Return guest! Jamie Figueroa, MOTHER ISLAND: A Daughter Claims Puerto Rico
[0:02]Hi, I'm Zippy Owens, and I am the host of this podcast, Mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[0:08]I am also a newly minted USA Today best-selling author of the novel, Blake.
[0:14]I've created a whole community of book lovers around this podcast, a publishing company,
[0:19]reading retreats, a bookstore, and more. Learn more at ZippyMedia.com or follow me on social
[0:25]at Zippy Owens or join the community at Zippy Readers.
[0:31]Jamie Figurilla is back on Mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books to discuss Mother Island,
[0:36]a daughter claims Puerto Rico. Jamie is the author of the critically acclaimed novel,
[0:40]Brother Sister Mother Explorer, long-listed for the Center for Fictions for a Snowball Prize,
[0:45]and shortlisted for the Reading the West Book Award, Figurilla's debut novel,
[0:50]Brims with Snowbinding Pros, Magical Elements, and Wounded Full-Harded Characters that
[0:55]nearly jump off the page. Faculty in the MFA Creative Writing Program at the Institute of American
[1:00]Indian Arts, Figurilla's writing has appeared in American Short Fiction, Emergence Magazine,
[1:06]Elle McSweeney's Agni, The New York Times, and the Boston Review among others.
[1:11]A Vona alum, she received a Truman Capote Award and was a bread loaf Rona Jaffy Scholar.
[1:16]Bori Qia, Afro Tano, by way of Ohio, Figurilla is a long-time residence of Northern New Mexico.
[1:22]Welcome, Jamie. Thank you so much for coming back on Mom's Don't Have Time to Read
[1:26]Bex to discuss Mother Island, a daughter claims Puerto Rico. This book was so beautiful. Oh my gosh,
[1:33]congratulations. Thank you so very much. I appreciate all the work that you do in the world.
[1:39]It's so inspiring and I really appreciate you having me back. Oh my gosh, seriously. I mean,
[1:45]the way you write really about everything, but even like there was a passage you wrote about
[1:51]the hot stones that you were using for your massages and how they were like just melting into your
[1:56]clients' backs and the heat and at like I am in the room with you. I'm feeling all of it.
[2:01]I'm feeling like it's all like gerina. It's amazing. The way you put us in a scene
[2:07]and make us think sort of spiritually about touch and love and all of it, it's really powerful.
[2:14]So thank you so much. You know the thing about touch is that it's such an integral key to belonging,
[2:23]right? In that foundational aspect between mother and child and also has so much to do with
[2:29]our own human essence and the need to thrive, right? And so really tiny ones and the elderly
[2:36]and that need to feel a sense of belonging with with human connection. So that was really important
[2:41]to you include that even though for a long time I didn't talk about being massage therapist.
[2:46]I love that part. I really like not just one part. I mean it goes throughout.
[2:52]Well, wait, why don't you back up and tell listeners what your memoir is about and how it came to be
[2:58]and maybe touch on the note at the beginning about what happened last time you wrote about your
[3:02]family, which I was like, huh, I did not even realize that, but okay. Yeah, you know this book
[3:11]really came about through the conversations I had after publishing the novel a few years ago,
[3:17]right? During the pandemic and being in so many rooms and intimately speaking with other writers,
[3:22]mainly women, mainly black and indigenous and people of color wanting to talk about the novel
[3:27]and I found myself talking about myself and my mother. That's interesting. There's characters
[3:33]here and they're not the same people, but yet what are the stories they keep going back to,
[3:38]as a way to connect? And so I realized if I didn't spend time telling this story, that it would
[3:46]drive every single story that I told, right? And so I really had to spend time and a very thoughtful
[3:53]and thorough way. Even though there was so much baggage, like you mentioned at the beginning of
[3:58]the book, I talk about how the last time I wanted to speak about my family and do it in a way that
[4:02]I thought was really honoring and honest. There was mass rejection from my mother's family and
[4:10]I understand that now for sure and it took a long time to heal from that. I thought I'm only
[4:15]gonna write fiction. And then I realized that I had work to do and giving myself permission
