Fiber Artists for Obama Has a Quilt!


Maria C. Shell, a quilter and fiber artist from Alaska, sent photos of the quilt done by Fiber Artists for Obama today. Since I opened the door for discussion about this group in an earlier post, I thought I would share some of her photos here. There is one full image of the quilt and a crop of my square.

Maria arranged for a CD of professional pics to come to those who contributed a square, so I'll post those, too, when I get them. I'm just extremely happy the quilt is finished. Still can't post any specifics about where the quilt will travel yet because I don't think the group really knows. And I've taken some word diet pills to control my tendency to just blatantly ask ... so, I'm in a *passive* state of waiting with this project.

We still haven't named the quilt, but Maria's stitching for the quilting of this piece is exquisite! So many wonderful details to get lost in. Maria did the border for us, and she donated the batting, backing and her time for the actual quilting. I'm more than impressed with her work on our squares.

Wow ...

Family Bonding and the Virtues of Wii


One of the funniest sources of entertainment for me recently has been watching my mother play wii games in the presence of our family. She's never really been a strong video game player, even when she bought an Atari system for me and my brother. I have to admit, too, that when my brother was surfing through wii consoles and ended up buying the system for her, I took a deep breath and hoped it would not be one of those gifts that would sit in the box and collect dust for years. I don't know if my brother was able to compare prices, or if he just knew this was going to be a source of laughter for the rest of the family and just made the investment -- no matter what the cost.

Much to my surprise, mom is all in! When she straps on the remote to her wrist and powers up the tele, we are in for some grand laughs. She talks back to the virtual creatures as if they can hear her, makes the most hilarious grunt noises and acts utterly indignant when the machine is able to beat her. She yells that she knows she's smarter than a machine and doesn't understand how on earth it could ever "hold back" her score. The game that requires her to ride the cow is the most hilarious to watch. She hits trees instead of targets and can't seem to keep her cow on the track. Then it becomes our fault that she didn't make a higher score because we were laughing too hard and distracting her. Guess what? This makes us laugh even more. It's the best unadulterated family fun.

Although I haven't been brave enough to try Nintendo Wii myself (and even though it's become a family pastime to laugh at my mother), I am thinking too of trying wii fit for my own enjoyment. I'll be smart enough to try it when no one else is around though ... so if I fall flat on my face trying to do virtual calisthenics, I'm the only one laughing.

For the last couple of months, I have spent many hours at the bedsides of ill family members. Most of my caretaking is really based on how intuitive I naturally am and how well I listen. Not only do I have to be on point with a schedule for meds, tube flushings, bandage changing and liquids, but I have to be very attuned with what the sick person really needs (as opposed to what she might be saying that she needs). I am no nurse, for sure, but I've done this so much recently, my best friend has started to call me Florence NightinCherryl. Truth is, I can only imagine what it might take to become a licensed practical nurse in terms of how much study is required. You really have to know some technical things about the human body and how it is supposed to function in a healthy state. There are many lpn schools that teach students how to work closely with patients in various health care settings to maintain and provide them basic medical care. You can complete LPN training in as little as 7 months to 1 year for a hospital certificate, or you can get an LPN degree in two years from a community college or trade school. LPNs earn up to $35,000 a year after graduation, depending on where they're located and what type of medical facility they work in. University of Phoenix, which has programs in several states, including Georgia, Florida, Colorado, California and Ohio (among others), seems to be a popular choice. Some of these kind of schools even have LPN - to - RN programs to ensure students become registered nurses, too. In our frail economic times, those who have been thinking about a career change might be pleased to know that this kind of work is always in demand. There is always a need for a gentle, knowledgeable hand on a sick bed.

Breaking Traditions "With One Voice"
"Gratitude" quilt hangs in Novi, Michigan


I'm so proud to be a part of the Breaking Traditions "With One Voice" exhibit going on in Novi, Michigan through next week. (My piece is on the third row, almost exactly in the center.) The curator, Lynn Krawczyk, hung the exhibit this week, and it looks stunning!

