How I Spent my Summer Vacation

I spent June and July working on a podcast project about preparing parents and kids socially and emotionally for the back to school transition. I loved working with Slate Studios and Target as the host of “Coffee and Crayons,” and I’m proud of the result. Check out the 3 episodes, including interviews with Amy Webb of “This Little Miggy Stayed Home,” Joy Cho of “Oh Joy,” and Morgan Neville, the director of “Won’t You Be My Neighbor,” here, or anywhere you get podcasts. We talk about inclusivity, creativity, and compassion, and how to infuse transitions like back to school with those components. Do let me know what you think! And please share, subscribe, and rate if you can.

Coffee and Crayons is an extension of my work with MILK, and I’m really excited about it. Even though the episodes are up and living in the world, and many kids have started school already, my family and I are still in the midst of our treasured summer vacation, hanging on tightly for the next few weeks until Labor Day.

Last week we went to Northern California for a cousin’s wedding and then on to Los Angeles to see my husband’s great uncle. This week, after picking up my daughter at overnight camp in New Hampshire, we are with my dad and sisters and kids in Maine. I’m writing from a screened in porch where the rain falls steadily and soothingly. 

In California, we were super active in a short amount of time – driving and hustling to events surrounding the wedding of a terrific couple, Aaron and Jessica. My son M can be sensitive to his environment, and yanking him around a lot outside of his normal schedule can often end in tears (his and mine). But we had our very supportive and compassionate family surrounding us that weekend, and that made it totally lovely and adventurous instead of treacherous and overwhelming, as busy trips with him have often felt to me in the past. Also having one kid to give our attention to (our older daughter goes to overnight camp for a month every summer), allows the time to feel precious with our son. Plus, less sibling bickering.

The experience of going to a wedding with my partner of 18 years (married for 14 this fall), was such an interesting one. Wedding are the ultimate in hope, and such slowed down, present, beautiful moments in time. I love the presence of love and choice in every moment. I love watching people dance. I love cake. I love weird speeches. Its just good stuff. I’ve said before, however, that a couple could really use a wedding like 6/7/8 years into a marriage, where speeches and celebratory words and dancing could do a world of good to a couple living in the thick of what marriage actually is.

And though I do love a good horah, the highlight of the California trip was seeing our Uncle Izzy (Isaac) in Los Angeles, who is my husband’s father’s brother, and the last surviving member of his generation at age 96. He and my kids began writing longhand letters to each other a few years ago, and the relationship between them has blossomed into something beautiful and poignant.

He writes often, in his beautiful, careful hand, about his own childhood, our family history, and about sports and any other subject that might engage M and Z. I saw these letters as something very dear and very special, and decided to compile them into a photo book for him. To say that he appreciated the book is an understatement – I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anyone more moved by a gift. Honestly, it made me want to find a child pen pal for every older person out there! So therapeutic and wonderful for all of us involved. 

After returning home to repack our suitcases, we headed north to pick up our daughter at overnight camp and our foursome became whole once again. I always relish retrieving Z at her beloved camp, and seeing how her face and manner has changed in a month's time. She’s always tanner and older and more and less familiar at the same time. We all swayed, arms around each other, sang “Leaving On A Jet Plane,” loaded her stinky duffel bag into the car and headed to Maine, where we are now chilling for the next few days with my sisters, nephews and dad. 

It has been a while since my sisters and all vacationed together with our families, but we are making it work! It's always evolving since we lost our mom five years ago, and I’m very grateful we are together in this beautiful spot, drinking gin and tonics, and remembering that we can be good to each other and that our kids can grow their own relationships. My last post was about the strength of friendship, but family too, is everything. 

See you soon for more MILK action. 

Modern Loss in Jersey City

Last night I talked about death in front of strangers and met some fresh MILKs.

I traveled to Jersey City’s Word Bookstore on a lovely summer evening. Musicians played on the car free street. Kids rode bikes, adults drank cold white wine at outdoor cafes, and a lovely crowd gathered in the bookstore to hear from Rebecca Soffer, co-author of Modern Loss, and four other storytellers, including myself.  Rebecca has been traveling the country since the book came out in January (listen to her MILK Podcast interview here), inviting people to share their own surprising stories about grief and loss.

At the event, I met Caroline Waxler, Sehreen Noor Ali, and Nicole Savini. They each told terrific 6 word memoirs stories about loss, faith, dementia and cancer, but also about how Denzel Washington impressed a Catholic priest more than he should have, how Joan Rivers killed giving her estranged sister’s eulogy, and how a mother struggles to talk to her daughter about the death of a grandparent. These women all spoke with emotion about their late parents, and their combined vulnerability, bravery and empathy are exactly what make The Modern Loss movement so damn special.

I told a story about something that happened after I lost my mom, involving social media, miscommunication, and how grief can bring out the worst in people. The incident, which still lives with me, taught me a lot about trust and how to treat people. It hardened me in some ways, and kept me an empathetic listener, in others.

