The Middle Place - Kelly Corrigan

Ashley heard about and recommended this memoir to me of a Piedmont mother of two, learning to navigate life in the middle place - that place where you're trying to learn how to be an independent person/parent of your own, but still find yourself running home to your parents when problems arise. Corrigan has a gregarious larger than life father, who has consistently convinced her that she is the most awe-inspiring wonderful person around. As a result, she seems to believe a little too much that the world revolves around her and that people live for her daily accomplishments and advice. There are times throughout the book where she seems to acknowledge this and reflect a bit on the reasons for her selfishness, but often it goes by unseen. Corrigan is diagnosed with breast cancer, and the book focuses mainly on how she handles this crisis - while still protecting her children, and being there to support her aging parents. I found it a little odd that on the day she found out about her diagnosis, she chose to email her 100 closest friends about what she was going through. While it is amazing that she had such a wide support network, it just seemed like such a public announcement of a private situation - admitting that she sent it to friends and family members that she hadn't really spoken to in years. She reproduces her email for the reader - and while touching, it failed to acknowledge that many of the people she was sending the email too had probably already been through a similar experience. To me, this anecdote highlighted Corrigan's focus on the self - and while she consistently wanted her friends to walk in her painful shoes, she rarely seemed able to walk in theirs, or ever acknowledge that others might be going through difficult times of their own. While I found her struggle with cancer to be quite honest (and it, as well as her close relationship with her father, brought tears to my eyes on numerous occasions throughout the book), I was frustrated by her view of the world, which seemed to presume that she was the only one suffering. This book is an interesting example of the difficulty transitioning from being someone's child, to being your own person. But, Corrigan is also a fine example of how profoundly (for better or worse) parents are able to warp their children's views and expectations of what the world owes them.