Krissymick

Life's Too Short

2012-02-02T21:39:00.000-08:00

When I was a junior in college, I spent a few hours nearly every day walking around Boston and Cambridge while listening over and over again to the same Lucy Woodward CD.

I've seen every episode of The Wonder Years and I'm highly suspicious of anyone who doesn't think it's the best show ever made.

When I was 26, I made one vegan cupcake recipe every week for 40 weeks.

I dislike cats. I distrust dogs.

I love vacuum cleaners. I love car washes.

I haven't been back to my hometown since I graduated from high school.

I've never felt as alive as I did when I lived in London.

I like cuddling up and watching movies. I love hiking. I've gone camping with the same three families every summer for 27 years.

I love Thai food. I like cucumbers and popcorn.

When I see someone with a flat tire or a dead battery on the side of the road on a cold, rainy day, sometime I want to cry. Sometime I do cry. I cry a lot.

The way people treat each other breaks my heart. The way people love each other breaks my heart.

I believe in decency and kindness. I am loyal and resilient. I think of others and I don't think that's weird.

I work with seniors and I think it's the best job in the world.

I am saving my money to make a trip to Denver to visit my best friend and cousin.

I wish my grandma was still alive. I wish my grandpa was still alive.

I love kickboxing.

Sometimes I wish I still lived in Boston.

I wish I was braver.

I know how to fight below the belt.

I don't understand some of the things I do.

I don't like the idea of having someone know where I am all the time.

I recently quit Facebook and I don't know if I'm going back.

I miss letters and phone calls. I text too much and I hate it.

I like hanging out with my parents.

I can be passive aggressive and I hate that about myself. I hurt people I love and I hate that about myself.

I've worn contacts since I was 13.

I like taking care of people. I like feeling wanted.

I refer to Robert Downey Jr. as "my husband." This has been going on since I was eleven years old.

I wrote a novel in graduate school.

I'm perceptive, even when I pretend I don't see things coming.

I don't know if I want to get married. I don't know if I want kids. I'm almost thirty and I don't know.

I know that I love love.

I love babies.

I think I have the best friends on the planet.

Lately I've been a terrible friend.

I can't decide on a place to live.

Before Christmas I got so sick I threw up on myself in my car.

Writing is one of the only things that makes me feel better. Reading, too.

I'll give you every chance in the world if I love you.

I love daffodils and lilacs.

I've never had a good Valentine's Day.

If I love you, I'l stand up for you. I expect you to do the same. I won't get over it if you don't.

I wish my sister lived down the street. I wish you all could have seen her play basketball. I'm sad she hurt herself and wasn't able to play in college. Watching her play was the only time I've ever witnessed greatness. Watching high school sports now makes me a little sad.

Sometimes I can't sleep because my mind is convinced I have a disease and I'm worried about how I'll tell the people I love.

I wish I hadn't wasted my time.

I have so many secrets and so few people know them.

I think my past is my own business.

I love hanging out in bookstores and coffee shops. I love wearing boots and scarves. I hate doing my hair.

I think wrinkles and age spots are beautiful and a sign of a life well lived.

I believe I'll sell my book some day.

I have so many little crushes on people; they help me get through my days.

I'd rather crawl in bed with a book than go to any party on the planet.

I accept my body a little more each year.

I wish I could just kick and punch the crap out of things sometimes.

I have trouble saying what I mean. I'm very misunderstood.

I'm complicated and contradictory and exhausting. I will push your buttons and make you frustrated.

But I'm worth the effort and frustration. I know I am. And if you disagree, I will gladly help you pack your bags. I deserve to be loved for exactly the person I am.

Decisions

2012-02-01T18:28:00.000-08:00

"This is a bag filled with dreams & recipes

for soup & she's deciding right now which

she's really hungry for."

--Brian Andreas, Story People

"The past can't see you,
but the future is listening."

--Terri Guillemets

Sweet Comic Relief

2012-01-31T22:31:00.000-08:00

A while back, my friend Heather sent me the book Is Everyone Hanging Out With Me? (And Other Concerns) by actress and writer Mindy Kaling (of The Office). It's charmingly funny, a super fast read, and the ultimate pick-me-up if you just want to tuck yourself into bed, read a light-but-clever book, and have some good laughs.

So maybe you should do that: Go tuck yourself into bed and have some good laughs with this book.

I did. I feel much better.

Everything Will Be Okay

2012-01-30T19:46:00.000-08:00

Everything will be okay.

Everything will be okay.

Everything will be okay.

And that is that.

Moving Day

2012-01-29T09:33:00.000-08:00

I was supposed to move this weekend. I spent the last few weekends going from apartment to apartment, dragging my mom along, walking through various complexes that featured basically the exact same layout over and over again. I received hundreds of emails from different apartments and management companies, from friends and colleagues helping me find a place. I made phone calls and visits. I built a pros and cons list for the places in the running for top spot. I scribbled out a budget. I tried to reconcile all the things I wanted: the price, the location, the features I didn't want to go without (oh, but I must have a washer and dryer).

I've been researching this for months. I have not one but two storage units filled with furniture and crap. I've been envisioning my new life in my new place and trying to narrow it down to the one where I can see myself living the best.

And every time I walked through a place, and every time I received an email or a phone call from a complex telling me all about their wonderful features, and every time someone asked me "Have you tried X?" or pointed out "There are a lot of apartments on Y Street," I felt overwhelmed by stress. I can't explain it. Every other place I've lived (I think I've lived in, what, twenty apartments in my adult life?), I've walked in and been able to visualize my new home and felt at ease and made a fast decision. And now, here, I feel like I just can't. Like every place I see has at least one thing wrong with it, one feature that prevents me from wanting to put my money down.

Maybe it's because I didn't want to set up another apartment for myself. I didn't want to be surrounded by my furniture, my food in the fridge, my trinkets, my cleanliness. Maybe I wanted to let in someone else's chaos and mess, to see my books against his on the shelf, to step over his piles of dirty laundry and not worry about being perfect and just be happy.

Maybe I just wanted to share my life with him and be happy.

Instead, I was argumentative and difficult. I magnified and weaved tiny issues into obnoxious and ongoing conversations. I pushed and pulled and set up every obstacle possible to prevent him from ever being able to say, "Yes, this could work. This could be." I let my fear take over and turned into someone nobody would want to sit down and have a conversation with, much less share a home or a life.

How does one recover from that? How does a person come to terms with the fact that she pushed away the person she loves, and then somehow be okay? That she took a situation that was simple and beautiful and turned it into something complicated and difficult and eventually unbearable?

I don't know the answer to that. I'm guessing the answer is buried under a mountain of therapy sessions. All I know is that I didn't move this weekend. I just really couldn't.

I couldn't really move at all.

Let the Sun In

2012-01-28T19:36:00.000-08:00

The sunshine's been out for several days now. It's such a rare and welcome treat to see in January in Portland. Every time I feel the sun's rays, I feel a little more optimistic. A little better. I guess this explains why I'm so much happier in summertime. I think I've had seasonal depression since my first winter in Portland, which was twelve years ago. My relationships always end in winter. My motivation always falters in winter. I'm moodier and angrier and tenser and more agitated in winter. I feel like a different person in winter. This wintertime depression has become such a common and accepted part of my yearly routine, I don't think I even noticed that it didn't actually go away in the sunny months this year. I didn't notice that it clung to me all year long. It just felt ... familiar. So I let it be.

Right now, I'm excited. I'm hopeful. I have a plan for combatting the moodiness, the anger, the irritation, the sadness. And for once it involves looking beyond myself. I can't cure my own bad moods. I know this is true. But I know there are so many people who can help. So I'm asking them to help me, and they're answering loudly. Human kindness is an incredible thing.

I Believe This With All My Heart

2012-01-27T20:31:00.000-08:00

"All I ask is one thing,

and I'm asking this particularly of young people:

Please don't be cynical.

I hate cynicism, for the record.

It's my least favorite quality

and it doesn't lead anywhere.

Nobody in life gets exactly

what they thought they were going to get.

But if you work really hard

and you're kind,

amazing things will happen."

--Conan O'Brien

To Love and Grow Old

2012-01-26T20:13:00.000-08:00

The day my grandmother died, my grandpa sat by her bedside, held her hand, and sobbed for hours. I don't know if he knew it was her final day, but he at least seemed to clearly understand how sick she was. This was surprising, given his dementia. But that day, he knew. He looked down at his wife of 67 years, tears spilling from his eyes, deep cries falling out of his mouth, and he looked like he was in painful agony. Like his world was ending. Like he may as well have been dying himself.