Participating in this effort thrills me for two important reasons:

1) We all got to recognize the "givers" in our world. Though you'd never believe it by looking at the daily news, there is still a lot of good happening on our planet. Volunteers and community organizers have done their ample parts to help save us repeatedly.

2) We raised $1,085 for the American Cancer Society!!!

There are 108 quilts in the show, which will also be traveling to the following galleries and shows:

Fabrications Retreat
Garland Resort
Lewiston, Michigan
Oct. 7-10

Carnegie Center for the Arts
Three Rivers, Michigan
Nov. 9-Dec. 20

212 Arts Center
Saline, Michigan
July 1-31, 2009

Siouxland Samplers Quilt Guild
Siouxland City Convention Center
Sioux City, IA
September 19-20, 2009


Lynn was even gracious enough to create an online catalog of all the entries to let you see the pieces up close and read the artist essays that accompany each one. What a generous gift she gave to us as artists, too!

I have been debating whether or not to go public with my frustrations over the Fiber Artists for Obama piece. Behind the scenes, it's not been nearly as organized as Lynn's exhibit. Maybe I will speak about it soon ... I've been so aghast with the *disorder* there that my sense of no-nonsense frankness reared its determined head and seemed to scare some folks. They implied I wasn't being kind ... and maybe I wasn't. I was trying to get straight answers, which kindness had not afforded us up to that moment ... and which we still don't have.

As a result, I really pulled back from the group, which ironically, I can't seem to post anything to anymore, and I'm focused on my own Obama quilt, about which I may have some good news to share soon.

Ultrasound technology is a field I've always only associated with babies and pregnancy. The use of this science enabled my first real moments as a mother while my child was barely more than the cells that created her. Somehow, I had been living in a fantasy world thinking the entire motherhood journey was not quite real until I saw her for the first time on that sonogram monitor. It amazed me that I was about to give birth i n the 20th century and technology would be able to give an ultrasound technician and my doctor valuable information to care for me and my baby. As my children have almost reach adulthood now, I am realizing more important functions for the ultrasound. It has assisted those in my family with fibroid tumors and other medical conditions that require physicians to have to take a closer look. There are many schools that specialize in training those who want to work in this field. Career Education lists about 102 of them. There are even very specialized areas you can focus on in the field: abdominal sonography (liver, kidneys, gallbladder, spleen and pancreas), neurosonography (brain), obstetric and gynecologic sonography (female reproductive system), ophthalmologic sonography (eyes) and vascular technology or echocardiography (the heart).

Zoe Beloff ... Staging Hysteria


Perhaps it was her words about a new installation in New York's Bellwether Gallery that struck me:

"As a media artist, I’m fascinated by the idea of graphically recording mental states, finding ways to show the intangible workings of the mind. My installation, The Somnambulists, centers on the idea of 'staging the unconscious.' Five small theaters each present a 'hysterical drama.'"

The art of it for me is in recording mental states ... *staging the unconscious* ... vocalizing the subconscious ... suggesting a *super-conscious* ... showing the inner workings of the mind.

Admittedly, I was very drawn to the pictures of Zoe Beloff's work. The *stagecraft* is quite stunning! It has a very *magical realist* feel for me. And there is a book and DVD component for patrons.

But it was part of Beloff's process, too, that intrigued me. An artist who often works with cinematic imagery, including film, dioramas, stereoscopic projection performance and video installation, she focuses on emotional trauma as a cause of hysteria, and develops sound theatricality around it. According to a statement she makes at the NYFA Current site, at the end of the nineteenth century, *acting crazy* was all the rage in Paris cabarets.

Beloff stages the hysteria plays in The Somnambulists as musicals where the spectator seems to have entered the theatre of the hysteric's mind. The set is built as a Victorian toy theater made of wood, and the actors are virtual. She aims to create a hallucination for viewers rather just making them feel they are looking at a projection on a screen.

She took this approach because of the work of Sigmund Freud and Dr. Pierre Janet in Paris at the time:

"Realizing that his patients’ hysterical attacks provided a window into the unconscious workings of their minds, and aware that they could neither hear nor respond to him in the throws of their delirium, Janet discovered that he could communicate with them by entering into their imaginary world, as a second actor. It was as though he had entered the theater of their minds and, as master of ceremonies, was able to manipulate their fears so that their nightmarish delusions had happy endings."