[4:22]to telling a story and I started thinking about silence and I started thinking about how we silence
[4:29]ourselves, how we silence each other, the lineages of silence, and who really gives us permission
[4:35]to tell our stories. And so all of that was part of moving forward with this. And you know,
[4:41]it's a story that very much started with my mother's story. In the early years of therapy, I'd
[4:46]go to therapy. I would say tell me about yourself and I would tell my mother's story and then they
[4:50]would look at me like, huh? And so I get their method. And also I think what I was trying to say
[5:00]was that as an Afro-Indigenous person from the Caribbean, what I'm bringing into the room with me
[5:06]are all the generations which have impact on my life on a day-to-day basis. I didn't know to say that
[5:12]at the time. I noticed they that now. And also going through my mother's story, the portal of my
[5:18]mother into a larger expression of mothering from a culture and an island of Puerto Rico and
[5:24]feeling that understanding and sense of connection and belonging. And then ultimately going through
[5:30]that portal into the largest expression of what it is to be constantly muddered by forces that
[5:39]surround us all the time and to be in connection with that what I call divine force of constant
[5:46]nurturing, protection, you know, life-affirming and life-giving force and all those complexities
[5:53]and all its complexities. Wow. Well, when you tell your mother's story and you do so really
[6:00]beautifully, not only her many relationships and how it affected your childhood, all the moving and
[6:06]the packing and oh my gosh, the one scene you have in the middle of the night where you're all,
[6:10]you know, and you're like she wouldn't have been able to leave otherwise and you were in the car
[6:14]these moments that you depict are so vivid and, you know, they're like hard grasping moments,
[6:20]but how can you tell your own story without talking about how displaced you continually were
[6:25]over time and then you trace it back also to your mother's being left up given up for adoption
[6:31]and her search for mothering and not knowing how to be a mother. And then at the end you being a
[6:36]a mother. I mean, it's like this perfect like thing. How do you, I mean, I know how do you make
[6:43]sense of it? It's your entire book, but having a mom who had all that stuff obviously you want
[6:49]to talk about it in therapy, but how do you deal with that in a day-to-day setting and
[6:54]how do you conceptualize it and all of that? Yeah, that's a really great question and
[7:01]it's sort of get some traction with it because it is such a big question. People say to me often
[7:08]hearing about this story, as you get older, you come to have a greater sense of compassion
[7:14]understanding for your parents. And I think, yeah, that's true, but it's not necessarily the way
[7:20]in which they're meaning it. Like all is okay under the umbrella of they were doing the best that
[7:26]they could. What I have found is I've come to understand the many facets of my mother. I have come
[7:33]to understand all the contexts, her own histories, her family's history, how the social and political
[7:42]context just comes to bear on a human being and their choices and their ability to be present for
[7:51]their families, provide for their families, imagine the future in a way that feels healthy and
[7:57]good and supportive. That's a different way that I'm answering that question that I'm being asked
[8:03]right about having this greater sense of compassion for my mother. And also what I've come to
[8:10]understand, Zippy, is my mother is a force of life that I will never fully know. I'm her youngest
[8:21]daughter. I had that contextual relationship with her. I tried to turn it around as many possible
[8:29]ways and shine light in all the different ways I possibly could and implicate myself as well.
[8:34]And also I will never fully understand her. She will never fully understand me. We are whole
[8:41]worlds that are in and out of orbiting each other. And I feel like that is the most honest
[8:48]and most loving and most compassionate way I can be with her. Well thank you to all the therapists
[8:55]who enabled you to come up with that answer. It was awesome. Can I read this section? It's
[9:08]towards the end, but I just thought it was so beautiful. Is that okay? He's twice more in my life.
