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Mother

A short piece of fiction I wrote as a character study a few weeks back and am now dedicating to all the mothers out there (and most especially to my own mother). You’re each more courageous than I can dare to imagine. Happy (belated) Mother’s Day.

-Jessica

Mother.

The word echoes in my head and I almost forget what it means.

Suddenly that word to which I had dedicated so much consideration trembles on the tip of my tongue — just another confused collection of consonants and vowels.

I’m supposed to be happy. After all, we’d decided it was time to start trying.

But as I stare at the pregnancy test quivering in my fingers I can’t seem to move past the word.

Mother.

I realize that I’ve no idea how to be one. Or how I got to here: alone in my bathroom, clutching the test and all I can think is that I’m not ready to be a mother — that I might never be ready.

And how is it possible that I would only discover this now — in the moment when life has already been planted, seed sprouting into embryo — a tiny clump of cells dividing and differentiating.

Becoming not-me. Becoming other.

I smooth my palm over the flat planes of my belly. It seems unimaginable that soon I will swell with new life.

“Gravid” — from the Latin “gravis” meaning “heavy”.

I have never felt so grave, so heavy, as I feel now, in this moment in which my life seems to be pouring from between my fingertips, even as life is re-born of a single flickering spark — poised on the brink of bursting into flames.

I fear that there will be nothing left of me but ashes when that flame has burned its way into the world — borne out from between my blooded thighs.

Mother.

The word rattles around inside my head and I can feel my atomic structures reassembling to make room for some newer, bigger person I must be becoming.

My hand presses firmly into the flesh of my belly, knowing that there is nothing to feel. The baby (baby!) is not yet bigger than a grain of rice — hardly larger than a dream.

Mother.

I roll the word across my tongue, stretch it out over my skin and am surprised to find that it threatens to fit — just barely — around the size and shape of what it already means to be me.

 

As always, I’d love to hear from you! What did you think of this piece? Leave your comments below.

 

Facing the fear of being seen

The thing about fear is it rises up in your throat until you’re choking on it and you think you might be about to puke. Suddenly your hand isn’t your own anymore as you feel your way into the words, taste them on the tip of your tongue, and then can’t quite bring yourself to put them down on the page.

Fear is the nagging voice in the back of your head that says you can’t say that and warns that they might not like you if they really know who you are. And because you got used to hiding at an early age, you think it’s safest if no one ever knows the real you.

After all, even you aren’t sure about that person you fear you might be.

The thing about fear is that it’s staying home when you want to go out and not offering help when you see someone who is lost on a street you know like the lines on the palm of your own hand and you’re tempted to say hey, where are you trying to go and maybe I could help?

But you don’t because that’s not the sort of thing that people do and no one asked you and everything feels easier if you turn aside and look away and above all you don’t make eye contact.

Because if you meet their eyes they’ll speak up after all and say hey, I’m looking for this place

And even though that’s exactly what you wanted to offer a moment ago, now you’re choking on the thought of how you’re in a rush and it’s so inconvenient to stop and you don’t know the area as well as you thought and you wouldn’t be of any help anyways.

And this is why you mustn’t make eye contact.

Dodging gazes — it’s been the way you’ve lived your life since you were small and you learned that teachers wouldn’t call on you in class if you didn’t make eye contact. You learned that you wouldn’t have to raise your trembling voice and worry what the other kids would think. That maybe you were showing off because you always knew the answers. Even though you weren’t and you didn’t want them to think that. (School was always easy for you — but people not so much and this is where you stopped make eye contact.)

But the thing about the fear is that you’ve finally come head-to-heart with the fact that fear is the only thing that’s still holding you back.

That it’s the lump in your throat that’s growing like a cancer until it eats at your voice, until time after time at the very last moment you’re forever turning your head aside and averting your eyes because this is what you do:

You never, ever make eye contact.

And what you’ve only just begun to realize is that eye contact is the beginning of everything — a solitary moment that says I’m here and I see you and look, you see me!

And that for just an instant we see eye to eye, two as one, separate and together — and together has always been larger than I.

Which is how I know that, no matter how frightened I am, it’s time to start making eye contact again.

It’s finally time to be seen.

 

What fears are holding you back?

