even though I helped you with this piece, I've read it twice today. each time, I get that pressure in my throat, the kind that if I let it could rise and become tears. I love how I feel myself healing right alongside you.
I'm so excited to dig in on all the work these ideas generate. So much of mothering is re-mothering; and just finding the ways we can plough care back into the world. You've got me thinking about nurture as a radical, cultural act that go way outside the bounds of child-rearing. That feminine economy, in practice.
I worship at the altar of mothers. My favorite women, whom I love more than anything, are mothers, and I had zero interest in reading about mothering. I thought nothing could bore me more. I’m proud to say I was so damn wrong. The way you write about mothering and your boys is so entertaining and cracks open a part of life that I never would have glanced twice at. For that, I am so grateful to you. Your ability to birth these new considerations within me and grow them to enormous proportions is the stuff of literary legend. ❤️🔥⚡️💥
THANK YOU. What I realized writing this is that any subject can be deep and interesting--just depends on how seriously we take it. It made me sad to confront my assumptions about motherhood as a deeply unserious subject. Definitely feels like part of a broader cultural dupe to take such a complex and difficult role and chronically minimize it. I suppose I feel the need to start pushing back on that. Your generosity really helps.
Most writing on motherhood sounds the same, and after so much of the same, it disappears within itself being overlooked. Yes, we know it’s hard. Yes, we know it changes your identity. Yes, we know it’s a massive event in women’s lives…but what else? Writing about motherhood always felt like it was only for other mothers, which is terrific. Still, the ultimate writing magic for me is to turn a common subject on its side to reveal something I’ve never seen before. That’s your gift, and it’s so refreshing to experience/read.
A while ago, I heard the NPR music critic Anne Powers talking about Joni Mitchel’s album, ‘Blue' (which was about giving a child up for adoption) and I had to pause the show and write down what she said in my journal: “Critics didn’t get it… people didn’t get it at the time… It’s a testimony to the need for women to tell their stories that aren’t officially in the history books or master narrative. Because unless we tell those stories they are not audible they are not legible. And even sometimes when we do they are not so you have to tell them more than once.”
Women's narratives have been discredited forever. But I do believe this is changing!
I really love what you said at the end: "I’m the writer I want to be because I’ve been tenderized and shot through with white hot love. And I’m the mom I want to be because I make meaning of the slow motion days that race into years. What’s the goal if not to be in awe of what’s in front of you?”
I don’t think there is a topic under the sun that is not worthy of writing about as long as the writer brings that exact take to it: tenderized, in awe, and trying to make meaning for the readers.
Wow, what a comment!! I almost ended the piece with "Motherhood is as serious as we take it--like anything, really." But I decided to thank my readers instead. I am going to race right now to find the interview. I didn't realize until I woke up to comments this morning what I wanted from this piece, or from the declaration that this is a mom blog and HOW PROUD I am of that. But I think you nailed it: it's just about being part of the chorus that takes this work and gives it the utmost credit. If I'd been reading rich, thick texts about the deep work of parenthood, maybe I wouldn't have spent so many years feeling like it was "less serious" than any of the other potentials available to me. I hardly mean we have to drop everything and be parents only. But those dark, early mornings, those long Sunday afternoons... what if those were all as 'impressive' as the other efforts we make in the world? Certainly, they can be just as difficult, and just as rewarding.
"the slow motion days that race into years" -gulp- and -yep- and SOB!
You consistently make me cry every week and the lines that get me are never about the bar exam. Thank you for pouring your heart out, it is more valuable than you could ever imagine. Thank you!!!
Thank you, Diana! I just wrote to Jenovia that it confuses me how we've minimized this part of the human experience. Imagine if across our society we regarded parenting as serious, meaningful work and not something that just... happens invisibly, or sort of by accident? I don't mean parents have to drop everything and ogle their kids all day. But I think it would be really healing for a lot of people if the effort were more valued and revered. It's only the future of humanity after all.
Exactly, Isabel. And I'd further that to all acts of caring, which is often done by women: gifting, cleaning, organizing, etc.
This work is made invisible, but it's so important.
I think often after a breakup, men desperately seek this invisible support right away, where as women will recuperate from having to have done all that unacknowledged work, and will take more time to get into another relationship.
I recently had a conversation with a friend who shared with me that a small group of women talked about how exhausted they were when in a relationship, and that's often been my experience too.
Sorry to digress, but I think it's often the space that women occupy that is diminished, yet counted on.
" we live with the rub. " So much here. This and more and more I could repost. Thank you. Keep writing. Keep speaking YOUR Truth. We all need to hear it.
one gets the feeling here the definition of "trad-wife" is about to get an extreme make-over here and soon and who better to do it than a mother in full possession of her "power" (and mole-skins!)
Isabel, LOOOVE this. You nail it! Also, I love Madeline Donahue’s paintings. A good friend of ours, Nina Johnson, represents her! https://ninajohnson.com/
She is extraordinary. I stare at everything she does with my jaw on the floor. I love how she's able to capture the humor and the horror of motherhood. Thank you for passing along Nina's website. I'm hoping my plot to win the Powerball pans out so I can cover our walls with her artists. So much talent in one place!!!
