel my anger peak, and then, gradually, simmer down and finally pass. I've noticed that when I do this, I'm actually angry for less time. There are fewer tears shed. My relationship to my kids is unscathed.

The hardest part about sitting with my anger is still dealing with the situation at hand.  Since my anger is usually triggered by Aedan getting too rough with his brother, I still have to act. Real life prevails: I can't just retreat to a quiet room and deep breathe until it passes. For now, I tell Aedan firmly that we don't push, hit, kick, bite etc. And then I go to Colm, if he needs me, and I hug him and kiss him and make sure he's okay. I hold his sweet little self until the anger begins to dissipate and then I might address Aedan more fully. For now, it works to get me through the day.

This trick of giving space to uncomfortable feelings works with more than just anger, of course. When I'm feeling depressed or anxious, I've begun to just notice these feelings, acknowledge them, and patiently watch for them to pass. And in the same vein, when I am feeling happy, joyful even, I honour those feelings by attending to them, letting them swell and crest and then gently lap at my toes as I wait for the next wave, whatever it might bring.

Were you surprised by unexpected emotions in parenthood? How do you deal with things like anger or deep sadness in your everyday life? I'd love to hear what works for you.