Write Like a Mother
Embracing the fractured yet inspirational rhythm of a creative parenting life.
I was playing on the floor with my 10-month-old one afternoon when my editor at The New Yorker called. One of my first freelance pieces for the magazine was in the late stages of the production process, and I was both eager to appear professional and anxious that it could be derailed. As my editor began to speak, the baby stood up and started toddling. “My son just took his first step!” I crowed before I could stop myself. There was a silence. “We can continue later if this isn’t a good time for you,” came the crisp response.
A few years later, when I was working on my biography of Shirley Jackson, I regularly encountered what I came to think of as “I don’t know how she does it” letters (in honor of Allison Pearson’s book about a working mother who teeters precariously on the edge of her so-called work/life balance). They were notes to Jackson from mothers who had read her humorous magazine stories about her family life and wanted her advice on how they, too, could become writers—a hope they had all but abandoned after having children. Here’s a sample from one, written by a woman who had formerly been a newspaper reporter:
After the No.1 boy was born I simply couldn’t find time to write, and that condition persisted after No. 2 boy came long. Now that I have three, of course I have infinitely more spare time, and a corresponding need for more money to swell the income. But to make money, you have to Write Something, and to Write Something you have to sit down to a typewriter and concentrate for a few hours each day-----and by the time quiet descends at night I’m too exhausted physically to keep my mind in gear.
I read this with immense sympathy. At the time, I was a recently divorced mother of two young children. I could travel from my home in New York City to the Library of Congress, where Jackson’s papers were held, only when my children were with their father. My days at home with them were a Swiss cheese of early school pickups, the usual seasonal maladies, and curveballs—like the time Hurricane Sandy hit and we had no school for a week.
I have loved being a mother since the moment I first laid eyes on my firstborn. I chose to work as a freelance book critic in part because of the great freedom and flexibility the job offers. But like this letter writer—and like Jackson herself, as I would learn—I have also always struggled with balancing the competing demands of my children and my professional life, even now that I’ve been writing and mothering for more than twenty years.
That call from my editor was only one moment out of many when I have felt acutely the clash between the two roles. There was my first residency, where the sight of a space set up just for me to work in brought me to tears. (I didn’t have a “room of my own” until that toddling baby was twelve.) There was the New York Times Magazine piece I closed at LaGuardia Airport, waiting to pick up a sick child whose flight home from sleepaway camp was hours delayed. There were all the times I hid out in the park across the street from our house trying to finish something before a babysitter left for the day. At this very moment, I’m writing this newsletter while making lunch for my youngest.
What if we could see the cognitive dissonance between these two parts of life as something to embrace rather than to overcome? That’s the premise behind the workshop I’m teaching next weekend, which I’ve been thinking about ever since I first embarked on this path.
Write Like a Mother: Finding Your Voice After Having Children is intended to help any writer harness the chaos and beauty of motherhood to fuel their creativity, from those with a new baby nap-training to someone already navigating the empty-nest stage. We’ll look at inspirational passages about parenting and creativity from brilliant mother-writers such as Ursula LeGuin, Audre Lorde, and (of course) Shirley Jackson, and come up with nuts-and-bolts techniques to keep the work moving forward even after a sick child has kept you up all night.
There are still a few spots left for this workshop. If this piece resonated for you, I’d love to have you in the (Zoom) room.
Date: Next Saturday, July 25
Time: 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM EST (Naptime!)
Where: Live via Zoom (with recording available)
Where I’ll be
New York, July 26, 2 p.m. I’m joining forces with my brilliant friend Heather Clark for a live conversation. Heather is the acclaimed author of Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath and, most recently, the stunning novel The Scrapbook, a moving exploration of how the aftermath of the Holocaust ripples through generations. We’ll be diving into history, fiction, and the writing life—and we might even tell the background story of a special connection between Heather’s book and my work. Free! Full details and registration here.
I "solved" the problem by writing about my children, until my (ex)husband told me he didn't want to read about the family in the local newspaper. Fair enough, thought I. This constraint forced me to write a personal essay column, rather than a mother-column. Writing short personal essays was good training for the long personal essay that I wrote after the divorce: "Leaving Babylon: A Walk through the Jewish Divorce Ritual." Lemons and lemonade.
Just want to point out that fathers face the same dilemma, especially those who are self-employed and work at home. At the infant and toddler stage, as long as the child is nursing, there are some things we can't do, but once that's over the duties are much the same and it's a matter of how the parents decide to share them.