What it seems Beloff is going for here is the creation of a whole new language through visual effects. Right now, she is working on an exhibition titled "Freud in Coney Island," which aims to celebrate the centennial of Freud's visit to Coney Island in 1909.

I can't wait to see what kind of ride we can expect in the new work -- and where I might go in my own mind, of course.

A Family Food Tradition: Stepping Aside for the 'Elder' Cook


There is a funny tradition that has probably lasted several generations in my family: whoever is the elder cook gets all the props. It doesn't matter that you make the best baked macaroni and cheese or that your sweet potato casserole is more delectable than your mother's. When she is in the kitchen, you yield to her and you praise your expertise.

I have taken this little ritual a step further: if my mother is cooking in the kitchen, I don't even enter the cooking area unless I'm asked. Period. She knows how she wants everything cooked, where she wants it to land on the table ... and she rarely wants any other "noses" in her space while she works her magic. I admit, I am this way too when I am the cook.

Sometimes I cringe when the younger generation doesn't follow this practice. My nephew, for example, always says, "You make grilled cheese sandwiches wayyyyy better than Gram." I want to duck for fear that he will be picking his face off the floor. And my son ... infamous for asking me for my dirty rice while his stepmom is in earshot. He seems to find great joy in emphasizing that she cooks hers from a box.

It's not that we want to perpetuate a lie when we step aside for the elder cook. It's that we want to honor the culinary traditions that have come before us. We all eventually get out turn to be the cook.

Imagine the horror that crept through my family's phone lines when they learned that I would be making the entire Thanksgiving dinner by myself and all they had to do was show up. I can't tell you how many times I had to go over the same menu with the same people, as if them asking me two or three times what we were eating was going to change the menu list. Are we eating only vegetarian? I'll bring some turkey! What are squash medallions?

Hilarious!

My nose almost flared when one of my relatives showed up with chicken wings thawed, washed and ready to pop in the oven. I had repeatedly told them to bring only themselves.

We got through that Thanksgiving and everyone seemed deeply satisfied with what they ate. Even my uncle from Maryland said, "If I had known I could eat vegetarian food that tastes like this, I might have been eating more vegetarian all along." The man would stab you in the palm for a chicken wing, trust me.

It was important for me as the eldest in my generation to do this meal and hint at them all that the baton needs to pass. I think by the end of the meal, they got it.

My friends all know that cooking is one of my other loves. Even when I was a young wife living in Indianapolis, most of the friends who gathered at my house came in search of food ... and I never disappointed them. It was a pleasure watching VC eat chili made with kidney beans and tofu after she swore she would never eat either. In recent years, she's expressed how much she misses that dish. Or LS coming from Ball State just to get perch or orange roughy.

The things I've learned over the years about food did not come from attending culinary schools -- unless you count my mother's, aunts' grandmothers' and neighborhood surrogate mothers' kitchens. I remember making my first pot roast when I was nine years old. After that, everything else was a breeze.

I think I knew very early to connect what I was stirring in a pot to the people whose mouths would embrace it. It's like that every single time I come to a stove. I put every ounce of creativity into a meal based on the love and admiration I feel for the people who will eat what I cook.

Sometimes, I am tempted to reserve some of my elder time (about twenty years from now) for some kind of culinary training. I'm curious about the prestigious Le Cordon Bleu program and its French techniques. I want to know how differently chefs behave in restaurants, hotels, bakeries, food commissaries, catering companies, cruise ships, healthcare institutions and vacation resorts. What is the difference between an executive chef or sous-chef? A cook and a chef? Could you be a short-order cook and still be fancy in what you present to eaters? What do these schools teach about Rachael Ray and her "yum-o" enterprise?

I don't know that I'll ever make it to culinary school, but I'm definitely adding it to my bucket list. I already have the love of food down ... now for more technique.

