Interview: Laisha Rosnau

Your back of the book bio:

Laisha Rosnau’s first novel, The Sudden Weight of Snow, was published by McClelland & Stewart in 2002 & was an Honourable Mention for the Books in Canada First Novel Award. Her first collection of poetry, Notes on Leaving (Nightwood Editions 2004), won the Acorn-Plantos People’s Poetry Award, & her second collection, Lousy Explorers will be published by Nightwood in April 2009. A former Executive Editor of Prism International, her prose & poetry have been published in Canada, the US, the UK, & Australia.

Your playground bio:

Laisha Rosnau is the proud mama of Jonah Alexander, born June 2007, & is currently gestating “Perogy,” due June 2009.

Do you identify yourself as first a writer and then a mother, the other way around, or something else? Why do you think this is?

Most of the time, it doesn’t feel very polarized. I’m thankful that I had already published two books before Jonah came along. I identified myself as a writer before I became a mother. I still identify myself as a writer as well as a mother, though a different times of the day or week, I can feel like one more than the other. Our next door neighbours have been taking care of Jonah twice a week since he turned one. On those days, in those hours, I am a writer first. Sometimes in the evenings when he’s asleep & I’m writing, I’m also a writer first. Whenever I’m with him, I’m Mama first & foremost. When walking or driving, I can be both. I can contemplate a line or a scene or character while he provides me with a running commentary of the world around us: “Truck, bird, bus, tree, truck, girl, bike, dog, truck…” (if up to him, all future work would feature trucks as central motifs.) Being a writer doesn’t stop when I’m not writing. Neither does being a mother stop when I’m not with Jonah. I’m thankful that I don’t feel like I have to make a choice of being one over the other.

Did you always want to be a writer? A mother? How does the reality differ from the fantasy?

Yes to both. I always wanted to be an artist, though not always specifically a writer. My mom saved a copy of a letter I wrote to Katherine Paterson, the author of Bridge To Terabithia, in grade 2 or 3 which I ended “P.S. What’s it like to be an author? I’d like to be one when I grow up.” At different points I have wanted to be a painter, a photographer, or a dancer. I didn’t have enough of the right kind of talent for those things--or enough interest or passion to sustain a practice--but writing has always been a constant. I can’t say there’s been anything else that has topped the list of things I wanted to do when I grew up--writer & mother.

I never went through a phase in my life when I questioned wanting to have kids. I loved babies when I was a girl, loved babysitting as a teen, & worked in childcare as a young adult. I thought I’d have kids by the time I was in my mid-twenties. Then I got accepted to grad school, broke up with my long-term boyfriend & no longer had a future father for my imaginary offspring. I lay awake in my single bed in my graduate student dorm room & thought, “Okay, I’d better write a novel now because that’s all I have left.” Nine months later, I had a draft. A year after I started, I had a book deal. My first book came out a month before I turned thirty. I met my husband at a book launch a year & a half later & our first child came out the day I turned thirty-five.

Though the first book publication was a really heady time, the reality of being a writer differs more greatly from the fantasy than the reality of being a mother does for me. People can tell you over & over again how unglamorous the writing life is but it is difficult to imagine until you experience it first-hand. Even then, writers like me are so easy to please that all it takes is a tiny travel fund & the hospitality suite at writers’ events every few years to make up for years of monotony, solitude, & crippling self-doubt on the job.

Even though I always wanted kids, I don’t think I harboured many fantasies of what it would be like. Working in childcare (as a nanny, in a daycare, etc) helped. I stopped in my mid-twenties because I was already getting burned out of other peoples’ kids & wanted to save some energy & enthusiasm for my own, knowing then I’d need every reserve I had. If anything, I expected to have a more difficult experience of early motherhood than I have so far. My son brings me more joy than I ever could have imagined possible. I credit part-time childcare with some of my capacity for joy. I would always love my son as much, regardless of whether or not I had a few hours away from him each week, but childcare – & the time it allows me to write--allows me to love motherhood even more.

What are your measurements of success as a mother? As a writer? Have these evolved and, if so, can you talk about in what way and why do you think this is?

Having a curious, engaged, happy (for the most part) child & being a curious, engaged, happy (for the most part) woman alongside him. No small task as it takes the right balance of sleep, food, exercise, fresh air, social activity, quiet time, etc. for both of us-- & every day is different. I found it challenging enough to find the right balance before Jonah came along. Now to keep both of us in mind each day? It’s not strenuous but it is constant-- & worth the daily effort. Sometimes success means simply getting from one end of the day to the other. If I can laugh about it at the end of the day, it’s been a good day. If I’m crying, maybe not so good but part of the process.

I am learning to measure success in the process of both parenting & writing. Success in motherhood cannot be measured in one final “product”-- & neither can it in writing. Feeling a measure of success in the process of writing takes just as much juggling as does parenting to find the right balance in any given day or moment. If I am curious & engaged in what I am writing, researching or editing, I consider that a huge success. Oddly (or not?), I have less of an expectation of happiness while writing as compared to while parenting. Moment to moment, parenting gives me a lot of happiness. Moment to moment, I often find writing hard--it’s fulfilling & it can be sublime at times but a lot of the time it feels hard (in a “good” way, though not necessarily a “happy” way, if that makes sense.)

There are days when living with a toddler is like living with a tiny drunk person--joyful, clumsy, clinging to me saying “dub you, Mama!” then pushing me away in protest of some perceived slight. Other days, it’s like living with a mini Dalai Lama & I get blissed-out off his joyful fumes. Living with a book in progress is similar, I think, though my manuscripts rarely tell me they love me & they seem drunk way more often.

What's your writing schedule like? What was its journey to get to where it is now?

Uh, writing schedule? It used to be the thing of daily quotas, weekly goals, monthly milestones, of hours & words a day eventually adding up to become, ta-da, manuscripts! Now I fly by the seat of my pants & try to apply said pants to chair to write when I can. Nap times, evenings, weekends – though many of those times devolve into a flurry of email/Facebook/internet-lurking procrastination. I tell myself, “I just need little break” then I wonder if I should nap. Sometimes I attempt to nap & as soon as my head hits the pillow, the wee wonder awakens--& that’s it for my “writing” for that day! Nonetheless, somehow, it gets done. I feel no less productive than before I had a child--I clearly am less productive in terms of solely writing but when I think of everything else I get done in a day and a week--& still find time to write – I feel sometimes feel like an icon of productivity. If I don’t, I tell myself I should!

I also went through a period, pre-baby of course, when I was working with daily quotas and monthly goals. How I write has changed so much that I doubt I'll ever return to that model. Do you long to return to that way of approaching your work? Is it a goal of your to do so, or have things changed so much you're on your way to another model?

Actually, I’ve found it liberating no longer be writing within the parameters of words and hours per day. Since Jonah was born, my goals have seemed more holistic somehow. Instead of thinking I should write 2000 words a day or a poem a week, I’ve thought, “Let’s see if I can gather these poems into something resembling a manuscript” then “Ohhh my, these poems need some serious editing” then “I think I’ll send some of these poems out,” etc. I’ve done what I can in the time that I’ve had and somehow a book came out of it.

I’m working toward another model but I don’t know what it is. I’m inspired by the anecdotes of other writing moms, like Carol Shields who says she started out writing one hour a day, between 11 AM and noon when her kids came home from school. More recently and closer to me, Annabel Lyon set a goal to write 200 words while her two young children napped and she has a novel coming out this summer (granted, she started it before the kids came along). Goals like that seem manageable (although I know when it comes down to it, that one hour & 200 words will seem difficult!) and I’d like to find ones that fit with my own life and family.