It’s a question I’ve been bumping up against all over the place lately as I struggle to find a way to grow as both a writer and as a promoter of my writing. Because as much as we like to pretend it’s a dirty word, writing without some self-promotion is an awful lot like shouting into the void.

And the truth I keep running up against is that I’ve built my life around a pattern of hiding. It’s a pattern that began in school when I was the smart kid, the one who always had the right answers but didn’t have the right friends, the one who always stuck out in the crowd. The older I got the more different I felt and the more isolating it became. 

As a defensive maneuver, I retreated into myself and in doing so I initiated a pattern of hiding. Of hiding me, not from myself, but from everyone else.

It’s a pattern that still haunts me today, even as I’m struggling to be a writer and it’s a pattern that I now recognize is holding me back.

Which is why I’d like to ask:

What patterns or fears might be holding you back from achieving your dreams?

 

The shooter says goodbye to her love

Just a bit of fun this week — I’m participating in Chuck Wendig’s Flash Fiction challenge again. You can check out my previous challenge contributions here.

This week’s challenge was to use one of the following ten sentences in a 1,000 word story — but I went for the promised “bonus points” (and extra challenge) of using all ten!

Here are the list of challenge sentences, for reference:

  • “The mysterious diary records the voice.”
  • “The stranger officiates the meal.”
  • “The shooter says goodbye to his love.”
  • “A glittering gem is not enough.”
  • “The memory we used to share is no longer coherent.”
  • “The old apple revels in its authority.”
  • “Rock music approaches at high velocity.”
  • “Sixty-Four comes asking for bread.”
  • “Abstraction is often one floor above you.”
  • “The river stole the gods.”

I had to stretch just a bit to get them all in, but on the whole I think the story works surprisingly well!

 

The memory we used to share is no longer coherent. The thought echoes in my mind.

Nothing makes sense anymore — it hasn’t since our last big mission, the one in which we failed to prevent the River from stealing the Gods and I woke up battered and bruised and still reeling in the aftermath of machine gun fire that had sounded like nothing so much as rock music approaching at high velocity.

I’ve never entirely made peace with the way machine guns sound so much like drums — and the beat goes on, and on, and on like a nightmare I’ve forgotten to wake up from.

—

I woke up aching, and for blissful moments I remained unaware — entirely free of the memories of that mission and the way it had tipped my world over onto its head, spilling the pieces of my life across the floor like so many marbles.

Back in training the General used to say, abstraction is often one floor above you. Over and over he would repeat this — at every briefing, on every training mission. Abstraction is often one floor above you.

We never knew what he meant and he never explained himself, just peered dangerously over the rims of his glasses and spoke the words as though they were the most important message in the world.

Perhaps they were. Perhaps they were some kind of secret code passed down from him to us, from trainer, from teacher (we called him “the old apple” when no one could hear) to us, the pupils. If so, we didn’t get it. Every time he’d trot out his adage, we’d snicker nervously amongst ourselves.

Later we’d shrug off our incomprehension and murmur to one another behind closed doors, the old apple revels in his authority. But our glibness would taste hollow in our mouths, like false comfort.

Now, suddenly and terrifyingly, I think I know what the General was talking about. I used to think he meant for us to keep in mind the bigger picture, to always be playing the larger game. I used to think it meant, You’re a spy and you must think like one. Never forget.

Now I think he meant this: waking up feeling battered and awfully alone — unsure if the game you’ve been playing looks anything like the game you thought you’d been playing.

Suddenly nothing seems certain. Not this. Not you and me. Not our mission. I don’t know what I’m supposed to believe in any more.

None of it feels real. Not even the warmth of your body stretched out beside me in our bed.

—

You propose after that. Not immediately after, it’s weeks after and we’re out to eat — waiting for the signal, you said (Sixty-Four comes asking for bread). And so I’m shifting in my chair and picking at the roll on my plate, peeling off little pieces of the crust, snipping them up with my fingernails.

I’m anxious. It’s our first real mission since that one — the one that felt like the ground was falling out from underneath my feet and plunging me into some new and mysterious upside-down reality in which nothing makes sense and the memory we used to share is no longer coherent.

And then you pull out a ring and I realize the mission is a ruse and I’m speechless. I don’t know what to say because just a handful of weeks ago I would have said yes, but now the only thing I can think is that a glittering gem is not enough.