Demerath Law Offices offer free consultations for personal injury and wrongful death cases. Attorney Larry R. Demerath, who has 35 years experience in personal injury litigation, has worked diligently on behalf of Nebraska clients. As an Omaha Car Wreck Attorney he has used his life experience to represent fellow Nebraskans present and prove damages claims. A Vietnam veteran who served in the U.S. Air Force before going to law school, he grew up on a farm and understands the hazards victims face in agricultural products liability cases. Since graduating from Wayne State College and the University of Nebraska College of Law, Demerath practices in both state and federal courts and is comfortable with any size case.

In an era when everyone seems to be looking for products that not only work to maintain human hygiene, cure blemishes and promote good health, everything seems to be creeping back to what is natural. People want products made from natural ingredients. Acnexus, a one-step all natural exfoliant, is no exception. Though the bottle reads that it's a scrub, it acts like microdermabrasion. The acnexus blend of 27 natural ingredients infuses Redmond Clay and micro bits of walnut shell to help massage acne fighting ingredients beneath the skin. Unlike most other acne solution skin cleansers, Acnexus does not contain potent chemicals and alpha hydroxy acids, which melt the skin in order to deliver what they have promised. It also does not contain highly flammable bleaching agents like benzoyl peroxide, which causes many consumers to have an allergic response. It works based on the *process* of exfoliating the skin. After a year of use, manufacturers have said the product appears to reduce signs of aging as well.

Coco Chanel's "Fashion School" Happened on the Streets of Paris
Shirley MacLaine plays the fashion diva on Lifetime


I have to admit that I was a little nervous to watch the Lifetime movie, Coco Chanel when it premiered a couple weeks ago. I thought for sure they would get it wrong and mess it up. Anytime Shirley MacLaine is on board, though, it is bound to be one helluva ride. I always know there is going to be a word, phrase or scene that I can take away and ride until its cliched wheels fall off. She's 74, a fireball, and doesn't take crap off of anyone as a character or her real self.

I honestly wondered how the producers and director would fit the very large personality of MacLaine into a made-for-tv movie. Somehow, it worked. Perhaps it was because her very dramatic scenes in the film were quite poetic on some levels and because the storyline operated in flashback mode where Barbora Bobulova, who played the younger Chanel, got a lot of face time. (Thank sweet Buddha for that! Too much of MacLaine would have ruined it.)

I was really inspired to be reminded that Chanel started as a struggling hat designer (hellllloooo!). It was amazing to watch how she overcame crazy odds to land in a storefront shop and on people's heads. I loved that the story focused on her rise and not all the glitz.

There were these other poetic moments, too, (moments when I tuned out MacLaine to really hear Chanel) that I found myself gathering quotes:

"Failed innovation is painful. The revival of it is sinister."

"The poetry of fashion lies in illusion."

"Freedom is never out of style."

"Success is built by one's failures, not by one's successes."

"A dress must be able to be at once a caterpillar by day and a butterfly by night; it must be able to crawl and fly."

All of these quotes led me to think about how fashion designers are choosing to train (or not train) themselves.

There is the traditional route of fashion school, where you can choose a school that fits your goals in order to advance your career. The advantage here is clearly that you become "connected" with other designers, show promoters, publicists and media, and a host of other entities (teachers, mentors, guest lecturers) who can inspire your greatest ideas. Many of these programs also include courses in merchandising and retail, and teach you a lot about how to get your designs to market and earn a substantial living at what you do.

Fashion schools also open your possibilities to a whole range of other careers, like: fashion writer, clothing patternmaker, fashion buyer, boutique owner, fashion stylist, accessory designer, costume designer or model.

Visiting some of the fashion school articles, potential students can learn about the "little black dress" (originated by Coco Chanel) or wedding dresses by Vera Wang or what it means when we say "Haute Couture."

There are also those who choose nontraditional routes. They happen to be in the right place at the right time or they sell so many of their own designs that what they make becomes hot pop merchandise. This is the route of Coco Chanel. Even when others scoffed at her efforts, she kept making her hats until the practice had turned into an entire empire.