Has becoming a mother changed how you write? What your write? If so, in what ways?

I’m still able to think of novels & characters & scenes. I’m still able to do research “toward” a novel. I can even write notes on file cards! But to write a novel? Umm. Even with two days of childcare, I haven’t been able to find a way to sustain the kind of focus I need to write a novel. That said, I didn’t get those two days of full-time care until I was already pregnant with my second child and had just signed a contract for my upcoming book of poetry, on which I’ve been working on until a couple of weeks ago when it was sent to the printer. Perhaps I should cut myself some slack.

Writing poetry in Jonah’s first year was a God-send. I could write or edit a draft of a poem during nap-times. Unlike writing fiction for me, it seemed like the times I was away from poetry increased my focus when I returned to it. When it came down to the last few weeks of intensive editing, it was exhausting. Parenting a toddler and editing poetry are such different ways of thinking and focusing--one no less challenging or stimulating than the other but each so different. To have my brain so stretched each day was exhausting. When I think back on the intensity of editing my novel, I can’t image attempting that while parenting a baby or toddler, though there are women who do it so it is possible. I still harbour fantasies of writing scenes of a novel during nap-times with the next (in these fantasies, both children nap at the same time, for the same length of time, each day) but I realize this is wildly optimistic/unrealistic. I also realize how much I loved spending the first year of my son’s life with him full-time & how quickly it passed. My writing career isn’t going to disappear, but my children’s first months & years will.

With a new book and a new baby arriving at around the same time, do you have any goals for your next writing project--poetry or novel or? Or are you going to just try to survive the first year and then see what unfolds?

Mostly the latter. Since we’ll be moving cities within three months of the new baby’s birth, I’m really only aiming for survival and perhaps even sanity in the first six months--dare to dream. Moving with a newborn & a toddler? I’ll be lucky if I can return email.

I’ve been incubating another novel since I was pregnant with Jonah. I’ve daydreamed about it, made notes, done research, even sketched ideas (literally drawn little pictures) of what it will look like. I plan to keep doing those kinds of things and I think that novel will keep living in me until I have the time, means and focus to write it but I don’t think that will happen until the next baby is at least a year-old or more.

How aware is you child of your writing?

Jonah is still too young to have much awareness of it all. I recently thought to take my books down and show him my author photos on them. “Mama?” he said, and “book?” Yes, I said, mama writes books. I’d like to keep instilling this knowledge in him and our next child.

Virginia Woolf famously wrote, "…a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write…." She never had children. Is a room to yourself enough for a writing-mama? What do you need?

A room is nice, yes--but even more important to me is a supportive partner & part-time childcare. I’d take both of those over a room, if I had to. It’s ridiculous but sometimes I feel guilty about having p/t childcare, thinking about how other writing moms were able to navigate their way through early childhood without the “luxury” of any childcare. But then I remind myself that that plays into the whole “mother as martyr” thing, in which despite having full lives, degrees, & careers before children, we are expected to somehow embrace motherhood so completely that planning toddler activities & play-dates will fulfill us. Not so for this mama. To forgo time set aside specifically to write would also play into the whole “art as a hobby” thing, something else I want to avoid.

As it is, I only have fourteen hours a week of childcare & when I have another child in a couple of months, while I’d like eldest to go to care part-time, I’ll probably be with the youngest full-time for the first year. During Jonah’s first year, I wrote during naps & in the early morning between nursing. With a two kids, I’m not sure when the writing will happen. I may be happy to take a full year “off” (ha, ha!) or I may be bleary-eyed with lack of sleep & batsh*t with not enough writing. I really can’t tell.

It’s very important to me that my work as a writer isn’t perceived as less valid because it’s “part-time” (in practice – in spirit it’s a full-time passion) & the financial remuneration from it is sporadic at best. Thankfully, I have a partner who has never doubted how important writing is & has always supported me in finding the time & ways to write. I want to instil this kind of respect for what I do in my children as well & the way I can see how to do this is to have things like specific times to write, child-care to make that possible, & a room or a space that is reserved for my writing – things that say, “What Mommy does is important.”

If you could go back, what would you tell your pre-child self?

Get over yourself! Do you really need to go out for coffee, drinks, dancing so often? Stop staring into middle space & plot out a novel or two that you can bang off during future nap-times (ha, ha!). I wouldn’t really – I’m glad I did all that & had the time to do so.

What do you think your pre-child self would tell you?

You should go out dancing more often! Take your husband! You’ve forgotten how much you like it! Also, a closet full of clothes purchased at Superstore does not a wardrobe make.

In terms of this topic (motherhood and writing), do you have any regrets? Guilt? Envy?

When I worked from home before being a mother, not once did I wonder why I didn’t bake muffins more often (read: ever). Since being at home as a mom, thoughts like that often cross my mind. Though I spend a lot of time at home (either with Jonah, or writing, or both) & I can’t stand clutter, I’m not a super-domestic person. This didn’t bother me when I was a work-from-home writer – why should it bother me now as a work-from-home mom?

In terms of writing & motherhood, no regrets or guilt so far. I feel envious in a hypothetical way of people with more time (& more time to sleep) but when I think of what I have--a supportive partner, a beautiful son, a writing career that finds it way into whatever space & time it can--I can’t feel envious for long.

The early years of motherhood have been described by various writers as a haze or as an incredibly creative time. How would you describe it? Are you still in it? When did you leave?

I’ve found it to be both a haze & an incredibly creative time – in more ways than one: I’m about to publish my third book (end of April) & about to have my second baby (mid-June). I feel like my mind, heart, capacity for empathy, adaptability, sense of humanness & sense of humour have all been expanded gazillion-fold since having a child--& this has left me feeling more creative than ever. Yet while I feel incredibly creative, actually getting to the page requires stumbling through a haze of interrupted sleep, loads of dirty diapers and days of being a constant event planner/personal chef/chauffeur /educator/nurse/comfort for a toddler. And this is just with one child. Will I feel even more creative with two? Will the haze thicken? Will I need to wield my will-power like a machete to get any writing done? I don’t know--you tell me, Marita!

To answer you: Yes, yes, and maybe. I had to use my mad machete skills to carve time for me to write. It wasn't a matter of will power, but creating opportunities for me to write during the times of day that I could write. By the time my boys are in bed I'm so spent all I can do is drink tea and watch Mansbridge and sleep is so precious to me that I refuse to get out of bed before my children do!

Have you found that your times when you can have creative output has changed at all? I remember that you used to be an early-morning writer. Is that still the case?

I’m still a night owl who wakes up early in the morning with the urge to write – not the most practical combination! When I was pregnant with Jonah, I’d wake at 4 or 5 AM and often get up to write then nap later. With this pregnancy, I still wake around the same time but most often I stay in bed (sometimes sleeping, sometimes not) knowing my toddler will be up by 7 AM and it will be game on, Mama, game on. If I could manage to get to bed early, I might be able to use this time. However, evenings are the time I spend with my husband, friends, connect over phone and email, the time I read for an hour in the bath…and then it’s 11 PM. I feel like I hardly have enough time to sleep now with one child, I can’t imagine how it will be with two, or what writing will take place when. I may figure something out, become adept at “creating opportunities” as you put it. Some things may have to go to create those opportunities--less bloody Facebook for example (the long baths stay)--& I’ll likely be begging you for toddler-sized morsels of advice from you soon!

Birthing a book is like birthing a baby. Way off or right on?

