Blue Suburbia, Laurie Lico Albanese (New York: HarperCollins, 2004)

Billed as “almost a memoir,” this is an autobiography written in free verse. She tells her story of a childhood with an abusive father, who himself was abused by his father, and a cold, distant, unhappy mother, whom I would imagine was clinically depressed. She escapes her hometown and gets herself to college, and then eventually into a good marriage and motherhood. Yet her past haunts her, and her fears of becoming like her mother and mistreating her children, combined with suffering from anxiety disorder, overwhelms her. Therapy helps, meds help, and she turns herself around yet again. As someone with anxiety disorder who finally sought help at age 37, those passages of the book speak to me in a very special way.

It is a real accomplishment of writing. Although spare, her writing is so effective that I feel that I know her better than others who have written their memoirs in prose, in long, winding prose.

Among the highlights for me are the following.

In “Minding My Own Business,” she writes about her husband being accepted into an MBA program and choosing to quit his job and go to school full-time. She is apprehensive about finances and such, noting that while her husband sees an opportunity,

“I see
the difference
between growing up
middle class
with the promise
of more to come

and growing up
in the shadow
of the jailhouse.” (95)

The jail was built in her town when she was young, and it was built near her school. An earlier poem tells of her father teaching her self-defense techniques so she would be prepared when an escaped convict attacked her, something her father felt was certain to happen. (And yes, I asked myself why she didn’t use some of these techniques on him.)

In “Working Again,” she has triumphantly become employed as a reporter for the local paper, what she calls the “manic fulfillment” of all she has been through (142). The poem closes with

“empowerment
comes from being a big fish
in a small pond

and I don’t mean
the kind that has to float on the bottom
during winter
to stay alive.” (143)

One of the last segments is titled “Ordinary” and it begins:

“Is it dull
to have an ordinary life
or is it glorious?

I think it depends on the day
and what you think is ordinary

and how true
is your love.” (193)

It’s stunning work, and one of the most affecting things I’ve read in years.