1. I am enrolled in SBCC’s Intermediate Acting class taught by the wonderful Katie Laris. Officially. For a grade and everything. So far I have been to two classes, and have been asked to act in both of them. It is terrifying in the most exhilarating way. My premise was to make good on an “imaginary life” I’d discovered in my winter round of Artist’s Way Creative Cluster. Something to text the gals about, let them know I am still walking the walk. I rationalized it further by telling myself it was like a toast master’s exercise. Maybe I would learn to represent myself “better.” I would not be enrolled if it wasn’t the persistent updates and encouragement from my good friend Yvette. Two classes in, and all I know is I can make people laugh, and I am full of surprises. There is a monologue competition for a $500 scholarship. Dare I enter? I will keep you posted. Go Vaqueros.

   

2. You know it, and I know it, but my second round of Creative Clustering with Julia Camera’s Artist Way is well underway. With both an online session, and an in person, I am balls-deep (sorry mom) in the work of figuring out what is getting in the way of my art, and enjoying support, community and inspiration from other folks who want to do the same. At the risk of being blasphemous, I am going to say her initials are JC for a reason… My homework this week in addition to morning pages and my artist date is to compete two submissions (poetry or for the book). I CAN AND I WILL!

3. My mentorship with Danusha Laméris is winding down, and I have to say not one single regret. My membership with her Litfield platform is not, and I have so many poet talks/asynchronous learnings to do on my list between now and next April. I have eight new poets with whom I love to read and workshop poems , and lots and lots of encouragement. As we say around here, even a little goes a long way, so this is all good stuff. My last class may be September 15, but the teaching/learning continues, as it always does. I still can’t believe I got to do this. And I only got to do this, because I took myself on an Artist Date to a poetry workshop last year when I was supposed to be figuring out what I am doing with the rest of my life. Instead I stayed, and I learned from Ade and Tayllor, and I wrote, and I performed, and I applied to Danusha’s mentorship, and I got in. Turns out like Lindsay Scott sings, the way knows the way.

4. The COOLEST THING ever has happened. Some of you might remember my little obsession with a poetry collection titled Edith, about a girl and her dead parakeet and everything else there is in life. Practicing as I have been for making bold moves, I made a bold move about a week ago at the behest of my teacher Danusha: I emailed Meg and asked if she wanted to play poetry ping-pong. For those unfamiliar with the concept, this is when one poet writes a poem to another poem. The other poet picks a line or an image or a theme, and writes an original poem back. I sent her WHEN HORSEMAN MOVES IN WITH HIS GIRLFRIEND, which was inspired by her WHEN EDITH USED TO HAVE A BODY. Singers…. you know what happened next. SHE SAID YES! And sent me a poem that every time I read it gives me goosebumps. Hopefully one day she will share it with the world, or give me permission to share it with you here. It’s called THE FINEST MEN and it is, in my view, superb. Now for the hard part: I have to write her one back. CAN YOU IMAGINE? This is like when the local camp counselor’s at Michael Jordan’s basketball camp got to play pick up with Michael Jordan at the end of the day. I believe the word is so-elated-but-also-I-might-vomit

   

5. A happy byproduct of the coolest thing ever (see above) is my eight year old caught me working on my response poem and asked that she and I also play poetry ping pong. What can I say? I love my kid. Below you will find my response not to Meg the GOAT but to my kid, who I also believe is the GOAT.

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Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published

In response to NIGHT by one of my kids(which I didn’t get permission to publish, but if I ask her nicely maybe one day I can.)

WHEN YOU GET TO A MIDNIGHT DANCE PARTY

It’s right to let your bravery

guide you. Dream of a land not too

dark, not too hot, not too cold,

not too scary, where Music floats

airy above whistling feet in pink

and blue tube socks and sand man shoes

(muted or sparkling, you pick your pair.)

There, let all your hopes and your fears

meet, move them through a tango,

then waltz. Take a break, kid,

then bend those limbs in some good ol’

boogy down. Listen for the sound

of your own heart’s pound,

and dance to it, baby, dance,

let it rip, because your heart

plays a song that is so, so true.

In a time not too long ago there once was a little girl. Her name was Sarah and she liked to tell people how her mom told her it meant “princess.” Sarah was small in size but big in personality, and had the kind of frame that felt out of sync with the energy swirling all about her presence. The youngest of three, Sarah was always being shown something by someone and for the most part this suited her perfectly. She loved connecting with others and learning about the world, and often times earned praise from her mother or sister or brother for how quickly she could catch on. Life, for this five year old, was more or less full of wonder and love. Unfortunately, it was also full of waiting.

It was particularly difficult for Sarah to wait for her turn to show something to someone. This painful situation had given rise to what Sarah considered a shameful secret. At home, when dinner was on the stove and her siblings were squabbling and no one would look at her coloring, for example, Sarah would (sometimes) bite.

“OW!” Her mom would yell.

“OOUCH!” her sister would cry.

“Mom!!!” her brother would holler as he escaped her gnashing teeth.

“We can’t go on like this,” she’d hear her mother praying, a red mark of tiny teeth still hot on her shoulder’s skin.

The worst part was, Sarah didn’t even like biting. Loud noises always followed, and she hated loud noises. But she didn’t know what else to do. When she explained, her mother told her in a hurry to get all her children to bed “I don’t know the answer right now, either, my girl. But when I don’t know what to do, I ask the Universe for help.”

That night, before Sarah went to sleep, she bit her own lip and looked out her window and whispered “Universe, help!”

The Universe answered. Sarah had a dream where she was visited by not one, not two, but three fairies. The first fairy was dressed in a dress patterned with blueyed grass flowers. She had bright round cheeks, and redish brown curls that hung around them just right.

“Who are you?” Dream Sarah whispered

“Hello, Sarah my princess! I have so looked forward to coming to see you.”

the blue fairy responded.

“You have?” Dream Sarah asked.

“I have.” Blue fairy confirmed. “My name is Fauna the Floral Fairy, and I have come with help about your little problem.”

Dream Sarah’s own cheeks reddened. “You know about the… biting?”

“Yes, dear, I know about the biting. And I am so proud of you!” Fauna fluttered around Dream Sarah as if she had just scored a goal in soccer.

“Huh?” Dream Sarah said, trying not to let her eyes spin.

