Once Upon a Time

Once Upon a Time

I’ve turned the page on my storytelling.

The other day my grand-daughters (age 4 and 2) begged me to tell them bedtime stories. Oh, what fun! I have an arsenal of fairy tales inside me. Drawing on one of my own childhood favorites, Little Red Riding Hood, I quickly had the girls engrossed.

As the tale escalated, so did my panic. Let me explain. The girls’ parents are vigilant to protect them from the harsh realities of the world. They don’t have television and ‘hate’ is a bad word in their home.

Two innocent faces stared up at me with big eager eyes. And here I was on the verge of planting an indelible violent scene of a ferocious wolf devouring poor sick helpless grandma. Thinking quickly, I had the wolf lock grandma in the closet but before I could help it, in busted the ‘kind’ woodsman brandishing a razor sharp ax eager to cut the head off of the wolf. Well, I just talked fast and rushed through the murder hoping the girls wouldn’t register it and “then everyone sat down to eat plum cakes and tea and lived happily ever after” (except the wolf, of course).

Hoping to get that nightmare fodder out of their precious little minds, I quickly began another story, Jack and the Beanstalk. Soon I was out of the frying pan and into the fire. First, I felt bad telling them that Jacks mother screamed at him for selling their cow for some ‘stupid magic beans’ when they were both starving to death. Then I worried that my daughter would later call me when her girls were running around shouting the cannibalistic Ogre’s refrain, “Fee-fi-fo-fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be he alive, or be he dead, I’ll grind his bones to make me bread!”

Oh dear, I didn’t remember bedtime stories being this difficult when I told them to my children.

My tempo got faster and faster as I realized this entire story was void of any redeeming value whatsoever. Jack unjustly steals the Ogre’s magic harp and when the Ogre tries to retrieve what is rightfully his, Jack sends him hurling down, down, down, to the earth to meet his violent death, leaving the kind Ogre's wife to mourn out her days as a widow. Why hadn’t I been cognizant of these stories before now?

In my college children’s literature class, I remember learning that fairy tales were originally intended for adult audiences as parlor entertainment. Not until the 19^th and 20^th centuries did they become adapted for children.

You won’t believe what I did next. Yes, yes, three’s a charm. I pulled yet another made-for-adults-but-used-to-terrify-children story out of my repertoire and began Hansel and Gretel. I’ll spare you the retelling and just give you the gruesome bullet points:

• Kids mother dies
• Dad marries wicked stepmother
• Family is starving
• Stepmother devises a plan to abandon children in dark scary forest
• Children find a witch’s house
• Witch locks up boy intending to fatten him to eat later
• Sister forced into slavery
• Sister burns witch in oven

Can somebody please tell me why my mother read me those #hannibalstories? And why did I tell them to my children?  What stories are parents telling their children nowadays? 

I emailed my daughter and assured her that I had just ordered a copy of Aesop’s Fables from Amazon and she was safe to bring the girls over again.

Ask the Boss

(Photo Credit: Google Image)

I’m afraid of heights. I’m afraid of water. I’m afraid of my phone, my doorbell, and everyone outside of my door. 

Door

At ten o’clock one Sunday morning I heard knockings on my door. I heard five clear, distinctive knocks, and I imagined the person outside the door: Male? Female? Young? Old? Neighbor? Salesman? I wondered what that person wanted. Then I waited. 

I didn’t know exactly whom or what I was waiting for. My family was getting ready for church meetings––taking a shower and getting dressed. I was cooking breakfast in the kitchen. I hated that it was only logical I be the one who answered the door.  

So I kept waiting. 

Instead of knocking, the person at the door was now ringing the doorbell. The kind of doorbell ringing that was akin to a raging driver’s honking––long, loud, and there was possibly some cursing under the breath. 

Still, I waited. 

I turned off the burner and waited. 

It was quiet in the house, as if my husband and my sons had all fallen asleep in the shower. I started to get antsy––angry, even––for their nonresponse. I wanted someone else but me to answer the door and then tell me who it was and what he wanted. But more than that, I wanted the person at the door to think there was no one in my house so he’d leave.

I felt perfectly justified standing in front of the door, listening to the knocks and doorbell ring all morning without answering the door. I didn’t feel I had a reason to interact with anyone. 