I don't think many of us in the hatmaking business are really trying to build an empire like hers. But what an inspiration it was to see it all unfold, to know that one of the most heralded designers of our time went to fashion school on the streets of Paris.

There's something powerful that can be said about dreaming and grassroots.

The Tale of My New Purse: Camera Bonding and Product *Snatching*


I've really been bonding with my new camera and still have lots to learn. So far, minus the memory card challenge (I'm going to have to surf for bigger memory cards because I have one that only holds 32 MB), it's such a good buy!

There is even a solid video recording component, so I'll be able to do poems with such ease. The greatest thing of all is that I am no longer taking those grainy photos like before, and this gives me great joy. As you might guess, I will spend the next week photographing everything in sight, especially new work, so I can get it uploaded to my store.

I am sharing a photo here of a bucket purse from my new fall hat & purse line. Quite a few people have asked for it, and I have selfishly decided to keep it for myself. It's been a good sales pitch whenever I've been out.

I love that I had the foresight to line the purse and make it more sturdy ... and give it a fancy turquoise embellishment with a silver hook ... but the top of the purse is soooo soft (angora yarn) ... and it's a hot orange with hints of red and gold creeping in.

And I absolutely love the high I get when someone in a store or a parking lot asks right after a short gasp, "Where'd you get that?" (That is always the goal in sales, isn't it? ... to make people ask!) I wear certain hats that I make for this same effect.

Anyway, I'm still learning the marketing thing, but I think the one important thing I've learned is that *creating* or *constructing* the scenario where people will willingly ask about your product is key. You have to make them interested. And if there's one thing that I'm really good at it's giving just enough of my work to make people ask about more.

I might not know about the marketing aspect of this whole hat-selling thing, but I am good at getting people to ask questions about what they see.

A Way for Writers to Buckle Down in the Financial Crunch


The current state of financial affairs in our land has forced many writers to supplement income by freelancing, blogging and copy writing. Some who have completely lost jobs have had to use this as primary income.

Prior to the "necessity is the mother of invention" move into the freelance field, many hesitated to take the leap. It was the inconsistent nature of the work holding them back. Many harbored a need for someone else to be responsible for their own security.

As someone who has done this for the last five years, I want to say that it takes a minute to get your stride and to establish contacts that will keep your work flow steady. Once you reach that plateau, however, "corporate America," "nine-to-five," "day job," and "office politics" become such dirty words. The insanity of all of that is really beyond me.

Now, I can't really knock an office or work-shift paradigm for those who seem to make it work. Nothing beats being happy with what you do for a living because you would probably do it whether you get paid for it or not.

While I can offer no solid advice for those who want to try their hand at freelance gigging, and I won't point anyone in the direction of companies who hire you for freelancing gigs, I can, from time to time, offer helpful resources that I encounter. I am choosing to be very careful about what I offer because the same thing doesn't work for everyone. I had to diversify my income sources, and that works for me, but some people need to just focus on one thing only in order to be successful at it. You don't know what works for YOU until you get out there and try it.

One source I'm going to share today is Michael Stelzner's blog, which focuses on writing white papers, and specifically a blog entry that talks about the "Top 10 Blogs for Writers." The distinguished blogs offer advice, tips, continuing education, inspiration, networking and any other kind of thing that helps the freelance writer stay afloat.

Check it out and see if something there helps you leap. I'm going to keep preaching about becoming less and less dependent on a nine-to-five to feed yourself, especially if you are a creative type. You do what you have to do, but ultimately, it doesn't make good art or help you keep good sense.

Celebrate!
The Busy Season


I've been pretty lax on celebrating the achievements of fellow writers and artists lately. It's not that I haven't paid attention or been jumping out of my skin with glee each time I hear about something fabulous unfolding. I've just been in my "busy season" and trying to get at least four hours of sleep.

