Michelle Underwood

  • A Damn Good Mom

    A Damn Good Mom

    My daughter asked me to rock her tonight. I was tired – we’d been driving all day and I was up late last night. I had a thousand other things that needed to get done – chapters to write, bags to unpack, school work to prep. I was hungry and stressed because there was no Read more

  • Fear

    Fear

    I’m afraid of the dark – I always have been. I never knew why or what triggered the fear, possibly an overactive imagination and too many novels, possibly just the fact that I was a kid, but I rarely went to sleep fear-free. For years, I leapt on and off my bed to avoid the Read more

  • Stung

    Stung

    I cried when I killed a bee today. I watched it crawl across the floor of the cabin that we’re staying in for vacation; it’s teeny, spindly legs trekking across the carpet, clearly seeking something. Before I stepped on it, I thought about what could happen if it lived. I’ve been stung before – I Read more

  • A Country Song

    A Country Song

    When I was 15, I fell in love for the first time. We spent our afternoons driving to Sonic for Route 44 Cherry Limeades with the windows down, blaring country music, imagining we were living a country song. We passed adorably folded notes in school addressed to “Babe” and “Baby” that were just cleverly rephrased conversations Read more

  • Dear Mom

    Dear Mom

    Dear Mom (and all the baby mommas and baby’s momma’s mommas), Now that I’m on the other side, the Mom side, I see things differently. I see what you sacrificed and why you struggled. I see why you did the things you did. I get it now. And I owe you a thousand apologies, but Read more

  • Amen

    Amen

    The water beating on her upturned face is warm, but far from relaxing. Her thoughts are frantic, jumbled, everywhere – grocery lists, to do lists, replays of conversations, everyday worries, fears for what’s to come, scenes from the day. They jump from here to there, shifting messily, rattling round and round painfully. She rests her Read more