Susan Lynn Peterson
My name is Susan Lynn Peterson. On most days you'll find me behind my computer writing or out in the garden growing vegetables. I love a good carrot, a good day at the lake, and a good dvd (preferably with horseradish potato chips and homemade hard apple cider). I enjoy Tai Chi and karate, am hugely impressed by the way regular acupuncture and Chinese herbs have improved my life, and have never met a cat I couldn't enjoy a conversation with. I tend to make sense of my life in terms of lagom (a Swedish word, which when fleshed out a bit means something like "the art of moderation"). And I was green long before it was trendy.
As for my writing, I'm working on a new edition of "Legends of the Martial Arts Masters" and a novel tentatively titled "How I became a Middle-Aged Warrior on my Summer Vacation".
“Just because it’s natural doesn’t mean you can be as stupid as you want with it.”
“Things were different back then. Today if a woman was asked to do the things we did back then, she would revolt, declare that she wasn’t anyone’s slave, wouldn’t be put upon in that fashion. But you have to remember that this was before automatic washers and dishwashers, before blenders and electric knives. If the carpet was going to get cleaned, someone, usually a woman, would have to take a broom to it, or would have to haul it on her shoulders to the yard and beat the dirt out of it. If the wet clothes were going to get dry, someone had to hang them in the yard, take them down from the yard, heat the iron on the fire, press them, and finally fold or hang them. Food was chopped by hand, fires were stoked by hand, water was carried by hand, anything roasted, toasted, broiled, dried, beaten, pressed, packed, or pickled, was done so by hand. Our version of a laborsaving device was called a spouse. If a man had a woman by his side, he didn’t have to clean and cook for himself. If a woman had a man by her side, she didn’t have to go out, earn a living, then come home and wrestle the house to the ground in the evening.”
“What did you work at?” Colum asked, shifting a bit on the bench to look more directly at me.“I was in service,” I said quietly, more quietly than I intended. I wondered if maybe the answer had gotten lost in the rumble of the engines. It didn’t.“Honest work,” Colum said. I knew that that was what people say about work they consider beneath them. Hauling and scrubbing and digging are “honest work.” Grubbing and mucking? “Honest work.” Tell someone you’re a doctor or a mill owner, and they never say “honest work.”
“When Americans find out I grew up in the tenements, the question they invariably ask me is “how did you end up there?” Americans, it seems, find comfort in reasons and explanations. They honestly believe that if they can find the reason for someone else’s misfortune, they can avoid that misfortune themselves. If they could find out how I ended up in the tenements, they could assure themselves that it could never have happened to them.”