WSG:7 Me

Women's Survival Guide

Good morning Readers! This week you get me all to yourself. Lucky you! But, don’t worry, I have two amazing Mavens working on their interview responses for the next time(s). 

CHANCE TO WIN A BOX OF BEACON HILL CHOCOLATES! 

Whoever gets the most “likes” on their comment at the bottom of the Newsletter will be awarded a lovely box of Beacon Hill Chocolates! The store is down the street from my house and happens to be run and owned by a woman. Please try….just comment and like some things so I know you’re out there and paying attention. 

It’s snowing right now in Boston. It generally does once or twice in April. That’s ok. It won't kill the pansies. I have trouble imagining what it might be like to live in an area where it’s pretty nice all the time, sunny and tepid. Just thinking about consistently nice weather feels treasonous to my region. 

We ski in New Hampshire on a mountain that is rarely sunny. It’s steep and icey and cold. There are other mountains not far from it that aren’t as steep and get more sun. But we don’t go there.

Why? Because we have season’s passes and are too frugal to go buy a full priced ticket at a neighboring mountain. I’m not convinced this is the right thing to do, but I can’t help it and neither can my husband. We grew up at a time when we patched our hand-me-down sweaters and corduroys. Even I had hand-me-downs and I’m an only child (thank you cousins Tracy and Johnny). It was just the way it was.

To this day I have to control myself not to wash out plastic baggies. Not because of the environment, but don’t get me started on hating plastic because I do to the depths of my soul, but because it’s wasteful to have a single use thing. One could throw coins in the (cleaned) used bag and toss it in the “miscellaneous” drawer in the kitchen. Done. Wait a few years and then throw the baggie out. 

I’m not saying that the 70s was a better time to grow up than other decades. It was a weird era. However, if there is one thing I’d like to pass on to future generations, it’s a sense of humor. I believe we enjoyed the ability to make fun of ourselves and see the humor in others. We have all gotten a little thin skinned over the years.

Think of the TV shows we grew up on: Bugs Bunny, Sesame Street, The Electric Company, Fat Albert, All in the Family, Sanford and Sons, The Jeffersons, The Brady Bunch, The Partridge Family. On and on. They were funny shows then and they would be offensive shows now. 

Meet me in the comments!

What shows did you love from your childhood?

My iPhone Weather list! What’s on yours?

NYC, Paris, Cat Island, London are just because I love them. Boston, where we live, Bethlehem NH, where we like to go ski, Malibu where family lives….there is another page, but, I’ll save it for another time.

Maven Interview: Me talking to Me

What do you do to relax? 

I’m very good at filling time and relaxing. If someone says, you’ll have to wait for two hours for your car to be ready...that’s fine with me. But, to set out to relax I need to do the opposite in some ways, like run. As a good friend says, “it keeps the squirrels in the attic under control.” I do yoga, Iyengar, but that’s not relaxing. It’s exhausting, but necessary. I watch The Great British Baking show at 7 PM on WGBH, Boston. They show the old ones with Mary Berry, whom I adore. I read. I pet the dog or my daughter’s cat (long story). But, I always, no matter the weather and temperature, take a tub. My day is not complete without a soak in the tub and something to read.

What books are on your bedside table?

My bedside table

I just finished Night Boat to Tangier by Kevin Barry, a fictional tale about two aging Irishmen, Maurice and Charlie who ran drugs in the early 1990s in Spain. Agatha Christie’s Cards on the Table is also on my bedside table. I haven’t read it yet, but I can always depend on a Christie novel for a good read and great sentence structure. Speaking of sentence structure, any John LeCarré novel is exciting and based on reality-ish and that’s scary. He and Christie are wonderful writers and perfect for anyone who loves vocabulary and murder. 

Unf*ck Yourself by Gary John Bishop sits there and I pick it up occasionally. It’s a surprisingly useful hand book that my mother gave me. I have at least 20 books next to my bed. Some I may never read, like Wolf Hall by HIlary Mantel. I keep meaning to read it, but have you seen the list of characters? I can barely remember my keys, let alone teams of 16th century English people. Also on the table is Dead Letter Men by Nicola Tyson, one of my favorite artists and influences. She has a sense of humor that is intoxicating and on full display as she writes to dead male artists and works through her relationship with them, their place in history and their influence on her work.

What are you excited about?

I continue to be excited about doing this newsletter and enjoy the process of finding and interviewing people. I am grateful for their generosity with their time and story.  I am also excited about a new body of work begun recently of the Boston Public Garden in snow. The series stems from a few pictures I took walking with my Dad late this winter.

I struggled to be enthusiastic about going to my studio for the past year and half. I can’t even blame COVID. Needless to say, it’s a relief to feel differently about painting and to want to do it every day. If you’re curious, here is my instagram handle @KimDStockwellStudio. Finally, things are looking up, don’t you think? 

Why did you start Women’s Survival Guide Newsletter?

You may have already read about why I started this project in the section called “What is Women’s Survival Guide?” It’s at the bottom of my main page on Substack. The concept for Women’s Survival Guide grew out of my own experience.

I had a health issue that I am sure another woman of my age had experienced. It occurred to me, ‘wouldn’t it be nice to look up an issue and see real people’s reflections that I might learn from?’ People submit their experiences and people search for answers. In looking for a way to begin and form the base of people for the online experience, I discovered that Goop started as a newsletter. Ok, Gwyneth had a bigger rolodex to begin with, but the concept was very simple. It made sense to me as a way to grow. From there, I made it my own with the Maven interview, recipe and question for four anonymous women. I will probably grow the newsletter to encompass other ideas, but, for now, it’s a manageable size. 

What category would you add to the guide?

I think there are a lot of very personal topics that would be a godsend for some of us to know more about without plugging them into our search engines and getting flooded with erectile dysfunction ads or other similar unmentionables. 

Question of the Week for Four Women: 

What’s your favorite spring flower and why?

1. Daffodils. I love the way they smell, that yellow is one of my favorite colors and it is the flower my husband brought to me from his yard when we first started dating every time I saw him that Spring.

2. Tulips. I love that they open over time.

3. Peonies. They are so lush and elegant.

4. Apricot Blossom. There is an Arabic saying “fe mishmish” that means “when the apricots bloom” (like ‘when pigs fly’). My Dad used to say it all the time and I would look for the apricot trees to bloom (we had them at our house).

That’s all for this edition. I enjoyed sharing some thoughts with you and I hope I will hear from you!
k