Muttertag

I’ll be off yodeling in Switzerland this weekend, the land I hate to love. I complain often about the country that separates us from Italy with its overpriced everything and inconvenient currency. But whenever I arrive it’s so amazingly gorgeous that I chide myself for being petty. Anyway,

Not to miss Mother’s Day! Here’s a photo from 1996 that says motherhood is not an endless feast of cuteness and bubbling good moods. It is also isolation, doubt and enormous, eternal inconvenience. Rather like Switzerland. (That baby is also gorgeous.)

Escape into Life was kind enough to include one of my poems, Dear Scum, in a poetry feature this month on motherhood. The poem was a reaction to a pornographic letter and drawings a disgruntled schoolmate of my then 8- or 9-year old daughter left on our doorstep. Certainly exercised my motherly outrage that day, week, month and pretty much year. There! I broke the “don’t-explain-your-work rule.” You'll live.