Except I can’t say that because you’re not just my partner, you’re my partner, and we have to keep working together and so I nod awkwardly and you slip the diamond onto my finger.

I cannot think that anything has ever felt heavier than the weight of that gemstone, dragging at my heart.

—

Which is how we’ve come to where we are now. You’ve gone out to dinner for “business”. I’m perched aloft, watching the meal unfold from an empty office building across the street.

A stranger officiates the meal. I don’t recognize him. He’s not one of our regular contacts. I would have remembered that face — grizzled and unpleasant. I would have remembered the way you lean back from his presence, as if in distaste.

I’m not sure if your discomfort means something good or bad. I’m not sure what anything means anymore.

Who are we really working for?

Abstraction is often one floor above you, the General used to say. Now I believe he meant that one day this day would come — the day when I finally saw the sum of our actions from such a great height that everything we’d done and everything we’d become all began to seem, not like a collection of random duties, but a purposeful progression animated by unseen hands. A masterpiece of puppetry on a scale that I find can hardly be comprehended.

I had no idea they might have this much power.

But now that I’ve seen and suspected, the only thing left to do is act.

I have to end the game. I have to put a stop to the madness.

I wonder if you know. I wonder if you saw it too. You were unusually sentimental when you left for this meeting — you’d whispered our old code phrase, the one we’d used back in training.

The mysterious diary records the voice. The syllables had brushed up against my ear, warm and familiar, and my heart had thrilled once more to the nearness of you, to the way you whispered I love you.

And love you, I do. But the time has come to do what must be done.

My finger tightens on the trigger and even as I blink back tears I’m already whispering goodbye.

 

Did you like this piece? Let me know in the comments!

(And if you did, please share!)

 

The agony of anticipation

It’s in. It’s done. I press “Submit’ or “Publish” or “Send”.

Suddenly all those moments of effort and labor are gone. Their results ent off, winging their way as photons streaming through fiber optic cables.

Except for the times they are gone as pages printed, folded, and neatly tucked away into the corners of gentle envelopes.

But in the moments after I press “Send” or hear the mailman fetch the letter from the box — that is the moment when doubt creeps in and I suddenly find myself transported back hours, back to staring down the blank page once more, frantically re-working my awkward phrases and crippled sums in a desperate bid to reassure myself that the clamouring questions can be answered.

What if I didn’t do it right? What if it’s not good enough? What if no one likes it? What if Everybody hates me forever?

I know my fears are hyperbolic and inflated and I despise them for their groundlessness even as I feel myself succumbing to their trembling hysteria.

I lose myself for a moment or two — I stumble and fall into the trap even as I see it looming. For a moment, a minute, my ravening mind turns in on itself in a whirlwind of self-flagellation.

How dare I send my heart out into the world, dressed only in it’s glorious frailty and imperfection? How dare I raze the walls of my sovereign shelter and invite chaos into the breach? How dare I flay truth from the bones of my dignity and bare my breast to the world?

How dare I dare to make this inglorious leap into the unknown?

But just as the pressure builds to the point where I cannot bear the weight of my own self-recrimination, where I can feel faith in my actions crumbling, where I long to press rewind (I’m so sorry. Please just let me take it back.).

At that moment Reason steps in.

Reason brings logic and perspective back to table and points out that nothing irreparable has been risked. Reason knows that failure will not be the end of any part of who I am.

Reason understands that inviting risk is as important and inevitable as breathing.

Fear is not assuaged but Reason persists and ultimately Fear subsides, curls up somewhere in the back of my mind — unconvinced and ready with a scathing I told you so.

And so we continue, Fear, and Reason, and I. As we run, trip past “Send”, and leap once more into the deep.

Is “Everybody” out to get you? Or is it just yourself?

I face down the “Send” button on my email daily. I publish on the blog.

Sending my work out into the world is something I struggle with daily. It’s a constant battle between me and my doubt — and my guess is that maybe it is for you too.

Martha Beck suggests that we carry around with us a notion of a generalized “Everybody” who exists to judge us. We notionally reference our Everybody when we say offhand things like “Everyone must think I’m a jerk” or “Everybody knows I’m an idiot now”. But the thing about our Everybodies is that (if they’re real at all) they’re made up of just a handful of people.

