“Whenever I see a mano and metate—this or another—I think of it as a metaphor for motherhood. The little ones always grind down us big ones so we curve around them, accommodate them, cradle them. Our children do more to shape us, I think, than the other way around. Go ahead and believe you’re the one doing the shaping, but when it’s all said and done, take a look at how hollowed out you are. Take a look at how nothing else fits that hollow space like your child.”

—excerpted from “Mano, Metate,” High Desert Journal, Issue 25—