Amazing!! There aren't too many others, although everybody I know seems to have an Uncle Bruce. I joke that I've never met a bad one. Springsteen, Willis, Wayne, Lee. Can't go wrong.
Dude. My bio: environmental lawyer turned SAHM + homeschool teacher. Might I too be a trad wife?? I’ll be waiting on your next piece with bated breath.
Written with the compassion for yourself and all women, biological mothers or not, since all women mother the world. Writing and mothering are essentially about being vulnerable. Thank you again for being out front with the complexity of motherhood and writing.
YES YES YES, I can only come at this from my own, personal experience but I know that so many people pour their nurture and care into other human beings--large and small, in so many private and transformative ways. That's all it's about. Digging in and being transformed.
Living a life in balance between family and career is a rare gift to your children. And writing is that rare career at this unusual moment on this terrific platform that I believe adds tot he role of mother.
However you define your blog, I know this: it's valuable and a gift to your readers.
I feel so lucky on all of these fronts. Both that these roles have fused themselves together and that there's a space where they can be so generously received. And I diminished it in jest, but the newsletter format feels much more enfranchising than blogs ever did :)
A giant YES of thanks to you Isabel. Every word reached my marrow.
Mothering my brood is at the heart of EVERYTHING . It enables complexity, vast love, ambitions. More. Mothering exhausts me till I reinvent. It thrills till I'm spent. Then rise. And so it goes on.
The way motherhood is held - denigrated, undervalued yet glorified as long as we abide by 'rules' - that's what is worth grappling with.
Love to interview you for the Parents who Think podcast. Would you let me know if you'd be open to that?
Oh my goodness, what a way to describe it. An existential death and rebirth a thousand times a month. (A day?) I'd love to chat more, just send me a message!
even though I helped you with this piece, I've read it twice today. each time, I get that pressure in my throat, the kind that if I let it could rise and become tears. I love how I feel myself healing right alongside you.
I'm so excited to dig in on all the work these ideas generate. So much of mothering is re-mothering; and just finding the ways we can plough care back into the world. You've got me thinking about nurture as a radical, cultural act that go way outside the bounds of child-rearing. That feminine economy, in practice.
👏🏻
I worship at the altar of mothers. My favorite women, whom I love more than anything, are mothers, and I had zero interest in reading about mothering. I thought nothing could bore me more. I’m proud to say I was so damn wrong. The way you write about mothering and your boys is so entertaining and cracks open a part of life that I never would have glanced twice at. For that, I am so grateful to you. Your ability to birth these new considerations within me and grow them to enormous proportions is the stuff of literary legend. ❤️🔥⚡️💥
THANK YOU. What I realized writing this is that any subject can be deep and interesting--just depends on how seriously we take it. It made me sad to confront my assumptions about motherhood as a deeply unserious subject. Definitely feels like part of a broader cultural dupe to take such a complex and difficult role and chronically minimize it. I suppose I feel the need to start pushing back on that. Your generosity really helps.
Most writing on motherhood sounds the same, and after so much of the same, it disappears within itself being overlooked. Yes, we know it’s hard. Yes, we know it changes your identity. Yes, we know it’s a massive event in women’s lives…but what else? Writing about motherhood always felt like it was only for other mothers, which is terrific. Still, the ultimate writing magic for me is to turn a common subject on its side to reveal something I’ve never seen before. That’s your gift, and it’s so refreshing to experience/read.
I wish you could see my blushing. But I won't subject you to live video.
I too worship at the altar of Mothers.
A while ago, I heard the NPR music critic Anne Powers talking about Joni Mitchel’s album, ‘Blue' (which was about giving a child up for adoption) and I had to pause the show and write down what she said in my journal: “Critics didn’t get it… people didn’t get it at the time… It’s a testimony to the need for women to tell their stories that aren’t officially in the history books or master narrative. Because unless we tell those stories they are not audible they are not legible. And even sometimes when we do they are not so you have to tell them more than once.”
Women's narratives have been discredited forever. But I do believe this is changing!
I really love what you said at the end: "I’m the writer I want to be because I’ve been tenderized and shot through with white hot love. And I’m the mom I want to be because I make meaning of the slow motion days that race into years. What’s the goal if not to be in awe of what’s in front of you?”
I don’t think there is a topic under the sun that is not worthy of writing about as long as the writer brings that exact take to it: tenderized, in awe, and trying to make meaning for the readers.
Wow, what a comment!! I almost ended the piece with "Motherhood is as serious as we take it--like anything, really." But I decided to thank my readers instead. I am going to race right now to find the interview. I didn't realize until I woke up to comments this morning what I wanted from this piece, or from the declaration that this is a mom blog and HOW PROUD I am of that. But I think you nailed it: it's just about being part of the chorus that takes this work and gives it the utmost credit. If I'd been reading rich, thick texts about the deep work of parenthood, maybe I wouldn't have spent so many years feeling like it was "less serious" than any of the other potentials available to me. I hardly mean we have to drop everything and be parents only. But those dark, early mornings, those long Sunday afternoons... what if those were all as 'impressive' as the other efforts we make in the world? Certainly, they can be just as difficult, and just as rewarding.