“You’ve finally asked for help! That is no easy thing to do, my child. I am so proud, and of course I know exactly what you need.”

“You do?” Dream Sarah replied.

“I do. Tomorrow morning, you are going to teach your mother the following password, are you ready?”

“A password?”

“Yes dear, a password. When she hears this password, she is to respond to you as if you just bit her— all at once and with the most acute attention.”

Dream Sarah thought about this for a moment.

“The password is FAUNA NEVER FORGETS!” Fauna said, and then toppled in summersaults in the air laughing.

“Fauna… never… forgets!” Dream Sarah repeated.

“That’s right. I know please and thank you get a lot of press, but those three words are the most effective spell you can find for this kind of thing. The moment you say Fauna Never Forgets, you will command the full attention of your mom.”

Dream Sarah felt a wave of relief cream into her five year old heart. But she still wasn’t sure. Could it be true? Or would it just lead to more biting?

As if reading her thoughts, Fauna replied “You’ll never know unless you try it, love.”

As if her words had opened a door to Dream Sarah’s dreamscape, a bright yellow fairy bumbled in, buzzing to herself like a little bee.

“Hello Fauna! Hello Sarah my princess!” said the little yellow fairy, whose dress was decorated with the most beautiful dandelion patteron.

“Penelope! How nice to see you again.” Fauna embraced the yellow fairy and for a moment, to Dream Sarah, the two were encased in a green orb.

“Hi!” Dream Sarah said, eager to make the acquaintance. This fairy beamed playful joy, the kind children can’t help but gravitate towards.

“Now Sarah, I’ve heard about your little problem.” Penelope said.

“Oh dear.” Dream Sarah groaned. How embarrassing.

“None of that, it’s nothing to be embarrassed about. Didn’t you tell her Fauna? We are so proud of you!”

“I did tell her.” Fauna muttered.

“Proud of me? For biting?” Dream Sarah asked.

“No, silly goose, for asking for help. It takes a brave person to do that sort of thing. And I have just the secret to solve your problem for good.”

“I already gave her the secret..” Fauna began

“Well it’s always nice to have options, don’t you agree Sarah?”

Dream Sarah thought about that for a while.

“Fine.” Fauna conceded, “It is always nice to have options.”

“I agree.” said Dream Sarah.

“So,” Penelope began, “whenever you get that urge like you really, really need your brother or sister or mom’s attention, what you’ve got to do is pull on their secret patch!”

“Their what?” Dream Sarah asked.

“Their secret patch!” Penelope continued, “it sits right above their left hip on their shirt or dress, depending. Once you teach them about it, any time you pull on that, they will respond to you EXACTLY as if you had bit them: with their full attention and a sense of urgency.”

Dream Sarah thought about this for a while. A secret patch that she could show them, rather than being the one shown something as was usually the case. Her eyes shined with intrigue.

Suddenly, there was a flash. A green fairy whose pants were covered in fern furls had appeared. She pushed her long dark bangs out of her sparkling brown eyes and said “Hello, lovies!”

Fauna and Penelope squealed in delight as they flew in a flash to the green fairies side. “Tiffany!” they squealed, and embraced in a three way hug as if they’d been kept from each other for a whole summer. A copper orb seemed to glue them together for a moment as they embraced.

“Sarah, my princess!” Tiffany the green fairy said “I am SO proud of you!”

Sarah smiled this time as she said in the affirmative “because I asked for help.”

“Exactly that reason, my bright, bright child.” Tiffany the green fairy fluttered. Then, with the utmost seriousness Tiffany leaned forward, into Dream Sarah’s ear and whispered “We all make mistakes, love, but we are not a mistake.”

Dream Sarah thought about that for a while.

That little flutter of relief Dream Sarah felt earlier in her heart turned into a steady thrum.

Tiffany the green fairy was buzzing about her now in a kind of excitement, as if she had something to share but had been told to wait and it was a struggle to do so.

“Do you have an option for me? I mean, a tool I can use to help with my… biting problem?” Dream Sarah asked shyly.

“OH! I am so happy you asked!” Tiffany exclaimed, and the other two fairies smiled to one another.

“Okay, so I think when you really, really need to get your mom’s attention, or your sister or your brother’s, and you feel like you are going to bite them, you should instead…..TICKLE THEM!” She cried.

All three fairies and Dream Sarah were laughing now. “Tickle them?” Dream Sarah repeated.

“Yes! But of course you have to teach them about it first. When you tickle them, they are to respond..”

“as if I had bit them, is that right?!” Dream Sarah interrupted.

“Exactly my brilliant child. It’ll work every time, I just know it will.”

Sarah smiled as she took in her three friends from the universe.

“Fauna, Penelope, Tiffany. I don’t know if any of this will actually work, but I do know I am brave enough to try.”

With that, the three tiny fairies flew into Dream Sarah’s arms where she could hold them, gently, as they all came in for a group hug. Dream Sarah marveled at her feeling of support and possibility. And as it expanded, so too a sparkling purple orb expanded around the four of them, holding them all close.

Sarah woke up the next morning and practically jumped out of bed.

“Mom! Mom!” She cried as she raced to her mothers bedroom, where she found her brother and sister already cuddled against her, asking for more sleep.

“Good morning, Sarah my princess” Her mother whispered. “Let’s go in the kitchen.”

Sarah’s mom slipped away from the eight and seven year old and put a kettle over the stove. Then she turned to Sarah and gave her a big, big hug.

“Mom, I can’t wait to tell you about my dream!” Sarah said.

“And I can’t wait to hear it, lovie. Go ahead and grab us a blanket. I’ll meet you in the living room on our big blue chair.”

Sarah scurried off, while mom pulled down her favorite blue bathroom, yellow mug, and green tea bag with the words “Irish Breakfast” written in bold across the top.

“Now then,” she said, “let’s here about this dream.”

The story poured out of Sarah with a rapacious speed, but with the other two still sleeping, Sarah’s mom’s attention was wrapped. When she had finished, her mother had a big knowing smile on her face.

“So,” she said, “you’ve finally had your first visit from the family fairies.”

“The family fairies? I don’t quite understand” Sarah asked.

“Fauna, Penelope, and Tiffany visited me once when I was five year old struggling with my little problem” her mother said, pointing to her teeth.

“YOU used to bite?!” Sarah asked wide-eyed.