Somewhat off? Conceiving of, writing, & editing books has taken more sustained effort over longer periods of time. The act of creating a book requires inspiration, will, persistence, motivation, discipline, research, etc. The act of creating a baby requires one lucky roll in the sack followed by nine months of accepting that your body is now out of your control. I found it very strange in my first pregnancy that I was creating something by doing very little with my mind--my body had taken over &, apparently, knew what it was doing. I joke with friends, “That book isn’t going to write itself,” but those babies--they seem to know exactly what they’re doing in there & they do seem to grow themselves.

I don’t even know when the moment of “birthing” a book would be--upon finishing a first draft? Upon publication? Both of those things are on a continuum from the first ideas that form a book to the writers’ events & promotion that follow publication--opposite ends of the spectrum & neither are like birth to me. Giving birth was the single-most profound, extreme, intense, difficult, beautiful, all-consuming thing I’ve ever done. While I am incredibly proud to have conceived of, written, & published books, it just doesn’t compare to me.

I wanted to do this project because I found so few satisfying examples of the writing-mother. It was either the mythology of Alice Munro writing while her children played at her feet, the writer who resented and neglected her children because she was so consumed with her art, or someone like Sylvia Plath who ended up with her head in the oven. Which writing-mothers do you admire and why?

Until having a child, I didn’t think much about which writers were mothers or not. At some point, I became curious about the writers I knew who had children & asked them lots of questions about how they balanced writing and parenthood (or, acknowledged that “balance” might be the wrong thing to aim for!) but it was still theoretical, of course. Now having just one child, I have to say that I admire all mothers who write & all writers who are mothers. I know, that’s not a very specific answer but I really can’t narrow it down much. Knowing how challenging both writing and parenting are, & in very different ways, & knowing how much time each takes, I think anyone who does both is worthy of admiration. I admire most the friends I know who do both-–Jill Wigmore, Betsy Trumpener, Annabel Lyon, & you, Ms Marita! There are others, of course, but I mention friends who are also in the thick of raising young children while writing.

Someone else mentioned this in their interview--I read an interview with Margaret Atwood years ago in which she said something to the effect that she thought a person could write and raise a child/children, write and teach, teach and raise children, but not all three. I took that to heart. For a few years, I focussed on writing & teaching, & I loved both & the perspective each brought to the other. Now, while I’d still like to teach for a few days a year (yes, I said a few days!), what I really want is to write & raise my children. And that seems huge to me--it seems like enough, in the fullest, most fulfilled sense of the word.

Interview: Gillian Wigmore

Your back of the book bio:

Gillian Wigmore grew up in Vanderhoof, BC, graduated from the University of Victoria in 1999, and currently lives in Prince George. Her first book of poems, soft geography, published by Caitlin Press, was nominated for the Dorothy Livesay Prize and won the ReLit Award in 2008. Her chapbook, home when it moves you, was published by Creekstone Press in 2005.

Your playground bio:

Elly and Emmett's mum. Travis's wife. That lady in the barn coat. Isn't she some sort of writer? Nah, she couldn't be--she's not even wearing makeup.

Do you identify yourself as first a writer and then a mother, the other way around, or something else? Why do you think this is?

It depends to whom I'm talking. In the playground, it's usually, 'whose mum are you?' not 'what do you do', so I'm saved those awkward moments after someone learns you're a writer when they're trying to figure out what that means and how to respond. Reminding myself privately that I'm a writer helps convince me that I have a future that won't always include cleaning up peas off the floor, but I'm proud as hell of being a mother. Those peas on the floor are humbling but necessary--somehow they'll make me a better writer, I'm sure.

Did you always want to be a writer? A mother? How does the reality differ from the fantasy?

I didn't consciously think about either. I've always written and I think being a mother always figured in my imagined future when I was a child. I also didn't think about what it would mean to do either--that there would be moments I'd struggle to write, either because of time or inspiration--or that mothering wouldn't be all hugs and family vacations. Money figures in there, too--I didn't imagine kids cost to raise or provide for and I didn't think about how I'd come to depend on being paid for readings and classroom visits. The reality is hard to reconcile. I feel these are two really hard jobs that are sorely underappreciated and totally underpaid!

What are your measurements of success as a mother? As a writer? Have these evolved and, if so, can you talk about in what way and why do you think this is?

Success as a mother varies from instant to instant. If I've snapped at someone because I've been asked the same bloody question for the six hundredth time I regret it horribly and feel like I've never been a good mother--it's like I can't remember any time I've provided well for them or convinced them the world is good and they are perfect. When they say something delightful to someone that proves their creativity and intelligence I get that weird pride that feels like I've done something right, but I think the fact that they have never suffered from neglect or malnutrition is pretty good. That they feel entitled to live and have great ideas about the world is great, too. They are such interesting and funny people, my success may be in direct proportion to the delight I feel getting to be their Mum.

Oh, and writing? Right. Writing. I find success if I manage to finish a poem and find it less than wanting, especially if I manage to write a couple poems a month. I can't measure my success on whether I get a grant or not, or whether I publish in a magazine or not, I have to depend on my own sense of accomplishment--success in writing for me is really more internal than dependent on any Canadian writing establishment, but maybe that's because I'm still working to get off the ground in my career. Ask me next week when I feel like the Best Writer Ever. Oh, and did I mention I only ever feel like a writer when I get to write? And that that's rare?

What you said about your sense of accomplishment being based more on internal than external forces reminded me of Shannon McFerran's similar thoughts, and I wonder if this is more common amongst mothers and why that would be. What do you think?

I don't know. I hope it's not just true for us. I write primarily for myself - my own amusement, my own satisfaction. I try to write the best work I can, and though I have a specific audience in my head, it's not the Canada Council and it's not any critic. I have the possibly very idealistic view that everyone should be writing to write well, not to win prizes. That sounds silly, but I would rather be remembered for sound craft than for good reviews.

What's your writing schedule like? What was its journey to get to where it is now?

It's getting easier to write because I don't have infants anymore. My level of despair when they were babies was directly in proportion to how little time I got to pursue writing. Now that they are school-aged (one in grade two, one in kindergarten) I find myself with whole mornings to write! I never would have hoped for even this much when they were small because it was too depressing. I'm very serious about writing when they sleep in the evening and not answering the phone on my writing mornings--I have to be, otherwise that time disappears. I feel like time to write has always been hard-won, but I'm hopeful! If I've managed to carve out this much more time since then, how much more is in store for me?

Has becoming a mother changed how you write? What your write? If so, in what ways?

I write with more determination and more direction, now. Everyone feels they have all the time in the world when they are young, and having kids makes me realize that time is precious and I have to savour it. I spend a lot of time thinking about writing so that when the opportunity arises, I'm ready. As to what I write, I find I have more brain space for longer projects, now. I'm able to work on fiction, whereas when they were small, a poem, and not a long poem, was all I could work toward.

Do you feel like you are moving away from poetry, or you're simply enjoying exercising the fiction muscles which had been impossible to use during those early years and that you'll return to poetry?

I hope poetry is not moving away from me! I'm really enjoying writing fiction these days, but poetry continues to fascinate and inspire me. I'm reading poems more than I'm writing them lately, and I tell myself that's good for me. Having brain space for fiction is unbelievable--I didn't think this day would ever come!

How aware are your children of your writing?

My daughter thinks of writing in the same vein as teaching or firefighting or being a cashier - that it's normal and that people do it. My son wishes I wrote comic books. Or that I was a superhero. That would be really cool.

Virginia Woolf famously wrote, "…a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write…." She never had children. Is a room to yourself enough for a writing-mama? What do you need?