Wow wow wow. Thank you for sharing that bit from Anne Powers. I’ve screenshotted it so I never lose it.
Me, too!
I love what she said at the end and ditto your sentiments on it.
so so so good.
"the slow motion days that race into years" -gulp- and -yep- and SOB!
You consistently make me cry every week and the lines that get me are never about the bar exam. Thank you for pouring your heart out, it is more valuable than you could ever imagine. Thank you!!!
Oh Lordy how I would've missed having you in my life if I'd been a lawyer 80 hours a week. Phew for dodging that bullet!
This rocked me into another dimension. What the fuck
Ahh but was it only my doing? 🌀
You're a fabulous writer, Isabel!
I wish motherhood, and parenthood generally, was treated with more respect in our society.
Thank you, Diana! I just wrote to Jenovia that it confuses me how we've minimized this part of the human experience. Imagine if across our society we regarded parenting as serious, meaningful work and not something that just... happens invisibly, or sort of by accident? I don't mean parents have to drop everything and ogle their kids all day. But I think it would be really healing for a lot of people if the effort were more valued and revered. It's only the future of humanity after all.
Exactly, Isabel. And I'd further that to all acts of caring, which is often done by women: gifting, cleaning, organizing, etc.
This work is made invisible, but it's so important.
I think often after a breakup, men desperately seek this invisible support right away, where as women will recuperate from having to have done all that unacknowledged work, and will take more time to get into another relationship.
I recently had a conversation with a friend who shared with me that a small group of women talked about how exhausted they were when in a relationship, and that's often been my experience too.
Sorry to digress, but I think it's often the space that women occupy that is diminished, yet counted on.
Keep up the great writing!
We have to elevate it. Make it so. I do.
You certainly have for me. Bruce's birth would not have pushed me into a new dimension if I hadn't had your support, confidence and encouragement.
" we live with the rub. " So much here. This and more and more I could repost. Thank you. Keep writing. Keep speaking YOUR Truth. We all need to hear it.
one gets the feeling here the definition of "trad-wife" is about to get an extreme make-over here and soon and who better to do it than a mother in full possession of her "power" (and mole-skins!)
I am belly laughing.
Wow… just wow..
❤️❤️❤️
Isabel, LOOOVE this. You nail it! Also, I love Madeline Donahue’s paintings. A good friend of ours, Nina Johnson, represents her! https://ninajohnson.com/
She is extraordinary. I stare at everything she does with my jaw on the floor. I love how she's able to capture the humor and the horror of motherhood. Thank you for passing along Nina's website. I'm hoping my plot to win the Powerball pans out so I can cover our walls with her artists. So much talent in one place!!!
I love that you have baby Bruce. My 6 year old grandson is Bruce. I love the name !
Amazing!! There aren't too many others, although everybody I know seems to have an Uncle Bruce. I joke that I've never met a bad one. Springsteen, Willis, Wayne, Lee. Can't go wrong.
Of course I thought of your Bruce when Isabel named her last son...❤️
Dude. My bio: environmental lawyer turned SAHM + homeschool teacher. Might I too be a trad wife?? I’ll be waiting on your next piece with bated breath.
Oooowieee we need to talk!
Written with the compassion for yourself and all women, biological mothers or not, since all women mother the world. Writing and mothering are essentially about being vulnerable. Thank you again for being out front with the complexity of motherhood and writing.
YES YES YES, I can only come at this from my own, personal experience but I know that so many people pour their nurture and care into other human beings--large and small, in so many private and transformative ways. That's all it's about. Digging in and being transformed.
Isabel,
Living a life in balance between family and career is a rare gift to your children. And writing is that rare career at this unusual moment on this terrific platform that I believe adds tot he role of mother.
However you define your blog, I know this: it's valuable and a gift to your readers.
I feel so lucky on all of these fronts. Both that these roles have fused themselves together and that there's a space where they can be so generously received. And I diminished it in jest, but the newsletter format feels much more enfranchising than blogs ever did :)
This is gorgeous.
Thank you so much for reading. I’m humbled. 🧡
A giant YES of thanks to you Isabel. Every word reached my marrow.
Mothering my brood is at the heart of EVERYTHING . It enables complexity, vast love, ambitions. More. Mothering exhausts me till I reinvent. It thrills till I'm spent. Then rise. And so it goes on.
The way motherhood is held - denigrated, undervalued yet glorified as long as we abide by 'rules' - that's what is worth grappling with.
Love to interview you for the Parents who Think podcast. Would you let me know if you'd be open to that?
ps. can't wait for your trad wife words
Oh my goodness, what a way to describe it. An existential death and rebirth a thousand times a month. (A day?) I'd love to chat more, just send me a message!