A friend, saying she’d been a fearless young woman, added that she’s become increasingly anxious as she’s grown older. “When I feel that anxiety starting to build, I tell myself, ‘I am loved.’ It calms and centers me.” The next day, another friend shared a link to a Krista Tippett podcast in which the interview subject, … Continue reading
Filed under Writing …
From this deep slumber
I believe in the sanctity of privacy. After a shamefully garrulous riff in my 20s, when I put pen to paper or key to screen whatever rot spewed forth, I finally grew up enough to begin erring away from over sharing. This coincided in a way with becoming a mother. Learning the value of protecting … Continue reading
Stories itching to be told
Today I started writing an essay in response to a call for submissions on “The Best Decision You Ever Made.” Was it homing in on the clarinet as my instrument of choice in the third grade? Learning Italian in high school as a means to get to Rome in college? Moving to Washington, D.C., to … Continue reading
Lake Silverthorn
Much of what’s been on my writer’s mind this past week regards last summer: a summer in which, while hugely pregnant with new life, I confronted the dying and deaths of an uncle and grandma whom I loved very much. Written in honor of my godfather and late Uncle Greg, who died after a brief … Continue reading
Hearts touch through this work
It’s been a dizzying month of getting affairs in order. I’m joyfully relieved that my recent life’s myriad dissonance may be resolving, and am hopeful that this caesura may last at least long enough for me to catch my breath. If I’m lucky, maybe catch a few more consecutive hours of sleep, too. Some of … Continue reading
Smitten with Eli
I’m smitten with Eli. I receive Brain, Child’s promoted essays and posts on my Facebook timeline. One, in honor of May being Cystic Fibrosis Awareness Month, linked to what has quickly become my favorite blog. It’s about Eli, a baby boy with cystic fibrosis. Every day I am eager for updates. Part of it’s because Eli … Continue reading
Not enough time
Rushing through my morning shower, then, later, chopping vegetables to throw in the oven for the first dinner I’ve made in weeks, ideas for projects knocked around my skull, each new one outpacing the last. Me chasing after, trying to catch up to grab and hold on to at least one in the hopes of … Continue reading
How hard we try
My reading lately has introduced me to two beautifully done, though emotionally challenging, pieces, i.e., this by Martha Bayne and this by Adele Myers; two exciting writers, Cheryl Strayed and Elissa Bassist, their recent dialogue and work, which I’ve added to the “to-read” list on my new goodreads profile; a great poem, “I had been sad … Continue reading
Third trimester malaise
An essay I wrote last summer was published on Brain, Child Magazine’s website yesterday. It’s about my third trimester of pregnancy with Henry—and how it was the absolute pits. After sharing it with a friend of mine, she wrote, “In conversations with friends that have children, it seems that mixed feelings (and I’m not talking … Continue reading
Emily Dagostino 