The Mother's Day letters project
I'm preempting my usual Dinner Together day to announce a Mother's Day initiative. I'm calling it the Letters Project.
I'm looking for you -- yes, you -- mothers and grandmothers to send me letters you have written to your daughters and sons. If you haven't written any, write one now. It can be for your child to read as a teenager, or as an adult, or for this very moment. It can even be to your unborn child, or the child you hope to have or will never have, or to one who has died.
If a Tweet is all you have time for, write and send me that.
Then we're going to share all this great advice with each other, culminating in a (hopefully) big splash for Mother's Day.
It started because I got the most wonderful letter from my grandmother the other day...
She's been dead for more than 20 years. And the letter wasn't to me. It was a great surprise from a cousin, who wrote that she had "borrowed" my grandmother during a breakup many years ago. (Her grandmother, my great-aunt, had died.)
My grandma Leah Patterson, for whom my daughter Leah is named, was a fantastic lady -- funny, warm, and not just smart as a whip, but wise. In this letter, she didn't disappoint.
It's dated Sept. 4, 1979. Grandma was 83 years old and a longtime widow. Here's some of her advice to my cousin on what to do after the breakup:
"I do realize that this is an especially restless age, but you have so much to contribute -- young and strong -- brains and beauty. I'm sure if you go ahead and do as you are now...use your talents -- you'll enjoy it, and the man problem will suddenly solve itself."
"Men seem to be unsure of themselves since women are taking over so many things, but maybe that too will pass and we'll all enjoy feeling liberated and equal and life will be normal again."
(Um. Grandma? Not as much progress on that front as you would have thought by 2010...)
"In the meantime, have all the fun you can with your contemporaries of both sexes. It's nice to remember your fun time when you can't climb fences!"
"I'm still having fun in a different way. I play bridge three and four times a week, eat out a lot with some other crazy old ladies, and I just bought myself a color TV!"
I can't wait to read and share your advice. And, I promise, I will write a letter for my kids, too, and share it with you here.
(Photo of letter from my grandmother by me)
Categories: Holidays, Mother's Day letters