She looked at him with such tenderness, such gentleness, as if to say: Oh, I'm so sorry. As if she wasn't the one dying. As if, even in her death, all she wanted to do was comfort him.

It was the hardest thing I've ever watched.

But it also made me think, wish, hope and pray for this: I hope I grow old with someone I love. I hope we take care of each other and help each other and love each other to our dying day. I hope there's someone there for me when I'm using a walker or wheelchair, when I'm facing down the end.

I don't really know the meaning of life or what exactly it is we're meant to do on this earth, but I have to think that finding someone and loving him and growing old with him is really one of the few things that truly matters.

Day One.

2012-01-25T21:39:00.000-08:00

I've been looking back at the most recent stretch of time in my life and I'm trying to do the math. Has it been months or a year? Has it been several years? I can't really figure out the answer and it scares me: I can't recall the last time I didn't feel overwhelmed, stressed, anxious, worried, fatigued, fearful, sad or lonely. I know this sounds crazy, given the amount of joy I've experienced: Can I really not remember a day when I didn't feel like I was hurting? I used to say to my boyfriend, "I never cry. I don't know why I'm crying right now." I said it a lot. I cried a lot. I look back at the last few years and I can't remember many days when I didn't cry. I'm ashamed that this is the version of me he received, that he rarely had access to me as Happy Kristen.

How does this happen? It becomes normal. The stress piles on, situations expand and explode, and I can convince myself that my general weepiness is related to just this one last thing or just this series of several things, and not just my life in general. I convince myself that I pick fights with people I love because I'm having trouble with whatever the latest incident is -- as if there weren't a hundred prior incidents I had an equally difficult time handling. As if this is just some phase I'm going through, and not an accumulation of poor coping methods and unhealthy habits.

I've felt lonely on coffee dates with my friends. I've felt misunderstood by people who care about me and love me. I've felt overwhelmed by my everyday life. But I could justify anything, you see, because I was always convinced I knew what the problem was. My excuses ran the gamut: I didn't make enough money and the financial stress was weighing me down. When I started making more money, I was working too much and the job stress was weighing me down. I'd feel better if I wasn't so worried about the health of my relatives. I'd feel better if my living situation was different, if I lived closer to my boyfriend, if I sold my book, if I didn't have to watch my grandparents die, if I made more money, if my friends were less busy with their own relationships and families, if people understood me better, if I had more time to work out, if if if if if if if ...

My God. And then a few years pass, and I'm convincing myself it's normal to burst into tears when someone asks me how I'm doing. The shame of knowing how poorly I was really doing would bubble under the surface, under a smile and a laugh. Yes, balancing freelance writing and graduate school was hard. Yes, having a few friends turn against me was hurtful. Yes, being in a long-distance relationship was hard. Yes, having sick and dying family members was scary. But for another person, would it be crippling? Would there be the nearly daily crying jags? The ongoing fights that I perpetuated -- would anyone else ever see these as normal?

Recent events in my life have pushed the grip of anxiety and depression harder and tighter around me. I've reached the place where the fear of asking for help no longer outweighs the fear of staying where I am. I can't stay where I am. I can't experience the mental anguish anymore, and I can't experience the physical symptoms anymore, either. I'm tired of the nausea, of the flu-like chills and hot flashes. I'm tired of the constriction in my chest, the heaviness in my heart. Most of all, I'm tired of not having control over my own life.

If you're wondering why you never knew all this about me, it's because I let the happy moments justify the anxious ones. I've experienced so very much joy in the last few years -- mainly as a result of my writing, my wonderful family, and my amazing friends. I've laughed my ass off. I've had incredible conversations. I've learned a lot. I've spent important time with people I care about more than anything. When I admit to being depressed, I don't want to take away from any of those wonderful moments, or any of the wonderful people in my life. The difficult feelings I experienced mainly came to me inside my own head, and often when I was alone. The love I received couldn't have possibly been better. This has been my own quiet issue, and at times I've done a really decent job of hiding it.

But what service is that to you? Who do I help by hiding what's really going on in my mind? Who gains when I pretend there isn't really anything wrong?

Today I have to say that indeed there is something wrong. And maybe there's some bravery in admitting that, but that doesn't counteract the cowardice of covering it up for so long. It's not something I did knowingly. I truly kept thinking, over and over to myself, that I'm only upset because of Current Situation X. It's only now when I look back and realize that Situations A-W preceded Situation X that I realize I have a problem.

I've never spoken openly about any of this before. But like I said, who am I helping by hiding it? So, there it is. I've laid it out. I have a lot of hard work to do from here. But for now, for this moment, admitting my truth makes me feel a little relieved.

And A Happy New Year

2011-12-30T21:14:00.000-08:00

I have to say that 2011 was one of the most challenging and sorrowful years of my life; however, I consider myself to be incredibly lucky and I feel a lot of joy and hope when I look to the future. I think my life is blessed in the following ways:

1. I'm in love with my best friend. He opens my mind and teaches me new things every day.
2. I love my family so much that I willingly hang out with them on a regular and frequent basis; they're more like friends in this way.
3. I love my friends so much that I'd want to do anything for them; they're more like family in this way.
4. I get paid to do something I would happily, giddily, 100% complaint-free do for free.
5. There is an incredible mentor figure in my life who showers me with guidance and kindness and generosity and love.
6. I achieved my #1 goal of graduating from graduate school this year.
7. I achieved my #2 goal of completing a novel this year.
8. I have two living grandparents; the two who've passed away are still very much a part of my life.
9. I have a handle on my student loans, thanks in large part to the generosity of my two grandmothers.
10. I work with people I love. I live with people I love. I hang out with people I love. I have Date Night every Wednesday with someone I love.
11. I think life's too short for bad friends and I don't waste my time and energy on people who suck away mine. I'm surrounded by worthy and inspiring people.

Merry Christmas

2011-12-25T21:34:00.000-08:00

I wrote this last year and I was thinking about it today, now that the bearer of hotel soap gifts is gone and the bearer of Readers Digest presents is in such declining health.

This year, my parents wrapped up a few things from my grandparents' apartment and put them with the other gifts under the tree. They were all trinkets purchased to benefit the National Federation of the Blind, another one of my grandma's passions. I opened a talking watch, magnifying glass and travel alarm clock.

They mean the world to me.

The Reader’s Digest Years

By: Kristen Forbes

When I recall any Christmas spent with my family, a few images inevitably come to mind. I can see everyone wearing the pajamas we opened on Christmas Eve. I can see the mass of paper on the floor, the cups of coffee moved aside and the pile of failed lottery tickets stacked on the table. There are the magazines we get in our stockings, the candy we eat all morning, the sleepiness in our eyes and pile of clothes and gadgets at our feet. Christmas is like clockwork in my family and there are some things that will never change, from the coffee cake we eat for breakfast to the checks from grandparents we save for the very end.

In some of these memories, during a certain period of time that lasted probably somewhere around ten years or so, something else was always inevitable during our Christmas celebration. This something else was – well, it was something else. It was manifested madness. It was a study in the art of the polite response to a bizarre gift. It was, as we fondly refer to them in my family, the Reader’s Digest years.

These were the years when my grandpa, year after year after year, entered the Reader’s Digest sweepstakes in hopes of winning the big crash prizes. He never did win any big – or small – cash awards, but he entered so often he received a seemingly endless supply of trinkets and gadgets. These trinkets and gadgets became our Christmas gifts.

Nothing says “Merry Christmas” to an eight-year-old girl quite like a faux gold ring too big for even her thumb, an oversized man’s watch, or a travel alarm clock.

The Reader’s Digest frenzy was compounded by my grandma’s endearing habit of passing along the free gifts she received during her travels. It was not uncommon to unpeel the holiday wrapping paper and find a bar of hotel soap, mini shampoo or a sewing kit inside. We added these to our pile of gifts, their presence as welcomed and inevitable as any other holiday tradition.

My favorite part of the Reader’s Digest years was when one of us would get to her present from my grandpa earlier the others and we could all watch our future unfold as that person opened the present. Whatever the “prize” was that year – a clunky necklace, a calculator, a battery-operated device none of us could ever figure out – would be the prize that year – as in the prize, as in that’s what each and every one of us would get that year. So not only would I receive a ring so big it probably wouldn’t fit my biggest toe, my sister and mom and dad would also receive absurdly large rings. We could match.