“I did.” her mother replied, “and just like you I had a visit from the fairies. And just like you, I told my mom all about it. And you know what I just remembered?” Sarah’s mom said with a laugh.

What?

”My mom, your nan, had a visit from them too!”

“Even nanny used to bite?!” Asked Sarah?

“Even Nanny used to bite.” said her mom.

Sarah thought about that for a while.

“So, which one would you like to try out today?” Her mother asked.

'“Well,” said Sarah. “If it’s alright with you, I’d like to try Penelope’s patch here at mom’s house, and Tiffany’s tickle method at Dad’s. Would that be okay?” Sarah said hopefully.

“That would be more than okay.” Her mom replied. “And just remember, you might make a mistake..” her mother began,

“I know, mom. We all make mistakes, but that doesn’t mean we are mistakes.” said Sarah.

The End.

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Reason Number 1: I am not getting any younger. I had a boyfriend in college who told me his mom ran a marathon at 39. “She hurt her knee really bad. Isn’t that stupid? Why would she do that?” Well, Mr. You Know Who You Are, maybe she did it to have time away from her boys. Maybe she did it to prove her own strength. Maybe she did it for a sense of self. Maybe she did it to have a reason to go to Hawaii alone. I’ll be 40 next month, so no chance of getting across the finish line before my not-future- mother-in-law did, but what can I say? The race I signed up for has a no refund policy and you can only postpone by a year, so here we are.

Reason Number 2: Bucket List. What would you do if time and money were no object? A year ago I was preparing to receive my last paycheck as a full time classroom teacher. The possibilities were endless! I wasn’t sure what I would be doing (in addition to finishing my wildly successful debut novel) but I knew it wasn’t stepping back into the classroom for 12 months. I had savings from burning down my domestic life the year prior, and big dreams: marathon running apparently one of them. I guess I am running it to have something I can point to and say to myself “see!? I did something with that one (and a half) year. I ran a marathon!”

Reason Number 3: Grounding. I may have joined a cult. Hear me out! I have flirted with Buddhism for a few years now (thank you Mindfulness, a buddhism gateway drug) and have recently found SGI- Nichiren Buddhism, specifically the practice of chanting. I am about a month in, and find that sitting down to chant does indeed reinforce my desire to be here now and do something. I am a little skeptical because new friends can be scary to someone who has indeed been mindfucked a time or two… but, what’s a life worth without a little risk? Perhaps the binaural beats of my feet pounding the pavement will keep my head on straight.. this time.

Reason Number 4: Direction. I am not, as all signs may have been pointing to, independently wealthy, and my savings will indeed literally run out, unless I find some sort of direction. I either have to a) finish and sell my book b) get a job or ideally c) do both. Turns out a year of “if I can’t classroom teach, what can I do” leads right back to where I was before teaching: tutoring. Thank you Pacific Prep for the opportunity. I am hoping that by adding in long distance running goals somehow Goal A will happen. Because what’s the alternative? Just sit down and write? Bah!

Reason Number 5: Okay and this is just crazy but: Community. Last time I trained (and failed) for a marathon, I made a fatal error: I went it alone. Not so this time! I have my Artist Way group starting on the 24th that will give me a solid first three months. I know someone who runs from high school and plans to hit that very fit woman up via my cellular device. And I may, just MAY join some kind of running meet up. (Shudders). People are important. Making friends matters. I CAN do this!

Reason Number 6: Body Image. What can I say, once a millennial always a millenial. I preach a lot about all bodies being good bodies, but this body looks more and more like it needs a hand getting up everyday. One foot in front of the other. Long stretches of physical exertion. Endorphins and a grabbable ass? What could go wrong…

So readers, as the saying goes: the die is cast. Are you betting on me, or against me? More updates to follow either way.

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When Horseman Has Moved In With His Girlfriend

there’s nothing to do with my ears.

I listen to old CD’s in my black car stereo. I leave

the case open on the dash like I would when Horseman

still claimed things like

the passenger seat, before I started thinking

about music like a messenger pigeon, just vibrations sent over

for my grieving body to rock to. It’s almost like he just left

for more coffee but then didn’t come back! Except

it didn’t happen that way. Horseman left

on a Thursday morning, halfway, and was

gone all the way by that next Monday’s noon.

It took me a sunset to realize this

and when I finally did I wanted to call to him,

in the other room, saying “Horseman! He’s moved on!”

I wanted to call to him “time to saddle up, H,

because this shit is going to break your heart.”

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Today I am sharing a poem that is at once vulnerable and low stakes. I have this thing about poems, that if I have to explain them, they are not doing their job. So I will try to avoid that. What I will say is I studied Mary Oliver’s The Journey, a poem that offered a stunning perspective, and tried to capture the other end of the paradox; that is, the truth of it’s opposite.

This is not my idea, but rather one that I learned from Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer at her poetry retreat last summer. There, she bestowed on all of us the following gift: If something is true, so is it’s opposite. You can learn from Rosemerry too and enjoy her work on Substack here.

If you haven’t done this exercise with a poem that stuns you, I highly recommend it. Like my best poetry writing experiences, now that I have written it, I know something that I didn’t before.

THE STANDSTILL

Everyday you really don’t know

what you have to do. So you stop,

though the voices within you

keep whispering

their good advice—

though the house, in one small corner

ceases to tremble,

and you feel the new-nothing tug

at your spine.

“Destroy your death!”

each voice exhales.

But you don’t move.

You don’t know what you have to do

though the water seeps in

with all its twinkling toes

through the very foundations.

Though your cheer

is fantastic.

It is not yet late

enough, it is a calm day

it is your chair, empty of fallen

leaves and sand.

And leap by leap,

as you bring your voices in closer,

the stars soften their burn

under the cloudless clear

and out there is the oldest voice there ever was

which impulsively you

mistake as your own

that never abandons you

as long as you stay further and further

away from the world,

as long as you stay uncertain about doing

the many things you could do,

as long as you stay uncertain to extinguish 

the only life you’ve ever known. 