My conviction that I have to do this. My computer. My husband's support when I go away to read or write. Books. Other writers. Pats on the back, occasionally. Coffee out with other mother/writers once or twice a month to prove I'm not alone in this.

If you could go back, what would you tell your pre-children self?

Take your time. It will be alright. Your time will come. Have a nap. Would you like a cup of tea? Beer? Can I take that for you? Here's a pillow. Hey, do you want a day off? Let me take the kids. Go away for the weekend!

Really, though, I'd tell myself that time spent thinking about writing is useful, too, and that I shouldn't beat myself up because someday the time to write will be available to even me.

What do you think your pre-children self would tell you?

'What is that you're wearing?!' And also: 'No child of mine would be so...'(dirty/rude/anxious/offensive/silly/obnoxious/crazy/wild/loud)' ... fill in the blank--my pre-children self was very opinionated. I am not so opinionated anymore (meaning I have tasted humble pie).

In terms of this topic (motherhood and writing), do you have any regrets? Guilt? Envy?

I get overwhelmed by it. I wonder why I have to spend so much time brooding about motherhood and writing when I could just be writing. There is so much writing about motherhood right now that I'm almost sick of the topic, but at the same time I'm reaching around to find women in similar situations. I read Margaret Laurence's autobiography and found great comfort in an extremely pragmatic, hard-working woman talking about balancing the two (I didn't dwell on the alcohol or divorce, as I think one does what one can to get through the day...). I wish we didn't judge each other. I wish I had no envy. It bothers the hell out of me that most fathers probably don't brood about the tension between parenting and writing like mothers do, but perhaps I make an assumption there.

If you mean, do I feel guilty about writing? No. I try very hard to have a family in which everyone gets to pursue their passions, including me. Does it hurt to go away on a book tour for a week or two and leave everyone behind? Yes, but I think it's good for all of us.

I am so glad you brought up the Margaret Laurence biography! As you know, in a letter you had suggested I read it as you found it inspirational. I did read it and was horrified. I thought she came across as a neglectful, selfish woman/mother/wife. Now, with the hindsight a year can give, I think my horror was largely fuelled by the hormones of having a newborn--I read the book breastfeeding a three week old baby--and the panic that I'll never have the opportunity to write again. That said, I am very uneasy with the stereotype she embodies of the artist so driven she must put aside all else for her art. That the creation of art trumps family and health (see: alcoholism; promiscuity). In my sleep-deprived haze I felt offended by the notion that because I did not have the same level of drive (there was no possible way that I would be getting up at 5am to write, for example) that I didn't want success enough and therefore was not as deserving of it and consequently would always be a hobbyist.

I also find that stereotype to be more of a male one--there are so many male artists' personal mythologies in this vein. Which in turn leads to what you said about male writers in general not fretting about this the way we mothers do. Hmm...there was supposed to be a question in here somewhere for you. How's this: should we be searching for different models of being artist/writers for mothers, or should we be more willing to accept women in the models already forged by men (I'm thinking of Laurence here, and my horror of her but annoyance if it were a man)? What would an ideal model look like?

I think we should take role models where we can get them. So often women (and society) are quick to judge one another for choices made. I would rather gain insight from the lives of others piecemeal--as I need it and as it's available to me. I feel badly for Margaret Laurence because I do think it's harder for women--we're not allowed to be totally selfish about our goals because then we're bad mothers, not putting the children first. Margaret probably didn't view herself as a stereotype (obviously, Jill); she was most likely doing the best she could to write as well as she could, possibly to the detriment of others and herself, but she is no different than many other writers, just viewed differently because she is a woman. It's not fair. It's hard, and sometimes I can't bear to read another book of essays about women writing just because it's hard for everyone. I love to read writer's memoirs, men's and women's both. I just read Matt Cohen's memoir Typing and found it equally as inspiring as Laurence's, but in a different way.

The early years of motherhood have been described by various writers as a haze or as an incredibly creative time. How would you describe it? Are you still in it? When did you leave?

I feel like I'm out of the trenches. When I was getting up three and four times a night and working and trying to keep house and to get a little exercise and to write and nurture the children's growing minds, etc, etc, etc, I felt like I had my head down and if I let up for even a second it would all fall apart. Now there are moments of calm. This afternoon, for instance, all four of us sat in the living room for almost an hour in silence, each reading his or her own book. I felt like all the craziness of babyland was worth it. I think living with such creative creatures demands that I meet their inventiveness and spur them on, so yes, this is a creative time. It's also a hazy time. I hope I remember it.

Birthing a book is like birthing a baby. Way off or right on?

I don't know, but I know I want to birth more books and that I NEVER want to be in labour again.

I wanted to do this project because I found so few satisfying examples of the writing-mother. It was either the mythology of Alice Munro writing while her children played at her feet, the writer who resented and neglected her children because she was so consumed with her art, or someone like Sylvia Plath who ended up with her head in the oven. Which writing-mothers do you admire and why?

I admire the writer-mothers you've show-cased with these questions. My friends who are going through all this craziness and wonder with me inspire me to keep at it. I think we all run the risk of being depicted by others or posterity as some 'type' of mother (poor Sylvia, poor Margaret. I'm so grateful for my community of mother-writers, on-line and in the flesh, but I do like to think of a woman off by herself in the wilderness with her family, writing poems in her head while they all hang out laundry. When I feel sorry for myself I think of her and I'm so proud of her. I wish her well. I wish us all well and I wish us time to write.

This wilderness-dwelling writing mama with the helpful family--is she someone you know, or is she who you'd like to be?

She's someone I imagine, but she's got strengths of women I know - elements of Carla Funk's determination, Debbie Keahey's devotion to both art and family, Laisha Rosnau's commitment to her friends, your community building and scone-making skills, my mother's 'just try me' attitude... so many women enrich my life and my imagination. I'm really lucky. When I was pregnant with Elly in 2001 I heard Sharon Thesen read in Prince George and she was lovely and funny, smart as anything and such a great poet. I loved the reading, but what pushed me to see beyond my impending motherhood back to myself was hearing her talk about washing diapers--she was reading poetry and writing poetry in the throes of rearing a child and I thought 'oh, she did it and she's wonderful. I can do it, too!' I'm lucky to have heard her at that moment in my life and that she was so candid about mothering and writing. It made a really big difference to me and I'm grateful.

Edmonton Poetry Festival

In two weeks' time the Edmonton Poetry Festival begins. Fest official photographer put together this promo based on last year's madness. You'll catch my mug early on when I read at the Blinks. I'm on the board this year and we've put together a really great festival, if I do say so myself. If you're in the area, please take in some of the festivities. It will be a great time, I promise.

Interview: Tracy Hamon

Your back of the book bio:

Tracy Hamon lives Regina, Saskatchewan. She is a mother, a university student currently finishing a MA in English with a creative option at the U of R, she works part time as a barber/stylist and a the coordinator for the SWG Writers/Artists Colony, and she has recently started a reading series in Regina (Vertigo Reading Series). Her poetry has appeared in numerous Canadian literary magazines including Grain, Spring, A Room of One's Own and Event as well as numerous anthologies. Recently her manuscript of poetry on Egon Schiele was shortlisted for the 2007 CBC Literary Awards, and her second manuscript, tentatively entitled Some People Eat Cars, is forthcoming with Coteau Books.