Right now, I'm completely surrounded by my new hats, which seem to be growing daily and which will go up in my Etsy store soon. My bedside table is sprawling with an ever flipping sketch pad, scraps of fabric that I don't want to throw away because I'm sure I'll find another use for them, needles (crochet and sewing) and threads, a micro recorder (for poems in the middle of the night, of course, when my fingers are too tired to write or type), scissors and a bottomless cup of water. I think there may even be a couple of lists for Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner recipes there, too (I'm thinking I want to try a tofu cheesecake or vegan snickerdoodles and not tell my family they're vegan -- tee hee).

Every morning when I awake, I'm suddenly frightened by the mess. I am pretty much a neat freak when it comes to domestics. The only space that's not really clean or neat is my work space, and even that has neatly stacked piles of fabric arranged by project or a tray of papers that I need to look at before I shred. But the space I'm designing in right now is a wreck, and I'm not doing anything about it. In some part of my brain, cleaning up in the middle of such a creative storm will stop my creative storm. So, I'm afraid to return to neatness.

I do hope the muses will let me rest a little soon, though. I miss order.

So, for the things I've been celebrating and not talking about in this space ...

First, the 2008 MacArthur fellows have been named, and I am through the roof (!!!) that one of the recipients is a fiber artist from Charleston! She has preserved her Gullah family's tradition of weaving sweetgrass into these gorgeous vessels. Her name is Mary Jackson.

Sweetgrass is indigenous to the low country area around Charleston and is called by its name because of the sweet fragrance when it blows in the sea breezes. Traditionally, the baskets were used to harvest rice and cotton on plantations and basketmaking was a tradition you could only teach to someone who was your blood family (not in-laws or extended family). Currently, about 200 families in the area still do strawgrass basketry, and they seem to have relaxed the code of teaching it only to family. Jackson learned from her mother and grandmother, the same way I learned crocheting and quilting from both of my grandmothers.

What seems to distinguish Jackson from her mother and grandmother is that she has taken the art of basketry to a whole new level. She uses the techniques that they taught her, but designs vessels with more contemporary shapes and styles. The women in her family before her sold their baskets for $2-3 a piece ... Jackson has received commissions for $20,000 and has taken two to three years to complete a project. Generally, though, her pieces range from $400-2,200.

Her entire family helps her in her business; her son and husband gather the materials, which she never wants to buy commercially. Her daughter runs the office.

What I want to say about how happy I am about Jackson's selection is that the MacArthur selection committee chose a fiber artist, chose someone who makes art with her hands, chose to recognize an indigenous craft -- one that is both an art and holds a utilitarian purpose, chose to see the genius in something that is family-centered ... chose sweetgrass and Mary Jackson. While I noted there were no poets or playwrights selected this year, I feel so honored to have this kind of work get the attention it deserves.

Kudos to Mary Jackson: You said you wanted to keep this tradition alive. My goodness, did you ever!

Other MacArthur fellows that I'm super excited about (not that I'm not thrilled about them all): Chimamanda Adichie (fiction ... yipee!!!), Will Allen (an urban farmer from Milwaukee), Andrea Ghez (astrophysicist), Walter Kitundu (instrument maker and multimedia artist), Adam Riess (astronomer), Jennifer Tipton (stage lighting designer) and Miguel Zenón (jazz saxophonist).

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My bud Douglas Kearney has won the National Poetry Series for his book The Black Automaton. His book will be published by Fence Books in 2009. Adrian Matejka's second book, Mixology, was also an NPS winner and will be published next year by Penguin.

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Roger "Obike" Reeves has won a 2008 Ruth Lilly Poetry Fellowship. The prize is $15,000 and the fellows are nominated by a university writing program. Fellows can use the money to study or write poetry as they wish. Obike is currently an MFA candidate at UT-Austin's James Michener Center.

'Infamous Dicks': Infidelity A Hot Topic Again


Those of you who know my work know that I write quite a bit about infidelity. It is a subject that intrigues me for many reasons. The strain of "unfaithful" stories that have colored our news lately only feed this curiosity in me. Why on earth does a man or woman risk everything they've worked their entire lives for in order to have one or two reckless moments of genital pleasure? (Yes, I'm talking about the whole John "blah-blah" Edwards affair.