Eventually, my grandpa stopped entering the sweepstakes. I don’t know what happened – if he was talked out of it, if he arrived at the conclusion on his own that despite his many years of efforts, he’d likely never win that big prize, or what – I just know that one year the weird gifts stopped. The Reader’s Digest era was no more. We went back to receiving checks and chocolate. My grandma’s freebie presents faded too, which meant no more shower caps or hotel lotions.

Every year, I find myself hoping the gifts will make a comeback, hoping I’ll reach under the tree and see a box that looks and feels like it contains oversized jewelry or hotel giveaways. Is it really Christmas without them? How can we sit around in our pajamas, eating coffee cake and scratching at losing lottery tickets, if we’re not going to open any Reader’s Digest pens or pendants?

Life goes on. We drink our coffee and read our magazines, open our boxes of clothes and eat our candy sleepily. It’s still Christmas, and it will always be Christmas, even if we take all this away. Still, every year, I look under that tree and hope that one of those boxes – just one – contains a token from the Reader’s digest sweepstakes.

Kristen Forbes is a freelance writer. To view her blog, visit www.krissymick.blogspot.com.

"We understand each other, don't we? And we love each other very much."

2011-12-11T22:09:00.000-08:00

I'm so thankful I graduated from graduate school in June and didn't have to go to a residency this December in the middle of everything else that's going on.

I'm so thankful my friend Heather emails and texts me every single day, checking in on me, making sure I'm okay, making me smile, and being there in every possible way.

I'm so thankful my boyfriend was willing to hop in his car and drive 3.5 hours so he can arrive after midnight, miss a few days of work, and be here for me when I need him.

I'm so thankful to be a Forbes and to have such an incredible family by my side.

I'm so thankful for all my other friends who have been checking on me often and making me feel so loved.

More than anything, I'm grateful and honored that I spent my grandmother's final day with her, and while I did she held my hand and said, "We understand each other, don't we? And we love each other very much."

Truer words were never spoken. I'll be grateful always.

December 10, 2011

2011-12-10T22:24:00.001-08:00

1.) I was born in March of 1982. Nine months later, my uncle died. His death and my birth are intertwined in our familial history.

2.) My grandpa died the day after my fourteenth birthday. I think he held out as long as he could as a favor to me.

3.) Today we spent the 29^th anniversary of my uncle’s death cleaning out my grandma’s apartment. Everything must go.

4.) Watching someone you love be in pain is the most unbearable thing I’ve ever experienced.

5.) It’s not that I actually want the table and dresser and chairs and bookends and makeup bag and little notebook filled with scrawled lists of books and medicines and directions. It’s just that the thought of not seeing them again is unfathomable.

6.) She is not her things, but I will hold onto them as tightly as I can anyway.

7.) “Does being supportive mean sitting on the phone with you and listening to you cry?” Yes. That’s exactly what it means.

8.) A stronger person wouldn’t have to excuse herself from dinner to sit in a bathroom stall and sob.

9.) Today my grandma Florence called, crying over the son she lost 29 years ago.

10.) Today I watched as one of her sons said goodbye to my grandma Margie for the final time.

11.) I was born in March of 1982. Of all the days in the last almost-thirty years, I think today was the hardest.

The One About Being Thankful

2011-11-25T19:20:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. It's not because of the food, though I love a good meal. It's not because of the parades or the football games, which I never watch. It's certainly not because I'm anticipating Black Friday; I couldn't care less about that. I love Thanksgiving because it's a day of giving thanks. I love it because I always spend it with my family. I love it because I have so much to be thankful for.

This Thanksgiving was bittersweet. I spent it with my parents and grandparents. It was my grandmother's last Thanksgiving. This fact never strayed far from the surface. Thanksgiving almost didn't happen at all when she spent her morning in the hospital after a night of relentless nosebleeds. The nosebleeds were caused by the oxygen; the oxygen is there because of the cancer. Cancer is consuming the body of a woman I love more than anything. This fact never strayed far from the surface, either.

So how do we celebrate when facing the inevitable? We celebrate like we always do: with family, and food, and gratitude. We sit at the dining room table -- my grandparents side by side in their wheelchairs, each of their bodies growing weaker and more frail -- and we eat food and we give thanks. It's as simple as that; it's why I've always loved this holiday.

I'm thankful I was able to spend the day with a woman who means more to me than I could ever express in words. I'm thankful I was able to serve food on her plate, and to hold her hand, and to let her know she means everything to me. I'm thankful my grandpa was having a clear day, speaking in full sentences and remembering everyone's name. I'm thankful I was able to sit in that living room again, as I have for every Thanksgiving for the last three or four years. Soon, at my grandmother's request, we'll move all the furniture and close up the apartment. Soon, this place will be gone. Today, I'm thankful it's still here.

I'm thankful for extraordinary friends whose love, kindness and support has guided me through my days recently. For every text message and phone call and letter and email and package, I am so grateful. That I have friends who listen, and who let me cry, and who tell me that it's okay to feel exactly how I feel, is a tremendous gift. I am loved fiercely and I love fiercely in return.

I'm thankful for sweet parents, for a kind sister and brother-in-law, for funny cousins and patient aunts and strong uncles. I'm thankful for the innocence of my niece and nephew. I'm thankful for the wisdom of my grandparents -- and I'm especially grateful that at almost thirty years of age, I still have three grandparents with me.

I'm thankful for a new job at a retirement home. I've seen firsthand how vulnerable those final years are. These wonderful, incredible people who know more than I ever will find themselves in need of assistance from others, at the mercy of others. It would kill me if anyone ever treated my grandparents with anything less than unconditional love and kindness. I'm honored in my new position to treat other people's parents and grandparents the way they deserve to be treated.

I'm thankful that between two part-time jobs, I work full-time hours that pay on regular schedules, unlike the freelance work I've been doing for the last five years. I'm thankful for a steady income, small as it may be. I'm thankful to be able to do my writing on my own and not have to depend on it to pay my bills.

I'm thankful for the kindness of others. I've encountered so many happy people who brought me joy, and strong people who brought me inspiration. Mostly I've encountered kind, thoughtful people who have overwhelmed me with their capacity for compassion.

And that tiny handful of people who've treated me poorly in the last few years? I'm thankful for them, too. They've taught me so much about humanity and friendship -- about what to expect out of myself and others. My life is stronger and richer because of the amazing, thoughtful people in it.

Dog helps LO teen manage his diabetes

2011-11-13T22:05:00.000-08:00

Here's an article I wrote for the Lake Oswego Review in October.

Magical Thinking

2011-11-08T23:23:00.000-08:00

I'd like to tell you the facts, which go like this: There's a 90-year-old woman whose lung cancer has spread to her liver and bones. Less than six months, the doctors say. These are the facts. I'd like to tell you the facts and end it there.

But those facts ring hollow. They sound clinical and cold. They do no justice to the real story, which is this: I've never known someone with a better sense of humor. When I was little, all I wanted was to grow up and be her. I wanted to be as smart and as funny, though I thought this impossible. I wanted to be her friend. She always made me eat a little more than I really wanted, but I never said no; everything she made seemed so specially prepared, like she went out and bought the ingredients just for me. She taught me the art of the thank you letter. She taught me how to appreciate black coffee. How to laugh at myself. How it was okay to not get through a meal without spilling something on my shirt; everyone loves the person who can't make it through a meal without spilling on her shirt. She showed me how important it is to go for a walk and to eat a healthy breakfast and to take care of yourself. She raised the greatest man I've ever known.

I can't think of my childhood without going back to that dining room, sitting across the table from her over a game of Scrabble or cards. I'm back in that kitchen, helping her cut vegetables for a salad (Why did her salads always taste better than dessert?) In the back rooms of that old hotel-style ranch, my sister and I would poke through the contents of her purse and crawl into her bed to watch A League of Their Own on TV. She was always offering me Oreos, and taking me out to the walking bridge to feed the fish, and fluttering her eyelids and pointing out the deer and calling me Krissy, which almost nobody else does.

The general consensus on the novel I wrote is that everyone loves the grandma character. She's a composite of my own two grandmas, but she's mostly this one. This one, with her lists and her piles and her worries. This one, who shuffles and frets and paces. This one, who I just want to sit down with, and play Scrabble with, and eat Oreos with, and say thank you for raising the greatest man I've ever known, and man I just want you to be happy and know how much I love you.

Life has a natural progression; we all know it well. People get older and then they die. It'll happen again and again and again. But I always knew, even from a very early age, that this one was going to be one of the hardest for me. That the idea of existing in a world without her was going to hit me harder than I'd probably know how to handle.