Phone

Same thing with my buzzing, vibrating phone. I look at the caller’s name on the screen and walk away without answering. This I do, because the caller isn’t my husband or one of my children or my children’s school secretary. I don’t need to talk to anyone else. If it's important, the caller will leave a message and that's my preferred alternative of a phone conversation. 

Activity

There were signup sheets going around in church last Sunday, calling people to join the neighborhood book club, the midweek potluck at somebody's beautiful backyard, the exercise group and the morning walking team. I saw handwritten names and phone numbers and email addresses on the signup sheets and imagined the kind of fun those people were going to have without me. 

I don’t hate people. And I’m not a narcissist. But I need to be home alone, not interacting with anyone. That’s what my brain tells me to do. That’s how my brain decides I'll be happy and content. It’s not always like this, but most of the time it is. I know I feel and act differently than most. I realize my head can be a bad neighborhood and I have to get out of it sometimes. Some research shows that I’m an introvert. Some say I suffer from social anxiety. I honestly don’t care which correct label should be taped to my forehead, because the more important thing to worry about is my daily life functioning:

Should I answer the door? The phone? 

Should I join the neighborhood book club? Exercise group?

I don't know. My brain is the boss. Let me ask the boss. 

So the doorbell and the phone continue to ring. Everyone continues to have fun without me. I continue to hang out with my boss, at home, in the bad neighborhood that's my head. 

And that's just fine.

Allison

Blog: Allison Hong Merrill
Facebook: Allison Hong Merrill
Twitter: @xieshou
Instagram: @jijenmerrill

Grief and the Real Me

My kids and I on our way to visit my sister. 

I miscarried last month. Normally I’m a little more reserved about sharing stuff like this, but what’s the point of writing non-fiction if not to share something real? And this is as real as it’s got for me lately.

This last month has been hard. There’s this disconnect between what I know and what I feel. I know many women also have miscarried and some never even speak of it. I know five weeks is really not that long and other women have had it worse. I know God still has a plan for me and that I’m blessed to have two children. I know. I know. 

But I still feel like crap. I’m still depressed. I cry at stupid times over seemly nothing and didn’t write for four weeks. I binge watched Korean romances and my house fell apart. I felt angry, sad, hopeless, and frustrated, in alternating rotations, sometimes within one hour.

I’ve been thinking about myself, the me underneath everything that happens to me and around me and through me. I’ve also been thinking about depression, hormones, and emotions. It’s struck me more than once that my emotions aren’t me. My depression isn’t me. My anxiety, fear, and my imperfect body are not me. They are what’s happening to me.

I have to tell myself it's okay to grieve. Sorrow and sadness are the mirrors of hope and love. That is how it’s supposed to be. Maybe we can only feel as much love as we are willing to feel sorrow.

Little by little, I’m getting myself back. I write a bit here and there, read, and clean my house. I go on a trip to visit my sister. I stand in a parking lot and my dad and mom wrap their arms around me and tell me things that I need to hear. Even though I’m thirty and supposed to be all grown-up, I cry on them and feel better. I go to a ward barbecue and though I can't find it in me to really talk to anyone beyond the usual hellos, I feel a spark of the old me reemerging as I look for the missing shoes of my neighbor's children.

Tiny things. Tiny moments. I fight to let myself grieve, to stop judging myself, and let what I feel be honest and true.

I start to wake up.

I see blessings; gratitude breaking through the hurt and leaving my heart softened for the re-planting of faith. It becomes my stepping off point for all the good that can be found, somewhere. In a future still opening to me, still unfolding into a distance marked with hope. Because none of this is me. It’s my test. It’s my journey. It’s supposed to hurt. It’s supposed to be hard. It’s a million things tailored perfectly for me. The real me. The me I sort of know, but can’t quite remember, who understands that this life is a blip in my eternity. 

The real me continues, before this and after this, always and ever a daughter of God. And that's non-fiction, in the realist of ways.

The Absent-Minded Mother

     The worst “mommy fail” moments become kind of funny when shared over lunch with your friends. Perhaps these have happened to you. If not, you can expect them sooner or later.

