Honestly, as someone who is writing an intergenerational memoir of their Bangladeshi grandmother as their thesis, this piece of literature hit home for me. At first, I will say I searched everywhere to find some kind of translation option, and even if it was there.. I probably didn’t understand it haha. I will also say that, I love when writers include their native tongue in their work because representation truly matters. I can’t imagine how readers of Latin American or Colombian descent feel when they see their roots being told into a story. As someone who is married to a Puerto Rican Colombian, I was ecstatic while going through this piece. Now, on to the actual piece itself. Retratos vivos de mamá is definitely a read that made me work work work! Having to translate every page was tedious, but worth it. The topic of your parents life before kids isn’t usually spoken about that often… until its too late. I see many grieving videos of people who lost a parent and they always add: “I wish I asked them about their childhood”. I know so much about my grandmother who is so dear to me, but not as much as my own mothers life. I grew up in a very rocky relationship with my mother, and have resented her for many years for a traumatic childhood. After I moved out from NYC and started my life here in NJ, we have gotten closer and our relationship has been healing. Now that we’re closer (ish), I do find myself wondering how my mother was at my age.. or even younger. Im 26 and by then she already had two daughters lol. This may be quite dark, but I have this feeling that my mother will be the topic of all of my writing when she passes one day… as she is the topic of all my poetry now. After reading this piece, I want to know more about my mothers childhood, her boyfriend, the men before my father, and all of her interests that probably were passed down to me. I especially enjoyed towards the end of the pages when the writer says “ I found out how much of her lives in me and his much of me I put in her when I write”. Because thats essentially what my own work consists of. Lastly, I do appreciate the “book” form the electronic lit piece takes because you get to flip through a sort of old “Scrapbook”. 

Writers are not Strangers 

I am a sucker for interactive stories. Ever since we did Facade and then Tyler’s Google Forms one, we’re been on a roll! I will say the connection between Alix’s mother dying and us also reading Retratos vivos de mamá is uncanny! I think as writers we were all pretty honest with our ratings because we would want the same for ourselves. I have been really enjoying having the control in a story because maybe thats the chaotic person in me trying to ruin things. I guess I was also trying to see what would happen if rated it like a 1 and then pressed on the options that weren’t so great..which is what I did. I feel like the game was trying to punish me because I swear it was never ending. I think since I was playing the game as a jerk, there were significant pieces I was missing out on.. so I am really interested to see how Hunter tackles this piece!