But Edwards has plenty of company on that front: former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, former NY Governor Eliot Spitzer (and the current Gov. David Paterson who replaced him), James McGreevey with Golan Cipel, Colorado Minister Ted Haggard and yes the cheating husband-wife duo now vying for the White House, John and Cindy McCain ... we seem to be inadvertently forming an "Infamous Dicks" club.)

It's beyond me. We should have some kind of test that tells us how many times in the past has the person you're thinking of marrying or being serious with cheated on a partner. When you're thinking of committing, you should decide if the cheater's behavior is an ongoing pattern.

Maybe we should compare this kind of infidelity trait the way that we compare auto insurance quotes and see which partner gives us the best rate of faithfulness. Or maybe we should be allowed to take out marriage insurance for cheating spouses.

I'm having a flashback to the time when Bill Clinton was the "Infamous Dick" on parade. I was going to pick up my children at their father's and the TV was splattered with Monica Lewinsky's nasty blue dress drama. I heard my ex-husband say, "Impeach him! If he'll do that to his wife, he'll do it to his country." His wife, the seasoned adulteress who had slept with him before I left our home, came out of the kitchen to say, "She knew that man was married. She knew what she was doing."

All I could say was, "Really?"

Then I yelled for the kids to hurry up so we could get the hell out of there. How soon they forgot that they. too, had committed this sin. I think this will always be one of my biggest twilight-zone moments and the moment I realized that people are comfortable holding everyone else accountable except themselves.


By no means am I trying to be so judgmental that I don't know that sometimes the person you cheat with is a better partner for you. It happens all the time. But if you're going to do it, do it right! End the relationship you're in, for goodness' sake. Everyone is an adult and can benefit from the truth.

I guess after writing about it so much, I still don't understand why people take the risk. Because they know they can get away with it? Because it makes their current relationship more exciting and edgy? Because they don't give a damn if they get caught? Because they love lying ... who knows.

I'm scandalous enough to just tell the person I'm with that it's not going to work out because I want to screw someone else. I'm not very good at the *player* thing. I think I'm just too blunt for it.

I'll be able to write something more coherent about this eventually, but I had to say the news flurry is sorta making me sick. I am deeply moved by the way Elizabeth Edwards is handling her own situation. She moves and speaks with such grace and protects the interests of her children as much as she can from all the drama ('cause that's who really gets squashed in all of this).

I pulled out my She-monger play and read it again a couple weeks ago. It's a story with only three characters and explores the assumptions of infidelity.

It's strange how some of the dialogue still makes me sweat.

The Wild Dream: Dead Black Poets Society


Maybe I just spent too much time on the ellipticals and really shook my brain too hard, but I had the weirdest dream this weekend ... and every time I went back to sleep, I kept picking up where I'd left off before. There was no escape.

In these situations, I always know there's a message or a lesson, but this time, I have no idea what it is.

I was taking a bus trip accompanied by Sonia Sanchez as her younger black power self and Amiri Baraka as his older irascible self. We were all immersed in deep dialogue about what it meant to be "black" and "poet." Every time I tried to get my point across, Baraka kept interrupting me and telling me to try it again.

Sonia swatted at Baraka and stuttered to my defense each time, "Nnnno-no-no-no-no, dear sister. Blackness has to do with where your blood and your pores have been. Being a poet means you can be any word you want to be."

Baraka then starts rattling off a list of names of dead black poets. The way he tries to look through me almost makes me cry.

Then some bright-skinned girl with a partially braided fro, Sarah Palin glasses, a way to hot wool coat and a big forehead tries to wrestle my notebooks away from me. I become more fierce and beat the snot out of her taking my books back. Baraka laughs without his teeth. Sonia sucks her teeth and says to the girl, "That's one you'll never win."

We finally pull up to a bright orange carriage house, and the girl whom I've been fighting and I are the only two who get off the bus. The driver quickly closes the door and takes off. A crowd inside is loud and there is music playing.

"You first," the girl says to me. Suddenly she is clinging to my sleeve and looking around as if she's watching for snipers. We walk to the front door, ring the bell and Gwendolyn Brooks answers the door reciting "We Real Cool." After we walk through a front parlor, we go into a back room that is set up for a reading.