[9:13]I have felt what I could not see. Both times it was in a bedroom when I was fighting sleep,
[9:18]longing to be tucked in. At the end of the bed was a wait, like someone's sitting, my feet pinned
[9:23]by the blanket, and then another wait on my ankle or lower leg, reassuring comforting,
[9:28]protecting a maternal presence comforted me. I was not alone. I will always need a mother no matter
[9:34]what age I am and she will not be there. I've been in mourning about this all my life. And while I
[9:39]resist claiming where my mother and I are the same as if to resist her is to define myself as if
[9:44]making choices opposite to hers make me unto my own. Here is where we are no different. She has
[9:50]also spent her entire life in mourning for her mother. I will always need a mother and she will not
[9:55]be there. I will construct her out of the natural world from trees and f-
[10:00]flowers, roots, and remedies,
[10:01]from warm waters and heavy blankets,
[10:03]soothing mugs of hot drinks,
[10:05]and dreams that speak to me for days.
[10:07]I will assemble her from another form of chosen family,
[10:10]grannies and mamas, aunties, and sister friends,
[10:13]who will meet and hold all of me.
[10:14]I will put one hand over my heart and one hand over my belly,
[10:18]and I will breathe into the fullness of my body,
[10:20]breathe against time, space, and time.
[10:23]Oh, so gorgeous.
[10:26]Thank you, Zippy.
[10:27]Oh, my gosh.
[10:28]I mean, how does that feel like to hear all that?
[10:30]First of all, you write it's like poetry and prayer,
[10:33]like all mixed up, right?
[10:34]It sounds like it's so spiritual the way you write.
[10:37]I don't mean it in a hokey way.
[10:39]I hope you know it feels so reverent in a way,
[10:42]the way that you construct your sentences even.
[10:44]So just tell me, how does that feel?
[10:47]How do you feel about that?
[10:49]That feels beautiful to hear you read it,
[10:51]and it also feels very much like the place
[10:54]that I am called to return.
[10:58]It's bittersweet, it's really bittersweet
[11:01]to have gotten to the place of being able to acknowledge that,
[11:04]feels triumphant, feels like generational repair,
[11:09]and also the morning and the longing
[11:13]and coming to that place of understanding through lack.
[11:18]That's a particular path that leaves marks.
[11:21]So being in that space is challenging
[11:26]and also to be in the present moment,
[11:31]which we're all called to do, of course.
[11:33]We could talk about that for a long time,
[11:35]but what is here in the present moment
[11:40]is so much connection and support and community and love
[11:46]and I'll tell you some things to be going around the country
[11:48]and doing readings and having other buddy,
[11:52]what people in the audience, you know what?
[11:55]First, I thought to be quite honest,
[11:57]I was really scared of being in front of Puerto Rican people
[12:02]that I didn't know with a regard me
[12:05]as my family has regarded me.
[12:07]I'm sure they don't need me to tell a Puerto Rican story.
[12:10]There are many, I wasn't sure how it would be received,
[12:13]and so I was quite nervous.
[12:14]And what I have found, and this makes me emotional,
[12:20]what I have found is on the whole people
[12:24]who are ultimately saying to me with their stories
[12:28]and with the way in which they look at me in regard me,
[12:31]is that they see me and they hear me
[12:35]and they honor and respect my story
[12:37]and that we stand together in this place of repair
[12:42]and we stand in it with dignity and with love
[12:45]and with honesty and with integrity.
[12:47]And that's something that my mother could not give me
[12:50]but that the larger community of Puerto Rican people
[12:54]that I've been in connection with are reflecting back
[12:57]to me and giving to me and to have that gift
[13:01]in a lifetime is really tremendous.
[13:05]Well, that's amazing.
[13:07]Well, I'm so happy, I'm really happy for you.
[13:10]I mean, you never know what writing a book is gonna do.
[13:14]You don't, it's so true.
[13:18]You put it out there and think of the people
[13:20]that you're helping feel a sense of home
[13:23]and a sense of belonging and it's never so cut and dried
[13:27]for anyone and hearing each other's stories,
[13:29]that's all we can do, that's amazing, that's amazing.
[13:33]Yeah.
[13:34]So Jamie, writing this book,
[13:36]were you crying at passages?
[13:37]Was it like a creative analytic part of your brain?
[13:40]Like how did it come about and you go back in time
[13:43]a lot and you speak in different voices
[13:46]really from time to time and third person
[13:48]and first, like you're, it's a pastiche, right?
[13:51]How did you do that?
[13:54]Well, I spent a lot of time writing in my notebook
[13:58]about this material, probably not nearly 20 years.
