Unassisted - 5 years

            In my memory, my exhilaration about publishing my memoir, my first book, Unassisted, in late January of 2021 is muted. I could blame it on the peculiar impact that the pandemic had on our collective emotions; our outward selves layered in masks, fear and bewilderment about the future. That layer operating like a hard shell, such as the wrinkled shell surrounding a walnut. Our insides still full of life, wanting to be free. Holding our breath until we could return to what life was like before.

            It was the worst case of taking life for granted. My life: a good one, on solid footing with a caring, curious husband, four children still seeking our warmth and counsel, a job that made me feel at home. I could wear soft clothing that didn’t pinch, steer clear from makeup, take to my elliptical at the oddest hour. I was one step away from my computer and my phone, where words and images continued to spillover like too many things to sort on a conveyor belt in a factory.

            Five years ago, I felt acutely the progress as each stage of my book’s publishing moved forward, a check mark, a moment of satisfaction. My ego seemed to have exited stage left; I agreed with most everything my editor suggested. I accepted that words I had put to paper over the course of several years needed magic and massaging. I wanted my book to be its very best, as if it had taken on a persona of its own and was no longer a part of me; nurturing it, teaching it how to survive on its own in the world was akin to letting my children go out there themselves.

            I do have a video of the day I received the first box of my book; 25 copies. I sat at my desk, my glasses perched on my nose, my hair thinning yet curly from the effects of the vaccines, the time spent indoors, the lack of social interaction. I seem elated; I hold up my book for the camera to see, for my husband wielding my phone, capturing the moment.

            My children will tell you I don’t get too excited about things in general; I am calm, a cool customer, until the rare event when I am not. I operate best under pressure, I am the person to call if you can’t get your cat out of a tree, if your kitchen is on fire, if you just discovered your spouse is not who he says he is. I am comfortable with nuance, with uproar, with disassociation. I might tense up or weep, but I will hold your hand, I will work to find answers, I will listen carefully and analyze; make a list – for groceries, pros and cons, or next steps.

            I want to write about how glad I am I got my first book out into the world, and perhaps, how important it was to me that it was a memoir, even though it was firstly, a story of a traumatic few years in my life. I have not journaled for years, after journalling voraciously most of my girlhood, from age seven to seventeen. I have kept those journals not because I ever go back and read them but maybe someone else will after I am gone; I can still remember what I wrote. My memoir caught me up; it painted a portrait of who I had become. So many of the basic parts of me from my childhood survived and that was a revelation to me. I had worn many outward selves, but that walnut inside the shell was still the same nut.

            Writing and more importantly, publishing my book informed me that it was possible, that you can or “YOU CAN!” as one of my yoga instructors says with conviction in class after prompting us into a difficult pose, holding it for what feels eternity, our muscles full of sorrow. And I can, I can again.

Up next: Waves Apart– A Novel by Erin J. Stammer

When the earth finally shifts, the truths they’ve buried will rise with it.

Susie Ahane has spent her life preparing for disaster. Born in Japan and shaped by childhood loss, she’s built a fortress of vigilance around her family in Portland, Oregon—stocking their basement bunker, memorizing emergency plans, scanning every horizon for signs of danger. Her husband Hank, a gentle math professor raised by a single mother, tries to meet her fears with steadiness, even optimism. Together they raise their spirited twins, Iris and Mae, and their young son, Dean, weaving a home full of love, stories, and unspoken scars.

But nature is only one kind of fault line. When a tragic near‑drowning fractures the family’s closest friendship, when the weight of old ghosts presses in on Susie, and when the looming threat of the Cascadia earthquake becomes more than metaphor, the Ahane‑Holdens must reckon with the truth: surviving isn’t the same as living.

Spanning continents and decades—from Sendai to Boston to the Pacific Northwest—WAVES APART is an intimate, lyrical novel about the legacies we inherit, the memories we outrun, and the deep resilience of the human heart. It is a story of mothers and daughters, of love that steadies and love that consumes, and the ways families rebuild long after the shaking stops.