classes but had stage fright. She had done some modeling and talked about moving to L.A. but had no definite plan to do so and no job for when she got there. She went to California to see her father a couple of times a year. He was making movies after a checkered career, and had married a producer who was more successful than he was. He was still married to her, and they had had three more kids, all boys. Carole loved visiting them, and the atmosphere in L.A. She loved the idea of moving out there and living with her father and his family, but she wasn’t ready to leave New York.
Liz was constantly worried about her. She had turned into a mother hen, and both her daughters teased her about it. She called them three times a day to see how they were. She just wanted them to be happy. For the past twenty years, her daughters had been the main focus of Liz’s life. She didn’t want to be like her own mother and miss the boat on motherhood. So she had dropped everything for them, and now that they were gone, she wasn’t even sure she could still write. She had promised herself she would try, but nothing came, and she dreaded being on vacation with her family again, and having to explain to them, again, why she had done nothing for the past year. How did you explain that to people like them?
As far as Liz was concerned, her brother Phillip was second only to their mother in the astounding empire she’d built on her own, with their father’s silent, loving support. Phillip was the pretender to the throne. His wife was a successful attorney, a partner in an important law firm, and looked down her nose at them all. She was beautiful, sleek, well dressed, and had assured all of them she was going to be a judge. Liz’s brother John was an incredible artist and a genius in design. His wife had a doctorate and was a professor of literature at Princeton. And her baby sister, Cass, never came on the summer birthday trips. She had distanced herself from all of them since their father’s death but had become one of the most important music producers in the world, based in London, and for the past five years was living with a world-famous rock star ten years younger than she was, Danny Hell. Liz constantly asked herself how she could compete with people like them. All she had ever done was write a few lame short stories, have two failed marriages, and bring up two wonderful girls. Sophie and Carole were her only accomplishment, and no one in her family was impressed by that. She knew they all thought she was a total failure.
Her mother was always kind about her writing and tried to encourage her, but Liz feared she was just being polite. They felt sorry for her. Liz had been floundering and fighting to keep her head above water all her life. The only thing she’d ever been confident about was mothering her kids. It was the one thing she was sure of, where she never doubted herself, and she loved her daughters more than anyone or anything in the world. But she was also the only one in her family who had never finished college, had been married more than once, and whose marriages had failed. She had no career, lived on her trust, and had been paralyzed by her fear of failure all her life.
Liz lived in a Connecticut farmhouse she’d been meaning to remodel and rebuild since she’d bought it ten years before, and she’d never managed to do that either. She just never got around to it. Although the bones and structure of the place were beautiful, it was a mess, constantly leaking, with things breaking that she never quite knew how to fix. In some ways, her life seemed like her house to her: it had potential but was disintegrating quietly and falling apart. And now she had to go on vacation with all of them again. She didn’t have the guts to do what her younger sister did every year, and turn their mother down and refuse to go. Instead, Liz always did what was expected of her, never wanted to upset anyone, so she and the girls went
Liz was constantly worried about her. She had turned into a mother hen, and both her daughters teased her about it. She called them three times a day to see how they were. She just wanted them to be happy. For the past twenty years, her daughters had been the main focus of Liz’s life. She didn’t want to be like her own mother and miss the boat on motherhood. So she had dropped everything for them, and now that they were gone, she wasn’t even sure she could still write. She had promised herself she would try, but nothing came, and she dreaded being on vacation with her family again, and having to explain to them, again, why she had done nothing for the past year. How did you explain that to people like them?
As far as Liz was concerned, her brother Phillip was second only to their mother in the astounding empire she’d built on her own, with their father’s silent, loving support. Phillip was the pretender to the throne. His wife was a successful attorney, a partner in an important law firm, and looked down her nose at them all. She was beautiful, sleek, well dressed, and had assured all of them she was going to be a judge. Liz’s brother John was an incredible artist and a genius in design. His wife had a doctorate and was a professor of literature at Princeton. And her baby sister, Cass, never came on the summer birthday trips. She had distanced herself from all of them since their father’s death but had become one of the most important music producers in the world, based in London, and for the past five years was living with a world-famous rock star ten years younger than she was, Danny Hell. Liz constantly asked herself how she could compete with people like them. All she had ever done was write a few lame short stories, have two failed marriages, and bring up two wonderful girls. Sophie and Carole were her only accomplishment, and no one in her family was impressed by that. She knew they all thought she was a total failure.
Her mother was always kind about her writing and tried to encourage her, but Liz feared she was just being polite. They felt sorry for her. Liz had been floundering and fighting to keep her head above water all her life. The only thing she’d ever been confident about was mothering her kids. It was the one thing she was sure of, where she never doubted herself, and she loved her daughters more than anyone or anything in the world. But she was also the only one in her family who had never finished college, had been married more than once, and whose marriages had failed. She had no career, lived on her trust, and had been paralyzed by her fear of failure all her life.
Liz lived in a Connecticut farmhouse she’d been meaning to remodel and rebuild since she’d bought it ten years before, and she’d never managed to do that either. She just never got around to it. Although the bones and structure of the place were beautiful, it was a mess, constantly leaking, with things breaking that she never quite knew how to fix. In some ways, her life seemed like her house to her: it had potential but was disintegrating quietly and falling apart. And now she had to go on vacation with all of them again. She didn’t have the guts to do what her younger sister did every year, and turn their mother down and refuse to go. Instead, Liz always did what was expected of her, never wanted to upset anyone, so she and the girls went
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