shame

Today I'm sharing an excerpt from a post, from Ask Polly on thecut.com, which is ultimately about shame and its usefulness in art.

I read this on a lunch break earlier this week, and it was one of those moments where everything else fell away, and I felt that the writer was talking directly to me.
I've been contemplating existential questions lately. Why do I write and create? Does it matter? Why does it even matter?
This is why.
Facing shame with an open heart, on a path to art.

women in flight

You might remember from my last video, that I was bemoaning the dearth of female travel writers.
Well, I did some homework, made up a list for my Seattle Public Library account, and started reading. Today I review 2 books by women travelers in Yemen and in the Congo, both in the 1930's:
Freya Stark's A Winter in Arabia, and Emily Hahn's Congo Solo.
At a time when the world was gearing up for war and women had only recently gotten the vote in the US and were still viewed as inferior beings, these women traveled far, oftentimes alone, and stayed for months, learning a culture and shedding some of their assumptions and biases. Hahn in particular is a vivacious writer (and indeed wrote for the New Yorker for many years).
Bon voyage!

the joy before the Krach

New video alert!
I have a few things to say about "Blood Beneath the Skin," a biography by Andrew Wilson, about the wildly talented Alexander McQueen.
With a few comments about how fashion gave me life.

buddhism and open mics

Reading this interview with Charles Johnson inspired me.
I've been attempting to go to open mic's but fear often gets in the way.
Here, he talks about not just reading--performing!
The video gives more examples of his thoughtful, humanistic approach.

more more new construction

The odyssey of memoir continues (see posts #1 and #2 here).

• Last week, Lucky, by Alice Sebold, the true story of AS's rape and assault as a college student in the 1980's. I re-read it in a day, marveling at her fearlessness in recounting what happened, and continued to happen. The rare combination of immediacy and retrospection. I did wish she'd lingered more in the aftermath, where she battled addiction and some emotional disorders, but overall it's one of the best I've read.
• I'm also about halfway through Martin Amis' Experience. This is my third or fourth re-read. MA is one of my absolute favorites (e.g. The Rachel Papers, The Information). I fold over the bottom edge of pages I wish to return to ("is it you, is it now?"), and already the book is accordioned with bent page-edges. He writes with depth and precision, he's funny, he's heartbreaking, he's honest. As a writer, I despair at just how truly talented he is and as a reader, well, I can't stop reading. 
• I wish I had so much enthusiasm for another book I've also halfway read, Boy Erased. I'm struggling. The subject matter is so familiar--kid raised in a hyper-religious household, questions of sexuality and power and faith. And yet--it's dull. Nothing compels me forward. It lacks specificity. I feel the author holding back, even though he's revealing some quite personal information. I'll finish it, but it's a trudge.

it's alive

So we had diversity training at work this week.
Four hours of sitting in a stuffy conference room with co-workers watching a Powerpoint show and participating in interactive exercises. Sound like a recipe for eyeball-numbing boredom? It was actually interesting and entertaining and sort of fun.
Except. EXCEPT.
Except for the small-minded bigots (I witnessed two, possibly three) who sat sullenly, arms crossed, non-participating, combative when spoken to, for the entire four hours.
Sexism is alive and well; as a female I can vouch for that, and this session was no exception.
Racism, homophobia and all their neanderthal cousins seem to survive as well.
This isn't a huge surprise, given the political climate now, but still, shocking to witness it in person.
From adults.
From educated humans who ought to know better.
It makes me so tired.
So very sick and tired.
We haven't evolved much. We've survived. I wonder for how much longer.
*
Reading a Sylvia Plath biography at the moment. Author Anne Stevenson's hostility is so barely concealed. I feel like I need another bio just to balance the picture.
*
New (to me) music: Tkay Maidza, Australian hip hop artist and super cool girl.
This video tho.

Tey

I rediscovered Josephine Tey over the weekend. There isn't much better way to spend a Sunday morning than reading "The Singing Sands" in bed, coffee close at hand, dozing in the winter sunshine.

a lil lol

I read two articles on Jonathan Franzen at lunch today: one penned by a Financial Times writer who interviewed him over a self-consciously mid-range English lunch, the other written by an inmate in a federal prison headlined: Stop Sending me Jonathan Franzen Novels.
One pseudo-fawning, the other an impatiently brutal takedown, both ultimately an indictment of an over-privileged and hugely successful white dude who can't quite admit he was born on third base.
In any case, I enjoyed the dismantling. I re-read The Corrections earlier this year and found the tone so sneering and tone-deaf and cliche'd, I wondered how I'd enjoyed so much the first time.

the luxury of Reacher

I started a new Reacher novel the other day. For me, luxury is having a stack of unread mystery novels at hand. Fiction leaves me kind of meh these days--mostly because I'm not quite sure who to read and I'm tired of self-conscious New Yorker/MFA prose.
However. Lee Child's Reacher series never fails to thrill. The main character is a brawny, six-and-a-half foot tall ex-MP roaming around the USA righting wrongs, mostly with his bare hands and his wits. The stories are funny and amazingly detailed. You know how Reacher makes decisions and why and as a reader you're on edge until the last page. No data dumps at the end, no wild explanations, and almost never a happy ending for the occasional woman who crosses his path.
Starting a Reacher novel is bittersweet, as I'm already regretting how soon I'll finish it. The last one I read almost made me miss a bus! I was so engrossed in the story that the Metro bus pulled up to my stop and sat there, door open, the driver peering out at me until I came to, folded over the page to mark my spot, and hopped on.

superchill

Hey y'all I'll be reading at Babeland next week as part of Seattle's Lit Crawl. More info here and here.
Thanks to Jane Hodges and Your Impossible Voice for the opportunity. Come hang out! It will be a funtastic night.

so this is happening

The essay-slash-story that preoccupied much of last year's writing energy is going to see the light of day at a reading at Elliott Bay Books on April 4. I'm proud of the anthology, Beyond Belief, happy with my work and terrified to read this thing in front of actual people.
Scenarios play out in my mind constantly:
Will I chicken out and hire a stunt reader?
Or get completely wasty beforehand next door at Oddfellows and slur my way through?
Or maybe I'll function like a grown-up for once, get up there with my fellow editors and writers and soldier through my five minutes with reasonable gravitas.
Who can tell? Come down and see for yourself.