post-AWP

  So we went, I saw, and we came home again. Fourteen thousand people. I saw Marvin Bell entering the building as we drove past. I am mostly the invisible woman, too old to matter, but there were amazing people all around. My choices of what to bring home were determined by money ($15) and …

AWP

So yes, I am going. I am going to the national conference today, just for a few hours. Originally, because it is in Portland and has not been here in ages and because I know many people who will be attending and serving on panels (though specifics were hard to come by unless an individual …

HORSES and FOSAMAX

There's a connection. Wait for it. I was crazy for horses as a child. I begged for horse figurines for my birthday, read every horse book in the juvenile section of our local library before I hit adolescence and loved the smell of horse manure. "Can't I have a pony?" Not in suburbia. I read …

Harriet Tubman

The Emily Howland photo album containing the portrait of Tubman, (above: detail, ca. 1868) was unveiled this week at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture. (NMAAHC, Library of Congress) I have added the photo above to the post from this morning: UNDERGROUND RAILROAD. Harriet Tubman would have been about 36 years old. …

UNDERGROUND RAILROAD

I was reading The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead. In a blurb on the back cover, Oprah Whinfrey urges people to buy a second copy for a friend "because you are definitely going to want to talk about it." Someone asked me to be that friend. This fantasy fiction details real atrocities committed against African …

SEASONAL CHANGE

This last week was mildly eventful and full of change. The final three days of winter brought a stiff east wind—which locally is sometimes quite warm in winter. For three days we enjoyed temperatures in the 70s, which would be a warm day for us in summer! It was a particular relief after the nighttime …

TO BE SURE

The Los Angles Review of Books blog has a grammatical error. "Unlike Nancy, who’s mother died when she was three, I had a mom, and my mom had read Nancy Drew when she was my age." The contraction "who's" stands for "who is." The writer wanted the possessive form of "who" (whose) and failed to find it. …

A BETTER WORLD

Dystopias extrapolate the fears of the day while utopias project our dearest hopes and ideals. Science fiction writers from the Golden Age of post-WW2, for example, often address the disastrous impact of the potential for nuclear powers to obliterate the planet. They were concerned about global and intergalactic peace and the trade-off in freedom resulting …

PLAGIARIZED REVIEW

What a Google search has to say about Anne with an E: This reimagining of the classic book and film is a coming-of-age story about a young orphan who is seeking love, acceptance and her place in the world. Amybeth McNulty stars as Anne, a 13-year-old who has endured an abusive childhood in orphanages and …

ONLINE PRESENCE

I quit Facebook last month, and my teaching job once I'd handed in grades last week. On the beach this morning I found four small pieces of seaglass. I have painted the floor in the entry and hall a dark blue-green. Now I am sitting in the atrium, waiting for paint to dry, reading aloud …