Great Barrington — Growing up in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in the mid-1970s, Suzi Banks Baum recalls a single instance of “mutual recognition that [she] had a body that was doing something.” Baum was in middle school when she got her first period; not wanting to miss a field trip, to go swimming at a pool with friends, her mother suggested she go to the corner store and buy some tampons. There, Baum was dismayed to find them on a shelf too high to reach; as asking for help from the only employee, a teenage boy, was entirely out of the question, she left empty handed. It was her father who ultimately returned to purchase the box of tampons and congratulate his daughter upon delivering them. The end.
Except it wasn’t really the end at all, because Baum was in middle school and her journey with a woman’s body had just begun.
As has been her approach with myriad topics in the ensuing decades, Baum eventually embraced the mess and found a creative outlet for making sense of it—as evidenced by her essay “Connect: Disconnect,” winner of the Honeybee Creative Nonfiction award from The Good Life Review. The award-winning essay (Baum’s second, both excerpts from her memoir in progress) delves into adolescent life, sexual exploration, sexual identity, confusion, and education (or lack thereof) in midwestern American culture in the 1970s—issues that remain highly relevant in today’s world.
While Baum received a jar of Nebraskan honey in addition to her award from the prestigious publication, the winning review nods to writing more salty than sweet. “‘Connect: Disconnect’ strikes me with its unapologetic exploration of the power and pleasure of female sexuality,” wrote contest judge Jessica Hendry Nelson. “With fine attention to language and cadence, it combs memory to unpack a complicated legacy of want and wonder. This essay does not flinch, capitulate, or mitigate. In charting her voracities, the narrator reminds the reader of the vital power of her own.” Baum’s essay was inspired by the NYTimes Magazine cover article by Merritt Tierce entitled “The Abortion I Didn’t Have.”
Baum brings a distinctive woman-centered focus to her work as a writer, book and mixed-media artist, and teacher; from her very own backyard in the Berkshires to Gyumri, Armenia, Baum’s approach (and by extension process) resonates with women from all walks of life. As to the tie binding the seemingly disparate mediums together? “I’ve pretty much spent my life in pursuit of a different narrative [than the one I grew up with],” Baum says of her affinity for all of these different, messy processes that inevitably create “an irresistible invitation to express … [and] we need these reminders that our voices are valuable and important and necessary.”
At its root, the conversation hinges on raising children—in particular daughters. “And we just don’t have enough uplift yet,” says Baum, underscoring the inherent elevation, or position of reverence, the process should entail. This week, 50 years after American women took to the streets to burn their bras in a statement of solidarity while seeking equal rights, women across Iran are burning their hijabs and cutting their hair in a statement of protest (following the death of a 22-year-old who was arrested by the morality police for improperly wearing her hijab). Which simply means the work continues.
On a recent weekday morning, under the auspices of drinking tea and discussing memoir, I visited Baum in her garage-cum-studio (a sparse albeit stunning space). Spent marigold blooms—lauded for their generosity of hue, scent, and texture—were littered artfully upon a blanket to dry in the cool fall air. As I listened to Baum speak, I felt my body lean forward in an effort to capture each and every last word that escaped her lips. Using language I consumed, as if quenching an insatiable thirst, Baum gave voice to, “the [crushing] weight of expectations” coupled with “the female body as a barometer.” Her message was peppered with mention of choice, acceptance, surrender, agency—largely, it seems, on the part of those doing the parenting; upon closer examination, we must embrace these ways of walking for ourselves, and handle each arduous step along the way with the same grace we’d invariably show another.
Baum likens it to “put[ting] [something] in [a child’s] lap and model[ing] how to hold it,” a practice she finds equally applicable to animals and uncomfortable conversations—plus dozens of others in between. Empowering young people with these types of tools is how we raise them and ensure that, as we send them out into the world and into other relationships—where this way of moving and conversing may not be welcome—that they understand the inherent power, and by extension value, of their voices.
Of her own experience, Baum “got lifted up all right … by witnessing births and deaths, by living life filled with curiosity,” something she equates to bearing witness—which might be the most important work of all.
On Sunday, October 9, Berkshire residents will have the rare opportunity to see Baum’s work in person at her inaugural open studio event at 39 Hollenbeck Avenue in Great Barrington from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. She’ll demonstrate the process of eco-dyeing paper (around 11:30 a.m.) and offer a small book form for people to try (around 2 p.m.); a selection of Baum’s hand-bound books and original decorative papers will also be available for sale.
In the meantime, Baum continues to issue an open-ended invitation, to join her “out here, in this very tangible beautiful [world] that’s here for you—no matter what sex you are, no matter who you are, no matter what your past is. And let’s get messy; let’s experience a really tactile joyfulness. Your story is safe here.”
NOTE: Suzi Banks Baum dwells at the crossroad of literary and visual arts. A writer, mixed media and book artist, she expresses the holy ordinary. Her devotion to daily creative practice is the super-food for her signature teachings: Backyard Art Camp, the Powder Keg Writing Workshops, and Advent Dark Journal. She travels to Gyumri, Armenia to teach the book arts to women artists. Baum’s book, An Anthology of Babes, gives voice to 36 artist mothers; in addition, her work has appeared in Kerning literary magazine (2021); The Collection: Flash Fiction for Flash Memory by Anchala Studios; and the Walloon Writers Review. Her piece, Shoal, won third prize in the Hypertext Literary Magazine Doro Böhme Memorial Contest in 2021. Her mixed media work appears in Storey Publications 2022 release, Collage Your Life! by Melanie Mowinski. In addition to Baum’s winning essay from her memoir-in-progress, her artistic work has been featured in The Guild of Book Workers Journal and Mingle Magazine. Baum’s signature offering of Advent Dark Journal, a six week immersion in creative practice, begins in late November and concludes in early January.
