Who do we create for?

Embracing the process, not the product.

I’ve been thinking a lot about why I wanted to start my newsletter back up. I’ve also been thinking of an Elena Ferrante quote that says, in essence, that we write to be read. But I’ll be the first to admit that my work isn’t always read. Last year, I had an essay published that I was really proud of. Not many people read it. But a friend from high school who was mentioned peripherally in the essay commented that she had read it and enjoyed it, and my brother had read it and made sure to tell me what he thought. I held onto these conversations. But still, I remembered something a visiting author had told my cohort in graduate school—that what was so great about writing was the writing part, not the publishing part, or the editing part, or even the being read part. And, after that essay came out last year, I realized she was right.

This is not to say it’s not wonderful to be read. It is. My friend Lorna, an artist I admire a lot, recently read my book and wrote a very moving review that made me stand still and simply soak in the feeling of being seen, truly and deeply seen. I am so grateful for every single person that read my book. It is a niche one, not written for the masses. In fact, it was written just for me. I was compelled to write it and could not let go of its subject matter until I did. It felt as though every draft I wrote, I gained back more space in my brain and heart for something else—the next project, and the next.

In college, I was a couple classes shy of completing an art major. Painting became an enormous focus in my life, one that often still emerges. In fact, lately I’ve been itching for a paintbrush more than a pen, but a pen is easier to grab when holding a baby (or let’s be real, a phone, I write as I type this with my two thumbs…). No matter how I am creating right now, it is clear that I still feel a huge draw to create, despite having a baby connected to my body almost 24/7. The impetus to create is different from the impetus to be read, for me. In my college art classes, my painting prof taught me that making art was all about the process, not the product. What did it feel like to make marks? Make them. Let them add up to something on their own. You, the artist, just need to keep making marks.

Photo by Andres Perez on Unsplash

Sometimes I will be holding my baby and wonder who he will be someday, what he will do. Sometimes that thought can turn scary. But then I lean the tip of my nose to his, I draw back and smile, I dive toward him with a flurry of tiny kisses. I am making marks. That’s all I can do. He will become his own work of art.

I can’t lie, I often worry about the world I brought my son into. It is a frightening place, with animals going extinct and trees cut down, with shootings occurring every day and politicians that don’t seem to give a fuck that children are dying. I know that eventually, he will have his heart broken, because that is part of being alive, and I feel my own heart preemptively break at the thought. But I force myself to squash that feeling down. It is not here, yet, and there are so many beautiful things in this world, too. We see so much of the bad as we doomscroll and catch snippets of the news in the form of repeated sound bites and scary headlines. But then I think of all the mamas and artists and artist-mamas I know who are slowly, steadily making beautiful marks in their homes and studios and relationships. Kisses on feet, sketches on paper or an iPad, cookies in the oven, sentences slowly taking shape across a document while a baby sleeps nearby. So much of the mark-making goes unseen. But that’s where the stuff of life is. That’s what builds up each day into the work of art it is.

In so many ways, when you become a mom, you become invisible. You only have to take a look at the number of prenatal versus postpartum doctor/midwife appointments required or the “pro-life” movement that strips women of agency and autonomy and stops caring about the baby the minute they are born. I have a friend who once remarked that when she was pregnant she got so many “how are you?’s” each day and that after the baby was born, the question shifted to the well-being of her child. This is not an uncommon story.

I am lucky. My family and friends have not stopped asking me how I am, and they often ask about my writing just as much as they ask about my son. Being a writer is inextricably woven into my identity. I’ve been a storyteller since I could talk. In even the short window since I’ve become a stay-at-home mom, when introducing myself as such at gatherings, my friends are quick to jump in with, “and writer. Kaia’s a writer.” That is the mark of good friends. They won’t let you forget who you are.

Which brings me back to this newsletter, and why I want to write it. I want a record of my mark-making, and I want to share it with you. I am working on a novel and a collection of essays, but those marks I have to keep to myself for a long, long while. Those projects are going, but they are slow-going at the moment. I want to write something that feels good and important for me to write, and, yes, I also want it to be read by others, by you! (Thank you for being here.) Why do I want to be read? Well, I think I want to be seen as I am doing the often very invisible work of care-taking. I want to be seen as a writer and as a mom. I’m both. And a whole host of other things, too.

Being seen can be terrifying, but beautiful. We are all in process, never finished. Just like this newsletter. I could keep going, I could go back and fill in gaps that I would no doubt find, but my baby is about to wake up, life is calling me from the page, and I will go. I will make more marks that nobody sees but him and me, and that, too, is beautiful.