Try it out — next time you catch yourself having an “Everybody” thought — “Everybody thinks my writing is stupid” — try and figure out who exactly is “Everybody”. Has anyone told you directly that your writing is stupid? Try and think of a handful of people who you know for sure believe that about you. I usually can’t do it, but if I can I often find they’re not people whose opinions really matter. And so I try to ask myself if those opinions are really worth worrying about (after all, you get to pick your “Everybody”).

And if you have “Everybody will…” thoughts (“Everybody will think my writing is stupid if I share it”), I think it’s useful to realize that those are fear thoughts. It’s a kind of sloppy shorthand for “I’m afraid everybody will think my writing is stupid” and in that case it’s usually the fear you need to address — and again your Everybody may be helpful: do you know people who already don’t think your writing is stupid? Why not try letting them be your Everybody for now? (“What does Everybody think? They think my writing is great!”)

 

I’d love to hear from you! What do you do when the doubts creep in?

And, as always, if you liked this piece — please share!

 

A meditation

This week I’m happy to share with you a prose-poem I wrote on the things that get in the way of writing — enjoy!      
-Jessica

 

There’s a warm cup of tea on my desk and I finally can feel my fingers for the first time in hours as the warmth of liquid comfort creeps through my veins and slips hurriedly out into my extremities. My fingers sit on my keys and I wait.

Inhale.

I wait for the muse or my soul or whatever it is you want to call the first stirrings of inspiration. The flutter of here and now and this and why don’t you start here, with this beginning — with this warm cup of tea and my fingers, their skin overly dried and roughening but still a little soft from the water of dish-washing and counter-scrubbing, still noticing the ache between my shoulders after what feels like a cathedral of floor-sweeping.

Exhale.

The silence creeps in and I don’t know what to say. Inspiration refuses to budge and I can feel lists upon lists, quivering in the back of my mind. Reminding me that I forgot the stretch of counter with the toaster, that I haven’t touched the crumbs that have collected on the kitchen table, that the dust bunnies beneath my dresser just keep growing. There’s a thousand and one things that I still need to get to.

Inhale.

I keep my fingers on the keys. It’s a kind of rule these days. Fingers on keys is safe.

When I was little and just learning how to type they used to call these the home keys — asdf jkl; — the place your fingers rest in the moments between typing. The place from which all typing begins.

These days I find myself more familiar with the home keys than I have ever been as I sit, fingers on keyboard, and wage a war with myself over my own right to write.

Exhale.

The thing about stories is they speak to us. As readers and as writers, stories bloom in our mind and they teach us something about the kind of people we are — about the kind of people we wish to become.

When I was little I didn’t dream of writing. Or maybe by the time I did it was already too late. I think that by the time I dreamed of writing I’d already learned that writing isn’t a “real” job and that I shouldn’t bother to try. I’m doing my best to unlearn that thought now, facing it down every day as I sit — fingers poised on keys that are ever so slowly starting to feel like home.

Inhale.

I think that’s all it is really, in the end. Coming home to ourselves over and over and over. Showing up. We’ve all become so busy that it’s nearly impossible anymore to find the time: time to breathe, time to sit, time to rest, time to sleep.

It’s even more impossible to find the time to write.

Because writing is like fighting demons and the moment you sit down the thing that comes up is resistance and — even though the desire to write has been niggling all day as you bought the groceries and did the laundry and cooked and then cleaned up from cooking — as soon as you hit the chair and find your fingers waiting on their favorite keys the only thing you can think about is the laundry that still needs folding, and whether you should check on the crock pot, and haven’t you been meaning to vaccum for weeks?

Exhale.

The trick is not to do it. The trick is to keep your fingers there, in the home position that’s starting to feel less like a home and more like a prison the longer you wait — as the clamour of all these other things (useful things…) you could be doing just keeps getting louder. And louder.

And the thing I think it’s important to know is that you have to just keep sitting.

Inhale.

Every moment is a choice. And in this moment I choose to come home to my writing.

Exhale.

 

Now I’d love to hear from you! What gets in the way of the important things you’ve been meaning to do?

If making time for the stuff that matters is something you struggle with. Here are a few resources you might want to check out on why it helps to do the important things before the urgent ones (hint: your email is urgent, but not important!).

And if you liked this piece, please share!