LEGEND OF THE WHIPPOORWHILL

Whippoorwills are named for their calls,
a haunting sound that used to terrify
the unwed in that electrifying way 
only a fortune telling can:
One call? Assurance of finding
that special someone, but many 
in succession? Chances go down 
to null. I imagine the unwed whispering
their furtive protection prayers after
the first one, or perhaps the unhappily 
engaged raising  an eye brow, and willfully
listening for more. Whatever the case
the whippoorwills are fading.
Light pollution and deforestation,
threats impervious to their clever camouflage.
I want to know who will miss their calling,
and what creature instead can predict
the fate of our passionate dark. What other bird
has the broad gash of their mouths, hosts
their nocturnal airborne feasts,  shares their cunning
 in the ways they breed, in the ways they hide?
I always kind of thought we need a go between
some winged thing who flies here, there,
who knows where our secret lusts and longings 
are unburied, who bid us to listen closely
to an unempty dark. 

Saddle Up

Horseman's got long lashes
she says, noticed right away. 
Flicks the butt of her cigarette
over a brown heart shaped tray, never meant
for ashes. A long drag later comes
the wondering about his tree trunk
neck. Does his mane feel strawlike, 
or leafy, willowed against such thick bark? 
The whippoorwill sings out then, just once. 
A late afternoon call for alright everybody, 
lights out. Now her turn, shameless, speaks her 
ardent prayer Whippoorwill, guide me under 
this belt-buckle-moon. Let’s show Horseman
 how to open wide. 

JELOUS

Horseman’s got some facial hair, 
the whippoorwill sings out
as my lips touch Horseman’s
sandpaper-mouth. Strange, how 
unique each version of this is. 
The density, the smell, and yet 
the grit each time so just right. 
Whippoorwill songs on.
Think of all the moths the bird trills 
I could catch with whiskers like that.
I laugh at the truth of it, because,
sure. It's always light that draw
us in, but the whiskers are why
tonight I stay.  

Horseman

Your man smell is still cauterized to my cashmere,
damnit. My nose refuses to know you are gone
for good. No boots are right for mudmucking
todays, so I throw on whatever.  
It won't do to stop my weighted walk
at the top of the hill, at the bottom of the glen. 
Soggy, there is nowhere to sit that'll permit my eyes
to be any kind of winsome. The horizon meets my blank stare. 
The whippoorwills, resigned. Longing, letting go, 
these are yesterday's hues. Ardent, there is no changing the fact 
you have already galloped through.

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“What I don’t understand, Susie, is why you waste your talent? You’re great with kids, and would make a great teacher. Why waste time and money to create such trash?”1

Young Susie Hisler burning eyes were trained on Mother Hisler’s sharp gray pants suit. Only, all she could make out from her tear-soaked vision was the backside of it. On its way out the door.

Alone, in the 2nd St. Gallery she’d rented with all her camp counselor money, Susie set out to pack up each of her pieces. The first, a 12”x12” abstract painting titled “Death of Actaeon.” Susie had used blue to represent his blood, the hounds varying hues of yellow, tawny and neon orange. The palate echoed the mythic woodland setting, where a young Acteon met his demise: torn to pieces by his own hounds having metamorphosed, so says Ovid, only moments before.

Susie was wishing for her own sparagmus right about then. Despite her first show being well attended by the local arts community, not one of her pieces had found a home, and to make matters worse, her mother (who finished the better half of an MFA, she’ll have you know) had just delivered her a scathing review. As she wrapped her upcycled guitar sculpture of Venus (who else?) she let her mother’s reaction sink in. Art was the realm of real geniuses. She’d have to get realistic. Go back to school. Teach.

Turns out teacher school wasn’t so bad. Everyone in her cohort had a dream they were grieving, so it made for excellent happy hours. The football player who’d been injured. The English teacher who was so close to selling his book. And then there were these unicorns: the Math teachers. Every Math teacher Susie ever met had always known they were going to be a teacher. “Summer vacations, plus the pension, the benefits– teaching is the dream!” was a refrain she heard from each and every one of them in some form or another. Her? She was the math teacher’s muse: an artist who understood values, angles, proportions, and could bend them to her will for any creation she thought up. The collective Math teacher department couldn’t help but sigh.

What a refreshing change for Susie, who had often struggled to be the most innovative or weird creative in her artist circles. Square Susie was more like it, just producing derivative bullshit from those Ovidian myths she liked so much in Latin class. Her work was so normal it barely raised an eyebrow, but she made for the perfect artist friend: nonthreatening and encouraging. Ideal for those out there doing the real art. And the real art was happening worlds away from credential school. Here, her enthusiasm and interpersonal skills were what glowed, not her canvases.

“Kids love you,” her mother would coo to calm her nerves before student teaching. For Susie, there was nothing like having mom in her corner for once. So, she graduated. Got a job. Set up her classroom. And met Bob the math teacher. Bob was friendly, gave her things like colored pens and calendars, and always seemed to be in the copy room with a helping hand when she needed back up. Around this time Susie started looking for a place of her own, and surprise– to live where she worked, she needed twice her income. Or, a roommate. So, Susie decided to fall in love with Bob. Which worked out great for Bob, who had run the numbers.

The problem was, a couple kids later and one mediocre professional review, Susie was ready to blow her fucking brains out. Bob was all about maximum output, maximum savings. Earn as much as you can and use none of it. This meant he picked up every sub job, a second job, a coaching job. This also meant he had no gas left in the tank for old Susie or the kids. And Susie was becoming snoozy in the classroom. When one’s days are filled with “mom mom mom ms ms ms mom mom mom,” one can grow a little weary. Susie decided the problem was Bob, and made plans to leave.That was not part of Bob’s equation.

It was during the year-long algebraic expression of their entire lives (aka divorce) that Susie had Stevie King as a student, for the second year in a row. This kid was a nightmare. He was always trying to turn school into his own personal marketplace. Selling newspapers, comic books, screen plays, right under their noses like the teachers were all idiots. Not Susie. As she watched her half of the savings go straight down the toilet, she watched her rapport with the students do the same. And little Stevie King was no exception. Still, it was no excuse. It’s been some forty years now, and even while sleeping on the sidewalks of her city, Susie still blushes with embarrassment for the way she talked to that kid.

Bob the math wiz was getting pretty creative with the numbers, and convinced Susie he ought to pay a third of what the state recommended in child support. Seeing how his income could fluctuate and all (what if fewer teachers needed a sub?). Economically, he moved out with every piece of furniture they had owned, including Susie’s “Death of Actaeon” painting which he’d once deemed fit only for their dank laundry area in the garage. Worst of all, he wasn’t facilitating the kids’ calls Susie when they asked him. Fifty percent is an exact value, after all.