So now it approaches. It's no surprise that it's just the way I always knew it would be: terrible. I know there are logical, rational people out there who appreciate the natural progression of life and appreciate that 90 years is no small feat. I'm not one of those people right now, though. To me, the story isn't about a 90-year-old given less than six months to live.

To me, the story is about an incredibly funny, smart, beautiful woman who taught me most of what I know about writing, family, love and life. To me, the story is about not being ready to say goodbye, 90 years be damned. They say only the good die young and it's true, but they're not always talking about chronological age. This has never been a story about an old woman nearing the end of her life. She never has and never will be an old woman to me. No matter what that number really is, it still feels too soon.

I envy my sister for marrying and having kids young; I'm realizing she'll never meet mine if I do. My grandmas are both larger-than-life presences in my life; the idea of them not existing for another generation is unfathomable.

I'd like to tell you the facts: A 90-year-old woman has cancer and the end of her life looms. But if I just told you the facts, would you ever have any idea how much I love her? And how much -- against all logic and reason -- I wish she could just stay here and continue to be with me, be with us?

And I Guess That's Where I've Been Lately

2011-10-25T23:24:00.000-07:00

I've been away. I could give you the cheap, easy answers, the ones where I proclaim how busy I've been and say something like, "Who has time to write a blog when she's out living her own life?" The real answers are both bigger and smaller than this, simpler and uglier, too. It's not that my life is too busy -- though certainly, I don't have an abundance of time these days. It's more that my life in its current form includes ingredients that I don't know how to share.

I don't know how to talk about some of the things I've seen recently. I realize that just by saying that -- by putting it in words like that -- I make it sound melodramatic and hollow, not to mention vague. And maybe I'm not even telling the truth: maybe I do know how to talk about the things that are happening, and maybe I simply don't want to. Whether it's protecting the privacy of everyone involved or simply saving myself from the pain of actually confronting anything, I don't know. It's likely a combination of the two.

What I do know is this. Everyone has grandparents and parents and relatives and friends who get older and sicker and nearer to death, but knowing this doesn't make it any easier. People witness the aging process all the time. It is both natural and common, but knowing this doesn't make it any easier. Bodies break down. Minds deteriorate. Functions fail. This is not original. This is not unique. Seeing it firsthand, however, feels isolating and lonely. There is an order to life, a practical scheme, and when you set down all the pieces and watch the lines connect, it makes sense. Knowing there's an order, and a practical scheme, and a connected path that makes sense, however, does not make watching the end any easier.

Things are ending in my world. I'm watching it happen every day. I'm seeing the impact. And it's scary and confusing and complicated and lonely, but the other thing I know is this: I love the people in my life fiercely. I have friends who give me love and support and go so far above and beyond what is expected. I have a family that stands by me, creating shelter for me always. I have a boyfriend who surprises me with his goodness and compassion and keeps me going when things get really tough.

I'd like to never think about the day when they'll all be gone, too. But that's what death does: it creeps into everything. When I visited my wonderful grandma in West Virginia, I was always conscious of the ghosts in the room. There's the couch where my grandpa used to sit. There's the story about my uncle again. There's my grandma, looking at the expiration date on a bottle of salad dressing and wondering aloud: I wonder which of us will be here longer.

There are days when I wish I could be seventeen again, with college applications and boy drama the biggest worries on my plate. We condemn the selfishness of children and teenagers, but shouldn't they be allowed? Shouldn't we grant them the time to enjoy life without feeling all its weight?

I wish my grandmother wouldn't tell me in explicit detail exactly how she'd like her funeral to be. Don't come if there's snow, she says. And make sure I get a flag. I was a veteran, you know.

And I do know, but I don't want to talk about it.

I don't want to talk about my grandpa's dementia, the way he placed his feet on the pedals of his wheelchair, so sure they were the rudders of an airplane. So sure he needed to fly that plane to San Diego, to pilot himself out of there and into a new world.

And I don't want to talk about the big one, the cancer diagnosis that shatters me more than I thought possible. It seems like there's been enough of that this year, hasn't there?

But then that's the selfishness rearing its head again, presenting the belief that all these things shouldn't be happening at once because it's somehow unfair for all of these things to be happening to ME. As if people don't watch their grandparents get older and die every day, every hour, every minute.

There's nothing special about my pain right now. I'm one out of millions and I know this is true. Knowing this, however, doesn't make it any easier.

Ruminations on Adulthood Part 357

2011-10-02T10:49:00.000-07:00

When I first got out of college, I liked having a job because it gave me a sense of purpose. My day was comprised of tiny, simple acts – putting my work clothes on in the morning, parking in a lot designated for employees, taking the elevator up to a certain floor – that made me feel like I was a person (an adult) with a place to go and a reason for being there. All the morning rituals, from pouring a cup of coffee to starting my computer to greeting my boss, reaffirmed this. I was there because I was necessary and I was necessary because I kept things in order for another person.

I was good at what I did. I was organized. I was calm. I was willing to come in early and stay late to finish a project. I was eager to learn. I had a slew of questions I wanted to ask my boss on the first day, so I could gain a better understanding of the company and my responsibilities.

He didn’t want me to ask questions. He wanted me to figure everything out for myself. I tried, and this was challenging, and sometimes it required me to guess, and often I guessed wrong. This made my boss unhappy. He refused to communicate with me, but then he got mad at me when I didn’t just know how to make him happy. It was a strange relationship. I just had to try my best.

The main problem in our working relationship was the fact that he disliked me and was always on the lookout for my mistakes. He wanted facts to corroborate his feelings. He was not the one who hired me, nor had he ever wanted to work with me, and this was something he was unwilling to get past. His unease with me made me nervous. My nervousness caused some of the very mistakes he was on the lookout for. The cycle was never-ending.

The way it ended was this: He wanted me to go. The person who hired me advocated for me to stay. She wanted me to be reassigned within the company. I could have said yes, and I could have worked under someone else, and I could have seen my old boss every day and known that he’d rejected me. Instead, I said no. This was seven years ago.

People wonder why I've been so adamant about working for myself for so long. There are all the creative arguments: I don't want to feel stifled, I want my time to be my own, I want to do the kind of work I love, I want to manage my own life, I don't want to feel trapped, I want to create work I'm proud of, etc. And then there's this: I never regained my confidence. Failing at this job -- for whatever reason -- made me feel terribly inadequate. I've never felt as detested as I did when I worked hard and my boss hated me. This plays a big role in my decision to do what I do, despite the fact that my income cripples me. My income actually holds me back from doing the majority of things I want to do. I can’t book a plane ticket to go visit my friends. I can’t live in a nice place. I can’t chip away at my student loans. I can’t even eat a nice meal without feeling guilty.

I guess my crossroads is this: Do I complain about this for the millionth time while continuing to do the same thing and somehow expecting different results? Or do I get past my fears and try something new?

Coolest school in state? Hint: It's nearby

2011-10-02T09:15:00.001-07:00

From this week's Lake Oswego Review.

"Portlandia" makes niceness hip

2011-09-23T13:41:00.000-07:00

From this week's Lake Oswego Review and Portland Tribune.

Bankers, ministers and more

2011-09-23T13:39:00.000-07:00

From this week's Lake Oswego Review.

My Like/Hate Facebook Relationship

2011-09-21T10:01:00.000-07:00

I hate writing about Facebook because I’m already bitter about the amount of time I spend on a site that I actually sorta kinda hate. I also can’t resist writing about Facebook, a site I actually sorta kinda like. I’m fascinated by the fact that it simultaneously frustrates me and pulls me in, that I both hate it and can’t resist it.

They change their interface on what seems to be a daily basis, and from what I can tell things are more cluttered and less streamlined than ever before. This causes me minor anxiety every time I log on because I all I see are things, stuff, ahhh! I like to keep a tidier ship than Facebook is currently allowing me. There are different lists, and highlighted numbers, and different things happening on different parts of the screen: Ahh. Sensory overload.

Facebook makes it possible for a variety of things to happen, and I find the majority of them to be incredibly annoying. For example, on any given day in FacebookVille, you are likely to find: people publicly listing their chores and to-dos (“Going to the store and taking a nap”), entire photo albums dedicated to someone’s tattoo, political rants, endless advertising, and people letting you know where they are and who they’re with at all times. You will learn: what your friends eat, what television shows they watch, how they feel about the weather, and the details of their child’s potty training.

