Recently, I saw Everything Everywhere All at Once. I loved it. I loved a movie focusing on someone movies often ignore. I loved the over-the-topness, the maximalist, weirdness. I loved the sincerity and heartfelt storytelling. This weekend I binged watched Undone on Amazon Prime. I didn't plan to binge watch. The story and the animation …
Way back in the very early 80s, Mom took me on a day trip to hang out at a beach town with friends of hers. The memory has faded, but we had fun, and on the way back home, I said or asked something about the women we'd hung out with that made my mother …
I'm usually torn between being inspired and discouraged. When I was a kid, my mother believed in being honest. Perhaps her own mother didn't outright lie, but she certainly wasn't forthcoming. And after the divorce my mom did her best not to speak ill of my dad, but she did in a moment of anger …
My mom told me I learned my color wheel before I learned my ABCs. It surprises me now how I struggle to use color in my work now. In a high school art class, we had to draw a scene and then paint it. I loved my pencil drawing. It was of my best friend …
I promised something creative everyday, and today that something is for death. Perhaps you haven't experienced this yet (and I love if you haven't), but I know many have had that moment when they walk outside, the world rushes about its business, and you want to shout, "Hey! But someone is missing today! How can …
Mom / 1944-1989 This morning, I read this article by Rebecca Solnit about the many conflicted emotions wrapped up in Mother's Day. Right at the start she says something that reminds me of conversations I had with my own mom. "Half our holidays are punitive, at least for those left out of what the the …
One more story. This is from before I was born. It is something my mother told me. My dad bought the house before they were married in 1965. He built his first dock. It proved lower than it should've been because soon after, the water level rose. About an inch of water covered the dock's …
The Civil War brought us death on a massive scale, and I've read how people turned to seances. First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln held seances too. The Spiritualist movement was already in place by the time of the war, but certainly so much violent death spurred more people to try so-called spirit circles. (Aaron Mahnke's …
Continue reading There’s a Gaping Hole in the Livingroom Wall
I was going to write something completely different, but I've forgotten what. As some know, my mother died of an aortic aneurysm when she was 45 and I was 21. In early November, someone I grew up calling Aunt (but who is not genetically related) almost died of an aortic aneurysm. Thankfully, she is recovering. …
I don't remember what I was thinking when my mom took this photograph of me. Probably something along the lines of "I hope this is the pose Mom wants." She took her photography very seriously and I was pleased and terrified when she wanted to take photos of me in my ballet costume. I was …
Marta Pelrine-Bacon 