Luann Tennant Coyne

Category: Mothers

A Day for Gratitude

Begonia with red flowers, isolated on white.

In 1961, in a small town in rural Michigan, a first-grade teacher helped her students fill paper cups with dirt and plant a begonia seed in each cup. I was in that class. We set our paper cups on the sun-drenched windowsill of our classroom and, in between learning East from West and North from… Continue reading A Day for Gratitude

The Gift of Hope

People think that only the elderly, living single, forgotten lives, can feel lonely and despondent.  People do not realize that the young, invisible in a crowd, can feel just as lonely, and just as miserable. When I was in sixth grade, I felt terminally different. I felt like a total misfit, a permanent ugly duckling… Continue reading The Gift of Hope

Lilac Legacy

Each of the pass-along plants in my yard comes with a story.  The most powerful story, however, comes from the lilac bush, and with it, an unsolved mystery. When my husband and I built our new home, my mother gave me a piece of the lilac growing at her retirement home on Island Lake in… Continue reading Lilac Legacy

Growing Peace

Peace is something that we humans have to work at, if we want it.  We have to cultivate it, in our families, our relationships, and our communities. My grandmother did all those things. She even grew peace in her garden. It was a hot summer afternoon at my grandparents’ farm in Northern Michigan, in the… Continue reading Growing Peace

The Job of a Grandmother

The job of a grandparent is to make a grandchild feel beloved, special, secure.  My grandmother did that for her grandchildren. Now I try to do that for my own grandchildren. World events can and do storm around us, but as grandparents we put aside our fears and concerns to give our grandchildren time and… Continue reading The Job of a Grandmother

Self-Care is Not Selfish

I found becoming the mother of a newborn terrifying. I was completely responsible for this helpless mite.  What if I screwed up?  What if I forgot to do something crucial? How could I possibly think of myself when this little one needed (and demanded) everything from me? I went into hyper-caretaking mode. Every moment (and… Continue reading Self-Care is Not Selfish

A Crater in My Life

It is Autumn, when a new batch of teenagers go away to college and a new batch of “empty-nester” parents learn to live a childless life, one no longer consumed by the ticking clock of responsibility for another human being. What do you do when a role that has kept you busy for 18 years,… Continue reading A Crater in My Life

A Mother’s Day Wish

I have a Mother’s Day Wish. It is for every woman, since we all mother in one way or another. My Mother’s Day Wish is that each of us, for one day, put aside all criticism of ourselves and of others, and practice what mothers do instinctively, 365 days of the year… join in the unending circle of unconditional love that makes the universe go round.

Mother’s Blue Bowl (Follow the Wind)

exc-5e343b032b2d5a648e39dc8a

We all have them.

Memories tied up in wood, or glass. Physical artifacts containing invisible family stories of the people whose blood pulses through our veins. Stories that tie us to the past, but also give us vision and courage for the here and now. 

Such an item is my mother’s blue glass bowl.