Moms rock. This we know well. And the more than 1,000 six-word momoirs that poured in over the last two weeks rocked our world six inspirational, funny, and unusual words at a time. Here’s to all the moms with so many more stories to tell, in six words and many more.

The three winning momoir entries are:
Jessika Blanton, “Mommy’s boobies no longer Daddy’s boobies.”
Tara Lazar, “Suffered miscarriage. Daughter offered her doll.”
Sheryl Stein, “Can I pee in private, please?”

And while not among the judge’s top three winners, an especially appropriate one at this time of year is the simply stated: “Call your mom. She misses you.” True that.

For more of our favorites from the moms, see the Featured Momoirs. The contest may be over, but moms of all ages are always encouraged to tell their story in six words here. Or in more words in our My Life So Far story project.

Happy Mother’s Day!

Note: This post is by Cree McCree, a veteran music scribe and author of the diary, Going Home to New Orleans. For more on the Big Easy, see SMITH’s all-true, serialized webcomic, A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge.

Jazz Fest popped my cherry and good when I hit the mud running in 1988 and learned I was “Born to Ooze.” I instantly went native, joining in strange tribal rituals like the Watermelon Sacrifice and melding my sweat-slicked body with a dizzying succession of partners to the mesmerizing beats of the greatest live-music jukebox in the world.

Two decades later, I’m still a Jazz Fest baby. Despite the festival’s ever-slicker corporate trappings (and don’t get me started on those), the sheer power of the music breaks through, sometimes against all odds, the way the sun broke through the clouds after a torrential morning downpour on the final Saturday.

Just after the rain stopped, I met up with SMITH’s Larry Smith and his wife Piper at Ground Zero: Keith and Thea’s house, three blocks from the Fairgrounds, where many a Jazz Fest virgin has been bitten by the resident S-s-s-snake. This year, they had 17 out-of-towners in residence, along with plenty of locals like me who stop by for the nonstop party (and the sweet off-street parking space). What better place to capture the Fest spirit of six?

The six-worders that follow were culled from a notebook left out at Keith and Thea’s over Jazz Fest’s seven-day run, and from random encounters at the Fairgrounds.

“What I Learned at Jazz Fest”

How to live simply. Still learning.

Be prepared. Be prepared to improvise.

Never bring more than you need.

What happens at Jazz Fest happens.

The choice: Good example/horrible warning. Read more »

I think Philadelphia rocks. I grew up just 20 minutes outside the city, went to college there, am in and out of the city as often as I can. I loved the last Rocky movie, live for dinner in South Philly, have written thousands of words on Philly fans and am hopelessly devoted to the town’s teams (can you feel my pain?). All of which is why I’m so pleased that the six-word memoir book is heading to the City of Brotherly Love for two events and one contest. On May 16, Rachel and I will be reading at the Barnes & Noble in Rittenhouse Square at 7:30pm. Then on Sunday, May 18, we’ll be in good company at the Free Library Philly Book Festival, where Team SMITH can be found at the Poetry Pavilion at 12pm, telling stories and leading a six-word slam.

To celebrate our Philly invasion, we’re partnering with Philadelphia Magazine (one of the first places in the country to praise Not Quite What I Was Planning) for a special six-word contest called “It All Happened Here in Philadelphia”. Three memoirists win a one-year subscription to Philly Mag and a copy of the six book, which we’ll choose based on “creativity and Philadelphia flavor,” and announce at the May 16 event.

I can’t wait to see what the great people of Philly come up with. Here’s mine, which will only make sense to Birds fans, but means the world to me: “Dad. Me. Jacksonville. Still loved it.”

Rocky from Flickr user Damon Green.

We often tell the story of Summer Grimes, whose sixer was selected as the most all encompassing and slapped on the front cover of our little literary effort. For almost a year she ignored my congratulatory emails. In this email, she explains why, then hops right aboard the good ship Six:

“Dear Rachel,
I am completely ecstatic to be a part of this project. One year ago as I sat alone in my hostel in Budapest and read an email informing me my six word memoir “Not Quite What I Was Planning…” was to be the title of a publication, I shrugged it off with cynicism. (Oh right, where do I fill in my credit card number?)

I was a few days into a month-long solo trek through Hungary, Croatia, Slovakia, Austria and Czech Republic in a mostly earnest effort to figure out what was next for an unemployed 24-year old twin cities resident with half an English degree. I forwarded your email to a friend with the subject title “Hey Something Seems Fishy :)”. We thought it was a very clever little scam.

I am currently overjoyed as an hour ago, I found out your email was not a scam at all (thanks to a few clicks via Google and a breathless conversation with an avid NPR-listener)! Thank you so much for considering my submission and even if I wasn’t good enough to make it into your book, I will humbly allow you to use my six words as your title

Sincerely and Ecstatically,
Summer N. Grimes

P.S. I am bespectacled also… and a hairstylist. Maybe I could give you the best haircut of your life and we’d become best friends and then we could be on The Today Show.”

