E is for Employed

I haven’t had a paycheck in over twenty years.  This was a choice, mostly.  I did a little freelance work when my first born was an infant but he was wildly unenthusiastic about napping on a schedule or taking a bottle so I settled in to the domestic engineer career ladder.  Stepstool. Milking stool.

I'd work for this guy

My youngest is starting high school in the fall and I am acutely aware of my lack of marketable skills. When I opted out of the workforce, the Internet wasn’t a thing yet.  I had a carphone that had to be installed, laptops hadn’t been invented, and to apply for a job you mailed out paper resumes and made phone calls. 

My last job official job was in an art gallery where among other things, I reviewed artist’s work by looking at sheets of slides that were mailed to the gallery.  I mailed press materials to newspaper and magazine editors.  I visited artists’ studios to select work or dropped off pieces at collector’s homes for consideration. People wrote checks and we had to wait 10 working days until they cleared.  Back then people smoked in galleries too, which seems bizarre now. 

In the twenty one years since I retired, the art gallery as a sales venue has been all but replaced with eBay and websites, but shows do still happen. I’ve been to a handful.  My money goes to other things, like graph paper, cleats, and iPads, so I’m not a patron of the arts and my gallery opening invitations dried up pretty quick. 

So how does one step back in?  A lot has been published about this lately, or maybe I’m just noticing it. I have zero marketable skills, at least compared to an unencumbered twentysomething with a relevant degree and practical experience.  How does navigating elementary school volunteer & carpool duties translate to a W-2? I am nowhere near hip enough to be a barista or bag groceries at Whole Foods.  I’m way too hormonal to be a crossing guard.  I might be too hormonal to be around other people, or their dogs. 

I’m open to suggestions.

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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Write On, Mamas! announce our newborn Anthology

Mamas Write, (Bittersweet Press)
29 essays by the Write On, Mamas! 

It's been a long and thoughtful gestation, and our due date is imminent.  Deep cleansing breath, and.......

Sunday, April 27 (3 PM) at Napa Bookmine

and

Sunday, May 4 (7 PM) at Book Passage Corte Madera

we get to follow Ayelet Waldman and Andrew Sean Greer!  OMG.

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

and stay tuned for the A to Z challenge......

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O is for Options

I want him to look down and ask himself ‘What’s on my plate?’  How do I create a future? Lay the stepping stones to a goal?  So far its still Chutes and Ladders for him.  Every day a new adventure. He has walked his plate to the dog bowl, scraped it clean of opportunities and wondered off the trail. I’ve heard from some (men) that this is admirable, formative.  They’re envious of his freedom. 

Why must his lessons be hand forged artisanally crafted, locally sourced, micro brewed in bad behavior? So Portlandia! His parentally woven safety nets of financial planning and collegiate expectations have been shrugged off, while suspended above his head a sharp blade dangles, twisting in the breeze of his creation with his tsunami of questionable choices. Only visible to maternal eyes, apparently. He senses it but it doesn’t factor into his decision making. 

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I is for Inconsolable

Today my I is for Inconsolable piece is featured on  Crazy California Claire's blog as a part of our Write On, Mamas! group Blogging A to Z challenge.  Enjoy!

Bike Tour to college

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E is for Expectations

drummer girl

Following the rules

The rules are set for a reason.  Mom expects you to be respectful, in word and deed, of yourself and others.  Mom expects you to be safe, and everyone around you has the right to feel safe. Mom expects you to be responsible, for yourself, your things and your actions.

Own it.

Vuotan @ DNA Lounge

Bending the rules

Rules are meant to be broken.  Well, sometimes.  Mom expects you to take risks.  Mom expects you to challenge yourself. Mom expects you to blaze a new trail, to dare to be different, not to follow the crowd.  Mom expects you to create your own rhythm.