Your playground bio:

I'm the mother of two lively daughters, MacKenzie, who is 18 and in her first year at university, and 15 year old Callan, who is in grade 10. MacKenzie reads everything and anything, and in fact began to read when she was four; however, she's not doing an English degree, because she wants to make money. My youngest is more athletic than readerly, and after several years of searching, we've found the kind of books that appeal to her. Lately though I've noticed she really likes critiquing short stories in her high school English class.


Do you identify yourself as first a writer and then a mother, the other way around, or something else? Why do you think this is?

I don't know that I identify with one more than the other, although I'm aware of being a mother more when I'm trying to write, and the imaginary swinging door of my work area continually opens and closes with the ancient chant of "Mom" and all those immediate questions and interruptions. As my children age, and become increasingly more independent, I find it easier to just be me, and I guess that me is both a writer and a mother.

Did you always want to be a writer? A mother? How does the reality differ from the fantasy?

I suppose I have always wanted to be a writer. There was always the day dream of being an author/writer, more than about being a mother; however, I love children, and I guess I assumed I would have them when the time was right. It just so happened that they happened before my writing career. But it seems both writing and children are a tremendous amount of work.

What are your measurements of success as a mother? As a writer? Have these evolved and, if so, can you talk about in what way and why do you think this is?

For every one success, I've suffered five failures, so I'm not sure I know the measurements. As far as my children, I hope that I've raised them to be able to think for themselves, and most of all be able to follow the paths that will make them happy. Success as a writer could almost be analogous to success as a mother. Maybe others have found the road not so littered with garbage bins of wadded up manuscripts, poems, stories, but for me, the challenge of trying to be successful is a part of my growth as a writer and a mother.

What's your writing schedule like? What was its journey to get to where it is now?

I write whenever I can, or at least when I have some idea confusing my brain to the point where I must start to write it out. I have more time now to write now than I did when the kids were small, when I led a somewhat nocturnal life, writing poems late into night's cavernous mouth, but I have trouble trying to force myself to write. I need an image or the idea of an image to get me going on a poem, and a really interesting idea plotted out to get me started on a story.

Has becoming a mother changed how you write? What you write? If so, in what ways?

As a teenager, I wrote stories, poems, plays, and even newspaper stories for high school, but my academic career, and writing career, was deferred as I focused on experiencing life and the world for awhile. I began writing after my first daughter was born, and I took an extension class at the University of Regina with Dave Margoshes. The class helped to convince me that I still wanted to write. Shortly after, I became a mother for the second time, and again put my writing on hold, but a hold with a plan. I decided that when my children were both in school, I would go back to university to finish my degree. And I did. While I was working full time, and mothering full time, I found myself making up for lost time, and I began to write.


How aware are your children of your writing?

My children are very aware of my writing, although they don't quite comprehend the time it takes to write. They do love coming to launches, readings, and literary events, as long as I don't read anything they find embarrassing. They have great potential to be miniature marketing machines.


Virginia Woolf famously wrote, "…a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write…." She never had children. Is a room to yourself enough for a writing-mama? What do you need?

A room is never big enough, particularly the bathroom. No matter which room I'm in, they're calling for me, or knocking for me. I like to retreat away from the home when I need uninterrupted space and time. The space provided by the Saskatchewan Writers Guild retreat at St. Peter's Abbey allows me the quiet environment to focus on editing and writing without interruptions, without having to cook, or clean, or answer to the name of Mom. Luckily, I'm now the coordinator for the retreats/colonies, and can get away more often, which has really helped my writing process.

If you could go back, what would you tell your pre-children self?

Nothing, as I'm not very good at listening to myself anyway.

What do you think your pre-child(ren) self would tell you?

Slow down. Of course, as I said earlier, I'm not good at listening to myself.

In terms of this topic (motherhood and writing), do you have any regrets? Guilt? Envy?

No regrets, although I wonder sometimes how I managed to do everything.

The early years of motherhood have been described by various writers as a haze or as an incredibly creative time. How would you describe it? Are you still in it? When did you leave?

It's an interesting metaphor, early motherhood as a haze. I think I've become too far removed from those years to remember them well. For me, the haze came after and now I wonder how I raised my children when I can't find one word that suits a line in a small poem. How did I manage?

Birthing a book is like birthing a baby. Way off or right on?

Way off. At least with childbirth, the pain is gone as soon as the baby is born. And it's not so with writing. It's rather a love/hate relationship trying to produce a book, and I find I'm continually shaping the poems until the last minute, and sometimes after the book is out. Perhaps the metaphor should be more like being a mother, than just the birth. Mothering is like writing in that we continue to look out for our book, even after it has left the womb, and the house.

I wanted to do this project because I found so few satisfying examples of the writing-mother. It was either the mythology of Alice Munro writing while her children played at her feet, the writer who resented and neglected her children because she was so consumed with her art, or someone like Sylvia Plath who ended up with her head in the oven. Which writing-mothers do you admire and why?

I admire all mothers that write, but Carol Shields is one writer/mother that always seemed real to me. Her family was important and an integral part of her life. As well, after reading most of Margaret Laurence's books, I think she's an important mother/writer in that she sacrificed so much to be a writer. I admire them for their tenacity to keep writing while being bombarded with the joys/perils of motherhood and for their amazing writing.

Coming to a screen near me! (And maybe you, too!)

Perhaps it isn't healthy to be this obsessed with a movie I haven't seen yet, but I'm so out of the pop-culture loop at the moment, the only movies I'm aware of is this one and Where the Wild Things Are. So please, let me be excited for a little bit here. A kind soul from Who Does She Think She Is left a comment the other day informing me that the film will indeed be coming to Edmonton and some other fine Canadian cities. To date, they are:

Regina Public Library Film Theatre – Regina SK
Winnipeg Cinematheque- Winnipeg MB
Metro Cinema- Edmonton AB
Plaza Theatre- Calgary AB
Hyland Theatre- London ON
Princess Cinema- Waterloo, ON

I don't know the dates for the other cities yet, but it will be playing in Edmonton from June 19 - 23. When I learn of the others, I'll let you know.

They also want to know of other Canadian cities/theatres where they should take the movie. Looking at this list and knowing that they already have, or plan to, show in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and Vancouver, I think they should go to Halifax, Victoria, and, because I know a pair of fantastic creative-mamas there (Hi, Laisha! Hi Gillian!), Prince George. If any of you know what theatres they should approach in these cities, or know of other cities and theatres they should target, please email me or leave a note in the comments.

Interview: Shannon McFerran

Your back of the book bio:

Since graduating from the MFA program at UBC, Shannon McFerran completed a teaching certificate and worked as a secondary school teacher with an English specialty. In 2005 she merged writing and teaching backgrounds into a career writing and editing curriculum material for K-12 and post-secondary.

Shannon has also written and thrown out many novel drafts. Although her thesis novel was shortlisted for a prize, she has since realized her talents as a non-fiction writer. Shannon is a member of a research project studying girls’ diaries, and is currently writing a book called Writing Ourselves Into Being: The Girls’ Diary Project.

Your playground bio:

I’m mom to Anna “Mighty” Mitchell, Age 4.5. I usually explain our unique setup—Tim and I both work from home full time. Anna’s the only one who leaves the house every day, so she complains she doesn’t have as much time in her pajamas as her parents. We joke about getting her a mini briefcase.

Anna goes to a daycare 300 metres from our house. I can see the building from my office, which is in a corner of our bedroom. Sometimes I walk over to the window and look down the hill to where she’s spending her day, and I find that motivating. Get done! Anna awaits!

Do you identify yourself as first a writer and then a mother, the other way around, or something else? Why do you think this is?

