Women’s Issues

Fall Fashion Magazines Not Based in Reality

Kathy Stevenson1 Comment

There is something that compels me each year at this time to buy the fall fashion issue of Vogue. Why I have this compulsion is a true mystery, as I spend sixty percent of my life in generic beige twill pants and a black Gap t-shirt, and the other forty percent in my pajamas – one of the perks of being a writer and working at home. That being said, I also don’t want to show up at an event this fall and find out that shoulder pads are back. Or maybe I do.

There is some bad news on the fashion front, my friends. First of all, big purses are still in, only now they are even bigger. Some look like they could hold a Volkswagen bug or a baby elephant. And all that fringe! I personally have never liked fringe on anything, and I suggest that unless you want to look like a leftover flower child of the sixties, you, dear reader, avoid it.

It seems that every fall the flower child look is re-marketed in a way that will make it more appealing to women. This year you will see the words “bohemian,” “eclectic,” and “global ethnic” used to describe the layers of mismatched patterned fabrics that somehow mistakenly found themselves together on one unfortunate body. Although these outfits might be appropriate if you are thinking of joining a Ukrainian circus troupe or a caravan of traveling gypsies. Continue reading →

Cake Baking and Other Luxuries of Summer

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(Originally published on July 4, 1991 in The Beach Reporter.)

Yesterday morning we baked a chocolate cake. Nothing unusual in that, you might say. Except for the fact that it made me stop and think that most of us don’t have many mornings when we can just bake a chocolate cake if we want to.

Normal mornings are spent in a frenzy of getting kids to school on time, the breakfast dishes done, the beds made, the laundry started, the pets fed, and getting myself either to my computer, the grocery store, or the gym. On normal mornings I barely have time to buy a chocolate cake, let alone make one from scratch.

Actually, we used a cake mix, but that’s close enough. Any time you get to break eggs into a bowl, lick the beaters, and use an oven, I count that as making from scratch. We did make the frosting ourselves though. I would never buy frosting in a can. Continue reading →

A Summer Fantasy Becomes Reality

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(This essay was originally published in The Christian Science Monitor.)

It was one of those rare days at the beach. The humidity was low, the temperature hovered right around 80 degrees, the sky was washed with watercolor blues and the flags snapped briskly over the boat harbor. Lake Michigan was quiet and waveless and even the water temperature had risen above the frigid level to merely bone-chilling.

So what was wrong with this picture?

Actually, everything was right. I had finally reached that nirvana of motherhood – that fantasyland that mothers of young children only dream of. My adolescent children, who had accompanied me to the beach, had run off with their friends as soon as we’d arrived. I was alone.
I could reach into my canvas beach bag and read a book or magazine uninterrupted. I could roll over and nap. I could buy myself an ice cream and not have to share it. I could float lazily on a raft, write a short story, re-invent my life. Continue reading →

The Pink and White Terraces of New Zealand

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(This short story originally appeared in the South Boston Literary Gazette, and was awarded “best in issue.” Unfortunately, that literary journal was print only, not online, so I am sharing here online for the first time.)

THE PINK AND WHITE TERRACES OF NEW ZEALAND

Of the months at sea, the less said the better. Although the journey itself certainly must be mentioned. I set out from my adopted country a bride and returned a widow, a change of status I now think of as an improvement.

I was not altogether ignorant of a bride’s responsibilities and duties toward her husband. I had no mother myself, but in the convent there were young women my own age, and also maids and such who came in who talked a great deal more than you might think about the relations between men and women.

When I was a certain age, an acquaintance of a distant relative wrote to the sisters asking if I might be suitable for a match. I had not known of any relatives until then, and apparently they wished to remain anonymous, because I was never given their name or their whereabouts.

But that hardly seemed important, as the background credentials of Mr. Tucker were analyzed and it was deemed that I could do worse. I was sixteen and strong and healthy and couldn’t remain a ward much longer.

In exactly six weeks I was on my way to New Zealand. The year was 1885. Continue reading →