Last weekend I was working at Rose City Comic Con, and in the few days before that when I could have been writing a post to schedule for Sunday, I was recovering from the overwhelm of organizing + running a garage sale for my son plus a lot of extra peopling at my [former] school, and also watching TV my husband wouldn’t care about (he was away on business) while eating things like rosemary crackers with tapenade for dinner. These are not good excuses, I know, and apologize for my inconsistency. I want to become a more disciplined Writer but so far all I’ve done is get a new cute dry erase calendar that sort of fits where my gravely disappointing glass calendar tried to live; it is right now covered with month-old ideas, some I’m not sure exactly what I meant when I wrote them but I do remember how earnest & smart I felt when I did it.
Moving on.
In poetry: I’ve had a poem chosen by our local arts advocacy group Artstra to be displayed on city buses as part of the Clark County Poetry Moves program. This is the third time I’ve been selected though I have never been able to see any on the move - I foolishly don’t consider taking the bus in my town, even though I’m ready to jump on any public transportation whenever I travel; maybe I should start submitting to the contests in other major cities I want to visit and hope they choose me + I can work a comic convention there within the year. #GeniusPlan
This was my first selected piece, written as soon as I got to school after the actual experience in fall of 2019:
Stopping Time
The unexpected joy of
Slowing down to follow a bus,
Tiny sleepy faces peering out the back
windows,
Allowing me to spy a heron's morning
silhouette on the lake
At the bend of the roadThis one I wrote during one of my porch mornings in September 2021, sitting in the old school desk I share out there with the orb weavers, drinking tea and listening to birds:
Transition Wind applauding in trees the final curtain for a villainous summer after a stale encore of still dry days. Geese harkening in clouds the sanguine change for a somber audience. Move on, they say, it’s time.
And this year I pulled a section from what I wrote last December for Kwame Alexander’s community poem about our pets:
In TV: I actively rejected the series Fleishman Is In Trouble when it came out last fall, even though it stars actors I really like - Claire Danes & Lizzy Caplan have stellar range; Adam Brody often brings unexpected depth; Jesse Eisenberg is generally fine but I have a special place in my heart for him because he once sincerely told me at a Live Wire Radio taping that my entry for the Memoir Title Based on Your Instagram* contest was funny. I was reluctant to watch because a) I typically reject hyped things on Leo/Virgo snob principle and b) it seemed like exhausting navel-gazy Millennial rich white people stuff. However, when my husband goes away on business I read a lot with my cat and also, as mentioned earlier, try to find shows to watch that he probably won’t like [because no cars/explosions]. So this summer I succumbed and was enthralled, watching the entire season in three days.
I can’t tell much about the plot & characters beyond what you’ll see in the trailer [you must let your eyerolling go - it is a good amount of navel-gazy Millennial rich white people stuff but it’s more than that and IT GETS WILD] but I will say this: it made me think + rethink my perceptions of people, all of my relationships & expectations, and most of my existence as an American woman. It was also exhausting, but valuable. Plus has a cool soundtrack1.
*It Only Looks Like I’m Constantly Drinking - particularly ironically apropos in connection to my book pick this week
In books: A few weeks ago I went to a book launch reading/interview for Kristi Coulter’s newest book Exit Interview [which I will discuss after I finish it + the other 3 books I’ve got going at the moment] but also picked up a copy of her earlier memoir Nothing Good Can Come from This that I read a few years ago. It was recommended by a fellow teacher who loaned me her library copy, a sign that it was so powerful she would risk a fine for me to experience it.
Coulter explores her history with alcohol not only through personal anecdotes from youth to adulthood but also via impressions she developed from family & friend relationships, popular culture, and the media. Because we are about the same age and also both white American women, many of her experiences were immediately relatable, though I had not spent much time in my life unpacking how deeply interactions & pop culture affected my own behaviors and choices. I think about this book often, even though I do still choose to drink alcohol; I examine my motivations for pouring a glass of wine or ordering a cocktail - emphasis on the singular far more often now - and my jaw clenches at the sight of cutesy ‘wine mom’ shit. (Relevant tangent: This SNL skit from 2021)
I appreciate that Coulter, and I, have immense privilege in a variety of arenas and thus have easy access to many useful ways of dealing with stress or trauma. We might sound at times like we have all the answers and things are simple; we might feel judgy and disdainful. I personally blame these things on my Leo/Virgo cuspness - I don’t know Coulter’s birthday but regardless, a memoir is one’s own perception of how things went and how one dealt with them to get to here. I felt seen and heard, even though I’ve never revealed out loud any of the thoughts I’d been having about my relationship with alcohol for 30+ years. This is a book worth sitting with for a while. Maybe not right after watching Fleishman Is In Trouble though…
In my office: A few weeks ago we adopted Fred, a 7-year old orange one-eyed cat. I thought Zelda might enjoy a fellow one-eyed friend around the house to share her complaints about my tardy feedings & general lack of concern for her well-being (see poem above). Fred is still confined to my Room of Requirement as he is a very timid guy, though he’s been pretty chill about Zelda yowling outside the closed door and later jumping the baby gate to poop in his litter box. He lets us pet him, only occasionally swiping then immediately seeming to regret the impulse, and will eat with us around now. Sometimes he chirps at me and we’re pretty sure he jumps on my desk at night (pencils knocked over, paperclips all over the candle dish) even though the shelter asserted that he’s a “bush dweller.” So he might be a secret Mungojerrie and Zelda will become his Rumpleteazer…time will tell, and I can hardly wait.
I’m thinking this would be a fun epitaph: She was exhausting but valuable, with a cool soundtrack
Did I mention that Fred is an incredibly handsome cat? Congratulations on adding to your family.
Beautiful poems.