Globe and Mail: I Know Nothing About Raising Her Right

Art by Tara Hardy as published in the Globe and Mail, August 21, 2013

At the moment of our daughter’s conception, we threw caution to the wind, but soon found ourselves scrambling to get it back.

It’s not that we didn’t want a baby, but we had debts to pay, grad programs to start and a pathological fear of minivans that hung heavily over bi-monthly talks titled “Children and Other Distractions.”

Circuitous conversations, they went something like this: “Let’s try to have a kid – but we’ll need a new car – we can’t afford that – so we’ll just work a little longer – but if I had another degree surely I’d make more money – yeah, let’s wait to finish school – but then I’ll be too old – fine, let’s try to have a kid – but…”

On the evening in question, her dad declared: “Seriously, will there ever be a good time?” Locked in an embrace that would distract him from that question, I never did voice the fear that hovered above my right ear: What if we raise her wrong?
I know so little about everything. Well, at least everything that is important to raising a child right.


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This essay, originally titled Trust Me: I Don't Know,consumed me the month after my son was born: writing between feedings, editing in the middle of the night. It has been written and rewritten a dozen of times since. Today, it found a home off my hard drive, in a very condensed format (there are about 2000 words more), in the Globe and Mail.

If you enjoyed this narrative non-fiction style, check out my other essays: My Neighborhood In Transition and Backyard Betrayal.

Alberta Views: My Neighbourhood in Transition

 This was a piece I wrote for a competition that, like so many, I never won. The great thing about writing for competitions (besides helping to support many of my favorite print magazines with the registration fees) is that the exercise presents a deadline to work toward. Working alone can be rather uninspiring: deadlines are my critical 'kick in the butt'.

I've lived in Alberta Avenue in downtown Edmonton, Alberta for eight years: we moved here just as the community received millions of dollars of revitalization funding from the City of Edmonton. It's been an interesting, critical, transitional time to live here and this piece is, in part, an exercise exploring my relationship with my neighbourhood and with my neighbours.

See the PDF here. It first printed in Alberta Views in April 2012.