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Essays

Meredith Porretta

Haunted:
The Gothic Motherhoods of Shirley Jackson and Diane Arbus

Jackson’s demons were clearly bigger and more terrifying than the conventional ones of balancing writing and childrearing. Yet she managed to give space and import to those smaller moments of…

Essays, Literary Reflections | November 2019 | By Eileen McGinnis


Laura Fuhrman

The Last Bedtime Story

But over the last year or so, no matter how engaging the book, I could never get through more than two or three pages before he’d decide that was enough.

Essays, Literary Reflections | November 2019 | By Ruth Dawkins


Meredith Porretta

Writing from a Pile of Shoes: Chronic Illness, Kids, and Creation

I had driving questions: How much caregiving can any one woman do without breaking down? Why do women seem so often to be the caregivers? What becomes of us when…

Essays, Literary Reflections | November 2019 | By Kathryn Trueblood


Daniele Levis Pelusi

Get in the Car!

Just when I think I have all my essays dressed and ready, I’ll discover that one isn’t actually ready at all—and another is wandering off.

Essays, Literary Reflections | September 2019 | By Susannah Q. Pratt


Photo by Cristina Gottardi. See more of Cristina's work at instagram.com/cristinagottardi.

Speaking Book

For me I realized, Jolabokaflod was an extension of a language I had been speaking with both passion and conviction my whole life. Jolabokaflod is about speaking book.

Essays, Literary Reflections | June 2019 | By Cindy Adelman Frank


Photo by Annie Spratt. See more of Annie's work at instagram.com/anniespratt/.

My Fledgling Reader

But that morning, I felt something sweeter than being needed. My little girl was taking wing and exploring her way through a world of images and words, independent of me.

Essays, Literary Reflections | May 2019 | By Julie Sonnek


Photo by Edwin Andrade. See more of Edwin's work at unsplash.com/@theunsteady5

On Repetition and Revision in Motherhood and #MeToo

I am more aware than I’ve ever been of patterns, patterns that have stunted growth and shored up strength, patterns that have contributed to my identities as daughter, woman, and…

Essays, Literary Reflections | April 2019 | By Sara Burnett


Remixing Memories: Back Down Memory Lane

I wrote to reassure myself that my kids would be okay. That I could be less than perfect, and that they would still be okay. I wrote to reassure myself…

Essays, Literary Reflections | April 2019 | By Deesha Philyaw


Photo by Hannah Olinger. See more of Hannah's work at instagram.com/han_o_photo.

The Single Sentence

That sentence I wrote, to announce the end, said it all. Yes, it was surrounded by other words–accomplishments, family lineage, hobbies–but that one sentence was truest. I’d never written anything…

Essays, Literary Reflections | March 2019 | By Kandace Chapple


Dead Scientists Society: Experiments in Creativity and Parenting

During the two-and-a-half years before I began exploring Franklin’s life and work, I’d been focusing on loss—loss of sleep, loss of autonomy, and, above all, loss of identity. Franklin suddenly…

Essays, Literary Reflections | February 2019 | By Eileen McGinnis


Birth Meridian

I’d read all the pregnancy books, humorous and practical alike, but none of them really prepared me for that moment. Instead, it was the desolate landscapes of Cormac McCarthy’s fiction—which…

Essays, Literary Reflections | January 2019 | By Beth Winegarner


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