Submission Spotlight: Gulf Coast

You’ve got until September, so dust off that piece that’s seen too many rejections and get to work. In three months, give it another go and consider Gulf Coast. Founded in 1986, this is the literary journal of the University of Houston’s creative writing program. Phillip Lopate and Donald Barthelme founded the journal, which has expanded to two print issues as well as its online publications. The…

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We’re not that close is like shooting a marble through a conversation. It’s so smooth. It feels like a fact, the way a rock is a fact. We’re not that close might be describing a state of being that just… is. Like how the sky is blue. We’re not that close. Most of us don’t know or remember why the sky is blue, and we’re okay with it.

Sometimes I say we don’t talk that much, because that much is so big and so empty. It’s for when I want you to think we share something. That we’re members of the same grown-up adult society of people who don’t call their parents enough. Oh, I say, you don’t talk to your mom that much? Oh, once a week? Yeah, me too! We’re so bad! 

I used to be honest. In conversations I’d say, we’re estranged, we’re not speaking right now, I don’t know how she’s doing. But I didn’t like how people followed up, wanting to know why. Or how they helpfully replied that I was hurting my mother. They could not imagine not talking to their own mothers. Did I know I only had one? 

i don’t think this essay knocks it out of the park but it’s worth reading for the sarah paulson/holland taylor worship

I’ve been estranged from my mom long enough that Mother’s Day doesn��t feel like much to me (plus it’s MY day now!) But I did read a very amazing essay about mother daughter estrangement yesterday. Minus the part about her mom actively drinking still, this could be me.

http://phoebejournal.com/welcome-to-bad-mom-club-nine-alternatives-to-reconciliation/