I'm mad because I don't know how to ask you for lasagna

It doesn't take much for me to decide, at long stupid last, that there is no God.

A dog skull does the trick, this afternoon. I'm cured. 

The dog no bigger than a large cat leaps onto the couch into the same space and at the same moment I am reaching for--what? Who knows now. The puppy's small dense skull collides with my left eye socket. She is unscathed (the whole fucking world, even a dog, knows how to shake itself off and walk away untouched--pain is remarkably optional for many) but I reel from the impact.

The pain is a fresh pain, at least, something new. That triggers the tears I've been holding at bay for days. I press the heel of my hand to my brow, sobbing furiously and instantly. The pain as an isolated moment is not the issue. It's a dogpile of pain that won't let up, accompanied by self-commentary so vicious, I would drive a knife into the eye of anyone who spoke to my daughters in the same way. 

Read MoreInfo
22 Comments
Written by Jennifer Mattern On

How to write your tween at camp

First, grumble fuck a duck under your breath when you realize you have to spend another $19.95 for the right to correspond for two weeks with the creature you were in labor with for 40 hours straight, the baby who rendered your vagina a Level 5 Haz Mat situation, the daughter you have kept alive for 12 years despite poor culinary skills, the confounding little broad who stares at your left eyebrow with her mouth slightly agape when you try to explain that hygiene is really a very exciting thing.  Yes. Fork over $19.95 to Bunk Notes for a third year in a row. Bunk Notes: the Official Hostage Converter for Summer Campers.

Read MoreInfo
1 Comment
Written by Jennifer Mattern On

The stories with nowhere to go

Time took care of most stories.
It was a massacre, I could not watch, you're
lucky to live so ever-far. I envy you that, I covet your stoic silence
and hate you for it and when I say hate you I mean love you with 
the very last thread of what I have and what I am. 

Senseless? Fine. I am weary of short words posing as sense.

To think I might have touched your face.
I still don't know what bravery means to you.

Read MoreInfo
1 Comment
Written by Jennifer Mattern On

Here's what you'll do

Here's what you'll do if you know
what's good for you. Pick a star,
nothing fancy, a five-and-dime
bit of glitter from a flyover galaxy.

Then weave the roses I like so much 
into the indigo one or the other of us
calls sky (but never at the same time).

Read MoreInfo
1 Comment
Written by Jennifer Mattern On

Sophie's a Berkshire Idol contestant..and needs your votes!

So this kid of mine? The songbird? She made it to the Finals Round of Berkshire Idol, with this performance of "Someone Like You," below. Finals are this weekend, May 11th, at the Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield, MA. But this week, online votes are also being tallied at iBerkshires.com! Yes, you have to create a username (boooo!) but I swear it's short and painless (yaaaaay!). Will you help a kid get her rock star on?​ CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP AND VOTE!

At Finals, Sophie will be taking on "Somebody to Love" by Queen. OH YES. Tall order, but she's going for it. I'll post that soon too. In the meantime, thank you for all the AMAZING support, and please do consider voting once a day this week for our favorite Berkshire Idol (who still needs to be reminded to clean her room, but hey, rock stars are supposed to be messy, right?).​

Info
6 Comments
Written by Jennifer Mattern On

The reason I love spring

​Beloved Sophie Mary Rose, at 4:09 am today, you will be 12 years old. Twelve. A dozen. I can no longer hold out my hands and say YOU ARE THIS MANY, and neither can you, come to think of it, although you might try to, with some concoction of your odd double-jointed digits.

​Sophie, my firstborn, you were four pounds at birth and the doctors were solemn about your prognosis.

 

Read MoreInfo
6 Comments
Written by Jennifer Mattern On

A simple no

This morning:
the first reason I've ever had to love spring
asks me if she can borrow the nondescript hoodie
once worn by the peep-toeing songstress of
my won't-tell soul.

We are talking:
thin gray slubbed cloth belonging to
my grocery-store savior, my ridiculous
avocado-mash seductress, my star-spun
tangle with a little thing called beauty, 
my once-and-only simple and complete.

Just so you know:
This hoodie would not sell on eBay.
Relist? No. Reenlist? Maybe, in that
dreamy world of if that then this.​

Borrow it:
Springtime child knows my answer before she asks.
But she asks anyway, to prove a point to herself.
She is a tornado coiling into itself, compressing into
blurred, indignant loops, no sense of up or down.  

Fine, all you had to say was no. A simple no.

Away she whirls, in search of a hoodie unwoven by
winter threads of a mother's tedious memory.
I wonder how long it will be until this child of spring
learns that there is no such thing 
as a simple no.

​

Info
2 Comments
Written by Jennifer Mattern On

America's Top Model uses Wee-Wee pads

Isabella Cosette Flora Wilhelmina von Matternhaus recently snagged the opportunity to model for the absolutely amazing renowned pet photographer Amanda Jones. I am awfully lucky to call Amanda my friend and creative collaborator. If you ever want to give an extraordinary gift to yourself (or someone else in love with a dog), book a session with her. (She'll even come to your neck of the woods.)

​Isabella the Italian Greyhound, in her beloved ratty skull sweater, February 2013.

​Isabella the Italian Greyhound, in her beloved ratty skull sweater, February 2013.

Info
1 Comment
Written by Jennifer Mattern On