The Four Corners
Standing on the quadripoint of mother, sister, daughter, and wife
Driving home from Alan’s funeral in 2016, we made an impromptu stop at Four Corners Monument, the spot where Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, and Colorado meet. I wrote about this in my memoir, how what seemed like a carefree, whimsical tourist stop became something else.
“Here, everyone put your toes in the middle,” I say, grabbing my phone to take a photo. I hold it overhead and point it downward so that the frame is filled with just our four feet, each in a different state, pointed perfectly at the quadripoint.
“Let me see,” Kris says, and I hand him my phone. As I do, the kids shuffle over toward him to look at the screen. He squats down to their eye level, and they all hunch over looking at the photos of themselves.
I look at the ground and realize I’m standing alone on the Colorado/Utah side now while Kris and the kids are in Arizona and New Mexico. I gaze over at them, my chosen family, and I start to cry.
It had been a long, intense week, but as I went through the motions of the funeral and other family gatherings, I had trouble naming what exactly it was I felt. Grief, for sure. Shock and confusion over the sudden nature of Alan’s death. But there were other layers too. Layers that had to do with the fact I was spending so much time with my family of origin after breaking away and creating a family of choice.
The whole week I’d tried to figure out where I fit in after being estranged from my mother for many years. Was I still a daughter? (Had I ever been someone’s child?) Was I still Alan’s sister now that he was gone? How did I fit in? Was there room for my grief in the mix?
But when I looked down, I saw it. I not only stood at the quadripoint; I was the quadripoint. Sister, Mother, Wife, Daughter.
We can be many places. We are many people.
Leaving home at 17 and creating my own version of family didn’t make me any less of a daughter or sister. I hadn’t abandoned those roles or abandoned my family. Rather, I’d come home to myself. I’d become a fuller version of me, one that now includes spouse and mother (and friend and writer and traveler and nature lover…). All could be true at once.
In other news…
Save the Date!
Tuesday August 27th: I’ll be at Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe, AZ talking with Nora McInerny about my book, caregiving, complicated families, and more. The event is free and open to the public. RSVP at the link above.
Psychology Today Column
I’ll be writing a regular column for Psychology Today that explores various forces that act upon our lives — family, disability, grief, love, estrangement, friendship, joy, and the people and places we call home. My first post went live this week. Read it here.
The Washington Post
Had some nice things to say about my book…
Goodreads Giveaway
I’m giving away two signed copies on Goodreads. Enter here.
Order A Signed Copy From
If you’ve already read Forces of Nature, I’d be honored if you left a review so that others can more easily discover it too: Amazon, Goodreads, Barnes & Noble, StoryGraph
What I’m Reading, Watching & Loving
Speaking of quadripoints, last week I tore through Miranda July’s new novel, All Fours and I’ll never be the same. It has me thinking about the benefits and costs of showing up as our true selves, the ways we die and are reborn in the course of one life, the gift/curse of aging, domesticity as both an enemy and enabler of art, how to define intimacy, and so, so, SO much more.
On the plane back from Atlanta two weeks ago, I rewatched the film Past Lives and realized it’s even better the second time around (and maybe that’s the point?)
And, I haven’t read it yet, but my event and conversation with author
made me so excited for her forthcoming memoir, Going to Maine. I hope you’ll preorder it so we can discuss in the fall.What are you reading and loving lately?