Family
In Human Parts. More on Medium.
THIS IS US
Grandma, why do you have so much hand sanitizer?
My great-grandmother saved Sweet ’N Low packets. Those little pink rectangles of currency now only found in very old, very sticky diners where rent is minimal and corporate interest in property nonexistent. In her lifetime I don’t think my great-grandmother ever purchased an artificial sweetener of any kind. She never needed to. There was always a healthy supply in whatever giant purse was within arm’s reach. If those ran out (they never ran out), there were old shoe boxes in cabinets serving as secondary stash. …
Remember, one day in the not-too-distant future, you’ll be begging her to slow down
First, scope out a quiet neighborhood where she can practice driving with minimal distractions. The roads should be wide enough that she doesn’t feel squeezed by oncoming traffic. Make a mental note of potential obstacles like pedestrians, cyclists, off-leash dogs, and trash cans.
Quiet locales with meandering cross streets are perfect. They’ll remind her of where she grew up which may help calm her fragile nerves. It also ensures that she’ll begin to make a positive association with leaving you forever.
Once you’ve settled on the perfect neighborhood, pull over and take a deep slow breath. Gaze at a worn…
Lived Through This
Because I wish someone had warned me
Content warning: Graphic descriptions of injury
If you ever need hand surgery, you should try to get it done in Japan.
At least that’s what the hand surgeon at Mass General Hospital told us right before he spent 10 hours trying to reattach my husband’s severed left index finger.
The surgeon’s tone was cheerful and matter-of-fact as he talked with us. We were sitting on a cot in the emergency room on a Friday night. Jared had been working on a project at our house when his hand got sucked into the blade of a table saw by a loose…
PAST IS PROLOGUE
An accidental correspondence revealed how one doting father’s life ended in a tragic crime that took decades to uncover
In my experience, fathers tend to fall into two general camps. There are the dads so preoccupied with their own interests and careers and financially supporting their families that they rarely interact with their kids. Then there are the dads who strive for an active role in their children’s lives: They change their diapers and teach them sports, counsel them as they grow up, and worry about their futures.
But then again, imagine a father who would write an operetta for his children, with parts for each to sing to fend off homesickness when they’re far from home. In the…
THIS IS US
I struggled to understand my father. Here’s what I do know about him.
There are some things you should understand about this man, the man who fathered me:
1957
He looks like almost every other baby ever born: red-faced, hairless, eyes closed. His cries pierce the quiet country desolation and scatter among the last brittle oak leaves of winter. Spring is coming.
1968
Middle child syndrome. Somewhere among the cows and the chickens, the last of the hogs and two stray dogs. Not as pious as the eldest, a daughter, nor as charming as the youngest, another son. Poor eyesight and a buzz cut. Nothing special, really.
1973
Pulls a knife on the kid at school…
THIS IS US
On our first overseas trip as a family, our bodies fell apart
When we began dating, Tyler and I did a lot of traveling. We started out small: Our first trip was from Boston to the tip of Cape Cod. Soon we ventured further, to California, to Mexico, to Peru. We broke up once in Key West. But I was too broke to change my ticket, and we got back together before our flight home. We got married in Maine but never took a honeymoon — I was pregnant and vomiting six times a day by then. …
THIS IS US
How one novelist reconnected with the ancestors she never met
LIVED THROUGH THIS
The father who never accepted me is dying, and I’ve already moved on
“You go on in there and talk to yo Daddy.”
My mother is whispering but emphasizes the word “talk” with a squeeze of my hand as if she thinks some sort of deep revelation between my father and I will break a levee between us, setting free a long-ago dammed-up river of love. I’ve come back to Ohio and am standing in the nursing home where my father lies dying in bed just down the hall. I don’t even want to be here to tell you the truth. I feel little to no connection with the man lying in that…
THIS IS US
Not all children grow up
The first playdate was the product of an infant/toddler reading hour at my local library in the fall of 2002. I’d been freshly laid off from a dot-com job that had consumed me. My daughter Ana was 18 months old.
I’d been adrift, aimless, caught in the purgatory between unemployment and whatever came next. Suddenly I was in the company of a toddler all day, every day.
And so I found myself in the library at 11 a.m. …
Lived Through This
Moments when ‘everything’s going to be ok’ isn’t true
Everything is going to be okay.
We whisper it to our children when they skin their knees or have a fight with a friend. We proclaim it to those who have lost their job, their partner, their health. We post it on Instagram, showcasing our optimism. We repeat it like a mantra to ease our own anxiety.
Everything is going to be okay.
We assert it to bolster our conviction that the pain is temporary or even inflated. …
Human Parts
A publication from Medium about humanity: yours, mine, and ours.