     You are in the carpool line at school. A couple kids pile in your back seat. You’ve got instruments going in the trunk area, kids piling in the middle, your baby making noise in his car seat. You pull out into the lane and away from the school, glance in the rear-view mirror and see…your son running after your car, waving his hands. Next stop: the high school. You pick the teens up in a local neighborhood. They start to pile into the car. Your favorite song pulls up on your playlist. You sing along while you start to pull away, only to slam on the brakes when you hear shouts from the back seat. You look around to see the last passenger running along with the door wide open, trying to get in the moving car.

     The phone is ringing in your ear. You are calling someone, but who? Why? You hope when they answer you will recognize their voice and remember.

     You go to pick up the pizza, get all the way there and notice you forgot your wallet. You go to the grocery store and come home with a whole bunch of food you did not know you needed and nothing from your mental list of things for dinner tonight. Let's not even talk about the Target phenomenon.

     There was something planned for this morning. Monday morning. You know it. Something…

     You need to call your child’s teacher. What was her name? It’s on the tip of your tongue…

     They are passing out yearbooks. Everyone in the class gets one, except your child.  So the next year they are passing out yearbooks and every child gets one except your child who gets two—making sure you don’t forget can get expensive. Then, this year, my child actually came home with FOUR yearbooks. You can believe my phone was beeping with texts about that one.

     "Don't dry my jersey Mom, the letters will stick together."

     I nod. "Got it."

      "No, seriously Mom, coach said I'll get in big trouble. DO NOT DRY THE JERSEY."

     "I'm not gonna dry your jersey. I got it, OK?"

     One hour later: You totally dry the jersey.

     
     You put milk in the pantry and flour in the fridge. 
     You brush your teeth with Desitin and put sunblock in your armpits.

     For me, it all started when I had my first baby. I thought I was just sleep deprived. I remember the first time I tried to have a conversation with someone and I couldn’t remember something.  I was so frustrated because the word was on the tip of my tongue. This kindly Mom in her forties just chuckled and told me my brain would come back. It was just the pregnancy talking. I smiled and was happy to be a part of the mothers in the world who make sacrifices to bring children into our families.     

     It has been many years now and six kids later; I would like to find that helpful woman and ask, “When?  When is my mental ability going to return?”  I am still waiting, and it’s not better! It’s worse! Now, instead of telling me it is the pregnancy talking, my kindly older friends tell me it is because I am so busy.  I have too much information playing all at the same time and some of it gets kicked out. How’s that for a scientific reason I forget things?

     What would we do without friends? I especially love the friends who forget things like I do.  When I do something crazy, I always call one of my absent minded friends so we can laugh about it.  

      “Hey, I went to the Dr. today and they told me the appointment isn’t until next week!”   

     “I went to the Dr. today too, but my appointment was yesterday!” 

     “My Dr. sends me same day text reminders and I still forget!” 

     We laugh all the time at all the things we forget.  We laugh because if we don’t laugh, we would cry.   

     My daughter’s best friend opened up her lunchbox and it was completely empty.  I have sent my daughter without lunch or money so many times that the two of them just plan on sharing with each other. Some of you might read that and wonder, “How do you send your child to school with an empty lunchbox?” But the rest of us read that and laugh. We laugh in relief that we aren’t the only ones.  Forgetfulness loves company just like misery, but forgetfulness does not have to be miserable, especially if we can laugh about it.

      I know there are more like me out there.  We are super intelligent people.  Clear, easy recall used to be normal and expected.  Lists were often made in our heads and remembered.  We were quick in conversation, had fun comebacks, remembered people’s names and important information about them so we could show we cared.  Our mind was a reliable friend. 

     But now, now is a different kettle altogether.  We walk into a room to get something and completely forget what we are after.  We stop talking mid-sentence because we can’t remember where we were going with that thought.  We try to listen while someone else is talking but if we don’t repeat in our mind over and over again what we want to say, it will be gone forever.  We have a whole mental list of all the things we wanted to do the minute the kids get on the bus and we can’t remember one thing on it as soon as we shut the front door to an empty house.  

 

     We forget orthodontics appointments, dentists, doctor, pet grooming, birthday parties. I forget all birthday parties. I think it is because deep down, they are the bane of my existence.  Birthday parties require a lot of specific memory power.  You have to remember to buy a gift ahead of time, and then you have to remember to actually attend on the correct day and time of the party.  There isn’t just one party to remember either.  Every child has multiple parties all year long!