In the audience? All the dead black poets that Baraka named for me.

I have no idea how to decipher this one. It is curious to me that I've had emails from two writers who were discussing the meaning of being a black writer in the last week. I haven't responded to either one of them because I'm trying to really know where I am these days.

So much talk about race around the current election and so much work to avoid talking about it in so many social situations has made me really make deeper assessments of where I stand on race -- the body of race, the body language of race, how to say black or white or Latina or Asian without saying it. We seem to have perfected bias and innuendo, even to the point that we deny that's what we're doing. What a large animal this is!

I find myself wanting to have the dream again so I will know what I say to this room of poets when I finally get to the mic.

Or maybe that's the real purpose of the dream ... to make me write about what I would say. Stay tuned ... you know there's more coming. In the meantime, I have belly dancing and pilates to distract me.

Thank you Todd Swift


I read Todd Swift's blog a lot, and was pleased to find the work of Annie Katchinska there. (Time for a little online trading of poetry here.)

She's only 18 and is already setting literary London on fire! I guess it really shouldn't matter that she's 18, but when you compare the poetic maturity level to others the same age (or to those of us who were once 18, too), you have to be impressed. Todd published her in Nthposition online and shared one of her poems on his blog. She has been a Foyle Young Poet of the Year twice. She even co-edits an online zine, Pomegranate, for poets under 30.

Were any of us doing that at 18? Are there any national U.S. awards doing this for young poets? (Not the Yale Series, but for really young poets who might be fresh out of high school.)

Read my excerpt of her below, and then continue to follow the magic.

The acrobat's daughter

ate cream cakes and wrote the word 'beautiful',
unsteadily, in red pen, said "And you have to love yourself"
as she poured the cheap rosé

we choked on, and only liked kissing
outside the tent while inside a pyramid of clowns
toppled over to delighted applause, and she bit

my ear, said clowns were mosaics, didn't
elaborate. She never did. She let me tie clusters of gems
round her ankles and throat, pointed to bruises, sore spots

where gymnasts with whirling batons, magicians
wielding saws, painted lips and hands
had all tried. She cracked her knuckles and spoke German,

Read the rest of the poem here.

Simple Birthday Pleasures, Big Personal Joy


I think that some birthday celebrations might qualify as free drugs. And mine this year is no exception. I would gladly volunteer myself for drug treatment if I could do it all again. My fantasy drug rehab would be to dope up on my favorite music and poetry, though.

In the last week, I have had the best conversations ever with long-time friends, had a festive dinner with a friend who's sight-impaired and who has promised to teach me Braille, told a juicy secret (my own, not someone else's), had some amazing laughs with my best friend, reconnected with old schoolmates who laughed shamelessly at my retro pictures, told a special friend goodbye, had some heart-to-hearts with my daughter, greedily shared a sinful old-fashioned homemade chocolate cake with my mom, got tough with a friend about his declining health and bad eating habits, squealed with glee at my niece, screamed against the teenage angst of my nephew, picked the petals off my peach roses and put them to another good use, awakened to the smell of someone special making scrambled eggs for me, played with all the lenses for my new camera, broke down the meaning of Missy Elliott's song "Meltdown" and explained why it is certainly a solid anthem for women, and made an mp3 file of myself singing for my long-time friend Reese (whose birthday is three days after mine and who swears we are destined to have an affair if either of us gets married any time soon) ...

Of course, these small and priceless moments don't begin to detail the partying, but I always say you've got to keep some things for yourself. When I'm a little braver, maybe I'll share some pictures, but not anytime soon. It was a little too krunk, even for me.

I'm all Uhura'd out! ...

until next year, of course, when I'll probably take the Uhura gig up a notch. It was great sexy fun assuming this role and watching how some people reacted. Hilarious! I really enjoy the boots and dark hose, though I normally HATE pantyhose on the regular. They're just too confining. Something about these hose with this dress-up gear, though, is just ... right.

Maybe next year, I host a party where every guest has to dress like Uhura or Uhura's man (whoever he is/was).