When Anna was a baby, I was all mom. I wrote little to none for several months. When she was a toddler, I still thought of myself primarily a mother, since the writer part was such a small percentage of my day.

Now that Anna is a little older, I have been writing for work and writing for myself, and so the writer role is beginning to grow again. I think I’d have a hard time ever placing writer before mother, even when Anna’s grown and gone. The roles swell and take up more space depending on what’s in front of you, but it doesn’t mean you are more one than the other.

Did you always want to be a writer? A mother? How does the reality differ from the fantasy?

I wanted to be a cartoonist, actually; Charles Schultz was my hero. When I was in elementary school, I drew more than I wrote. Then, in the sixth grade I wanted to be a mom, and have four children. I had names picked out for all of them.

In Grade Eight I switched schools and found that everything we were doing was a repeat of earlier grades in my old school. I started reading fat bestsellers, hiding the novels under a textbook or sitting in them in my lap under the desk. I’d go through one every other day. A steady diet of that got me hooked on story, if not great writing—and I picked up a pen and tried my hand at it that year. That was the first year I wrote a novel, and I’ve been hooked on internal worlds and getting them on the page ever since. The desire to mother waxed and waned until I met my husband.

I thought I would be successful earlier in life. In my fantasy, I would have been a successful author before becoming a mother, and then balanced those two things in a perfectly stress-free existence. But at a certain point, my desire to mother outstripped my desire to write.

When Tim and I were deciding whether we wanted to become parents, the big question for us was whether we could parent and continue writing. I think I was really positive we could make it happen, and Tim was more of a realist. I knew I wouldn’t write with a newborn, but I figured having a child would focus me more, and make all the time I had precious. Friends who were moms told me they never used their time so wisely until they had their children—that their children taught them to be focused.

The reality was that I didn’t get a solid night’s sleep for fifteen months, and I wasn’t prepared for the exhaustion. I wasn’t racing for the keyboard when my baby went down for a nap, wanting to use every available moment. Instead, I’d finally get her to sleep and then let my own head hit the pillow.

You mentioned that you used to want to have four children (albeit when you were a child yourself--I had wanted to be a fireman at one point, but nobody holds that against me). Did the choice to be a writer have anything to do with the choice to have a smaller family size?

Yeah, wanting four children originally was out of the desire to create characters, I think. Then I grew up and realized that having children is not creating characters, it’s allowing people who are going to create themselves to come into life—totally different! So once I grew up into that knowledge, I no longer wanted a large family.

Writing definitely was a part of the choice to have a single child, though it wasn’t the whole reason. Tim and I both write outside of our day jobs, and we knew that with the increased responsibility of more children would come less time to pursue that creative expression. When I try to explain this aspect of our choice I get the feeling I’m trading in Anna’s needs (or people’s perception of her needs) for our own. But I’m an only child myself, and I have friends who are honourary siblings to me. And I know people who don’t have any relationship with their siblings. Giving her a sibling would be no guarantee of giving her a close family member—but it would guarantee that we’d stop writing to meet that second child’s needs.

What are your measurements of success as a mother? As a writer? Have these evolved and, if so, can you talk about in what way and why do you think this is?

When I look at my life as a mother and writer, I wouldn't call it content, or successful. I am content with motherhood (but not always with my mothering). I am still on an upward path in terms of writing, learning my craft, and feeling comfortable or competent in what I'm doing.

I left writer-school eleven years ago. Now I haven’t been writing that whole time. I’ve been working a lot, I taught, I stayed home with Anna for two years—but since that time, I’ve had one story published, and the diary project articles. I really thought it would be different.

If I define success by making a living income off of writing work, I can say I have achieved that. Hey, the provincial government even paid me to write poems and short stories. (They pay about as well as a literary magazine.) But that’s not the success I dream about. Sure, I am enthusiastic about the courses I write, and I enjoy the work. But believe me, this ain't my first love. I still, and will always, want to be writing the reflective prose that makes the reader stop and think--whether that's fiction or non-fiction.

My measurement of success as a writer was always publication, and it still is, but it’s no longer the only one. Not quitting is a kind of success. Getting an idea and actually writing it down, not just thinking “oh, that’s nice, if I had time I’d write that.” To write it down even if I don’t get the chance or drive to flesh out that idea—that’s a success in itself. If I’m still writing when I’m 80, and my process is engaging my mind and bringing me joy, then I will consider that a success. Of course I won’t be totally satisfied until I’ve passed the test of publication, and can write a seamless story that affects an audience, that makes them want to keep reading.

My measurement of success as a mother will be if Anna is happy, well adjusted, and safe. If I have given her opportunities, and the best life I possibly can, as well as setting an example for her of how to live life as a happy and fulfilled adult.

A new measure of success evolved for both these roles when I became a mother. Anna must never blame herself for her parents’ not pursuing what gives them joy. If I don’t pursue my dream, that’s the example I give Anna. So continuing to write is the most important measure of success.

"A new measure of success evolved for both these roles when I became a mother. Anna must never blame herself for her parents’ not pursuing what gives them joy. If I don’t pursue my dream, that’s the example I give Anna. So continuing to write is the most important measure of success." I find this incredibly inspiring and a fresh way of looking at the duality of writing and motherhood. When and how did you make this realization?

That’s a tough one. I guess the seeds of that came when I was a kid and felt bad that my parents didn’t pursue their own dreams. You grow up and figure out that’s their choice, and that a child can never be responsible—but I think something of that stays with you.

The other part of making that realization was a kind of two step process. First, when Anna arrived, I wanted instantly for everything to be easy and right for her—the way you do when you have a child. That meant that as soon as I saw her I wanted her to live her dreams. And step two—I knew children learn more through modeling than we like to think. Hence, I’ve got to model what I want for her. She was about a year and a half when that struck me—so finally sleeping through, which meant I could have coherent thoughts again.

What’s your writing schedule like? What was its journey to get to where it is now?

It changes depending on deadlines, but I usually work a Monday to Friday week, 9 to 4. I work some evenings after Anna goes to bed, and sometimes a little on the weekends. Even before I had Anna I knew I wanted to work out some kind of career that let me work from home until she was much older, and I left a position with a lot of security to do that. It wasn’t until I worked full time from home, with daycare, that I went back to work on creative writing projects. I didn’t have the mental energy when I was working and parenting a young child. Now I use time between projects, time when work is slow, to work on my own writing. Sometimes I have a blissful five hours to write. Sometimes I have ten minutes. Of course the five hours is more useful, but I’m not going to look down my nose at the small bits of time anymore.

Has becoming a mother changed how you write? What you write? If so, in what ways?

Having Anna changed my relationship to myself in such radical ways, and that, in turn, changed how I write. I used to start out with a very set idea about how I wanted a project to look and then bang away at it until I got it close, and never be satisfied. (I’m a Taurus by the Western zodiac, and an ox by the Eastern—so two sets of horns makes for a certain amount of determination.) But now, I trust evolving shapes. It’s making for some far more interesting writing.

How aware is your child of your writing?

Anna’s more familiar with my past role as the storytime lady at the library, which, when you’re four, has a lot more appeal. I think she’s just sad I don’t work at the library anymore. We still bring new books home about twice a week, but I guess it’s not as good as the daily delivery.

Letters and words and telling stories are incredibly important to her, though, and it kind of scares us. Tim and I want her to become a computer scientist.

Virginia Woolf famously wrote, “…a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write….” She never had children. Is a room to yourself enough for a writing-mama? What do you need?

