Tsukismom Speaks

Tsukismom Speaks


I'm moving. Not in the sense that I evoke a particular emotional response in anyone, but in the sense that I can't believe how much stuff I've accumulated in just three years and now I have to downsize to a new place and I am in total denial. As in the queen of.

I am moving from Port Huron, Michigan, land of the place where the wives of those in power have hair that doesn't move (and there aren't any women in real power here, so I am not really being sexist), to Ann Arbor, Michigan, insulated land of undyed, uncut and free moving women's hair.

I am of two minds about the move.

I've lived here longer than anywhere else in my life, I have wonderful friends, there is the beginning of a left-wing community and an arts community. My house is filled with light and memories and love and I have labored to make it a good space. I hate leaving these things.

But then, in Ann Arbor I've got a great new job waiting, and I can take the bus to work, and my son Ben and I won't feel like fish out of water in the grocery store because there are other families who look like us.

See, I am white as oatmeal and Ben is brown as 60% cocoa chocolate. Then there's the hair thing: mine is long and frizzy and gray, and he's just a toddler, so most people assume he's my grandchild and my daughter abandoned him.

Ben is my son, and the bond is deep as any bond born in the flesh. We make the same faces, he's learning my speech patterns and we love each other with passion. We aren't really of different races: we are of the human race, and I hate it when we are made to feel different because of whom we are.

Ben probably doesn't notice yet, but I do and he will. And the move to Ann Arbor is as much about trying to insulate him from that harsh reality as it is about any self-fulfillment I hope to achieve there.

I have begun this blog in hopes of recording the changes we will find together, and of course to comment on random political and social issues. Really, it’s all about finding a voice after all.

Peace, shalom, salaam.