Facebook also allows me to connect and keep in touch with my favorite people, as well as people I truly like but maybe wouldn’t keep in contact with via email or phone. I like it when people share articles, or write witty status updates, or show pictures of their weddings and families. I genuinely like these things. I like watching friends repost another friend’s video or essay or project and seeing the positive reaction that’s garnered. I like the humor of it, and the camaraderie, and the way it allows people living far apart to still be in each other’s lives.

But man, I also hate it. And my hatred fascinates me, because I always go back for more.

It's 1908 once again

2011-09-20T11:05:00.000-07:00

This article ran in last week's West Linn Tidings.

Let the record show ...

2011-09-13T17:02:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty sure the only reason Facebook is eliminating the game known as Scramble is because it is the only thing in my life at which I reign supreme.

The Half Birthday

2011-09-12T00:15:00.000-07:00

Six months from today, I will turn thirty years old. I have approximately 180 days to come to term with this fact. Obviously people turn 30 (and 50, 70, 90) all the time, so this isn’t some monumental occurrence. Nor is it an event that should provoke fear, panic, regret or concern: It’s just another birthday, after all. It’s just another day.

And yet.

There’s the part of me that can’t stop looking at my life as it appears on paper. I’m not married, though I am in a wonderful, stable relationship. I don’t have children, though that’s not something I want at this point anyway. I have a career that fulfills me in the sense that I do what I want to do, but I’m by no means financially stable. Going to graduate school meant saying goodbye to what little savings I had. I’ve never owned a home, nor will I be in a position to own one anytime soon.

I was talking to someone recently about our jobs, and how little we make, and how frustrating this can be while at the same time recognizing it’s gratifying to do what we do. He quickly countered me when I attempted to compare our two positions, noting that his scenario was different because “this isn’t my career.” This path that I’ve been on for half a decade now: It is my career, and I do enjoy it, but it never really adds up to anything in a monetary sense, and I worry about that.

I would be less worried if it wasn’t for the fact that I’m turning thirty. I can chalk up most of the dumb things I’ve done in the past ten years to the fact that I’ve been in my twenties. It’s an ideal time to drift and wander, to try and experiment, to explore and discover. It’s a great time to make mistakes and make choices and make friends and make a go of it. I have made some colossal mistakes, mostly regarding my interactions with others, and I’ve learned valuable lessons about how I wish to conduct myself and where I wish to put my efforts. If I could do some things differently, I would. I learn as I go and I’m not going to beat myself up over all the silly choices I made.

Instead, I look forward. And what I see when I look in that direction is this: It’s still very unclear. People all around me are figuring things out, settling into responsibilities, and I’m still wondering: But how will I pay my rent? This doesn’t seem like the question of a 30-year-old. It seems like the question of a 22-year-old. The fact that I’ll soon spend two months house-sitting for a good friend is a.) wonderful and b.) an example of how I am still not, despite my age, really an adult.

When 2011 comes to a close, I will have spent six months in Portland, three months in Phoenix, two months in another city, and a month or so at school/traveling. I’m such a drifter, and I love this, but sometimes I think I’m actively delaying real adulthood. And again, this wouldn’t bother me so much, were it not for the fact that I’m turning thirty.

I’m at peace with the fact that I have yet to sell a book. I have yet to be married or start a family (if that ever happens). These things will all either happen some day, or they won’t. I’m not worried about that. I don’t feel pressured to adhere to a timeframe when it comes to these things.

And yet I wonder: As I turn thirty, what do I have to show for myself? A master’s degree, a lot of local writing credits, a fairly consistent writing routine, an amazing group of friends, a sweet boyfriend, a supportive family, yes! And I’m proud of these things, and I’m grateful for these things, and I know it’s not like I’ve been screwing around and doing nothing for the past ten years. I wrote a novel. I took care of my sister’s kids when she was sick. I took a road trip across the country. I studied abroad. I worked a lot of different jobs. I saved money. I lost money. I dated morons. I fell in love. I moved across the country. I moved back. I made lots of friends. I unfortunately burned some bridges and made a few enemies. I loved fiercely. I protected my friends. And, as Dear Sugar would say, I wrote like a motherf*ck*er.

And yet, the fact remains that I write this post from my parent’s living room, which is where I spend a lot of my time, on account of the fact that this thing I’ve chosen to do – this “career” I’ve selected for myself – does not easily answer the question “But how will I pay my rent?”

So I’m pondering that question, still, at 29, and I fear I’ll be pondering it, still, at 30. And I can’t help but wonder: Should I just grow up already? Get a real job, become a productive member of society, take care of myself, stop letting the goodness and kindess of my family buy me all these rent-free days? What’s going to happen if I stay on this path, exactly in the direction I’ve been headed? Am I still going to be here when I’m 30, 35, 39?

I’m turning thirty in six months. I feel like the reality is this: I have 180 days to get my act together and become a real adult. If I don’t, I don’t know how I’m going to deal with that day when it comes.

As a side-but-related note, my dear friend Alexis turned 30 three days ago. Happy, Happy, Happy Birthday, my wonderful friend.

Make us laugh: local comedians shine on stage

2011-09-05T16:53:00.000-07:00

Here's an article I did for the Lake Oswego Review.

I Sorta-Kinda Graduated

2011-08-30T22:23:00.000-07:00

Soo ... I don't officially graduate until I pay my school another fee. It's a fee that I can't, at the moment, afford to pay. As my boyfriend likes to put it, our diplomas are in jail and we can't post bail. Fear not: I'll get that little guy out of there as soon as I can.

In the meantime, here's at least one tangible thing I have to show: my bound book. That's my final manuscript, there on the right. I put it next to my dad's master's thesis. He received his MA in journalism from UNR in 1978. I (sorta, kinda, almost) received my MFA in creative writing from Antioch in 2011.

Just so we're clear.

2011-08-29T16:02:00.000-07:00

Remember like a month ago when I joked about wanting to have a graduation shower? I thought it would be nice/funny to invite a bunch of friends over, serve them good food, entertain them with games, and then (oh by the way) mention that I'm registered at Sallie Mae -- the same way brides and moms-to-be register at Target or Crate & Barrel. I was making a joke about the amount of debt I have; I certainly wish I had a creative way to get that debt to go down.

Just so we're clear: I meant absolutely no disrespect to people who have real wedding and baby showers. Those people are often my dear friends, and I'm happy to support them in whatever way I can (which is usually a pretty small way, from a financial standpoint anyway). I just wanted to clarify that, in case it was uncertain, because I wasn't mocking real showers. I was just pointing out that I'm invited to shower after shower and I feel totally lame and inadequate at each one, because I can never afford to get the person something nice. In fact, I keep buying things with my credit card, just to have something in my hands when I show up, and then I get even more in debt. It's a vicious cycle. Clearly the solution is to have my own shower and let you all take a crack at my student loans.

Or, I could just sell my book.

At this point, I'm not sure which is the crazier idea.

But seriously, no disrespect to the wives and mamas out there. I love you all.

Chivalry spreads to Lake Oswego as Knights of Veritas roll back the ages

2011-08-29T15:26:00.000-07:00

Here's an article about knighthood demonstrations I did for the Lake Oswego Review.

My Work's Never Done

2011-08-14T23:32:00.000-07:00

There are 64 files for my book on my computer: one for each version I wrote. No one version is the same as another. The very first version is only the first 25 rough pages. There's another version for the first 50. Some of the changes from one version to the next are subtle, but many of the changes are larger. I've gone through several full drafts; I've changed tense, POV, major plot points, and characters. My sentences have changed dramatically. I've deleted, added, and moved things around. I've incorporated feedback from 15 readers over two years. Nearly every sentence, at one point or another, has shifted or morphed into something else.

This week I worked on the 64th version of my book. I printed it out and read it line by line, marking up everything I wanted to change with a black pen. What amazed me was that still, in the 64th version, there's something I want to change on nearly every page. I'm still making major plot changes. I'm still fixing clunky sentences. I'm still finding tighter, cleaner ways to say what needs to be said.

I feel better about this version of the book than any of my previous attempts. Still, I know I'll likely have to make a folder for Version 65. I like this part of the process. In some ways, I enjoy rewriting more than writing. It's gratifying to tinker, tinker, tinker until it finally works as well as I want.

There's one sentence I know for sure has remained untouched from Version 1 to Version 64. It's the first sentence, and I'm not changing it for anything.

On Doing it Alone

2011-08-08T15:42:00.000-07:00

I attended a writing conference this weekend and it made me think about my first graduate school residency, when I didn't yet know anyone else at school. In fact, it made me think about my first day at Emerson College, and my first moments on campus at Lewis & Clark College, and my first days in Portland, London, Boston, and Los Angeles. There's something about not knowing anyone else that I find equal parts terrifying and exhilarating.

