(Special Note - the only images remotely resembling what I had in mind for this on flickr were both obscene. Please accept these goofy, loveable yet heinous critters in their place.)
Have you seen this big old hairy wort covered monster?
It huffs, it puffs, it continually blows down my house-of-cards-slice-of-time calendar and drives me into Mama-etc, insanity!
Because I have the super power of intuitive mind reading even now, I can see some of you nodding, smiling and yes – I even hear a groan or two.
My Super Power of Choice – The Time Stretcher!
Yes – when need be, I am able to stretch moments of time so that I can get what I need to get done, done without becoming a crazed whirling dervish at the same time – unless, ofcourse, I feel like being a Sufi Dancer – which is what a whirling dervish is so perhaps, if your super power is “I have to learn more cool interesting trivia” with that fact, you are now on your way.
I don’t need much, I just need that.
You know, when your best friend is coming over and you haven’t mopped your hard wood floor yet? It will only take ten minutes but there she is, pulling up in front of your house?
Zap the Time Stretcher into motion and the entire world, except for you, is on slo-motion.
You can get that floor mopped, calmly whisk on some mascara and lipstick, and greet her at the door with her favorite cup of tea and a smile on your face.
Plus you haven’t even broken a sweat.
My timer just went off. I was able to stretch time enough to write a respectable blog post in five minutes. I’ll take that, too.
(Special Note: There need to be more Moms posing as Super Hero's for the next round of Summer Blog Challenge. This is why I am stuck with a Mom Mobile image which is quite cute, but not exactly what I hoped to use! Grateful, though for the usage -
This Summer I asked for mothering advice from two famous Hollywood Mothers.
Well, I didn’t ask them mothering advice exactly the way you might think.
These are not, after all, living Hollywood Mothers.
They are legendary Hollywood mothers who are no longer alive.
I took time beside them at monuments in their honor: Donna Reed, the first mother, at her graveside in Westwood and then Joan Crawford, at her Hollywood Walk of Fame star.
Donna Reed’s show was one of my childhood favorites. It was in reruns by the time I watched it. I loved her swishy dresses and pretty face. She reminded me slightly of my own mother, except for the wardrobe. I got older and fell in love with Mary on “It’s a Wonderful Life” via its annual showings during the holiday season.
She seems like someone everywoman would want to chat with about motherhood, about being a woman, and then after the layers of fiction were released, I would want to know about what compelled her as an artist. I might even ask her now, post life, about what she misses about being alive.
Perhaps this is something that compels me as a writer: wanting to know about death and after death. Wanting to know at the end of one’s life as an artist what sifts out as significant. What seemingly small work became what one remembers the most and what “big” project turned meaningless and why – how- where – what was up with that as it happened?
Now Joan Crawford is a completely different mothering story. I wouldn’t even think of asking her mothering advice but something in my gut brought those words to my lips as I cuddled up next to her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame last Sunday night.
Yes, as odd as it sounds, I rested on the sidewalk with her star in order to get a compelling photo. I will do almost anything creatively for art or a laugh or both. It was sincered when I heard myself whisper to Joan, “Do you have any motherly advice for me?”
She has become a mothering joke from the “Mommy, Dearest” book and film. “Wire hangers” are legendary because of her disgust for them as they played host to expensive clothing she didn’t feel her daughter, Christina, valued as she should with a more voluptuous, fabric covered hanger.
I wonder how her thoughts would change if she could speak after death. While she was living she said, "Love is a fire. But whether it is going to warm your hearth or burn down your house, you can never tell."
What would happen once her anger and fear went away?
I poked around online, newly fascinated by these two iconic women. I discovered Donna Reed, who was a mother to four children and a “second mother “ to co-star Shelley Fabares, was also a co-founder of the Peace Activist Organization, “Another Mother for Peace”. Within the group’s beliefs is “No mother is enemy to another mother.”
What would Joan’s life as a mother been like if another mother – another woman – had reached out to her with that sort of compassionate, loving energy of “no enemies here, simply mothers caring about other mothers”?
What would happen once her anger went away?
What got in the way of her freedom from anger?
What can we, as mothers and as women, learn from how she held more tightly to anger and rage than to the love she must have felt underneath all that excess emotional warfare she fought every day.
You may be reading this thinking, “How do these two Hollywood Mothers have any relevance in my life today, anyway?”
Do you know anyone whose anger and fear tear awayen any love in a poisonous fire of contempt that kills any hope of joy they may have within them?
Perhaps this essay was written especially for you so that you may ask the questions to your friend or family member that I posed to non-living beings:
What would happen if your anger went away?
What would happen if you let go of anger and replaced it with something less destructive?
What is getting in the way of your freedom from anger?
Donna Reed might tell Joan Crawford, “When you handle yourself, use your head; when you handle others, use your heart."
When you handle your children, use your head, your heart and your arms for hugging.
Julie Jordan Scott has been a Life & Creativity Coach, Writer, Facilitator and Teleclass Leader since 1999. She is also an award winning Actor, Director, Artist and Mother Extraordinaire. She was twice the StoryTelling Slam champion in Bakersfield. She leads Writing Camp with JJS & this Summer will be traveling throughout the US to bring this unique, fun filled creative experience to the people wherever she finds the passion & the interest.
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