     School:  Another bane.  I forget all kinds of things for the kids’ school.  Pioneer day, Greek toga day, book character day are all routinely forgotten until the night before.  Supplies are tough to remember as well:  Poster board. Finding poster-board at 10 PM is rough. 

   

     People’s names! I have forgotten names of people I see every day, people I have known for more than a decade-- Name gone. Whoosh. Just like that.  I’ll remember it again in a day or two right when I don’t need it. 

    I did go to the doctor about it one time.  I even had an MRI. I did memory testing, blood tests and hormone testing—all inconclusive.  Nothing is technically wrong with me; except there is definitely something wrong with me.  I do not have the same mental functionality I had years ago and there are many women experiencing the same symptoms as I am.

     I think this condition should have a name. I am convinced it is a real thing and it happens more often than not.  Wikipedia says “A syndrome, in medicine and psychology is the collection of signs and symptoms that are observed in, and characteristic of, a single condition.”  Sounds like I have a syndrome: Let’s call it, the Absent Minded Mother Syndrome.

     Although medical professionals could not offer me a specific diagnosis, research has shown that there are at least 7 types of memory problems that are not signs of deeper health issues that many people experience.   According to a Harvard Medical School Report, “Forgetfulness—7 types of normal memory problems,” following are several of these normal memory problems that most women experience:

1.       1.  Absentmindedness:  Forgetting where we placed our keys, skipping appointments, missing a child’s soccer game.  All of these situations can be attributed to our absentmindedness and medical journals call this normal.

2.      2.  Blocking:  The word is on the tip of your tongue. You almost have it.  According to research, your brain does this when it retrieves a similar memory to the one you are seeking and therefore not the accurate word.  Usually your brain is able to produce the correct word in a minute or two.

3.      3.  Misattribution: Your memories overlap. You get part of the story right and then try to place new details from another memory in the wrong scenario.  

     Knowing that this type of memory loss is considered normal and that it is experienced by most of the population does not alleviate the problem.  It does, however, lesson the anxiety and worry that something is wrong with our brain. 

 

     But there is hope, help that I will publish at a later time. After I diagnosed myself with the absentminded mother syndrome I began significant research on how to alleviate the problem in my own life.  There are clever tips, technology, digital assistants, diet changes, meditation, exercises, different methods at home and new habits that can help us all function above our peak, even better than the days when we functioned at full mental capacity.

    

Is revising worth it?

I was about 20 pages into the revision of my political memoir when I got edits back for one of my historical novels. I needed the diversion badly. I thought my memoir was already pretty clean, just a few tweaks for my beta readers, but each page had edit marks all over.

And then I read my editor comments and letter on the novel. The thought that came to mind was, “Why don’t I just start all over? It would probably be easier.”

Instead, I ate tons of imaginary chocolate, took a deep breath, and decided to re-read the edits another day, when I could look at the comments a little more objectively. Without crying. Without giving up and taking up an easier career, oh, like rocket scientist. Or professional basketball player. As a center. (I am 5’1”.)

Seriously, why does revising have to be so hard?

Maybe the question I need to ask myself is, is revising worth it? I would have to say yes, because:

1.     You’ve already put in so much work, what’s another few more hours to make your story the best it can be?
2.     It could be worse; you could be staring at a blank page.
3.     Or it could already be published, and the reviews are pointing out what your editor is telling you. At least you can still change it, and your rep isn’t shredded to pieces.
4.     You wrote your draft. Revised it. Revised it some more. And now you will revise it one more time. You’ve done it before, you can do it again.
5.     Just think back to how awful your first draft was. How wooden the characters were. Really, this is tons better. Just take it one more step.
6.     That bestseller on the shelf? It went through dozens of edits. And then more edits.

So take heart, all of you out there who are struggling through your revisions. It is worth it. The day you get through those revisions and put out your book baby into the world, let me know and we can celebrate together.

Tonight, I’ll pray for some divine help. Tomorrow, I’ll tackle my revisions. Wish me luck.

Jewel Allen is an award-winning journalist, author and memoir ghostwriter. Visit her at www.jewelallen.com.