I’m not raising house plants.

photo: his brother

Making considered choices

Notice the sunrise, the full moon, new leaves, the fog. Mom expects you to be in awe of your world.  Mom expects you to contribute in a meaningful way. Mom expects you to persevere.

Clean up after yourself. Leave No Trace applies to the kitchen as well as the tundra. 

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C is for Can

Si se puede.

Last night I had the honor of meeting the author of the book Migrant Daughter.  Our book club selection of the month, and one member had worked with the author when she was a teacher in the Mission District in San Francisco in the late 60's.  Frances Equibel Tywoniak celebrated her 82nd birthday with us last night at our book club.  We had a great time getting to know her and question her about her experiences as a migrant farmer's daughter during the depression and attending UC Berkeley in the 1949 as one of the few Mexican Americans on campus, much less a woman.

Born in 1931 in New Mexico, her family had lived on their land for several generations before being forced to move to California to work as migrant labor.  She navigated her parents culture with Spanish only spoken at home, her school culture with Anglos being assigned to a very different academic tract based solely on ethnicity, and society's ever changing view of who she was based on her last name, her neighborhood and her language.

Fran persevered and made choices, sometimes heartbreaking ones like when she broke up with a boy she really cared about because she knew he'd settle for living in the barrio his whole life and she wanted more.  She graduated from UC Berkeley, taught school in San Francisco and ultimately was principal of a high school in the Mission.  She had a fire in the belly and was always questioning her world.





She signed my book, 'Si se puede'   Yes, we can.

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awkward beginnings

My writing is suffering from self conscious awkward adolescence.  Zits, braces, unfortunate hairdos, gangly, clumsy, hormonal, too short, ill at ease, trying too hard to fit in.  My writing hasn’t found it’s true self yet.

I keep trying, and every once in a while, by some miracle, I craft a really good line, an observation, or I hit a vein of inspiration, usually just as knives are being drawn in a discussion between my teenaged sons about a borrowed Berzerker t-shirt.  A frantic spousal call from the kitchen inquiring as to whether or not we have a spatula. 

I try desperately to hold on to the train of thought at it chugs away, belching smoke, obscuring my path, and I respond to my daughter’s question about planning her birthday party, by pointing out that her birthday is in four months, and we have plenty of time.  I say this a little too loud, though clenched teeth and then have to lure her back and stroke her head like a scared cat until she recovers and tells me we could look at birthday cakes on the computer. 

I had never written fiction before my friend, Ken suggested I join him in doing NaNoWriMo.  When he first told me he’d written a novel in a month I thought he was delusional.  Then I learned about November. I took the challenge.  The beauty of NaNoWriMo was that I didn’t have to show my work to anyone. Ever.  It is all on the honor system, just word count. The story doesn’t have to be going anywhere. It got me into a habit of writing and not worrying about content. Characters changed names, they died, they kept talking. My childhood room was described in detail for no reason.  A subplot developed that featured one of my beloved second grade teacher’s sad home life after she was done teaching cursive and all the ‘kn’ words for the day. Characters ate out a lot and stood up and walked to the kitchen and made tea, constantly. None of it made any sense but that’s fine because by Thanksgiving I was nearing my 50,000 word goal and then my sister went into labor.  This served a dual purpose: one of my characters suddenly giving birth and my knowing for certain that I did not want a fourth child.  Not that it was a consideration at all but it was satisfying to firmly shut the door on that possibility.  I was able to write the birth scene with detail that I could not have described before, having only given birth myself three times, and not having been able to observe all the technical details.  It’s amazing what nuances you miss when you’re in agony. I now had a doula character with dreadlocks to the backs of her knees and a myriad of catch phrases and technical drama.

It took me a long time to dive in and take my first creative writing class, because I was so self conscious about not knowing how to craft fiction.  Crazy circle of logic there.  I would have not put up with such reasoning from any of my kids but I dog-eared class catalogues for years before I had the courage to enroll.  I found total support, and was rewarded for sharing my work, which I had never had the courage to do. 

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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