A New Decade

Today is the beginning of my fortieth year. I'm starting a new decade and it was ushered in with a surprise party this weekend that my husband organized. I told my friends that the joyful gathering and messages from far and wide will bolster me through this new decade. That's a big (possibly cliched) statement, but I think - hope! - it is true.

Writing, teaching online, parenting, and otherwise living in this technologically-heavy world often leaves me lonely and feeling as blue as my screens' light. On this blog, I write about the juggling act we do parent writers do because it isn't anything that can be ignored or forgotten. Working full-time is a big job, parenting is a big job and writing creatively - essentially another full-time, unpaid job - is a big job. Three big jobs, in addition to other relationships and responsibilities, is no small juggling act.

Leading up to this birthday, I had been feeling panic about all I want to do and all that I haven't yet done. I even received a birthday message from someone today that said, "Happy birthday! Hey, forty isn't so bad. You'll get through it."

An old friend posted on Facebook recently about her feeling of success for making it to forty. I need to turn the impending doom of the "zero" birthday around and enjoy this time. After all, it really is a success if we are still all here together.

With that in mind, I wish us all happiness, a happy birthday if you share the day, and a hearty congratulations for making it this far. Here's to a full next decade of being surrounded by love, writing and reading.

I also leave you with this kind-hearted (for parents and former-children alike) New York Times article, "What American Parents Can learn from Chinese Philosophy." The piece ends with, "Caring for one another is hard work. It requires endless awareness, adaptation and responsiveness. But it is one of the most important and rewarding things we do. This is not just how our children will become better people and live better lives. It is how they can create a better world." I would add that it makes our writing truer and more important, too.

Poem @ The Brilliant Meal

Thank you to Anna Napp for sharing my poem, Permission to Stay, as well as a brief explanation about the poem's creation, on her website The Brilliant Meal. Anna's literary food blog offers beautiful stories, recipes, photographs and insight. I hope you'll look around the site and explore.

Anna's request to share something on her blog came at a fortuitous time - my birthday. As a friend texted me this morning, I'm turning 21 again. As with all milestones, I've been reflecting on the past and thinking about the future. I lived in Italy for four years, one as a student and three as an employee at NYU in Florence. Now, all grown up with a husband, son and different career, I'm living in Washington, D.C. And we're plotting to return to live in Italy temporarily in a few years. Life is filled with circular and straight narratives that intertwine.

The poem's title, Permission to Stay, reflects on the question of who can give and accept permission. The title comes from an Italian police document, but the meaning moves beyond the law. In this new year of mine, what permissions will I be given and carve out for myself?

Thank you again to my dear Sarah Lawrence MFA friend, Anna, for the opportunity to think about these issues and share a poem. I hope we can break bread in the same city together one day soon, preferably with a glass of wine.

Happiest birthday to our Bambino!

An almost two-year-old watching a panda snack 

at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. 

Two years ago, our son was born. He was fairly annoyed at the dry world and I couldn't get out of bed after a cesarean. Two years later, he can run through a field and drink water out of a cup. I can even leave him alone in a room to play for a a few moments as I make coffee.

We stop to look at ants on the sidewalk and clap when a song on the radio ends. He dances in his car seat, on the sidewalk, in his crib and anywhere he hears a tune or creates one himself. He can jump high, flapping his arms for momentum. At the end of the day, he likes to show me the firetruck he played with at daycare. He's started to ask for help to climb ladders on playgrounds and explores places I can't always fit to follow him.

The other day, while pushing him up a hill in his stroller, he kept pointing out "animals." There were bugs and squirrels and birds. I started to tune him out. It was hot and I wanted to get us both home. "Yes, animals," I agreed with him, "uh huh." And then suddenly he shouted, " Mamma! AN-I-MALS!"

I turned to look where he was pointing. There were two horses being ridden by police officers coming down the road and then past us on the sidewalk into the park. There were indeed animals. Two giant ones I might have ignored as I focused on getting home.

To you, bambino, I wish you a year of joy and many, many surprises. And I hope you'll continue to share them both with me.