Susie was pissed. And sad. And artless. That’s when she saw the movie script, and the kids were passing quarters. And as if possessed, she heard her mom come into her body and beating the kid’s pamphlet on her breast like a sword against every hope and dream that had ever crushed her, from within her emerged a cry “The thing is, Stevie, I just don’t know why you waste your talent on that, that trash!2”

The kid handed over the quarters, and let his head sink low. Susie let him walk off, believing every word of her pep talk was about him. There goes another teacher, she thought solemnly. Like a magnet, her furrowed brow gathered her severed good intentions, mores, and fractured teacher-mask. In pieces, she turned to her desk and said “It’s time for me to pack up.”

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I like to think of July as dragonfly season. 
All this burnt-orange and aquamarine 
feasting on summer’s mesquite. 
Dragonflies buzz around our wet-less,
airborne country with no hope of return
to their watery origins. Look, there!
Some skim low over the creekbed’s surface
as if to scan for memories in water-warped light. 
What do you think? Are these the ones wishing
they could go back? Be born again under different 
stars? On a night like this— with a good book closed,
Thai food in the fridge— Let's think
not. Instead, let's think parting with the world 
they knew before gives them everything they need
to fly.

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“What I can’t understand, Stevie, is why you’d write junk like this in the first place!”1 As soon as the phrase left her lips, her metamorphosis was complete. Miss H. was no longer any trace of the human she had been upon entering teaching. Now, she was a stone-cold-vampire; ready to suck the creative life out of any mortal who dared throw back their creative locks with a howling sense of joy.

It hadn’t always been this way of course. No, no Miss H at one time was, just like me and you, reader, a human. She had hopes and dreams, sure, and sometimes even a date for Friday night. School was just her day job. She’d maintain her weeknight schedule of dance classes and writing groups. And on Sundays, just for the thrill of it, she’d still attend her figure drawing class at the yoga studio. Drawing a human body objectified by so many different bodies all at once always left her feeling something close to reverence. It would be a piece of cake. Button up sweaters by day, creative expression by night. Or so she had thought.

Then, the first day of school happened. Mr. Olson had been addressing the entire staff that first morning, sure, but Miss H couldn’t help but feel like his sermon was especially meant for her.

“Role models.” He was saying “Each and every one of you are in loco parentis, which means you must at all times embody the values of this historic institution– the three R’s we like to call it.” Miss H was naively thinking back to her credential program, that fairytale landscape where the three R’s had meant relationships, rigor and some other one she was always forgetting. She could never stay focused after that word rigor. Didn’t it come from the latin word for locked, stagnant stiff? What was a word like that doing in education, which from its very outset meant to be led out– therefore to move– from somewhere to somewhere else. Rigor?

Mr. O had moved along. “Our three R’s are routine, reprimand, and route.” Huh? What kind of pep talk was this? “Students without routine are unruly, they will go wild and take over.” Ah. “Reprimands are necessary for students to understand their limitations. We can’t have our graduates spouting off nonsense like ‘I am capable’ or worse ‘I can be anything I want to be’ That’s for those other kids. Our students need to be last R. Routed. Any single one of them who seems to have a whiff of their god given gift and or talent must be nipped in the bud, steered in the completely opposite direction. Ms H suddenly heard a faint buzzing in her ears, a sticking sensation of deja vu in her gut.

It’s just my day job, she found herself thinking, as the rest of the staff’‘s skin seemed to glitter like diamonds. Why was every teacher at this school so pale? It wasn’t until she got to the lunch hour that she noticed the teeth. More than one of the staff had these long canids, like vampires. All bodies are good bodies she thought, and set the observation aside.

And yet, day after day her world became smaller. Lessons didn’t just write themselves! Who had time for writing class? Dancing? Forget it. Dancing up and down the halls routing and reprimanded echoed of Monday night’s old salsa routine. And no respectable teacher could take a figure drawing class. What if one of her students saw her drawing someone nude? Or worse! Their parents! No, all of that mumbo-jumbo would have to stop. With each creative enterprise she gave up, the sharper her teeth became for the three Rs. Work was going as well as it could for a first year, and her skin had started to take on that same diamondy shine. But then of course, came along little Stevie King.

Stevie was a quiet kid, did his work, not much of a talker. That all kept him from being on her radar at first. Sure, he followed the classroom routines alright. But there was something about the way he sat up straight, cocked his head to the side when she talked about plotting the story that gave her suspicion. His assignments were coming in with increasingly exquisite language, which she made sure NOT to encourage with any direct praise. More than once, feeling it was her duty to route any implications he may have made from his a’s, she gave him a b-. Just to remind him writing was DEFINITELY not his thing.

But Stevie snuck one by her. The day she got her hands on his folio of that movie script was the day her canids started to jut out of her mouth just visibly. But it wasn’t until she verbally flayed him that indeed, she had become one of the faculty.

“Well done, Ms H,” Mr O said as they watched young Stevie walk home, head hung low. That was a close one. He almost might have thought himself a writer.

“Not on my watch,” said Ms H, the sounds of her dancing shoes and poems and pencil sketchings now just a figment of her imagination.

1

Page 49 of On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Steven King

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Your man smell is still cauterized to my cashmere,

damnit. My nose refuses to know you are gone

for good. No boots are right for mudmucking

these days, so I throw on whatever.

It won’t do to stop my weighted walk

at the top of the hill, at the bottom of the glen.

Soggy, there is nowhere to sit that’ll permit my eyes

to be any kind of winsome. The horizon meets my blank stare.

We are both resigned. Longing, letting go, these are yesterday’s hues.

Ardent, there is no changing the fact you have already

galloped through.

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Tomorrow isTuesday 6/23/26. Tomorrow I go into my first ever book agent pitches. Tomorrow I will execute, four times over, what I have rehearsed (as much as I can stomach.) Tomorrow morning, (of course it’s in the morning!), I’ll hand over whatever the final draft of my first real query letter becomes, my business card, and a page or two of a story I have been thinking about for over two years, picking at and writing through for over two years, a story that a classroom-roster length list of once strangers now friends have listened to and questioned and shaped. My story. 

So. That is what is happening come hell or high water. 

