Category: Blogging
Monday, Nov 9, 2009 | Blogging, Feminism, Mothering |
Hi readers. Could I ask a favour, please? I’m working on a zine project for my women’s studies class, and have launched a blog to complement it. Both relate to a recent post on how the personal feels political. The blog is called Moms Are Feminists Too. If you are a feminist and a mother, or even a mother who’s thought a bit about feminism, would you consider visiting and responding to my opening questionnaire? It focuses on motherhood, identity, work, and feminism.
I haven’t got any brilliant ideas, yet, for change, but basically want to create a forum to discuss how we can make this job of mothering more valued in our culture. Think of these two extreme characterizations of stay-home mothers: yummy mummies and welfare moms. Think of the negative baggage both of those images carry: on the one hand, we have the self-indugent hyper-privileged moms, and on the other, the lazy, uneducated moms. It’s mean. And it’s prevalent. (Can you think of a different prevailing characterization for motherhood today? If so, I want to know! My fuzzy-mummy brain can’t conjure any up …). (And, yes, I wrote that last sentence on purpose). Stay-at-home dads face similar problems, which makes me think the underlying issue is a general cultural disdain for childcare and children.
Because this is a school-related project, I can’t promise it will have legs past the assignment’s due date. But then again, maybe it will. Thanks in advance for your help and input!
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Note: you don’t have agree with everything / anything I’m saying to add your voice to the mix.
Saturday, Nov 7, 2009 | Blogging |
This makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside … to come across, in dear old Blogland, a post about a story I wrote. The blogger is Rebecca Rosenblum, who read at the New Quarterly launch several weeks ago, and whom I’d heard last year, too. She’s a young writer with a unique voice and vision. You won’t feel like you’re reading something ordinary or done-before when you read her. Her first collection of stories is called Once, and I’ve got a link to her blog Rose-coloured among the CanLit blogs listed on the right. (The book itself is still on my to-read list …).
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In other news, have you been to the social event of the season yet? You know, the swarms of people lining up outside in the cold for hours on end to get … tickets to a U2 concert? … into the newest hot hot hot dance club? … the best ice cream ever invented? Would that it were so. Because at the end of this line-up is a brightly lit room packed with screaming babies and toddlers who had no idea that the climax of all this patient waiting would be a smiling nurse jabbing them with a needle. Whoo-hoo! Let me tell you, the fun never ends at the H1N1 clinics. I was reflecting on how waiting in a long line has a couple of effects, not necessarily good ones. Firstly, it makes you really want whatever you’re lined up for. It feels like there’s a shortage, and dammit, you’re going to get this THING that everyone else wants too–or else! Which, secondly, makes you really resent those queue jumpers slipping semi-apologetically (or not) into the lineup ahead of you. Thankfully, I was able to pull myself back and analyze these negative impulses, and go, hey, I’m not going to do this. I’m not going to coddle my mean-spirit, instead I’m going to be grateful, because the sun is shining, it’s quite mild, the kids are behaving, no one’s pushing or yelling, and the women working the clinic are super-friendly. Life’s too short to wallow. And as we were walking back to our car (hours later, car parked miles away, CJ screaming apoplectically because he wanted to stand on the stroller WHEEL and Could Not Understand Why mean mommy wouldn’t let him), along romped the cutest wee puppy, off her leash and squirmy and delightful, and we all got down and petted her and let her lick us and leap all over us, and everything felt much much better. Maybe Apple-Apple will get her wish after all. Maybe a dog is in our family’s future. Okay, distant future. But maybe.
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Oh, and in case you’re wondering, the above photo is a random shot of our kitchen floor. CJ’s fave new play area. He drags out every pot and pan in the house, grunting “heaby, heaby” (heavy). I just opened a drawer to discover a flattened purple stuffed duck in a frying pan, underneath a glass lid. Must get a photo of that.
Friday, Oct 2, 2009 | Bicycles, Blogging, Books, Exercise, Reading, Running, Work, Writing |
My photos are loaded onto a different computer. I may add some in later, but will not let lack of illustration get in the way of a small update. With a life packed perhaps slightly too full, there seems no time to blog. And I miss it. It’s like journaling, which was something I used to do every day, by hand (unfortunately–of perhaps fortunately, depending on one’s perspective–those journals are essentially illegible, written in code, due to my “handwriting” which is a cross between cursive and print–an unsuccessful, take-it-behind-the-barn-and-shoot-it cross. Except I can’t because it’s all I’ve got).