Reflecting on the five-year anniversary of Judi’s death, coming up next week, I know that I have grown in ways she would be proud. It has not been easy, but I am working on my family relationships. I am trying to raise good humans with my partner, and in my work, I am promoting voices and creating stories that I believe have meaning. I am trying to find the balance, and emulate my mother’s life by living mine with joy, awareness, and compassion.   

Mallory Kasdan, Rebecca Soffer, Nicole Savini, Sehreen Noor Ali, and Caroline Waxler

But back to Jersey City. It’s these events, books, and support systems that can help us get to a safe enough place with grief.  And to know that we can live again, we can morph after a loss and still be ok. We share our experiences, and we encourage others to do so, and it makes us better. A middle aged man last night had just lost his brother and niece, and wandered in from the street because he saw the Modern Loss sign outside the bookstore. He shared his own 6 word memoir with us, and we thanked him for doing so. With all of the terrible noise, cynicism and hatred in our culture right now, what a gift to have a few hours to sit with others, listen, cry, clap, laugh and support. Thanks so much Rebecca for letting me be a part of it. 

Totems

I see my tween daughter from down the street, long hair flying, giant backpack hoisted, sheathed in my mom’s dark brown hooded winter puffer -- size XS. It always makes me catch my breath for a moment – seeing Z in that jacket.

When we divided Mom’s closet between the three sisters, there was plenty to go around. Our mom loved clothes. My middle sister took the full length fur coat, which was weird but made sort of sense. My youngest sister took the loud blazers and some of the evening wear. I’m the oldest. I took the nightgowns and some purses. We divided the charms on the necklace she wore everyday.

Some of Judi’s more flamboyant pieces I gave right away to Zoe, who was seven at the time, for dress up: like the light pink cardigan with a pink fur collar and rhinestone buttons, white jazz shoes (?) and plenty of high-heeled boots to totter around in when friends came over. 

I hung other things in Zoe’s closet gradually as she grew, mostly sweaters and long sleeve t-shirts.  Such happy/sad, private moments I have with myself every time Zoe walks out of her room in something of Judi’s. A lavender cashmere cardigan, a pair of dangling silver earrings, or a purse I had forgotten about that Zoe now sports so proudly.

In June it will be five years.

The nightgowns are what are most important to me, still. I slip on my mom's nightgowns and I feel …  like a mom. Zoe and her brother snuggle with me in our king sized bed, under the covers, propped up on pillows. We watch “This Is Us,” “Gilmore Girls,” “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” shows with a nostalgia component. I wish I could talk to my mom about these shows, or watch with her. But me and the kids, we’re cozy. I like holding them next to me, in her nightgowns.

Anyone who has lost a person has had to contend with the stillness of things left behind. Recently, though, I feel strongly that given time, these items can have a rich and almost kinetic power. They have waited, patiently, and respectfully, and now they are ready to live again.

My sisters and I can refer to the clothes and know exactly what the other is trying to convey. I wore the red shiny trenchcoat to vote for Hillary in the primary. Youngest will wear a loud blazer, with gold buttons, uncharacteristic of her regular style, to lead a conference. Middle will wear pantyhose under her doctor dresses, which is weird but we get it.

We are all moving forward in our adult lives now without my mom, and we manifest her, every day. My younger sister is an advocate and policy maker for under served communities, just like my mom. My middle sister is an oncologist and forward thinker about alternative cancer care, inspired by our mom’s disease and her shortened life.

I take notice of the memories and the stories, and document how the clothes connect us. Since Zoe is the sole female grandchild, or the one most interested in fashion, she is the one to embody most of these totems, at least for now. She understands this inherently, and it squeezes at my heart that she does. She gets it. 

Zoe shines bright. She can argue like no one I’ve ever seen, except for Judi. Like her grandma, Zoe has charisma. She also has many pairs of size 5, brightly colored, slightly worn flats, which she will be wearing all spring long.

s.w.a.k.

My whole life I’ve been prone to emotional triggers brought on by songs, smells, textures, and tastes, so it’s no surprise I’ve folded these tendencies into my relationship with my kids and my own memories of childhood.

I’ve written some about the overwhelming nostalgia bath I’ve been taking since Zoe started kindergarden this fall. It’s been amazing. Today, when I was at her school for lunch duty, I took her and another little girl to the bathroom. They took me “the secret way,” from the basement level cafeteria to the girl’s room on the first floor. Through their chatter with each other, their expressions and in their excited two steps at a time climbing, I could viscerally recall my own elementary school and the journey from the lunchroom to the bathroom — the exact way the cafeteria smelled, the smooth concrete banisters against my hand as I ran up the linoleum stairs to the steamy heat of the girl’s (and the mystery glimpse of the unfathomable urinal through a door crack in the boy’s).