I feel the night before the first day of school feeling. The simultaneous “you need to get some sleep!” paired with “but how can anyone sleep?!” The “you’ve planned, practiced, prepared.” with “I just need to do one zillion little things before the bell rings.” It’s exciting. It is nauseating. It’s also all just a little too much. My inner critique is quoting my favorite movies, saying things like “pipe down, little Stevie” and “not everything is about you.” But there is another voice in there too, singing “anything could happen, anything could happen.” And those are the only two voices I can hear over a constant stream of panicking “sit still!” And “do everything!”

I am going to do what I tell my kids to do:

1.  I’m going to lay out my clothes. Aqua blue shirt, burnt orange pants(ironed?). Free people sweater with the pockets that have holes on the inside (resist.theurge.tomend!).

1. I am going to make myself check list:

   1. Wake up early

   2. Meditate and shit 

   3. Tinker query letter

   4. Print copies. 

   5. Eat something

   6. Get in the car by 8:00am.

   7. Listen to pitch rehearsal recording and make one last new one.

   8. Be where I’m supposed to by 8:45am.

   9. Relax, and let it all unfold.

My intention: FACT FINDING MISSION. LEARN! 

My learning targets:

-I will be able to address my interlocutors by name, accurately.

-I will be able to summarize her query letter in four succinct points while smiling. OR Sarah will read her query letter aloud. Both are acceptable. 

-I will be able to answer questions in direct, short sentences AFTER A BRIEF PAUSE. 

-I will be able to ask two questions and take notes on the answers. 

1) How do you measure success in your author-agent relationships?

 2) Is there anything else you want me to know? Wish your authors knew? 

Exit ticket: 

yes/no list for the 4 learning targets. 

Wish me LUCK!!!!!!

AFTER (to be continued)

Hiiii friends and family,

I did it! I survived my first agent round of agent pitches. Here is the play by play:

Pitch one: 2/4. Solid 50% so, we are rounding up. I read the query letter. What I learned is my query letter needs work. While it discusses the themes and the emotional tone of the work, it fails to identify the target for this agent: the illusive target that lies between what happens and plot points. The agent also referred to this as the story engine. Important questions the agent asked: what is the central conflict? what is the story arch? what is the climax of the book? I am not giving myself a pass on short succinct answers and I sure as hell did not have any kind of brief pause. I barely breathed. It was uncomfortable, but I found my pen, took notes, and went to wait for my next pitch.

Pitch two: 0/4. Technically not my fault. The agent is at present missing. Many people are on the lookout. Let’s hope they are safe and well wherever they are hiding.

Pitch 3: 4/4. What do you do? What excites you? What are you passionate about? These were the openers from agent #3. Let’s be honest, goal 1 was a slam dunk because folks have a name tag up. They immediately established a connection- we have teaching middle school experience in common. For goal 2, I ditched the query letter and told my story. It felt enthusiastic and flowed. I took my notes from pitch one and improvised. It was better. Goal 3. Not short, but I did answer the questions. “Does she?” I can’t remember the other one. “Does it work?” I said, “Yes.” So I will give this point to myself. First time hitting goal four and the gifts were many. This agent measures a successful relationship if the two go get lunch together— relationships over everything. They wished their writers understood that perfect changes, and that the cliche writing is rewriting is a cliche because its true. I get to email them more pages later. yay!.

Pitch 4: 4/4. Goal one, nailed it. Goal two, felt a little messier than pitch 3, but I got through it. Goal 3. The agent’s questions made it easy to keep the answers brief. Goal 4. This is where we spent the bulk of our time together. This agent is looking for nonfiction. My book is not that (see talking cats.) But they are quite experienced in their line of work and have been doing it successfully for a long time. He said he measures his success in sales, and that the agent-author relationship is a very close one. What he wants his authors to know especially with fiction is that they need to be realistic (hello, mom! who knew you would be here trapped in this elder man’s body!) Managing authors idealism is a big part of his job. And that rejection has very little to do with the author. Decisions are made on marketing. The most important thing an agent want’s to find is a writer who has voice, which is undefinable but you know it when you see it. To which I thought oh, like porn. But I didn’t say that.

FINAL UPDATE:

Agent 2 squeezed me in on her break and apologized for the mix up. They are interested, and they want to read more. YUSSSSSS!

Joy Harjo’s collection An American Sunrise provides cutting context, focused emotional acumen, and radical truths unlike any poetry collection I have come across. If you think you have been dealt a difficult hand, some unfathomable outcome has presented itself to you, just read this book to learn how to make music and grieve and dance the whole way through.

Her ability to both/and the indigenous-american experience is, for this whitey-mc-whiterson, unmatched. The severance she articulates between family members in her poems on the Trail of Tears and Indigenous Relocation Act (thanks for nothing, Jackson) looks at grief and its countless waves with a resigned, resolute courage. Harjo is not looking away. There is nowhere else to look. The loss is everywhere. And isn’t that how it always is? In light of ongoing ICE raids, in light of George Takei’s recent One Book, One Coast talk on They Called Us Enemy, Joy Harjo’s collection of poems meets the moment for me.

And after your heart and mind has been tenderized with how utterly nonsensical and immoral the indigenous history is after 1491, Harjo, about sixty pages in, takes a jack hammer to the our hearts and cracks us wide open with what remains: love stories between husband and wife, humor of mythic proportions with dick jokes, what the saxophone can do to a woman if she lets it, the poem titled Becoming Seventy.

Reading this collection of poems does what good poems are meant to do: it changes you, even a little bit, after each and every one.

I can’t recommend it enough, especially pages 66-72, but don’t skip ahead.

Don’t skip any of it at all.

.

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A house starts as four lines,

a red, crayon, box shape

imprinted by my five-year-old hand’s

signature stroke. Three decades later,

my eldest daughter will switch to green

to draw her triangle top. Give it a bit,

and her younger brother will add

twin teal smaller squares, will divide

them into fourths. My eyes should know that

these windows represent the promise

of a known depth, but I

just blink. My eyes don’t

know a thing.

The only thing I almost know? My youngest,

a daughter, will not be satisfied. Not until,

passing the five-year-old-threshold, she gets

her chance to scrawl pink and purple flowerbeds

on the right side, on the left of whatever

you call this.

For all of us, the shapes move, the colors

layer. Our family’s crayons melt into something

we, a kaleidoscopic household, can’t quite control.

Something neither my nose nor their father’s

can quite smell. Sure, whether here or there,

time will be measured in dollars and cents.