You hear that, NBC?

I was waiting for someone to do six words on W.

Six Words for Bush (a writing contest)
Wherein we describe W’s tenure as president, now that it’s (almost) finally over.

I just sent in my official entry: “Born on third base. Stole home.” Send yours here.

This arrived by email from contributor (and my new hero) C.C. “Lived like no tomorrow; tomorrow came” Keiser. Count it as many times as you like—six words, 5-7-5 syllables. Pure genius:

Unexpectedly,
however belatedly,
accepted at last!

Our new Six-Word Momoirs project with TrueMomConfessions.com and Delight.com is off and running. And the secret life of moms is as funny (”8 pound baby means Kegels forever”), sweet (”You had me at ‘my mama’”), and surprising (”Nipples now point in opposite directions”) as we suspected (well, our friends at TrueMom already knew). Lay your tiny maternal tale on us and you could win a $100 shopping spree at Delight.com, or a copy of Not Quite What I Was Planning. Contest ends on May 8 (right before Mother’s Day). And remember: the six-word memoir book makes a great gift for your mom. Just ask mine.

The winner of the SMITH and FOUND Mag’s Six-Word Caption Contest is Cassie Barton for “Home alone, Billy prepares TV dinner,” which now accompanies the photo you see here. Cassie’s a student in Oxford, UK who reports, “pleased—first time I’ve won anything,” and now lands every issue ever of FOUND, its book of FOUND Polaroids, and SMITH’s six-word memoir book .

Here are some more of our favorites from the SMITH community.

Spill, or I choke the dog!
Score one for the puddy tat.
Call me man boobs, will ya?
Bored, as papa went to Iraq!
Gimme the ball or Polly’s history.
Life before online role playing games.
Coping with boys who need bras.
No one fucked with Timmy’s crackers.
Young Charlton levels the playing field.
Take it back, they’re not boobs.
So you think you can sing?
Billy didn’t like Barack Parrot’s speech.
No, his grandma won’t take him.
Little Dicky Cheney: Hunter in Training.
Bigger allowance or the bird dies.
I bet you don’t even twitch.
Warning: Bored child with a gun.
Thanks, Snowball, the barrell’s clean now.
The dog’s OK, the bird goes.
Evil Genius Training, Day 2: Pets.
Know why the caged bird sings?
The actual hole will be bigger.
Jimmy tries his first remote control.
Bang, zoom, straight to the moon!
Target practice at Pee-Wee Taxidermy School.
Ya tengo la cara que merezco.
Sorry, I’m not a pet person.

When TreeHugger and SMITH asked our communities for six words on their “Green Life” we had great expectations for mini-memoirs on all things eco. Still, once again, what you came up with in just six words blew us away. So it is on this Earth Day, a day when everyone hugs the tree huggers, that we’re thrilled to announce six winners of the first annual SMITH Mag/TreeHugger Green Life contest.

The grand prize winner–and recipient of an iPod nano etched with the winning memoir—is Kay R for her brilliant, Saw the light, turned it off.

Second prize goes to Marcus Eder, who reveals in six words: “I read my porn online now.” We’re not sure what’s in his DVD player now, but what’s coming next is his new prize, a set of Planet Earth DVDs.

The above winners, and these four runners-up below, receive a copy of SMITH’s new bestselling book, Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six Word Memoirs From Writers Famous and Obscure.

Runners-up:
My solar backpack recharged my soul. -Krissie Nagy
Threat level has reached Code Green. -Kevin Letourneau
Walk the talk, and just walk. -Rita Ann
Save water. Shower with a friend. -Mego (Melissa Gould)

We’re not sure what to do with these two entries, except, well, smile:
Does anyone hug the tree huggers? -Harlan Stanton
I read Tree Hugger every day. -JonnyU

Honorable mentions:
Pee in cup. Water plants. Repeat.
Grow your own stash (of beans).
Right now, some dinosaur is chuckling.
Vegetarians taste better. We’re grain fed. Read more »

It seems like lately everything we post is “Whoa, we never thought of this—but YOU did.” From paintings to cartoons to videos to spinning classes to prayers, the six-word concept is spreading every which way through the freeflowing beauty of the user-generated age. Nowhere is this more miraculously apparent than in BookBabie’s “Six-Word Memoir Meme,” a phrase which now yields over 17,000 Google hits.

Apparently our concept was too big to be contained in letters on a page, because the latest “YOU did” is happening on YOUtube. User micahsamaniac read his six-worder aloud and received over 598,000 views. Hopefully, some of these viewers found their way over to our six-word book preview—you know the one with that so-catchy tune from Pedalsped?

Haterade spewing commenters aside, lots of people embraced the idea:

And my personal favorite: An original song!

Go ahead and post your own. If you’re a contributor, say your page number, and maybe flash around your copy of Not Quite… He’s feeling a little left out. But also inspired…