There's always that awful dining hall moment, sitting down to eat lunch and not knowing which table to join. But there's also always that sense of freedom that comes from being entirely in charge of my own choices. I like choosing which classes to attend based purely on which topics interest me the most. That's why I think my first residency at graduate school was my most authentic: I attended everything I attended because the subject matter interested me. I was not yet in the habit of attending classes my friends suggested, or attending classes my friends were teaching, or attending classes to kill time while waiting for my friends to finish something else.

This isn't to say I don't love my friends. I love them and I'm happy that because of them, I was exposed to an even richer spectrum of lessons and experiences. Not just in terms of classes, but social time outside of class: I learned so many things, from so many people, and I'm grateful for everyone.

Still, there's something about owning your own time and experience. About opting to sit outside and scribble in a notebook during the break between classes instead of chatting with the people in the halls. Sometimes I really just want to sit in the back corner and eat breakfast alone, while I organize myself and my thoughts. Sometimes I want to tune out the person whispering next to me in a classroom and just focus my attention on the instructor. Sometimes I want to leave immediately after class ends, get in my car, and breathe.

Here's the thing, and maybe I'll sound awful for saying it, but I'm going to say it anyway. I have a very clear vision for myself. I am motivated to get where I know I need to go. I work hard, I stay organized, and I try not to waste a lot of time. I'm more than happy to talk to people and to listen to their woes and worries, but when it comes to my own stuff: I'd rather just work. I don't want to chat about it. I don't want to complain about it. I don't really need to talk about it at all. I'd rather just work.

That's why, sometimes, I think it's nice to go somewhere where nobody knows your name. There are no expectations to talk to certain people about certain things. I met some interesting people this weekend. I had some nice conversations. But for the most part, I kept to myself and did what I set out to do: learned more about the art and business of writing.

My head is down and I'm working hard. What else is there to talk about?

Chad

2011-08-02T15:15:00.000-07:00

For many weeks, I've been diligently revising my book. Since its inception in 2009 to now, I've revised so many times that I now consider myself qualified to say I've actually written multiple books. The book it is today is not the same as when it began. The foundation is the same, but it has expanded and gone through several paint jobs. The windows are different, the lighting is different, and even the people who stop in for viewings are different.

Many, many, many people have helped me with this book. Still, day after day, for hours upon hours upon hours, I'm the one who sits at the keyboard and writes. I'm the one who falls asleep with the images in my head. I'm the one who has to remind myself at the start of each day that of course I have a choice: I can skip the work or I can do the work. Nobody else is going to remind me of this, and nobody else is going to particularly care what choice I make. The decision to sit down and do the work (or not) is all mine.

If I don't do the work, nobody else will. I am the only person qualified to write my own book. Knowing this, I feel like I have no choice but to just sit down and do it. Lately, I've pulled myself into a writing bubble and focused all my attention on these revisions. Normal human interaction be damned. Proper hygiene: Optional. What matters is that I sit down, by myself, and get the work done.

It's just me and my computer in here. Out there, though, I know there's still a world of life and possibility. This is where Chad comes in. While I'm writing, Chad sets off on adventures. While I'm writing, Chad is:

Catching a few rays

Rocking out

Getting some caffeine

Taking advantage of Happy Hour

Playing dress-up

Rafting in the ocean on a cupcake liner

An Antiochian Wedding

2011-08-01T00:07:00.000-07:00

Yesterday my Antiochian boyfriend and I drove up to Seattle to attend the wedding of fellow Antiochians Jason and Natasha. The ceremony was officiated by our Antiochian friend Elaina; among the other guests in attendance was another Antiochian friend, Michelle. Jason and Natasha met at Antioch in a punctuation lecture taught by Brad Kessler, one of my former Antioch mentors. Suffice it to say, this was a very Antiochian wedding.

Before graduating, I stood up in front of my peers and some members of my family and read for fifteen minutes from my novel. I spent a few of those minutes thanking some of the people who made an impact on me during my two years at Antioch, but due to time and nerves I wasn't able to do my acknowledgments justice.

At the ceremony and reception yesterday, which included many references to the beauty of words and writing, I thought again about how much the people I met at Antioch mean to me. I know we all had vastly different reasons for going to graduate school and choosing Antioch as the place to get our MFAs, but at our core we're all a bunch of word nerds united by our obsession with writing. I know I'm a better person because of the people I met at school; I'm so grateful for the experience and the friendships.

What I would have said, if I had the time or brain power before my graduate reading, is this.

I applied to Antioch University because Cheryl Strayed encouraged me to do so. That a writer of Cheryl's caliber took it upon herself many years ago to reach out to me is an enormous gift I've never taken for granted. Both directly and through example, Cheryl has encouraged, supported and inspired me more than she'll probably ever know. It was also through Cheryl that I met my first Antiochian friend, the one and only Yuvi Zalkow.

Yuvi agreed to meet with me and he sat with me in a Portland coffee shop for hours, listening to me fire off question after question about his experiences at Antioch. This was before I'd applied, though I already intended to do so, and I wanted to know everything. He patiently answered all my questions with grace and humor. He generously painted a portrait of the school that seemed both lovely and realistic. I thought that if any of the other students were as helpful and kind as Yuvi, going to school there wasn't an opportunity I wanted to miss.

So I applied. I applied to two schools at that time, both low-residency and both on opposite ends of the country. I got into both and had to make a big decision. I weighed my pros and cons list and what it came down to was this: Because of Cheryl and Yuvi, I wanted to go to Antioch.

The first evening of residency, there was an orientation session for our new cohort, the Carnelians. The chain of events there went like this: I sat next to a guy named Jamey Davidsmeyer. I recognized his name because his story was the first story in my workshop packet; we were in the same workshop group. Based on this story, I was already a fan of his. I loved his writing. If it were possible to fall in love with someone based on his writing, I loved him before I even met him. But then I did meet him, and he was friendly and funny, smart and engaging. As a Let's All Get To Know Each Other assignment, we had to interview each other and share our findings with the rest of the class. What we discovered about each other was this: He was an avid hunter and I was a vegetarian. Still, the bond between us was instantaneous and powerful. He was immediately my new best friend and I felt so fortunate to have him by my side as we navigated our first workshop and residency. A year later, he became my boyfriend. I cannot imagine my life without him.

Back at the orientation session, the girl who sat down next to me on the other side was named Natasha Robson. We hit it off instantly too, mainly because we quickly discovered we were both from the Pacific Northwest. In fact, the girl sitting next to her, Elaina Ellis, was also from the PNW. The friendship between the three of us grew rapidly and naturally; we spent the following three residencies as beach house roommates. We practiced our readings together, gossiped about our love lives (all three of us began the program single and all three of us graduated in relationships), and supported and encouraged each other while sharing a lot of chocolate and champagne. Residencies were so much fun because of those girls.

As Carnelians, my cohort bonded quickly. The mutual love and admiration we all felt for each other was palpable. I have never felt as protected and supported as I do with this group of people. Amongst the Carnelians, there are many key players.

Heather Mingus and I hung out a few times in the beginning, but our friendship flourished after the second residency. To this day, we email each other every day, multiple times a day, sometimes literally a hundred times a day. She has read every version of every draft of my novel, of which there have been many. She came to visit me in Portland. She never forgets my birthday. She has been my greatest cheerleader, not just in terms of supporting my writing, but making me feel okay about my life decisions as well. She probably knows more about me than just about anyone and I also cannot imagine my life without her.

Andrew Todhunter, Jennifer Morales, LeVan Hawkins, Morgan Strauss, Pazit Cahlon, Philip Barragan, Rana McCole and Diana Woods all made a huge impact on me by being kind, supportive, helpful, intelligent, hilarious, sweet and wonderful people. I had so many memorable conversations with all of them, usually over meals or in the hallways of Antioch.

Then there are the other Portlander Antiochians. Joining Yuvi and I in Portland were Jenn Crowell and Sarah Hutchins. The four of us got in the habit of meeting once a month or so for bubble tea and gossip. It really helped to be able to connect with other people from the program and have an outlet for talking shop while still in Portland.

To assimilate to graduate school, I was assigned a buddy. Mine was Brenna Humphreys and she was/is the best buddy in the history of the planet. Like Yuvi, she answered question after question for me before I arrived on campus. Once there, she took me in as her friend and continued to support me over the next two years. She is one of the sweetest people I've ever known.

