Memoirous

I am still stumbling across critiques of the movie Little Women.  This one I found randomly on Twitter. I say randomly because 1) I don't have the app on my phone and 2) I follow maybe a total of three people, about the same number who follow me. And, it so happens one of those people I follow linked to Alison Stine's essay in the Village Witch about the movie Little Women . What if Amy was the Better Artist? It is an essay about women in the arts--about what part of ourselves we have to give up, allow to be nibbled away, sacrificed in order to achieve recognition. This is especially pertinent right now during the Harvey Weinstein trial.  I think we all know by now that there isn't a level playing field.  I wish our work could speak for us, but instead it is about the pitch, the MFA, the professor or mentor who stands behind us. And, I've been to enough writer's conferences--sometimes it's about who we hook up with for the week that determines vis...

With the release of the nominees for Oscar this past week I am reminded once again of how a movie like Little Woman goes against the Hollywood grain. Most of the movies nominated for Best Picture are films that show violence; front and center are car chases, male-dominated leads—with one exception. Best picture Ford v Ferrari The Irishman Jojo Rabbit Joker Little Women Marriage Story 1917 Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood Parasite In her piece at Vanity Fair,  Greta Gerwig on the Lives of  Little Women —And Why “Male Violence” Isn’t All That Matters,  Gerwig writes about the film, her script and the utter lunacy of a book about 4 girls, their lives a collection of mundane details. Frm her article: I think Louisa May Alcott, whether she knew it or not, made the ordinary lives of girls and women extraordinary by turning her pen to them. I still think we very much have a hierarchy of stories. I think that the top of the hierarchy is mal...

I recently told a group I was having a potluck with that I was going to see Little Women. One of the guys said I love that movie. Now, for a couple of reasons, I knew he was confused. Brien is the kind of guy that watches the Bears and roots for the Sox. Come to find out, he meant the movie Hidden Figures—which made me think that both titles seem to diminish the role of women. But, I digress. The weather was so nice, a friend and I rode our bikes there—to discover it was sold out. So we purchased tickets on-line and planned to go later. Again, I digress. Which is life: a series of digressions. Little Women as the book and movie proves, is a series of small moments in lives considered hidden and little. Indeed, they paint, play the piano, write, perform—but this is in a world where they have no agency. They cannot vote and are limited in the occupations they might choose. The man is the head of the house, even if they make unwise decisions and go off to war. We see ...

5 th Grade I lied. I do remember my 5 th grade teacher’s name. Mrs. Medillo. She said in my school year book that I was her “busy bee reader.” I kept track of all the books I read on index cards. I had a stack of them. I didn’t know how to score the books I read more than once. It seemed a miracle that because of redistricting I was able to spend 5 th grade back at my old school Driscoll, except by this time my friends had moved on. We were different on a scale that only a tween would understand. I was desperate to read a friend, a book that loved me for who I was—somewhat nerdy, existential, an optimistic fatalist. Little Women. I could actually see Jo staring into the depth of her grief when she opened Beth’s hope chest, where the mementos of her short life were stored. Even today, my throat catches every time I read this passage. I am Jo, the writer, smudging the outside of my finger as my hand rushes over fresh ink on the page. Secretly I nurture a secret po...