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a normal day

Thursday, September 21, 2017

On October 18th, my daughter was born and I became the mother of three children. Hundreds of miles away, on the same day, another baby girl was born and another woman added the third child to her family. We were complete strangers at that time, but our love of photography and family brought us together. We started to have a conversation about motherhood with images, because we tell stories with our cameras. Since some tales are so similar, and some are not, we decided to collaborate and share a photo a week from a normal day as a mother to three.

“Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. One day I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return.” – Mary Jean Irion

i was just about to turn at the corner. that corner that leads us out of our neighborhood. the one that takes us to the busy streets that we must travel on to get you to school. some mornings are harder than others for me to make this drive. it isn’t a long one. just an emotional one. i always wondered if i sent your siblings off into the world too quickly. you have wanted it for what seems like forever though. it is just me that is doing the feet dragging. and there is always something that i can’t live without preserving. so instead of turning at the corner, i do a u-turn. back home we go so i can retrieve my camera. so i can make sure to always remember these bittersweet morning drives. “but we’ll be late” you say. you think i am crazy. the truth is my love, i am crazy. crazy in love with you.

photo by Heather Robinson blog | Facebook

You’ve been asking us to hold you a lot lately. Asking me, especially. Hold you at the bus stop. Hold you in the kitchen. Hold you at the park. Hold you on the stairs. And I love it, but you are a big kid. No denying that. You are big and solid and my body is terribly weak and often tired. So I hold you, but not for very long. I wonder if you can sense you are entering big-kid territory, and need the extra comfort? Or now I leave for working in the mornings and our routine around the house is very different and maybe you are missing me? Maybe there is no real reason at all, except who doesn’t like to be held from time to time? If daddy is around, I pass you off, and feel a pang of guilt and a little sadness that I can’t hold you for very long. But then, I catch this face, and that smile, and I know his arms are just as good as mine. His love is just as real. And you are held, in our arms and in our hearts and in that space we create where we all can go back to fitting on someone’s hip, in someone’s arm, on someone’s shoulder.

photo by Olivia Gatti website | Facebook

Into Something Better – August 2017

Tuesday, August 29, 2017

Sleeping in the Forest by Mary Oliver

I thought the earth remembered me,

She took me back so tenderly

Arranging her skirts

Her pockets full of lichens and seeds.

I slept as never before

A stone on the riverbed,

Nothing between me and the white fire of the stars,

But my thoughts.

And they floated light as moths

Among the branches of the perfect trees.

All night I heard the small kingdoms

Breathing around me.

The insects and the birds

Who do their work in darkness.

All night I rose and fell,

As if water, grappling with luminous doom.

By morning I had vanished at least a dozen times

Into something better.

We as a group of artist mothers from all over the world are making it our priority to turn off the tv/video games so that we can give our children the sacred experience to connect with the fast disappearing natural world. We will freelens our adventures into the wild and share them through this monthly project. The goal of this collaborative is to journey “Into Something Better”.

“The Catalyst”

This is where hope sprang. This hike in the mountains rekindled a flame that had nearly gone out. We needed this. We needed to run barefooted through the forest with only a sinuous brook as our guide.

Keep on keeping on around the beautiful blog circle with my insanely talented friend Joni Burtt in Canada.

a normal day

Thursday, August 24, 2017

On October 18th, my daughter was born and I became the mother of three children. Hundreds of miles away, on the same day, another baby girl was born and another woman added the third child to her family. We were complete strangers at that time, but our love of photography and family brought us together. We started to have a conversation about motherhood with images, because we tell stories with our cameras. Since some tales are so similar, and some are not, we decided to collaborate and share a photo a week from a normal day as a mother to three.

“Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. One day I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return.” – Mary Jean Irion

today i did things that i once did often. they felt good to revisit. really they felt better than good. they felt just right. they fit me. it’s like pulling on a pair of old, comfy jeans for the first time after many months of not wearing them. you noticed how well they fit too. i couldn’t even remember how long it had been since i took you to the library. but today it was just you, me, and the baby so i made it happen. normally when your older siblings are in tow, i am too weighed down with anxiety to attempt this type of outing. but today was different. we checked out several books and on the way home the baby fell asleep in the car. while he slept, you and i read books together in the front yard. the sun was shining on the tops of our heads but it didn’t feel too hot. instead it felt just right.

photo by Heather Robinson blog | Facebook

Grace has escaped me. It’s beginning to show in the things I do, my daily life. For two years I have felt it slipping, and wasn’t even sure what to call it then. In fact, the closer I came to defining my grace, the more I could see it was growing thinner and what passed as grace was an exhausting act of kindness and patience with no deep roots. I’ve started and stopped so many times now, to get better, to get rooted, to give myself the care that grace needs to grow again. I have the maps. I have the plans, the chants, the songs, the hope, the desire, the fear. I read the books, the cards, the skies. And when it feels the messiest, and usually is the messiest, it is with these girls who first gave me the glimpse of grace that I know I’m going to make it. We ran to the ocean, in less than ten minutes we left the house behind and all our activities paused mid-play, and we ran into the water and it was so cold it was shocking. It was the perfect kick in the ass to get my head on straight and hold onto my grace and get it to grow again.

photo by Olivia Gatti website | Facebook

Into Something Better – July 2017

Tuesday, July 25, 2017

Sleeping in the Forest by Mary Oliver

I thought the earth remembered me,

She took me back so tenderly

Arranging her skirts

Her pockets full of lichens and seeds.

I slept as never before

A stone on the riverbed,

Nothing between me and the white fire of the stars,

But my thoughts.

And they floated light as moths

Among the branches of the perfect trees.

All night I heard the small kingdoms

Breathing around me.

The insects and the birds

Who do their work in darkness.

All night I rose and fell,

As if water, grappling with luminous doom.

By morning I had vanished at least a dozen times

Into something better.

We as a group of artist mothers from all over the world are making it our priority to turn off the tv/video games so that we can give our children the sacred experience to connect with the fast disappearing natural world. We will freelens our adventures into the wild and share them through this monthly project. The goal of this collaborative is to journey “Into Something Better”.

Our Summer break is drawing to a close with school starting in just a few days. This has been an odd Summer. Normally we spend every weekend in the water. Either we are splashing and fishing in the cool river or we are swimming and playing on the beach at the warm lake. But not this year. Your crazy mama has been dragging you all over the mountains in search of a special place to call our own. Now that the hunt is over, it is hard for me to sit back and wait until we can finally enjoy our little cabin next to the bold stream. One month feels like an eternity. So, we try to return to normal and enjoy the special places that used to define our Summers together.