I suspect Virginia would have needed a nanny, if she had ever become a mother. For me, a room I’ve got it, or a quiet space of some sort. I’m not one of those moms who can focus in the midst of playing and shouting and kid energy going on around me, so I guess some form of childcare is what I need, too. But I suspect if I didn’t have that I would have found a way.

In your last interview, Ariel Gordon said she needed a wife, and that made me laugh, because Tim and I are always walking around saying we need a wife. Of course you’re right Marita that being a wife isn’t all about the laundry and meals. Tim and I have a rather equal division of labour around the house—and we equally neglect the householding duties. Part of what I need to be a writing-mama is the ability to turn a blind eye to the mess. How else can you work in your home space?

If you could go back, what would you tell your pre-child self?

Nothing. If I’d told her something about how it will all work out in the end, she might have relaxed and not worked as hard as she did, or taken the leaps she did to make the life I have now. I wouldn’t want to mess with that.

What do you think your pre-child self would tell you?

She probably would have told me not to quit for the period when I did, but pre-child Shannon wouldn’t have understood.

When Anna was just a year old, I showed a full novel to an agent, who suggested I make a few changes and try her again. That was as close as I ever came to reaching my goal, but it happened just as Anna got mobile, and five months before she started sleeping through the night. I was incredibly exhausted. I’d written five drafts of that novel, and I couldn’t do another. I was sick of it. At the time, I took it as a sign to stop, which it wasn’t—it was a sign that I was close and should work just a little harder.

Your story of the agent really struck a chord with me. When I was in Vancouver last April for Steve's launch, I ran into a classmate from my UBC days who had recently become the Acquiring Editor for a local press. He told me to send him my novel (my MFA thesis). At that point my youngest was two months old and my eldest had just turned two. I knew I wanted to work on it a little bit more before sending it to him. And of course, I never did. I just haven't had the time to even read it again. And of course I have a lot of guilt. How do we let go of the guilt? Or do you think we ever really can?

Oh no! Aaah! I hate hearing about this, because I can feel it completely. For me it wasn’t so much about guilt as it was about regret. I don’t like guilt. I think you can always get rid of it if you look into it far enough. Give it a try—

First, pick it apart. Ask where that guilt is being directed. So the question for you is, are you guilty because the classmate made a nice offer and he hasn’t seen anything from you yet? Don’t worry, the invitation won’t be rescinded at a later date if you haven’t responded in what you think is a “timely” manner. Are you guilty because you’re not making use of your talents as a fiction writer, letting a work go to waste? Don’t—everything you do and learn through mothering right now will surprisingly inform you and make you write better (as all our experiences do) next time you sit down with your draft.

Or are you guilty because in some moments you might blame your boys for your ability to get to that project? That’s the sticky one—the reality is you have only so many hours in a day, and you are spending them doing the important work of parenting two small children. And sleeping. And eating. And if you’re lucky—getting to do the things that maintain a marriage and getting a chance to sweep the floors, too. So yes, your choice to spend this time mothering is the reason you’re not working on your novel. But it’s your choice. You made it for very good reasons. If you can honour that, as well as know this is a temporary imbalance of your life roles, you can feel good about not writing that novel right now. It’s just a season, and the time will return when you can read it over again, and pick up where you left off, if you choose.

And if you have any other residual guilt that sounds like “Gee, I should be able to do this and...” then you must stop and go read What Mothers Do: Especially When it Looks Like Nothing by Naomi Stadlen.

You have already touched on this, but I'm going to ask you this one anyway. In terms of this topic (motherhood and writing), do you have any regrets? Guilt? Envy?

I do regret quitting creative writing when Anna was a year old. I don’t think I could have made a different decision at the time, but I guess I regret the timing.

Sometimes I regret not making more of an effort to write before I had Anna, but I think my particular path required that I become a mom and go through that aspect of human development to mature enough to write. Even if I’d wanted to reach my goals earlier, I know there are several good reasons I didn’t.

The early years of motherhood have been described by various writers as a haze or as an incredibly creative time. How would you describe it? Are you still in it? When did you leave?

It’s been an incredibly creative time for developing a new relationship to myself and other people, which of course affects what I write. The early years also pressured me into creating the sort of life that has room for creative projects. But there was a certain amount of haze, for sure.

Birthing a book is like birthing a baby. Way off or right on?

You birth a book and then emotionally divorce yourself from it to pick it apart and edit it. You birth a baby and then begin making emotional connections. The two are pretty different, but birthing a baby certainly taught me some things I now apply to writing a book.

I used to tell Anna, when she was in utero, that if she wanted to start coming into the world around 6 am—that’s when we usually got up anyway—and then be out by tea time, by 4:30, that would be great. I would rub my belly and tell her my plan.
The day she was born I woke up with my first contractions at 6. I birthed at home, on a brilliant day at the end of September. Anna flipped into the correct position for delivery at some point in the early afternoon, and she was born at 4:33. That kind of belief and trust that something will go well, the ability not to be scared by the effort or the intensity that goes into the process, just trusting I would get there—that’s something I’m trying to hold onto with birthing this book. But man, I can make a baby in way less time than a book. Maybe writing a book is more like parenting a child into adulthood.

I wanted to do this project because I found so few satisfying examples of the writing-mother. It was either the mythology of Alice Munro writing while her children played at her feet, the writer who resented and neglected her children because she was so consumed with her art, or someone like Sylvia Plath who ended up with her head in the oven. Which writing-mothers do you admire and why?

Not many leap to mind—not because those women aren’t out there, but because when you hear about a writer’s career, she tells you the career story separate from her home story, just like when you ask anyone about her work life. The thing about writing is that, for most mothers, the activity happens at home—so the two worlds aren’t separate from each other the way they are when she leaves home to work.

I heard that Barbara Kingsolver, whose work I love, wrote her first novel entirely at night during her first pregnancy, which makes me as a little incredulous—if it’s true, I’m completely envious. Oh, to have the sort of energy that lets sleeplessness become a productive state!

And look at that—even that is more about envying superhuman skill and less about admiring a writer mother who worked out a real balance.

Actually, I think I’m most at peace when I look to my friends who know that there isn’t a perfect balance—that even when you’re grounded, there’s always a swaying in the wind—and admire their practicality. Because really, once you’re beyond the physical needs of a baby and young child, it’s all just work and parenting. And all mothers and fathers are struggling with that, no matter what they do.

I’ve just read something, though, that’s made me change how I look at the mother-writer roles, and see them undivided from each other. Last night I read Susan Olding’s brave and unique essay called “Mama’s Voices” in her collection Pathologies. It’s about the three different people within herself: her independent self, with her own voice; her self as mother; her self as a writer—all of those things getting established at the same time, everything she does in one role affecting the outcome of her efforts in another. Every writer mama should read this one.

nursin' & workin'

Interview: Ariel Gordon

Your back of the book bio:

Ariel Gordon is a writer and editor based in Winnipeg. A hand-made, limited-edition chapbook entitled The navel gaze recently appeared from Kingsville ON's Palimpsest Press and occasioned a tour with fellow poet Kerry Ryan to Saskatoon, Edmonton, Regina, and Prince Albert (in that order).

Two other chapbooks are forthcoming in early 2009: Guidelines: Malaysia & Indonesia, 1998 from Edmonton’s Rubicon Press and Rutting Season: Poetry and Conversation with Ariel Gordon, Michael Lithgow, and Linda Besner from Montreal’s Buffalo Runs Press.

Your playground bio:

I’m Ariel. Anna’s mum. (Anna being the two and a half year old rampaging over there.)