Darn. Tangents always seem to happen in Blogland.
Here are some of the things currently filling my days …
Books: I’m writing a review for a former colleague at the Post, who is now publishing a magazine called Lake Simcoe Living; we’re rounding up some books to recommend for holiday giving and reading, and as such, I got to thumb through catalogues (not literally, because everything’s online now), make a shortlist, consult with her, then call publishers for review copies, which was something I used to do almost daily, but haven’t for years. Of course, all the publicists I used to talk to have moved on. But publicists are friendly; it’s their job. I’ve got two beautiful books already sitting at my elbow, waiting to be read and reviewed (that’s on my to-do list for this morning)–one of them I’m especially excited about: it’s called Earth to Table: Seasonal Recipes from an Organic Farm, by Jeff Crump and Bettina Schormann. The photos are gorgeous and make me want to fondle vegetables, and then cook them.
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Mark your calendars: I will be reading at the launch of The New Quarterly’s fall issue on October 22. That’s a Thursday. Which is the same evening that I also happen to have my first midterm. Seriously. Did I mention that I’m taking a women studies class? The professor thinks I’ll be finished in plenty of time. I’m excited about this class because I’m focussing my major paper on midwifery and doula’ing, and have already spoken to her about it. Yes, I’m a keener. Why the heck else would I be taking a class, if not to squeeze all potential learning out of it?
Tangent. Whoops.
October 22, Art Bar, which is in the Centre in the Square, in Kitchener. I’ll be reading around 8:45pm, but doors open much earlier. Details to follow.
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Kevin’s in Toronto running a slate of training classes, and this morning was HAIRY. I was a chicken with its head chopped off. Picture a cartoon Carrie suspended mid-air with legs and arms stretching in four different directions. And her head popping off. But we made it. And I enjoyed a brisk jog too. Which reminds me that I meant to blog about exercise. Am I fitting it into my life? I felt in better shape this summer with all the family biking we were doing. But I do bike to and from campus once a week, at a racing pace (why am I late, no matter where I’m going?). Biking after dark sure gets the heart pumping. I am covered with flashing red lights, but still feel only an invisible obstacle away from mangling myself. I also run home from school a couple of mornings a week. And I walk to school every day to pick up the kids (briskly on the way there, as, yes, I’ve started leaving later and later, because, really, why be early, when you can enjoy the adrenalin rush of not being sure you’ll quite make it in time?).
Does a joking tone translate in Blogland?
Stop typing. Stop typing, now. Time to work!
Saturday, Apr 18, 2009 | Big Thoughts, Blogging, Confessions, Writing |
Thinking about why I like blogging–because I do–and have come up with a very rudimentary hunch that there’s something mysteriously satisfying about publishing immediately upon typing, and imagining the connection between these words and another set of eyes. Today, I had no internet. This wasn’t a self-driven retreat from the Evil Distractions of the Internet, oh no; a cable in our house went on the fritz, and it was more like being forced into a chastity belt. No email. (There is the phone, you might point out). No internet radio. (There is, um, actual radio). No Facebook. (That might be a good thing actually, as I’ve recently noticed myself updating my status imaginarily at regular silent intervals throughout the day, such as, “Obscure Canlit Mama would like to know why her baby is so impressively wide awake at 6am,” or, “Obscure Canlit Mama has just escaped the library with a small shred of her parental dignity intact,” or, “Obscure Canlit Mama is frying bacon at mid-day. Don’t ask. Or, do.” You can see how addictive this becomes. Where was I?)
Right. No internet–therefore, no blog. No blog. No mundane moment grabbed and translated into words and chucked into the mess that is Blogland. I’m only just beginning to get a sense of what Blogland looks like. It’s crowded in here. Downright claustrophobic. There don’t seem to be filters, just personal taste, and the taste of one’s friends and fellow bloggers. There’s some really good writing out there, and amazing photographs, and recipes; but it feels overwhelming, like being at a trade show in a mosh pit with everyone shouting and screaming and you’re just sort of turning to the next person over and going, uh, what are you here for? And that person doesn’t really know, and then it occurs to you–neither do you.
