Category Archives: Creative non-fiction

Resolutions 2017

January 2, 2017Creative non-fiction, Humor, Inspiration, Parenting, WritingJackie Pick

• Be punctual with holiday-related blog posts. I have already started to draft my post “Nine Arbor Day Crafts & Recipes You Can Say You’re Doing While You’re Really Just Hiding From Your Family to Get Some Peace and Quiet”

• As consistency is key, continue with 2-part exercise program that I have followed for a several years decade:

Part 1: Watch 70s and 80s workout videos while eating gelato, which is healthier than ice cream because it’s a foreign word.

Part 2: While standing in front of fridge, closets, doors, drawers, shelves, or people while trying to remember why I’m there – do squats

• Find lotion that works for zits and wrinkles. Alternatively, hide husband’s glasses.

• Open windows before going to any room by myself so when I yell at the kids to leave me alone, my neighbors will hear me and applaud my boundary setting. Do same pre-coffee.

• Listen to Hamilton more often. There is no accompanying joke, I just love this music and this show and everyone involved in this show ever.

• Since “I thought the sweeping cinematography in the opening scene ” only works once, stay awake for movies we watch at home long enough to fake a conversation.

• Speak faster so that I can get more information out before inevitably being interrupted by one of my children needing a juice box, snack, hug, argument referee, Band-Aid, bicycle tire inflation, or to relay every Minecraft fact.

• Accept that I look the same no matter which mascara I wear, except for the one that smudges. Stop purchasing the one that smudges

• I have to leave the house to be an activist so:

Leave the House.
Be an Activist.

• Stop Random Capitalization as though you are writing the next Winnie the Pooh novel or other Good thing.

• Accept my Bill Murray ambivalence.

• Know that no one else will be ok with my Bill Murray ambivalence.

• Understand people will expend a lot of energy and gesticulate a lot and possibly spit a little in an effort to change my mind about Bill Murray

• Eat the chocolates.

• Use all the cookbooks in my office rather than rotate the same four meals and just call them different foreign names. Alternatively, learn to say “Leftovers” in more languages.

• Husband and children are just going to use the voice search on the remote control as a source of entertainment. Since searching for “Monkey Pants” will always be funny to them, move on with my life.

• Play ukulele when I have the time, be that at the pickup line or before and after parent-teacher conferences.

• KidzBop is a compromise.

• Maybe don’t compromise so much.

• Stop wearing the maternity underwear already.

• Only say “That’s ok” when “that” is actually “ok.”

Here in the Middle is out!

December 2, 2016Books, Creative non-fiction, Here in the Middle, Publications, WritingJackie Pick

I always thought middle age would be softer.

I thought my hair would be poofy, my body would be poofy, everything would have an easy-to-sink-into quality to it, like an overstuffed chair.

With the exception of my body, I’m finding middle age to be hard and sometimes sharp – and that’s when I acknowledge that I’m in middle age in the first place. I am edgier. My opinions are strong. Getting through the day can be hard. I feel increasingly unsure about the world as I grow surer of who I am. It is a great reversal, as I used to be confident about what the world was all about and have a tenuous sense of self.

That crisscrossing of certainty and uncertainty, of confidence and grasping, of hard and soft runs throughout the new anthology Here in the Middle, which was released yesterday and to which I am a proud contributor.

A mishmash of emotions always accompanies releases of new art. Pride and excitement, certainly. There is also worry that it won’t be received as it was intended, that the circle of audience and performer will not be closed. That worry is unfounded with Here in the Middle. This collection of stories already resonates with many people who are in the so-called sandwich generation. And while it’s not necessarily a bad place to be (who doesn’t like sandwiches?), it can be tough. It’s surprising to find yourself in a time when we all watch our children venture out into the world to various degrees, and then need to turn a watchful, caring eye to our parents.

It is a book of transitions, of moments where time stands still just long enough for us to realize not only how fast it’s all going but how much we change. How much we need to change. That we sometimes are forced to change be it under volcanic pressure or gentle yet persistent buffing.

My story, “Grandparent Privilege,” is a humorous look at one of these moments in my life. My role as “caregiver” is tenuous at best: my parents are healthy and active, my children run away from any of my attempts at caregiving, which mostly involves my asking if they washed their hands with soap. I wrote about being the odd man out in the relationship between my children and my parents. It is a love note to my parents, my children, and my steadfast husband who wishes we would drop them off at my parents much more often than we do.

You can read my story and many other beautiful, heartwarming, sometimes heartbreaking, always lovely stories by purchasing the book on Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

I would love to hear your thoughts on the book!