Perhaps, like on our broken marriage license,

each name on the lease is simply

Courage.

Foolishly, at this pitch, he and I both

grab for our binoculars. We try to inventory

the urban fowl, assess the longevity of city-street

trees, justify our claim to the space we hold

in these borderlands of our children’s Childhood.

We have squared our inches and feet, once,

no, twice over just to be certain. Certain?

Is it the backyard, the washing area,

the bathroom sink? What shape,

what color denotes

that crown-title

House?

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Tonight I am going to share a quick update in a tradition my family likes to call “The Good Things List" (shout out to my dad, who just became a subscriber.) Enjoy this brief update.

Good Things

1. Today, I got personal 1-1 career advice from the one, the only Danusha Laméris. Just me, her, her open heart and wealth of experience. Someone pinch me.

2. My dad has become a paying subscriber. Thanks, Dad.

3. I have drafted my query letter for Minervida four times. Someone get’s a star for doing her homework.

4. There is more laundry in drawers in my house right now than on the floor.

5. The children come home tomorrow.

6. Last week, I saw a white pelican on my way to an uninhabitated island in South Carolina.

7. Tomorrow, I’ll go to my favorite coffee shop with one of my favorite people.

8. I am in good health.

9. The cat’s are inside/not being eaten by wildlife.

10. My heart is still the tender kind. Evidence: I watched, and, in the end cried, along with Remarkably Bright Creatures.

Her family let out “ooooo” as she practiced her balance beams at five. Her friends said “aaaah!” as she aced the ropes course at fifteen. At twenty five, she even took a class from a swinging trapeze. She was whisked away by an instructor, had a dangling and spellbinding love affair, but in the end, was left hanging.

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After that the young woman decided to be realistic. “Everyone wishes they were an acrobat,” she told herself. “You don’t have the body, the breeding, the tenacity,” she’d continue.

Soon, with thoughts like these, she began to attract like-minded people.

“Acrobats, ha! They are all just egomaniacs.” said her new boyfriend.

“Acrobats are great and all, but come on… It’s not like you could be one.” offered her trusted friend.

“I am just so glad you have grown out of that acrobat phase!” exclaimed her mother.

And in this way, the young woman learned she could and would do anything, except be an acrobat.

She went to school and became a zoologist. She met a veterinarian, and this time, decided to fall in love. The vet was sensible, and had strict plans for their future. It included a house, two kids— okay three, but only because she begged, a steady daily routine. Most important was a frugal living style that would allow them to retire fat and spend a year on an African safari.

“It will be magical!” The vet was fond of saying “Think of how we’ll be on a schedule, with prepared meals and a little something new to look at each day.”

“Yes,” she’d reply, sipping her ice water. “Heaven.”

All the while however, the now middle aged woman was creating her own hell. Try as she might to suppress it, the acrobat dreams kept popping up. First, she caught herself whispering to her first born “someday, when you grow up to be an acrobat…” Next, she starting pitching theatrics for the gibbons at work.

“We could set it to music,” she’d say at the staff meetings. “Think of the lights!” her eyes would water.

The poor gibbons survived their Spring Spectacular, and the event was well attended, although, not exactly appreciated by all. The zoo directors, for example, had their concerns about how spectacle interfered with their vision of refuge.

At last, the middle age woman turned on those she held dear. The family who couldn’t understand her. The husband who built her a cage while she just stood there and smiled. When she finally got up the courage to whisper “I want to be an acrobat.” he replied, “But that’s ridiculous. I always thought I’d be married to a zoologist.” He’d said sincerely. She was at loss. Couldn’t anyone see that she was in agony?

In the end, it was the children who cracked open her open, as children often do. On a playground, they insisted she swing from ring to ring. The woman obliged, and with all her might, felt her strength swinging between gravity’s pull and her own momentum. The air moving through her hair, the recollection of what it felt like to do the thing she’d always wanted to do, with the people she’d always wanted to do it with. For a moment, she forgot her own name, forgot where she was. For a moment she embodied the acrobat.

The children stood dumbfounded. “Mom! We didn’t know you could do that.” They cried.

“There is so much, my darlings, I’ve yet to show you I can do.”

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When I think about the list of “what ifs” Leslie Zemeckis, Mary Knezevic, Angela Urrecheaga and the rest of the SBLF team had at the start of this scheme, the mind boggles. But the most important “what if?” on that list?

“What if it works?”

I participated as a volunteer for the Author, VIP, and Sponsor Party on Friday night (a phrase I got so good at saying, by the way), the Opening Party on Saturday night, and the Closing party on Sunday night. That first party, dressed in black, I showed up to the Tamsen Gallery thinking I would spend the night pouring wine.

Instead, I quickly became the bouncer. Due to some glitch in the ticket system, some folks had gotten access to tickets who shouldn’t have (the private link was not in fact so private. I too thought I had scored a sneak one, before realizing I would be there as a volunteer). Angela Urrecheaga, our fearless leader, coached me up as she shared I had the job of letting people know Saturday and Sunday’s parties were open to the public, but Friday was just for the panel participants. Cue cold sweat. Angela made it look easy, but did I have what it takes to hold the line?

I immediately had flashbacks of working the door for my high school dances, an AP looming over my shoulder as this or that friend tried to sneak it yet another illicit guest. Working the door of an open event? No problem. Bouncing the door? Not my strong suit. Mostly only the right people got in, and that’s all I will say about that.

As an upside aside: I remembered something about teaching I forgot. At my last school there was a no bathroom policy in the last ten minutes of class. Just like I would say to my fourth period who was constantly pressing the issue, I found myself saying to a disgruntled would-be-party-goer “the policy is this, but if you run, I am not going to chase you.”

In the end, it was a very fun evening and so special to meet author after author after author (as I searched for them on the page that was not exactly alphabetized). The authors, moderators, sponsors and VIP pass holders were on the whole and without exception gracious and funny, and really down for the ride as far as the weekend went. All three nights I came away feeling like it had been a success.

Another positive take away: Like our planning team when we hosted our 20th high school reunion, or like me when I hosted my first Creative Cluster, people were very concerned with the question “Is anyone going to show up?”