In workshops and mentee groups, I met people who inspired me with their immense talent and absolute kindness. These are people who absolutely made my Antioch experience what it was. Included in this group is Brax Cutchin, Crystal Cheatham, Elizabeth Earley, Eric Howald, Mandy Campbell Moore and Stephanie Quinn Westphal.

Also in workshops and mentee groups, as well as lectures and off-campus events, I met so many people who extended such kindness to me. I have been so inspired by my talented Antiochian peers. I know I'll probably never be able to list them all and I'll inevitably leave some important people off the list, so I won't attempt to name them here.

One person I will name is Tara Foley, the brains behind campus services. She helped me numerous times, and always with a smile and something to make me laugh. Brian in campus services also kept me laughing and happy for the last two years.

The entire faculty at Antioch is incredible, but one person who really stands out is Bernadette Murphy. Bernadette is a woman who knows everyone by name and whose exuberant energy is truly contagious. I respect and admire her very much.

Finally, I had the best damn mentors. For me as a person and as a writer, for the projects I was working on, for where I was trying to go and who I was along the way: They all fit me perfectly and helped me immensely. Dodie Bellamy was the first person to believe in my book and Susan Taylor Chehak helped me work through the revisions on my first draft. When I took six months away from the novel and worked on short fiction and a critical paper with Brad Kessler, I became a much better writer. Finally, I polished and finished the book under the guidance of Leonard Chang, who helped me so much I should dedicate an entire posting to just him. I’m so grateful to each of my mentors.

I'm not the same person I was when I started the program two years ago. I'm a more disciplined writer. I'm a more confident writer. I have a large community of writers and friends to turn to for support and love -- people who understand who I am and what I'm trying to do. It's been an honor to share the journey of the last two years with each of them.

I hope yesterday's wedding is the first of many events that continue to bridge and bond us together over the years to come. Writing can be lonely, but the last two years have been anything but.

Thank you and love to you all.

Write About an Empty Birdcage

2011-07-27T22:22:00.000-07:00

I can be jaded. A cynic. A Debbie Downer. But every once in a while, something so wonderfully awesome happens to someone so incredibly deserving, I really can do nothing to hold back my pure, simple joy. Sometimes life gets it so right.

Such was the case when my brilliant, beautiful, huge-hearted, charming, brave, deeply talented friend Elaina Ellis had her book published this year. Elaina's poetry is stunning. Even if you're not a regular poetry reader, which I confess I am not, you will love her poetry. It is accessible and beautiful and I don't think I'm overstating anything when I say the world would be a better place if everyone experienced it, either through reading or watching one of her kickass performances.

More than that, she's a wonderful friend and person. The kind of person I will root for forever. She is humble, hilarious, down-to-earth, kind, and supportive beyond belief. When you combine all those traits with an insane writing talent, the result is mind-blowing.

Her book, WRITE ABOUT AN EMPTY BIRDCAGE, is available now. You can buy it from the publisher or at Amazon here.

A Damn Good Writing Day Equals a Damn Good Day

2011-07-26T22:56:00.000-07:00

There are few things more annoying than an amateur writer with an unpublished book dispensing advice about how to write. That said, I've recently developed a formula that -- today, anyway -- brought me some writing success. This was after weeks upon weeks of massively depressing writing failures, which I will also highlight for your reading pleasure (for goodness sake, someone needs to get some pleasure out of it). And in my world, a damn good writing day equals a damn good day.

Step 1. Write FIRST.
   This is what I've attempted in previous weeks: Start the day by responding to emails. Start the day by cleaning my room. Start the day by going on a walk. Start the day making an elaborate breakfast. Start the day by running errands. Start the day by chatting with my family. Start the day by getting organized.
   No. No, no, no.
   Start the day by writing. You WILL have time to go on a walk or run in the evening, I promise. You WILL have time to return emails throughout the day. You WILL have time to get it all done. But if you don't start with the writing -- if you prioritize anything else above the writing -- you're screwed.*
   *Those of you who have real lives and real jobs that require you to prioritize other things above writing (and I'm guessing this applies to 99% of the population): I don't know, man. I don't know how you guys do it.

Step 2. Get the hell out of the house.
   Whether in a bedroom or living room, kitchen or patio chair, sitting on a couch or on the floor, set up at a table or desk, I will not write at home. I will watch mindless youtube videos. I will spend hours composing emails. I will clean my room. I will fix a snack. I will watch a show. I will read the paper. I will pay my bills. I will do my laundry. I will stare at a wall for an entire hour. I will not write.
   At a coffee shop or library, I write. This is the case every time.
   Interestingly, after I've been writing in public for anywhere from five to eight hours, I can come home and continue writing. The flow doesn't break. If I ever try to START my writing day at home, though, it just doesn't work.

Step 3. Bust out a pen.
   One of the single most helpful things I've done lately is this weird little trick I started doing when I was attempting to avoid doing any real work. I pull up a completed chapter on either my computer or phone and then I copy it, word for word, onto a piece of paper, using a pen. Somehow, in the process of writing it by hand, I catch words and phrases that need to be changed, fixed, added or erased. I catch things that I never caught when I read the words off my computer screen HUNDREDS of times. Writing by hand forces the brain to think differently. Rewrite a scene in pen and I promise it will improve.

Step 4. Surround yourself with the very best people.
   I had lunch with a writer friend today. It's a writer I trust, respect and admire. A writer who supports me, makes me laugh, commiserates with me and motivates me. Afterward, I wrote for hours. I produced my best work in months.
  If you have wonderful, talented friends, let yourself be inspired by them. Seek them out for guidance and encouragement. Writing is CRAZY and not a lot of people understand it. Find people who do and listen to all the brilliant and brave things they have to say.

Step 5. Come home, but don't stop.
   Eventually you'll have to leave the coffee shop or library. Come home. But don't stop writing. Once you're into it, keep going until it's necessary to stop so you can eat, work out, rest, acknowledge the existence of other humans, or do something important. If none of those things are required yet, keep writing.

Strange People: A Case Study

2011-07-25T09:45:00.000-07:00

I attended a seminar this weekend and a man's cell phone rang. This was obviously annoying, but also somewhat understandable; people often forget to silence their phones. It happens.

It's what happened next that caused my empathy to run out. After obnoxiously but presumably accidentally intruding the class with one call, he neglected to turn off his ringer still. So several more times over the next few hours, the phone rang again. Each time this happened, he let it ring all the way through to voicemail, instead of politely silencing it after one or a few rings.

Come on, guy. Really?

Also, can we please discuss for a moment the fact that in any class at any institution in any academic situation, there is always, always, always that one person who raises his or her hand twenty million times in the course of an hour to ask questions that aren't even close to being questions? In my experience as a longtime student, I've found that these people generally fall under two categories: They ask questions, but about something so obscure and irrelevant to the topic that it doesn't even count as a question, since it in no way moves the discussion forward. Or, they don't ask questions at all, but rather tell elaborate stories about themselves that, once again, have little to do with the topic at hand. In other words, they raise their hands over and over again in order to hear themselves speak.

Come on, guys. Really?

Have a Little Faith in Me

2011-07-19T23:25:00.000-07:00

I seriously do not understand why people keep asking me what sort of job I'm looking for. Ever since graduating, it's the first question out of anyone's mouth during any given conversation on any given day. Um, guys? I went to writing school. My bachelor's degree and my master's degree are both in -- wait for it -- writing. What do I want to do now that I've graduated, you ask? I want to write. Same thing I've always wanted. Hence me not getting a nursing degree, or an engineering degree, or a botany degree. Obtaining a degree in the creative writing field equals wanting to work in the creative writing field.

Obtaining a degree in the creative writing field does not equal having a sudden desire to procure a "real job." I have always wanted to earn my living as a writer; I have been working as a freelance writer for the past four or five years. Why, upon graduation, is there a new expectation that I should want to leave that behind and find myself something permanent?

I love working freelance. (Read between the lines: I hate freelance pay. That is another story.) I love it because it allows me to deal with my intense fear of commitment in a somewhat appropriate way. I get to do something different every week. I get to keep an erratic schedule. I get to keep to myself. I get to be myself, without any unwanted water cooler chatter. I love it. I hate the pay, like I said, but I love the lifestyle. I have no desire to deviate from it, just because I have a shinier degree now.

So for everyone who has been asking: This is my plan. I am trying to sell my book. (That's not a joke. I am truly putting that very serious thought out into the universe and I'm no longer making any apologies for it: I'm trying to sell my book.) Beyond that, I'm going to try to procure whatever freelance work I can, and hopefully I'll figure out a way to pay my bills doing this. I managed to survive all those years before I graduated; I'm going to continue to survive now. I'm not kidding, guys: That is my plan. Try to sell my book while doing more freelance writing. It's a simple plan and maybe it doesn't sound glamorous enough, but it's the real plan. And for me, for now, it's the only plan.