[14:02]And so these stories and these relationships
[14:05]over and over and over again
[14:08]in some ways much more raw
[14:10]in some ways much more superficial.
[14:12]All the ways, right, of writing about this.
[14:15]And that's also something that I want to highlight
[14:18]is the way in which we are in relationship
[14:21]with our own writing.
[14:23]Yes, we want to share it.
[14:24]Yes, we want to take it to the marketplace,
[14:26]but ultimately our own writing practice
[14:29]and the way it helps us to just stand in ourselves
[14:32]and in our lives was very much in the background.
[14:36]And then it was time to think about the next book
[14:40]and I have a novel that I was writing.
[14:42]No, no, and we were gonna push that forward and sell that.
[14:46]And it needed a little bit more refinement.
[14:49]It needed some more pages.
[14:50]And so I talked to my agent.
[14:52]We decided on a few months in that time.
[14:55]Instead, I wrote the first three
[14:58]at that time essays for this book.
[15:01]And it just felt like this was the next thing
[15:04]and so honoring that.
[15:06]So we sold the book.
[15:08]The book was not written entirely.
[15:11]The first third was written
[15:12]and the rest was outlined in, you know, how it goes.
[15:15]And so, and I had ultimately a year
[15:19]with my editor, Concepcion de Leon at Pantheon
[15:22]to finish this book.
[15:24]That was the tricky part.
[15:26]You know, on the one hand, it's like,
[15:27]oh, I sold a book and I stole it.
[15:29]And the yikes, because the time was ticking,
[15:34]we had deadlines.
[15:35]And also, she was along for my process.
[15:38]And that felt like, you know,
[15:41]the kind of thing really,
[15:42]can I close the door and lock it and then come out later?
[15:46]But when this is all much more formed,
[15:47]and that wasn't the way it was,
[15:49]I'd be sending her things that were very gooey on top of,
[15:53]oh, I have these pieces that I've been working on for years
[15:57]and they feel familiar and I know how to edit them.
[15:59]And I know how to put them together
[16:02]in this kind of collage scape.
[16:04]And then there were the parts that I had to write into
[16:08]that I didn't even know if I was ready to write that far into.
[16:12]And it was conversations with her where she was saying,
[16:15]you know, I understand what you're saying
[16:17]and I need more from you.
[16:21]And so, when you have a limited amount of time,
[16:24]when you're writing against a deadline
[16:26]and when you have an editor that you very much respect
[16:28]saying to you, I need you to dig deeper, right?
[16:32]That was all incredibly challenging.
[16:34]But what happened in that I would even call it a partnership
[16:38]was that some of her questions also
[16:40]because she's the Caribbean diaspora,
[16:42]she was able to ask me that I don't think
[16:45]I would have ever gotten to on my own.
[16:47]For example, in the familiar and the stories in between,
[16:52]she had asked me, when you look in the mirror,
[16:56]what do you see?
[16:58]And that detonated a little bomb,
[17:00]and I had to end the call and then call the therapist
[17:04]and the couldn't get us and have the time and meditation
[17:06]and really think about why was that so triggering?
[17:10]What is with this word to see?
[17:12]And how have I looked to others to tell me
[17:15]how to see myself and how do I undo that?
[17:18]And so, that's some of the working,
[17:21]at moments it was very hot and it was very close
[17:25]and it was very fresh, and at other moments,
[17:28]it was, this is material that I've been with for a long time
[17:31]and so it's varied in that way.
[17:33]But you know how it is with memory
[17:36]and memory is not static, it's not fixed.
[17:39]And so when we enter into that space with memory,
[17:42]it's a real dance.
[17:43]And how do we adequately show the way in which it moves?
[17:49]It doesn't feel like a linear experience to me
[17:52]and also culturally, that's not how we know time to behave.
[17:57]We have monochromatic time, we have polychromatic time
[18:01]and the way in which they engage.
[18:03]Of course, we're looking at our watches
[18:04]and we're looking at our planners.
[18:05]And also, there's a much greater,
[18:09]I wanna call it a beast of time in this moment, right?
