My Photos

Mother Earth

One of my most favorite suburban rituals is ﬁlling this cement urn each spring. It is also my most pain ﬁlled ritual. I always struggle with which plants to choose. How much sun, water and room will each require? Each day I prune and pinch and fertilize and fuss. Invariably, one plant thrives under my care as another seems to suffocate. Fittingly symbolic, this pot was given to me by my husband and our six children as a Mother’s Day gift.

Home Sweet Home

I contend that I was under the fog of love, or lust and red wine, when I moved my teen-age daughter and myself to one of America’s "most desirable suburbs." We moved into a subdivision just a few blocks from my new husband’s ex-wife and their three children. And because I think that he was also under the previously mentioned fog, we immediately made two more babies. That made for a grand total of six kids. By the time we snapped out of it we were a big, loud family bursting the seams of our little four bedroom "home sweet home."

Volunteering

Everyone I know in the suburbs, without exception, does some kind of volunteering. So one year I volunteered as an Assistant Daisy Girl Scout Leader. My approach resembled some of the advertising campaigns I had designed years earlier: very hard sell. I think my intensity scared some of those kindergarten girls and some of the mothers still look at me funny.

Spending Money

Anyone who has stood next to me on the playground for more than ﬁve minutes knows that I grew-up dirt poor in the country, working at the local egg processing plant. I often speak with pride about my frugality and my lack of consumption (“I own one purse”). But the ﬁrst time I had the opportunity and a little extra cash, I commissioned an artist to create a portrait of my six year old daughter. That was in 1986. Maybe I’ve been a suburban soccer mom all along.

My Favorite Gift

Over the years, my husband purchased several pieces of lovely jewelry for me. I lost some and returned some (in the middle of an argument). But on one anniversary date, we wandered into Starbucks before wandering into the romantic movie "Blades of Glory." We picked-out a pair of matching coffee mugs and now it’s our thing. Early in the morning, one of us takes the dog for a quick walk and fetches the paper while the other starts a small pot of coffee (illy) and warms "our" mugs.

Career Girl

This is my favorite picture of myself. It sits on a table in the entry to our home. I always thought this picture said, "I’m the kind of girl that can get the job done while wearing a dress and high heels (and a bad haircut can’t stop me, either.)" The past dozen years, in the suburbs, were tough and most of the time I didn’t feel very capable. I longed for the days when I would say, "How hard could it be to catch a little pig?"