Brooding About The Brood

Or, you know, thoughts on Mother's Day

Crystal Sands, owner and operator of a gardening/farming lit journal called Farmer-ish (her print annual, I was lucky enough to be published in) blogged this week about what she’s learned about motherhood from watching her chickens.

I am one of those people who, when someone tells me having a pet is like having a child, I know full-well that is true. I do not roll my eyes or scoff or think “you couldn’t POSSIBLY know what it’s like to have a child.” Because animals and children? Not that different.

And that’s been proven even more true to me since we got chickens six weeks ago. Like a baby/young child, we set the chicks up with a nightlight, and the first night we tried to take it away, one chicken stood in the middle of the pen and chirped repeatedly until we finally put the nightlight back. How is that so different from my 6-year-old coming out of her room three times complaining about her room being too hot, then too cold, then too dark? Spoiler alert: it’s not.

I find that having these chicks, being thrust into new motherhood again, has me ruminating on what it means to be a parent, a good parent at that, and how my parenting will affect these beings that depend on me. Will my chickens be afraid of the dark now because I coddled them with a nightlight? What lasting affects will my parenting decisions have on my brood?

Brood: an interesting word. As a noun, it means children. As a verb, it means worriedly pondering. The noun and the verb are their own separate words, but for me, and probably a lot of parents, they go hand-in-hand. When is a parent not worriedly pondering about their children? About their actions towards their children? (Especially in America where it’s so easy to do parenting wrong!)

It’s what makes “holidays” like Mother’s Day for me so tough. Because I never feel like I’m being an all-star parent. I never feel like I deserve a gold star in mothering. I’m too much of a brooder to claim that confidence. Mother’s Day to me is just a reminder of my inadequacy.

So yes, I’ll take a breakfast out—I do love eggs benedict and bottomless coffee (although my english muffin was burnt). And okay, yeah, I’ll take a beautiful plant (although it’s another addition to the brood—plants are also like children, in my opinion). And if my daughter tries extra hard to listen, that’s great, too (although it would be great if she tried to listen every day). But overall, let’s just call it another day, shall we?

When that little boy was back safe and sound with his mama, he sang the sweetest songs to her. “I’ll never leave you again, mama,” he seemed to say. Of course, he did because that’s what they do.

- Crystal Sands

My mother’s day plant, which I will likely kill, because I know nothing about taking care of plants, but for now it’s alive and quite lovely.

Sticking with a somber tone, Heather B. Armstrong died this week. I was an avid reader of Dooce for a long time. And then, I kept forgetting to check back for new blog entries. And then I forgot about it entirely. I did read and love both of her memoirs. She was a beautiful writer, and oftentimes, a funny one. She was dubbed “The Queen of the Mommy Bloggers” since she was one of the major trendsetters that got the era started in the 2000s. I read some of the news articles outlining her rise and fall of stardom, her rise and fall of mental health, her controversial opinions, her questionable practices. But I don’t want to focus on any of those. It feels disrespectful to me. So instead, I’d just like to quote the last blog she posted on her website, which is mostly a letter to her daughter. She was known for writing letters to her daughters on their birthdays, and I have read many of them. But this one feels different to me. This one feels like she knew the end the coming. Unlike me, who is so uncertain of how my child will turn out, she saw her oldest child turn 18 and saw that she was going to be all right with life, with or without her. And I’m sure she will be all right. But she would have been better with her. Maybe the world would have been, too.

Shame for an alcoholic is a language in which we converse with expertise, and the fact that I got sober the year my older kid became a senior in high school was its own blessing and curse. I have always been present for my kids and, good lord, you can say what you want about how I should not be dragging either of them into a post about their alcoholic mother, but there is no coincidence that I got to witness my child prepare herself for college with this much clarity. And I am going to give myself credit for having raised a woman who more than anything else possesses a ferocity for life so unparalleled that her grandmother, The Avon World Sales Leader, started taking notes when she saw the ultrasound. 

- Heather B. Armstrong

We were downtown to see Hadestown, and when the show got out, they were closing streets in preparation for the next day’s River Bank Run, so we got to walk in the middle of the road, and that just felt weird and fun. Also, take a look at that shitty Michigan road.

What Show I Went to:

New category for this newsletter, since I never go to shows anymore!

As mentioned in the caption, Hadestown was here this week. I have never seen it but I love the soundtrack, so we went. I didn’t love it as much as I had hoped to, but the performers were phenomenal, and I was geeked to see Nathan Lee Graham perform as Hermes, even though he’ll always be Frederick Montana in my eyes, in which case he was right when he said, “And this is, after all, all about… me.”

What I’m Reading:

It’s been three months since I mentioned it, but my hold for Screaming on the Inside by Jessica Grose FINALLY came in, and this book did not disappoint. Pretty much everything she wrote about American Motherhood had me shouting “YES!” Do yourself a favor and check it out.

What I’m Watching:

My husband and I watched all eight episodes of The Diplomat this week, and the writers’ vision with the actors’ talents has me just in awe of this engaging show. Although, my old ass can’t help but see Felicity when I watch Keri Russell work.

Quick PSA: without writers, there are no great shows so support the WGA strike!

As much as I wish there didn’t have to be a strike, I love the pics coming from the picket line.

Saw this pic on a screenwriting group I’m part of. Wish I could be there in person, but I’m definitely there in spirit!

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