[18:13]That we are in relationship with.
[18:15]And so, how do you construct a book that shows that
[18:20]surrendering to a greater sense of time
[18:24]and the disorientation of it?
[18:26]Also, historically, when there's been so much trauma,
[18:30]how do you show the impact of that in the structure
[18:32]and with the time?
[18:34]All questions that I was really wanting to put the reader
[18:37]through the experience of, you know?
[18:40]Well, the end result is incredibly powerful.
[18:43]Did you think about this subtitle, then the title
[18:46]and the cover, like the packaging of it?
[18:48]It's such a crazy art that we have to package up ourselves
[18:53]in stories and to a flat piece of tiny paper.
[18:57]What input did you have, if any?
[18:59]And what did you think of the final and all of that?
[19:02]Yeah, it was not that I know my story.
[19:05]Thank goodness also for my editor
[19:07]who ultimately had a working title
[19:09]and then at a certain point, she said to me,
[19:12]this is from a passage in the book
[19:14]and I think it would work well.
[19:16]And so I thought that it would also work well.
[19:18]Titles are really hard.
[19:20]Do you find those titles are really hard?
[19:22]Are they not free from them?
[19:23]It's like the hardest thing.
[19:24]You can say all these words and put all this together
[19:26]and then how do you land on that?
[19:28]And then a daughter claims Puerto Rico.
[19:30]We went back and forth about that for quite some time.
[19:33]I was afraid with having that subtitle
[19:35]that it would alienate readers who aren't connected
[19:38]to the Caribbean.
[19:40]I really wanted to focus on the relationship
[19:43]between mother and daughter
[19:44]and how universal that is,
[19:46]even though my story is very specific.
[19:48]So I wasn't sure about that,
[19:50]but we landed on something.
[19:51]And for the longest time,
[19:52]we were like, is it reclaims or claims?
[19:55]Mm-hmm.
[19:56]And then the image was really incredible.
[19:58]Initially,
[20:00]or some slight differences that we ended up changing,
[20:03]but yeah, it's really nice to get a cover
[20:06]and a title that feels satisfying.
[20:08]Yeah, that's very cool.
[20:11]What was the original title?
[20:12]Can you say?
[20:13]I'm just curious.
[20:14]Yeah, well, it's a little embarrassing now, actually.
[20:16]Why?
[20:17]No.
[20:18]It was like, it was so bad.
[20:20]Oh, it was a good bet when we're on uncontrollable circumstances,
[20:25]which is from that note that my mother would always write
[20:29]when I was late to school or I had to leave early
[20:32]or didn't show up for days on end,
[20:34]she would write a note for me that would simply say,
[20:38]due to uncontrollable circumstances.
[20:41]And I thought about, oh, well,
[20:43]that would sort of summarize everything,
[20:46]but ultimately, you know, mother Island works
[20:48]in all those ways that you want a title to work.
[20:50]Yeah.
[20:51]It's just the one thing, but then it says so many other things
[20:54]and it's magnetizing, it's open-ended.
[20:56]Yep.
[20:56]OK, well, I would not be embarrassed.
[20:58]I think due to uncontrollable circumstances
[21:00]is a very cool title as well, if you included the due to.
[21:03]But anyway, I love you.
[21:04]No, you're right, I would make you better.
[21:05]Yeah.
[21:08]Oh, my gosh.
[21:09]So what are you working on now, if anything?
[21:13]Well, I'm returning to that novel, of course,
[21:15]because it has sat for a couple of years,
[21:17]I want to do some changes.
[21:19]And also the thing that I was talking about earlier
[21:21]where writing this story has freed me
[21:24]to tell a larger story and try on that stories
[21:26]has also happened.
[21:27]And so I want to make some changes.
[21:29]But ultimately, three adult sisters
[21:31]are waiting for their elderly mother's wedding.
[21:36]And it goes into their current love lives
[21:40]and the way in which they are expressing
[21:41]and ultimately, at the end, they come together
[21:44]to learn something about what it is to truly love
[21:47]and be loved and be in love.
[21:49]Wow, that sounds great.
[21:52]We should brainstorm the title.
[21:54]Yes, we should make it.