Just goes to show you, you could be a National Best seller and still have that “but what if no one comes?” feeling. The best news: it doesn’t matter. There were panels that packed a full house. There were writing workshops of three that decided to go off site for wine. Can you imagine being one of two people getting wine with your favorite author? Two people in Santa Barbara right now do not have to. They did it! One workshop I worked, there was a no show, but that did not slow the author down for a second. She scooted off as quick as she could to a different panel she had been so bummed to have had that schedule conflict with. You win? You win. You fail, you win type situation.

Of course, and for me, a lonely mom whose kids were at their dads, the most important part was spending time with the other folks who worked this thing too. Everyone had a creative project to tell about, a background in the one time they wrote something, a dream they were working towards, a favorite genre, or an author or panel they were hoping to see. I even had one volunteer spontaneously compose and recite me a beautiful poem (shout out to Breton!). As I shared with another volunteer (whose ear I talked all the way off-you are welcome, Dustin), it was like being part of an interactive theater production. We all had our roles to play. Physical props had to be moved from one stage to the next (like drink tickets, for example.) It was electrifying.

Long story short, I would do it again in a heartbeat and I am so grateful I got to be there for that first, messy, wild and inspiring time. The courage, effort, and faith it took for that team to bring all that talent into our little neighborhood is inspiring. You can read more about the actual event in the Independent. And being the door-lady to that many authors had me thinking: what if it all works out?

I will close by sharing that I have booked my agent pitch appointments at the Santa Barbara Writers Conference next month.

Who knows, maybe one day I will be politely asking the next SBLF volunteer about her creative pursuits.

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ps. thanks for the swag bag, Angela and Mary!

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As May approaches, I have my eye on the SB Writers Conference in June, where authors book 15 minute speed dating appointments with agents.

So, this week I asked my friend and talented development editor Sheila McMullin how I could talk to people about this artifact I am making. Please enjoy these drafts I submitted to her to get this conversation started.

(Best if read using a 90’s rom com trailer voice).

1. One woman wades through the mess of life to choose recovery for both herself and her kids. Our 39 year old protagonist is about as wild and lovely as her setting, the mountainous urban frontier of a small central coast town of CA, which comes alive and talks with her. After escaping bad husband, Mars, and bad obsession, Lori, can she, with help from the ghosts of her ancestors’ past, forgive herself her sins, and find a way to pay rent in time? Or will she lose everything and ruin her kids’ lives forever, like her cats are convinced she will? Find out in this aching, high stakes, and somehow funny book that looks at the trans-generational patterns of trauma and one woman’s effort to disrupt them.

2. Minerva Eloise Sandra Byrne’s road map to success was straight forward: go to college, become a teacher, get married, buy a house, have kids. But like her initials say, this protagonist is a MES. Freshly divorced, but far from free, Minerva has to figure out how to live by her own rules, apart from two sisters, a loud mouth mom, cats that talk, and the ghosts of grandmother’s past, and an enchanted landscape.

   Will she be able to be all her children Athena, Albert and Little Astrid deserve (safety, stability, love)? Or will she lose them to her ex, and lose everything else in the process? After all, she does have a haunting secret, a full set of vices, and a pretty mean inner critic that at any moment could destroy her.

Sheila received both of these with good humor and lots of care, but we both agreed there was more to explore here. My exercise while she is traveling the world (literally-women approaching forty, just know one of us is at a wedding in Italy right now and that is a beautiful thing) is to try again, but write them with a specific audiences in mind:

From an email from Sheila titled 4.21.26 Meeting Recap

“Log lines for different audiences

another exercise in defining your why

for children

for therapist

friend

for Pam

like-minded stranger

for an agent”

Enjoy these swings and let me know which one connects for you in the comments.

For the Children:

Kids: “Mom, what is your book about?”

Me: “Well, there’s a lady on a mission to get herself and her kids to some “better” place, but she learns that the best place is always wherever they are together. “

Kids: “Mom, that is so boring.”

Me: “There are also magical cats, good and bad choices, and consequences.”

Kids. “Hm. Can I have a snack?”

For my therapist.

Karen: “Sarah, what’s your book about?”

Me: Well, Karen, thanks for asking. I wrote a book about this lady who figures out redemption is something we have to choose for ourselves, how life is rarely black and white, and how the best thing she can hope her kids inherit is compassion for themselves and others.”

Karen: “Interesting.” (scribbles notes.)

For my friend:

Hailey: “Sarah, what’s your book about?”

Me: Okay so there is this lady, and she is like our age, and it’s like she woke up in the middle of her life and was like ‘oh shit!’ and blows everything up. Sells the house, leaves the husband, quits her job...

Hailey: “This sounds like your life..”

Me: but wait, wait! There are talking cats and a love triangle and in the end she and the kids are better off.

Hailey: “I love cats.”

For Pam (my inner critic):

Pam: What have you wasted your time on today, you little delusional shithead?

Me: Shut up, Pam. I’ll have you know I wrote a novel that’s 27 chapters and a full 300 pages thank you very much.

Pam: 300 pages of shit.

Me: You are entitled to your opinion. I have a different one. I think it’s 300 pages about suffering and healing and lust and love and cruelty and compassion and really what makes life worth living. PLUS, I put a lot of native plants and birds in it.

Pam: “You know what’s a really good book about that is (names other author’s title)”

Like Minded Stranger:

LMS: Tell me a bit about your book? What’s it like?

Me: Well, it’s pretty regional. I set it in a fictional place that is just like where I grew up, so in that sense it kind of smells like home to me. There is a woman, she’s my age and her parameters are not so different (three kids, divorced.) But she is able to travel to places reality doesn’t let someone like you or me. When she looks inward, she is actually physically transported to her Inscape. She does normal things in there: long walks in the forest, tea around a campfire, and there’s familiar faces in there who help her out. But like all of us, she’s battling something, and at various points in the novel you are like “yeah. . .she’s going to lose.” But she doesn’t. It’s got lust and love and moral gray areas in there, but in the end she ends up where most of us do: she ends up hopeful.

LMS: That sounds wonderful.

To An Agent:

Agent: What is your book about?

Me: (Gulp.) A single woman with three young kids is tackling life’s big questions. Although it feels like it sometimes, she’s never alone. Through magic realism she has a team of allies who show up time and time again to free her from what’s really holding her hostage: not the ex husband, or her addictions, or her need for a new job– in the end, Minerva gets free of what we all have to from time to time: herself.

Agent: Great. Here’s a million and half dollars.

Me: perfect.

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