The lead up to Valentine’s Day today was epic, and Zoe has been vibrating with excitement. She was thrilled with her outfit of dark pink tights, light pink skirt with hearts, and white shirt with hot pink flowers. She spent the past five evenings under my tutelage, making valentines for every kid in the class – and really caring about how each kid would react to the size and sparkle of the stickers and the different colors of heart shaped balloons and flowers she was customizing for each one. I just loved it. Having recently discovered my inner scrapbooking soccer mom nerd (or, how fun it is to shop at Michael’s Craft store – a formerly suburban pleasure paradise now available to us New York City residents), we just sat there at her little table, cutting and coloring and sticking stickers, listening to Fiona Apple and discussing Eli’s favorite color versus Lina’s. Here was something I always loved doing when I was younger, something relaxing and creative and fulfilling we could finally do together. It totally rocked.

I used to feel a constant pull toward eras I never lived in, careers I’d never have, places I’d never live. I feel less that way now. Part of that must be finding my way, hopefully, or else realizing aspiration is never ending. Maybe that’s why memories are flooding in now – because I’ve accepted that now my real job to make things as sparkly and pink as I can for my kids, just as my own parents at roughly my age sacrificed a lot of their own middle years to make things exciting and textured and full of joy for me and my sisters.

Its funny to feel like now I’m the grownup comes up with the ideas and the adventures, and also the one who says the things like: “I’m turning that television/IPad off right this minute if you keep ignoring me when I ask you to bring your dish to the sink!” Some days it’s so much damn work to make all the decisions and keep the momentum going, but when I think about how much it means to Zoe to sit down and color with the set of 140 markers I picked up – and how much of a charge it gave me when my own mom bought me a similar set, I’m really feeling that sparkly Valentine’s love.

9/11 makes me feel vulnerable as a mom

My daughter started kindergarten this past week, but its me that’s gone back to school, and it’s 1977.

I watched Z. get ready for her first day, clutching her new purple quilted pencil case, and it shocked me how the memories flooded in. Suddenly, I’m four going on five, getting ready for my end of summer birthday. I’m wearing a paisley dress I obsessed over, the feel of the banana seat bicycle I first learned to ride beneath my bum. I remember how I looked myself dead in the eye in my parents’ full-length mirror, singing songs from day camp into a brush, mimicking how I saw older girls and women behave. I see Z. do dances in front of her shows on TV, hear her using intonations that I can tell she’s heard from other, likely older girls – the not so cute “Mommmmmm (MAH!)” and that’s “dis(GUST)ing!” I distinctly remember hearing my own voice say phrases like that – thinking I sounded so cool and mature.

I am enjoying my daughter more than I ever have. She is bursting with energy and excitement. Every day is filled with discovery and hilarious conversations. It hurts my heart to watch her growing up and away from me, but I feel so close to her right now, as I remember what it felt like to be her age. I have scattered memories of early childhood but Kindergarten is the moment true memory is sparked. I vividly recall my teacher, Mrs. Lockett. My white fluffy bathmat with pink, blue and yellow flecks that I took naps on. Having an accident at school and having a little plastic bin with extra clothes to change back into. The way strep throat felt.

Last night I was reading Where the Sidewalk Ends to Z. I was reliving my own confusion at some of the things I didn’t understand in those dark and subversive poems – trying to wrap my head around Shel Silverstein’s crazy and specific universe. And as we read and she melted into me, I kept swallowing the lump of pride and sadness and purity of experience. It’s the same way I felt as she shyly sat down at her Kindergarten table last week. It was like watching a really manipulative television commercial for Life Insurance, one with indie music and the mom watching the kid walk into her first day of school with backpack on both shoulders from behind – only it was actually happening.

I’ve also been thinking about how I felt a few weeks ago during the run up to Hurricane Irene. We live right in the evacuation zone in Brooklyn and had to make a decision the day before about whether to leave our building prior to the storm in case we lost power. We have another kid who is just a baby, and it felt a little too risky to stay in place, so we schlepped our pack-n-play and air mattresses and crap over to my brother in laws, also in Brooklyn but on higher ground. There I spent the night restlessly obsessing that a tree would crash through the window and kill us all.

I had many emotions during the 24 hours of the storm: fear, annoyance at the inconvenience, dread of the unknown. But I think the most poignant part of the experience was that I didn’t want to have to be the adult making the decisions about how to protect my completely helpless children. I didn’t want to be making copies of our important documents and sealing them in a Ziploc. I didn’t want to scour the stores for D batteries. I wanted to be the kid listening to what someone else told me to do.

Today is 9/11, so of course it is a moment to recognize ourselves as vulnerable souls trying to move forward through the scary and unforeseen things that continue to plague us. I am 39 years old and I have all the trappings of an adult, but sometimes I wish I could cuddle into my own mom and she could just tell me the right thing to do. Of course I now know, she had no idea what she was doing, either, when she read to me and tried to teach me how to behave in the world.

Millions before us have had children, raised them and let them go. But if you take a second to think about how scary and random life can be, it can bring you back to feeling like a five-year-old, standing on the steps of your big new school, clutching your purple quilted pencil case.