The Big Rumpus: A Mother's Tale from the Trenches

I am probably the last mom on the block to read Ayun Halliday's hilarious momior, THE BIG RUMPUS (Seal Press, 2002). I wish I had read it sooner. Rarely does a book force me to put it down while I laugh. This one did. My husband kept looking at me suspiciously as I chuckled to myself, holding my sides. He may have been wondering if I was laughing at him. But no, I was laughing at the high-density, fast-paced, irony-laden, stand-up comedy routine that Halliday offers up to her readers alongside a coffee and bagel. I got a caffeine contact buzz just from reading it. You might know New Yorker Halliday from the quarterly zine she publishes, THE EAST VILLAGE INKY, but if you don't, it is time to get acquainted, especially for mama writers. The opening chapter about the beginning of the zine describes the author's desire to make her life into art, and will resonate with any mother who thinks she has caught a glimpse of the creative potential inherent in motherhood. Halliday shows us a hip, less than perfect mother who writes and draws and loves through the chaos of child care, housekeeping, and the streets of the Big Apple. While she mourns the identity she lost as a radical theater performer, she revels in her new role as revolutionary mama writer, freeing the city she loves from dangerous mother stereotypes. I found her book refreshing and entertaining.But it isn't all laughs. I was also moved by Halliday's more introspective moods, as when she describes her daughter's stay in the intensive care unit that followed her birth. Or when she says what we all think but don't say about our fears that our children will die before us. Or when her mother love extends out into the world to mourn others' tragedies. These moments provide weight and depth to the book that help support the more general hilarity of other sections. As a mom who is not very hip myself, I found reading THE BIG RUMPUS to be a little like walking through urban streets wearing my country boots. But because Halliday is such a good guide, I was able to appreciate the local color, as well as find points of connection between the unfamiliar inhabitants of her world and the more familiar of mine. I recommend this book to anyone who wants to take herself, and motherhood, a little less seriously.

Rumpus: uproar, chaos, fracas, bedlam...see parenthood.What Ariel Gore does for the single young mother on welfare in The Mother Trip, Ayun Halliday does for the older mother of young children in an urban setting. The message from the trenches is loud and clear: we may not be June Cleaver, but we love our messy imps.Ayun Halliday writes with humor and love of her husband Greg and two children, Inky and Milo. Their day-to-day adventures stomping through the streets of the Big Apple make hilarious and heart-tugging reading. Halliday is particularly gifted at capturing the wisdom of her preschool-aged daughter who says things like "Daddy smells bad" as the Dad in question is puking his guts out while Halliday is going into labor with her second child. Birth and nursing stories aside, Halliday writes from the perspective of someone who has landed on a strange planet and is determined to make the best of it. In other words, she gives voice to the kind of mother I find myself being, which makes her work almost impossible to put down.

Okay, I've read something like 20 books about parenting but I related to none of them. They all embraced scrapbooking, stenciling, etc. and I thought 'Who does this?' Then I read The Big Rumpus, a refreshing look at life from a real mother's perspective. Halliday is an intelligent woman who does endless mom tasks, struggles with philosophies of motherhood, and (YAY) nurses her babes while figuring out how to get around NYC. She says things that I've thought but never dared say - (Sigh) I'm not alone! If you are a mom, want to be a mom, care for children, or want to read about a cool woman's adventures in the big city, read this book. If you nurse, have an intact son, co-sleep, wear your baby, and/or know how to laugh at yourself, buy this book. If you are 30-something and want to remember high school, read this book. If you love or hate the holidays, read this book. Heck, I think anyone will find this book touching, funny and just plain entertaining. Buy this book, you'll be glad you did.

Built on the bones of her four-year-old 'zine, The East Village Inky, Halliday's book expands on the experiences of (in her phrase) "a certain transplanted Hoosier mother tromping around Brooklyn, the East Village and several subway lines, more or less joyously burdened with an infant, a coughing three-thumbed three-year-old desperate to kiss him, a big broken orange bag, a Bug's Life lunchbox, an ill-advised plastic sackful of bulk food and a deteriorating stroller." Fans of her quarterly, hand-lettered, forty page 'zine will find the same irreverent, self-deprecating tone in Halliday's tales of rearing her young in the asphalt jungle (though they'll have to settle for a mere half dozen of her endearingly quirky pen-and-ink illustrations). A former massage therapist, off-off-Broadway actress, and waitress, Halliday had feared that her urban hipster life was over after the birth of her first child, India (the eponymous "Inky"). Instead, she's transformed the minutiae of their daily doings into these funky and often touching stories that embrace universal themes (high-spirited preschoolers, sleep deprivation, weaning) while providing a nose-against-the-glass tour of big city life with kids: falafel joints, rooftop parties, and multi-culti friendships forged on tarmacked playgrounds. Mommy voyeurism at its best.

Ayun Halliday is the perfect combination of artsy New York sophistication and Midwest down-to-earth modesty. She manages to reach into the reader's heart and mind, extract everything most real and vital about motherhood and spread that knowledge and love out for all to see. Nobody can make you feel as proud about having gone through the delousing experience as Ayun does in 'Nitpicking.' Nobody articulates the unthinkable so clearly, so beautifully horribly, as Ayun does in 'Spare Us.' She does all this by sharing her own stories, told with the same sideways earnest wit that makes countless subscribers squeal with pleasure when the latest East Village Inky arrives in the mailbox. Only, The Big Rumpus has more words (lots of 'em!), less pictures and an even bigger heart. EVI is the still-warm chips and fresh salsa that brings you into the restaurant; The Big Rumpus is the Burrito Grande. Yum.