Mary Novaria

As seen in the Huffington Post There's a meme going around, the one with two precious little girls in frilly, white matching outfits. One of them stands on the bathroom scale while the other says, "Try again without the socks."  It's meant to be cute and funny and, on the surface it is. I'm sure I've "liked" it more than once (along with tens of thousands of other women) as friends have posted it on Facebook, maybe even LOL'd or ha ha'd in the comments, because who among us has not commiserated with a girlfriend about our weight? One particular day, though, I got on my own bathroom scale and when the image of those two angelic preschoolers popped into my mind I was angry. Maybe the meme is just as much about friendship as weight, but I couldn't stop thinking about the heavy implications. What is cute or funny about these adorable creatures obsessing about a number on the scale? Feeling even at the tender age of 3 or 4, that they sho...

My latest on Huffington Post! My Friend Thinks I Don't Work Because I'm a Writer | Mary Novaria And, a really cool thing happened... Author Anne Rice, shared my piece on her Facebook page. Wish I could have "liked" it more than once. And then this happened. Ciao!

Photo by Sam Lamott Tonight, I got to bask in the glow of Anne Lamott’s wise, self-deprecating humor and the humility of one who always seems slightly flabbergasted that so many of us have come to worship at her feet. She’s stumping (somewhat reluctantly because she doesn’t like flying and gets lonely away from home) for her new book Stitches , which she began writing last December in a search for meaning and forgiveness after the tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn.   I have no idea how many of the hordes of people—mostly women—who came to see Annie tonight at All Saints Church in Pasadena are writers, but I have a feeling there were plenty of us. We hung on her every word, leaning in a tad more closely for the nuggets that relate to our craft. Here are a few… Write what you would like to come upon. In other words tell a story that you’d like to read. Most miracles involve writing. It seems she, like me , doesn’t always know what she’s thin...

This year I ditched liturgy and tradition for Anne Lamott. No foot washing. No stripping of the altar. No Stations of the Cross. Like a friend said, "There will be other Maundy Thursdays..." Instead, I went to see Annie... to hear her read from her latest, Grace (Eventually) , to answer questions ("How's Sam?"), and to bask in her honest, self-deprecating, spirituality. Few people have the self-awareness of Anne Lamott. Most who do have developed it through the painful, gut-wrenching, process of recovery... of getting lost and finding a way back. Few are able to share their shortcomings, jealousies and sins with another human being even in the sanctity of a confessional or confidentiality of a Fifth Step. Anne Lamott puts it all out there. She confesses ugly thoughts, and words that have escaped and can't be taken back. She confides that she has betrayed a friend and slapped her teenage son. She was drunk. She got sober. She struggles with her body im...