Do you identify yourself as first a writer and then a mother, the other way around, or something else? Why do you think this is?

I’m just me. But I will admit that I’ve worked a lot harder on my writing, year in and year out, than I did to conceive my child. So pregnancy/mothering is/was new. Or, after two and a half years, new-ish.

Did you always want to be a writer? A mother? How does the reality differ from the fantasy?

I was one of those people who said that I didn’t need to have children to be satisfied as a person. But I got pregnant and had a child and some of the moments I’ve had with her have been as good or better than anything else in my life so far.

I’m pretty sure I need to write to be satisfied as a person.

The two intersect in that I know that my writing life couldn’t take another child. So we’re not having any more. But that’s my negotiation and my life. I couldn’t begin to say what another woman writer might need in order to write.

What are your measurements of success as a mother? As a writer? Have these evolved and, if so, can you talk about in what way and why do you think this is?

That my daughter is fulfilled, engaged, and reasonably content. That I am fulfilled, engaged, and reasonably content.

Neither parenting nor writing is a bad way to spend a life.

(I’d still like a book or five to my name. But that’s just book-lust talking.)

Why is that 'just book-lust' and not ambition?

It’s my way of hedging my bets. Because I am both intensely ambitious and also okay with spending my life writing and not ‘getting anywhere’ with said writing.

I need both permission to succeed and permission to fail, it seems, in order to proceed as a writer.

Book-lust is also a hallmark of emerging writers. They/we/me tend to think that all their problems will be solved by books, specifically books with their/my name on them.

What's your writing schedule like? What was its journey to get to where it is now?

I should have gotten childcare of some description during the last few months of my mat leave, but I didn’t. I was being paid to be at home, taking care of her, so it didn’t seem reasonable to foist her on someone else. But I think I would have been happier with an afternoon or even a day to myself a week during those last few months.

Now that we’re out of that first year, mostly, Tuesdays are my writing days. My mother-in-law takes my daughter for the day, so it’s even free. Sometimes, I manage to get another day a week, by paying the nice hippy lady who takes her during the days I’m at the bookstore where I work part-time for an extra day.

But I will admit that when we’re too busy or my mother-in-law is busy, my writing days are sacrificed. But I get dangerously crabby without my writing days, so they’re pretty short-term sacrifices.

Has becoming a mother changed how you write? What your write? If so, in what ways?

I’ve never written such personal stuff. And after writing a book’s worth of poems about being a parent of a baby, I’ve embarked on a new writing project about absent parents. It scares the shit out of me (a part of me still yelps: why oh why?) but it seems to be what I need to write.

I think our best work comes from what we're afraid to write. What is it about the subject of absent parents that scares you so much?

Because taking the time to write about absent parents seems to mean absenting myself, at least to some degree, from my daughter’s life.

Partly because I don’t want to use my writing as a stick to beat my absent parent with. Because I’m not sure what the point is, bemoaning his absence. Will it help my siblings and me? Will it help anyone else?

Because I want to be fair and I’m not sure I know how.

Because being an absent parent is so gendered and I hate that. I hate that different roles and different expectations are assigned to men and women, especially around parenting.

The phrase that I return to with this project is that I’m “going out for a quart of expressed milk.”

How aware is your child of your writing?

She knows I’m “at work” when she’s in care. But she doesn’t know what writing is, besides that I make marks on the page and seem to think they’re important. And that she can’t make those marks herself yet. She’s also fascinated by my computer, because she perceives that to be an object of power.

But I don’t think she knows that I use writing utensils and computers to “write,” because her dad uses computers and writing utensils too. And he’s not a writer.

Virginia Woolf famously wrote, "…a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write…." She never had children. Is a room to yourself enough for a writing-mama? What do you need?

I need a wife.

Funny yet true. I know I've said similar things. I think of Pierre Berton who had seven children and published over 50 books in his life. I really don't believe he could have done that if he was the mother. But I do wonder if we really want that wife? Don't we just want someone who will manage the home--clean the house, cook meals, etc.? Do you need a wife or your husband to take on more domestic roles? I guess I worry that we sell ourselves short as wives when we imply that our main role is a housekeeper.

Sorry, partly that’s an in-joke. Because I never use the word ‘wife’ to refer to myself, partly because my partner and I aren’t married but also because of all its icky associations.

But really, I struggle, just like my mother struggled, with being ambitious but still finding myself responsible for most of the household gak.

And although my partner is mostly a useless tit when it comes to keeping house and home together, the reality is that the room of one’s own dilemma won’t be resolved until men and women receive the same training in householding.

In the meantime, my partner has tricked me into loving him (and does his share of the childcare), so…I have to live with it.

And tell him what to do.

If you could go back, what would you tell your pre-child self?

I would say, “You have no idea how your life will change,” like someone about my age with two children said to me when I was obscenely pregnant and on my way into a movie. And I’d resent myself for being condescending, like I resented that person. Of course I had no idea! (But still, he was right, I had NO idea…)

What do you think your pre-child self would tell you?

See above.

In terms of this topic (motherhood and writing), do you have any regrets? Guilt? Envy?

Sometimes I wish that I’d let myself take a maternity leave from my writing life as well as from my working life. But I was so determined not to have the essential part of myself (which I flatter myself to be my writing) be subsumed by my new role.

So I kept on reviewing books, even though the reviews editor was reluctant to assign me anything (this was after writing over 30 reviews for him, all to deadline). But in order to get the reviews done, I had to get what I call “downstairs babysitting.” My mother-in-law would come over and look after my daughter while I went upstairs and typed furiously. And when my daughter made her hungry squawks (she absolutely refused to ever take a bottle), I would race downstairs and feed her and then go back upstairs for another session of furious typing.

And I wrote short short poems, the shortest and sparest I’ve ever written. Because it was all I had time/space for, in the blurry blur of the first year of my daughter’s life.

In the end, I wrote most of a manuscript during this period but it wasn’t particularly relaxed. So I can’t decide which would have been better. To have been completely present (and not now have the poems) or to have absented myself a little bit (and now have the poems)?

The early years of motherhood have been described by various writers as a haze or as an incredibly creative time. How would you describe it? Are you still in it? When did you leave?

My scientist mother was a workaholic, so I have always excelled at keeping myself busy. At making my life ultra-full. So my challenge, before and especially after baby, has been to empty my life. In order to write AND parent, I’ve had to get rid of most everything else. So I’ve cut way down on freelance writing. Not because I couldn’t do it, mind you (sorry, I’m still talking to my reviews editor…). Because I chose to devote the time to my creative writing.

I’m not sure if the haze ever ends. Life is sort of hazy, isn’t it? And child-bearing/rearing seems designed to fill you right up…

To sum: it was both.

Birthing a book is like birthing a baby. Way off or right on?

I’m not sure. It seems too tidy a comparison. And neither writing a book nor having a baby is tidy.

I wanted to do this project because I found so few satisfying examples of the writing-mother. It was either the mythology of Alice Munro writing while her children played at her feet, the writer who resented and neglected her children because she was so consumed with her art, or someone like Sylvia Plath who ended up with her head in the oven. Which writing-mothers do you admire and why?

Until I had a child, it didn’t occur to me to admire writing mothers. I deeply appreciate some of the examples I’ve found in my reading since, like Robyn Sarah’s in Double Lives (MQUP, 2008) but I most admire the writing mothers I know a little bit. Like Gillian Wigmore. And Shawna Lemay. And you.

All of us struggling a bit. All of us writing when we’re able. All of us (again, I flatter myself), succeeding just enough to stay sane. To stay whole.