[21:56]Call you later and we can workshop it, you know.
[21:59]So that can work.
[22:00]Because of course, I don't have a title right now.
[22:02]Oh my gosh.
[22:05]Funny.
[22:06]OK, well, what advice would you give to aspiring authors,
[22:10]especially people who are trying hard to write their stories,
[22:13]trying hard to delve into some pain in the past,
[22:17]all of that, family histories, legacies, bigger stories
[22:21]of entire cultures?
[22:22]I mean, it's hard.
[22:23]Like, it's easier taking on a lot.
[22:25]So how do you do it?
[22:26]What's the advice?
[22:27]A few pieces of advice.
[22:28]Knowing that you're not going to get it right.
[22:31]So give that up right at the start.
[22:34]Know that you are not ultimately trying
[22:36]to represent anyone other than your own story
[22:40]and that you don't have to, by the time you complete the book,
[22:43]be able to tie everything up into a nice, neat bow.
[22:47]For this book, I just was thinking, by the time this book
[22:50]comes out, I'm going to be a different person.
[22:53]So how can I be OK with what I say now?
[22:56]And what I ultimately decided was,
[22:59]this is the beginning of a very important conversation
[23:02]that I hope to have for the rest of my long life.
[23:05]And I want to open it up to others and include them.
[23:08]And the main drive for the writing
[23:10]was to connect to the reader.
[23:13]So those are important things.
[23:14]And like, I think a lot of other people
[23:16]talk about the need to, I'm not going to use the word self-care
[23:20]because then I feel like people immediately
[23:21]go to that place where they skip over it
[23:24]because maybe they're not doing the best job
[23:26]or they're tired of it hearing about it, right?
[23:29]But thinking about the ways in which we provide care
[23:34]for ourselves during a very taxing process.
[23:39]And that can be, however it looks for you,
[23:42]but it needs to be regular.
[23:44]And then the support systems that hold us.
[23:46]Because yes, we sit out the desk alone
[23:48]and we sit in the room alone and we do our best.
[23:51]And there's a whole network.
[23:54]There's a whole constellation that is helping
[23:56]to support me and support me in the writing of this.
[23:59]So those are all of the things that I would share.
[24:02]Amazing.
[24:03]And on a totally frivolous note,
[24:05]you have the most amazing hair.
[24:07]Do you, what do you, do you use any certain products
[24:12]or anything?
[24:13]Like literally we're doing this podcast early in the morning.
[24:14]My hair is still wet.
[24:16]And Jamie looks like a supermodel.
[24:18]So what do you do to your hair to make it look so cool?
[24:22]Oh, well, I will plug one product,
[24:24]which is called a curl can dream.
[24:27]Hmm, very hard to find good products.
[24:29]I have found in my life.
[24:31]But you know, it's like 10 minutes before we started,
[24:34]my hair was wet exactly like yours.
[24:36]And then I found a really great diffuser.
[24:40]Oh, it's just like five, eight, maybe 10 minutes
[24:44]with the diffuser when it's mostly between wet and dry.
[24:47]And then it just kind of does its own thing.
[24:51]That's it, one.
[24:52]Okay.
[24:53]A curl can dream.
[24:54]I'll try it.
[24:55]Maybe it'll add some life.
[24:58]Okay, sorry to take it there.
[25:00]But anyways, okay, Mother Island, congratulations, Jamie.
[25:03]This is such a beautiful book.
[25:05]It's so good.
[25:06]And you should, I mean, the sense of hooky.
[25:08]You should be proud of this book,
[25:09]but you really should.
[25:10]It's really good.
[25:11]Really, really good.
[25:12]And really important.
[25:13]It means a lot, Zebi.
[25:14]I really appreciate it.
[25:15]Thank you so very much.
[25:16]All right.
[25:17]Have a great day, Jamie.
[25:18]Bye.
[25:19]Bye.
[25:20]See ya.
[25:21]Bye.
[25:22]Thanks for listening to moms.
[25:24]Don't have time to read books.
[25:25]If you love it, please leave a review and follow us
[25:28]on social at Zebi Owens and at Zebi readers.