Oh tumbled, jumbled metaphor. This is why I like Blogland. I can make a real hash of words in here, and not sweat it. When I’m writing a story everything has to fit, I have to be ruthless. I actually think that writing a good story bears no relationship to the metaphor commonly attached: that it’s like birthing a baby, or that the art is the artist’s baby. Pity that baby. Coolly reshaped to fit the parent’s vision, then frozen into position for eternity. But the blog feels more like a real baby. It comes out whole, there’s not a lot of editing, and it grows and changes–every day, or every post, forever replacing what was with what is, and is, and is, this permanent present. Which is pretty much exactly like parenthood. Maybe that’s why so many parents seem drawn to Blogland. We’re already living this, day-by-day, this sweet mundanity, these moments that feel so vital while amidst them, only to disappear, buried by routine; we’re already attuned to the bittersweet pull of time. How quickly a blog entry feels stale–that’s one of its peculiarities. Whereas a story can be read over and over again. I’m not saying old blog entries can’t be read again, and enjoyed (though perhaps mainly by the blogger herself); just that a large part of the pleasure is the immediacy, the realization that what you’re reading actually just happened, and the desire to check in again soon to see what will happen next. Even if nothing much really ever does.
File this entry under Big Thoughts. A favourite late-night-oughtta-be-in-bed-category.
Oh, let’s do one more thing, something new. Confession of the Day: This morning, I convinced Fooey to sit in front of a computer in the children’s section of the library, and signed in on it using her card (adults are not allowed), solely for the purpose of checking my email account. The good news is, I hadn’t missed any important messages.
Tuesday, Apr 14, 2009 | Blogging, Chores |
Inspired by Katie’s comment on the previous blog entry, and the website she suggested, I made a set of index cards with daily chores and weekly chores, and introduced the concept of an allowance to the kids. The oldest were ridiculously enthusiastic. Chore categories so far:
Daily: Wash dishes. Dry and put away dishes. Fold laundry. Set and clear table. Pack lunches.
Weekly: Vaccuum. Clean your room. Clean bathrooms.
Additionally, an all-family daily task: the 10-minute tidy!
The children are already saving their allowance toward a Bone book. And I already felt a weight lifted last night, the feeling that we were all working together toward the collective goal of a liveable house, not one person martyring herself to the domestic cause.
Local food, family, writing, balance.
That’s been this blog’s focus, and I will stick with it. But. The question is a little bit larger than that: What is the tone underlying? Why do this? Looking back, what I most appreciate about these blog entries are the beautiful reminders of day-to-day life, the moments that transcend the ordinary while living within it. On some days, those moments can be hard to find, but even the process of looking for them feels helpful, feels like it’s building something good, and strengthening. And so easily forgotten, too. The photographs, too, have been an unexpectedly happy addition, and pleasurable challenge.
I have bigger blog ambitions, but can’t promise these will come to fruition. Daily themes: Recipes. Parenting ideas/questions. Writing. Doula-ing. Or today’s: housekeeping.
Monday, Apr 13, 2009 | Blogging, Chores |
I’ve been reflecting on the public nature of blogging, and wondering whether it’s healthy to spill the ups and downs of my daily life live-to-air, so to speak; or, even more importantly, the lives of four children who have no say in the process. Ethics. Not sure. What do fellow bloggers think about this?
I’ve also figured out that my perpetually cranky mood relates to having too much to do, and not being able to do it to satisfaction; cursed perfectionism. Kevin sent me out for a solo walk yesterday afternoon, and while I was gone he organized the kids to fold laundry. That’s the pic above. I’m beginning to grasp that my future sanity is going to hinge on designating household responsibility, farming out some tasks, scaling back expectations, doing some ruthless prioritizing. Get a slow-cooker? Hire someone to clean weekly? Seriously. I need to entertain some alternatives. Suggestions welcome.
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Hi readers. Could I ask a favour, please? I’m working on a zine project for my women’s studies class, and have launched a blog to complement it. Both relate to a recent post on how the personal feels political. The blog is called Moms Are Feminists Too. If you are a feminist and a mother, or even a mother who’s thought a bit about feminism, would you consider visiting and responding to my opening questionnaire? It focuses on motherhood, identity, work, and feminism.
