Marion Roach Smith’s alternate sisterly reality, with Margaret Roach.
ONCE UPON A TIME there was no sisterhood. This is back when we were new to a school, or grade, the new kid in a neighborhood or a Brownie troop, back when no one seemed to like us. And then one day some kid passed us a pencil, or laughed at our joke, or slipped us a note. And soon there really was an “us,” and nothing seemed more important, or special, or forever. [click to continue…]
{ 8 comments }
ICALL IT “OUR GREAT EXPERIMENT.” My big sister Margaret calls it “Why not, and can-do.” It’s the release today (on the occasion of my “29th” birthday) of my fourth book by none other than big sister-turned-publisher. I think that’s the most unusual gift Margaret ever got me. Both of us Roach sisters also think it’s a must-have for anyone doing any memoir-style writing–whether in print or on a blog–which is what I’ve been teaching to sold-out classes for 13 years. Margaret says my writing tips helped her finish her own memoir, due out next February, which is how she got the idea to publish them. Get the details (and the book). What a birthday this is turning out to be! [UPDATED 1/11: My self-published book sold to a major publisher and will be re-released in an expanded version in late spring. Meantime, it is unavailable; I'll let you know when orders can be taken for the even more exciting version.]
{ 0 comments }
OUR BRAS. IN TRANSLATION. Is it just us, or do they look bigger in French?
{ 0 comments }
I LIVE ON A GRID. I call it The Grid. It’s a character in our lives to some extent, and everyone who knows it makes fun of it, and I’m good with that. Printed on a large white board, written in erasable dry marker, The Grid sits on my desk, in full view as I write, mapping out the seven days of my week and how I live them. On it is written even the incidentals—“walk the dog,” “stretch,”—as well as the truly important chunks of my life, like “write,” “meet the bus,” and “gym.” [click to continue…]
{ 12 comments }
WHERE I COME FROM, the word “salad” means lettuce. Perhaps that lettuce will be accompanied by onions, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, crumbled cheese, or all of the above, but lettuce—and I believe I speak for all my homepeople when I say this—would be the foundation of all things “salad.” And, being a New Yorker, I went along thinking my way was the highway until fate stepped in and threw a man in my path some 21 years ago who, when he said “salad,” was speaking a different tongue. So we got married, and mixed things up. [click to continue…]
{ 32 comments }
WHEN I READ SISTER ANASTASIA’S “Tips for Single Ladies (c. 1938)” today, all could hear in my head was the lyric to some long-ago song: “You must walk feminine/Talk feminine/Smile and beguile feminine/Utilize your femininity/That’s what every girl should know/if she wants to catch a beau.” Turns out it’s a 1963 Hayley Mills relic. When I sang it for the TSP women, they all got real silent. Can’t understand it. Hasn’t every woman watched every single Hayley Mills movie and memorized every song? I know I have.
{ 6 comments }
YOU KNOW HOW WE LOVE US SOME SINGALONGS. I mean, we’ve done it before. So here, for all you sisters juggling holiday prep, is our seasonal song, to be sung to the tune of There is Nothing Like a Dame, which, if you need to be reminded, is right up top in the music video. [click to continue…]
{ 7 comments }
EVERY TIME THE HOLIDAYS COME AROUND I am reminded that one of these days I simply have to do something with my mother’s ashes. It’s been nearly twenty years since she died. This length of stay out of the grave, or water or air, is not that startling. My father’s ashes have been in a closet at my sister’s house for more than 30 years, and though I tell myself that the right ritual will present itself, even the turn of the century came and went without inspiring an interment. [click to continue…]
{ 20 comments }
THINK IN PROPINQUITIES. It’s a phrase that makes me sound more prim librarian than not, I know, but I love that word “propinquity,” and its reminder that you think of your angle shots when the topic you want to write up is Thanksgiving, for instance. Don’t give us a Polaroid of the day, but rather some side view that illustrates how you learned a new way to give thanks. It happened to me when I brought a New York City cab driver to Thanksgiving dinner. [click to continue…]
{ 4 comments }
DANIELLE TOLD ME TO do it, and so I did. And I am so grateful, taking up one commenter’s suggestion and reading another novel by Margot Livesey (left), this time Eva Moves the Furniture.
{ 4 comments }
FRIEND SLOANE TANEN made Marion a chick shrink. Click to learn why.
First time here? Here's the idea: The Sister Project is a network of blogs about the many facets of the word sister, and the concept of sisterhood. A sisterhood of sister blogs, you could say. Whatever sister means to you, from identical twin to sister-in-law (or in friendship or in feminism), we’ll make room to listen in about it or express it on TSP. Like the slogan up top on our homepage says, “Don’t you have something to say to your sister?” We've got galleries of art and literature by and about sisters, and a Sisterpedia of sisterly trivia...but now we're getting ahead of ourselves. The quick study: Learn more about TSP, and how to find your way around. And oh—a giant, sisterly welcome.
