D is for Depot

'meet you at the depot'

This sentence has been said and texted a zillion times in our family.  

The depot is the social core of our Northern California town, a former train station and then greyhound bus station tucked at the base of Mount Tamalpais. Now it is a red brick plaza anchored by the Depot Cafe and Bookstore, edged with wooden benches, permanent chess tables and mature trees skirted with concrete benches that house musicians and parents and dog walkers on any typical day.  The bus stops across the street now. 

In the twenty years that I have lived here, I have sat on those benches with coffee while my baby slept in a stroller; I have watched my kids climb the trees, make chalk drawings, play hop scotch, ride scooters, skateboards and bicycles.  I have brought my kids coffee while they played guitars, banjos and mandolins, busking (very successfully)for money. Sometimes I'd see them there playing when I drove by. 

I meet up with my kids there now, in town from college or traveling; it's our central meeting place to hang out or go for a meal. Recently I ran into my son there unexpectedly, not even knowing he was in town; Little kids were climbing trees, riding scooters (with helmets now), the hacky-sack kids, moms in lulu lemons pushing sleeping babies in strollers, and an old guy playing a sitar under the tree. 

Mary Allison Tierney's essay The Gingerdreadman is included in the anthology Mamas Write, available at Amazon, or your local independent bookshop.

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Don't Like it......

So there's some unfortunate drama as the school year winds down.  Facebook is helping, in it's own weird way.  I hope things turn out for the best, that the bullies are properly dealt with. That the victims aren't terribly bitter and scarred.  

There have been some amazing parents and brave kids who were not bystanders and stood up to the bullies, so lessons are being learned.  

High school should be a breeze, right?

Mary Allison Tierney's essay The Gingerdreadman is included in the anthology Mamas Write, available at Amazon, or your local independent bookshop.

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..and yet another launch party!

Write On, Mamas! announce our newborn Anthology

Mamas Write, (Bittersweet Press) 29 poignant, gritty and funny essays on how mothering shaped us as writers, how we make time to write, memorable parenting moments and moreby the Write On Mamas

we've added a new launch party:

April 24th 7 pm at Diesel books Oakland

spoiler alert: my essay's about one of my kids

Write On Mamas are a group of more than 40 writing moms (and one dad) who meet online and in person to read, write, revise, and share. Members are published authors, journalists, bloggers, and poets, as well as those beginning their writing journey. Based primarily in Northern California, Write On Mamas also hail from Oregon, Minnesota, Maryland, and Calgary.

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M is for Monday

For this Monday. Today. A daily siren sounds at noon at Stinson Beach. I was there today when it blasted, with my daughter and the dog.  No school today – optional parent teacher conferences – we opted no and made it a beach day. An hour later we were home and I learned of the horror at the Boston Marathon. The first explosion happened at the same time the beach siren went off. I am so grateful for this day with my daughter and send healing thoughts to all in Boston and to those who were victimized by this violence.  I am shielding myself and daughter from all visual coverage.

My son and I spent last weekend touring the campus and local beach scene in Santa Cruz. He plans to start college there in the fall,  needed to check it out the living conditions.

Now, Monday, laundry and dirty dishes and snowdrifts of dog hair have gathered in their favorite spots.  Food-like things crunch underfoot as I walk by the piles in the kitchen and reach for the leash, sending our 13 year old Aussi-Border collie  into a complete Bieber fever spaz attack complete with sneezing. If she could bounce on her hind legs and clap, she would.

It is windy and chilly but I am seriously scoring in the sand dollar hunt. The dog is going nuts, hunting eviscerated crabs and chasing anything thrown. My daughter is walking behind me, head down in a hardback library book, fighting the wind to turn the page. She observes with all the wisdom of a twelve year old. ‘You know what the greatest thing is about Robert Downy Jr., besides everything?’ then goes on to tell me some antidote from an Avengers fan page.

Prepping my second son for the launch pad has me slowing down with my daughter.  The time between seventh grade and the end of senior year is a much faster five years than from kindergarten to fourth grade. So this day belongs to the beach, sand dollars, a half and half soft serve cone at the Parkside, and a screening of Mean Girls when we get home. The dog hair, crumbs, laundry unreturned emails and unscheduled blah blah can keep. 

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Joe Clarke

My middle child is all metal.  He is a rock god.  He’s twelve. This past winter, during his second week of cotillion he learned the fox trot.  He’s quick to point out that foxes don’t trot, in case you’re curious.  Cotillion teaches formal dance steps and social etiquette that my kids can’t possibly learn at home.  I was a non Cotillion kid when I was in middle school, mostly because my mother was in her rejection of the establishment phase circa 1976.  Of course it was all the other kids talked about at school the next day – the horror of dancing together in fancy clothes.  But they were grinning like idiots and I knew I was missing out. 

My guy who lives in his black Slayer t-shirt and baggy black jeans with ringlets down to his shoulders cleans up good for cotillion. He had been planning his cotillion attire for two years, since his older brother was forced to attend.  His attitude was much more enthusiastic, provided that I allowed him to wear a camoflage tux with a top hat. Sadly, we never found one. In a navy blazer and khakis he’s still all metal.  A rock god.  James Hetfield in a suit is still James Hetfield. 

That night they learned the art of proper introduction.  When changing dance partners, one introduces themselves, first and last name.  The instructor gave an example:  “rather than ‘I’m Joe’ say instead ‘I’m Joe Clarke’.”  Each time he changed dance partners and was paired with a girl from his school, my son introduced himself, “I’m Joe Clark”.   Bingo.  The girls laughed.  There’s more to cotillion than the fox trot.  Cotillion rocks. 

Mary Allison Tierney's essay The Gingerdreadman is included in the anthology Mamas Write, available at Amazon, or your local independent bookshop.

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