If, for whatever reason, I end up massively failing at the above-stated endeavors, I promise you I will try to find a "real job." I promise. Until then, though, please: Let me try. Let me fail, if I have to. Stop giving me your ideas about what I should "try" and what I should "do." All of those career options you've been peddling sound really great -- for somebody else. For me, for now, this is what I have to do.

Try and have a little faith. Maybe what I'm doing is really stupid, but I didn't spend all that time, effort, energy and money on graduate school just to give up and give in the moment I got the damn diploma. Let me try.

Things I've Done Since Getting My MFA

2011-07-14T12:04:00.000-07:00

1.) Moved most of my clothes into a suitcase I keep on the floor next to the couch in my parents' house where I've been sleeping. Nothing says "adult" quite like living out of a suitcase and sleeping on a couch in your parents' house. I think we can all agree on this.

2.) Smiled politely every time I've received The Look in response to my, "Well, I'm going to try and sell my book," in response to their, "So what are you going to DO now?"

3.) Continued to smile politely when they've lobbed me the follow-up: "Okay, but I mean, besides THAT, what are you going to -- you know -- DO?"

4.) Pulled a blanket over my face every morning in a half-attempt to block the sounds and sights of my entire family getting up and having breakfast ten feet from the couch where I am currently sleeping.

5.) Smiled politely. Very, very politely.

I'm Registered at Sallie Mae

2011-07-12T22:54:00.000-07:00

In the last five years or so, I've received a lot of invitations to a lot of celebratory life events. Friends have announced their weddings, pregnancies, et cetera, and the compulsory invites followed: wedding showers, bachelorette parties, weddings, baby showers, and more. I love that these sort of cultural traditions exist. I love that it is so culturally and socially expected and accepted for us all to come together in recognition of two people loving one another. We congratulate them for this love by showering them with gifts -- often in the form of kitchen gadgets for the pre-marrieds and tiny clothes and toys for the pre-babied. When major life milestones are achieved, we stand in recognition and give the couple everything they could want or need (or, at the very least, everything we find on their gift registries at Target or Crate and Barrel).

You are not alone in this world, we say -- or we mean -- in the form of blenders and wine goblets. We are here to give you a helping hand, we say, in the form of onesies and bath toys. We are proud of you, we are happy for you, and we are here to give you a little monetary lift, we say. We slide our charge cards and we write checks and we buy things. We sign cards. We say, "Congratulations." We wish them well.

It's all wonderful, all of it. I love that we come together and help each other out. I love that we recognize huge milestones like marriages and births. I love that it is such a rich part of our culture to appreciate and salute the happy couple.

My question, then, is this: Why do we give so much wonderful attention to certain life milestones, and why do we basically ignore other major accomplishments? For example, why was it not culturally expected and accepted for a few of my friends to get together and throw me a Kristen Was Accepted to Graduate School Shower? "Kristen is registered at Powell's and Barnes and Noble," the invite would read. "Please join us for an afternoon of cake and games and show up with a book or two from her registry list."

This would be followed, naturally, by an obligatory Kristen Graduated From Graduate School Shower. "Kristen is registered at Sallie Mae, US Loans and Wells Fargo. Please join us for an afternoon of cake and games and be prepared to write a check that covers a month's worth of student loans."

No? That would be tacky?

But why? Why is it okay to ask people to donate to your honeymoon and not to your debt? I'm making a joke out of this but I'm actually totally serious: Why? Why do familial milestones get the goods and academic ones get ignored?

Several members of my family and one of my best friends attended my graduate school graduation ceremony. A few members of my family wrote me checks and one of my friends wrote me a sweet card and gifted me a bottle of wine. I received some wonderful messages of congratulations and encouragement and I appreciated each one, but I also kind of wonder:

Why don't we band together to tell people like me: You're not alone in this world. We're here to give you a helping hand. You may not need a blender or a pair of wine goblets or some bibs or bath toys, but could you use this five dollar bill, or this ten dollar check, or this gas card or this restaurant gift card or some other thing that might make your life a little easier now that you're sitting on this mountain of debt?

Because seriously, I would love, love, love to get that kitchen gadget in recognition of your upcoming nuptials and that adorable outfit for your future child. I would love, love, love to attend every event I'm invited to, to raise my glass and say, "Man, isn't that something? You really did it. I'm so happy for you." But I have to be honest: Times are tough right now. It ain't easy for a college graduate with a pile of bills.

I'm just sayin'.

I Graduated!

2011-07-08T16:29:00.001-07:00

I received my master of fine arts degree in creative writing. More soon.

Updates

2011-06-10T14:58:00.000-07:00

First, I'm sad to report that Vananh passed away last Friday. She was such a fighter, and she had such strength and compassion; she will be deeply missed. She was beautiful and brave, poised and full of grace. An absolute one-of-a-kind lady.

Secondly, I'm leaving for my final graduate school residency a week from yesterday. There I will have to teach a 50-minute lecture and do a 15-minute reading before I graduate. I'm not particularly looking forward to either of these.

Next Thursday will also mark by departure from Phoenix, where I have resided with my sister and her family for the last three months. They have been so generous and kind to me and I will miss seeing them every day.

After I graduate, I'm going on a trip with my family. I'm really looking forward to this. Then I'm heading back to Portland, where I will start the next chapter of my life. Big things ahead.

I Don't Know How to Sugar Coat Right Now

2011-05-31T23:38:00.000-07:00

To say right now that I'm feeling sad would be an extreme understatement. I wish I were a stronger person, but here's the honest truth: Right now, I'm just really mad at the world. I'm mad that terrible things happen to wonderful people. I'm mad that things seem so unbalanced. I'm mad that one small family has had to face more hardship than an entire community of people should ever have to endure. I'm mad that the same woman who had to lay her toddler to rest two years ago is now having to fight so hard for her life, and I'm mad that the outcome looks dire.

In addition to being sad and mad, though, I'm trying to pool all my positive thoughts and send them to a strong, beautiful woman fighting for her life and her wonderful, amazing husband. If you can channel your positive thoughts their way too, I'd really appreciate it.

Here are some articles I've written about this wonderful family in the past.

A Life Lesson: One Family, Two Cancers, One Great Fight For the Future

Alec Martinez Leaves Legacy of Strength, Ability to Unite Others

The Martinez Family

And here's an article I wrote that was published in last year's Portrait section. I don't have an online link, so I'll just paste it here:

Extraordinary People: Stephen and Vananh Martinez

By: Kristen Forbes

“What makes us extraordinary?” Stephen Martinez thoughtfully asks as he sits in his Tigard living room with wife Vananh, who has her up and down days as she goes through another round of treatment for the ovarian cancer that first made its presence known in her body less than two years ago and has since come back three times. She has IV chemo abastin every other Monday, a non-toxic form of chemotherapy that works by starving the tumor. When these six rounds have finished, the next goal is to get Vananh into a clinical vaccine trial in Seattle.

That Vananh is fighting the second deadliest form of gynecological cancer (22,000 women are diagnosed each year and 15,000 will die, Vananh says) is unusual, out of the ordinary. What makes the plight of the Martinezes so extraordinary, though, is the fact that within months of her ovarian cancer diagnosis, the couple’s two-year-old son, Alec, was diagnosed with cancer, too. After battling an ependymoma brain tumor for nine months, Alec passed away in July; he had just turned three in May.

“When I tell people my son passed, and my wife got diagnosed, all in the same year,” Stephen says, “They can’t believe it. How unreal is that? It’s not like it was a car accident, and it just happened. It was this ongoing, slow process.”

“We watched our child deteriorate every day,” Vananh says. “To have him healthy, and then one day not, to go through three major brain surgeries and then all the other little surgeries – eight surgeries in six weeks – and then from there watch him not be able to sit, eat, talk, walk, hear. He had facial paralysis on one side – I mean, everything. Eight-plus infections. To have your child die in your arms and have to make that decision: When is enough? To not put him through that anymore – It’s like seeing the devil.”

The Martinezes have been through and seen things most people in this life will never be able to understand. The road this family has endured over the past few years has been so dark, so challenging. To any outsider looking in, it begs the question: Why? Why so much pain for one family at one time?

The Martinezes have their own moments, trying to make sense of things, wondering why all this has happened. And then they have other moments, extraordinarily courageous moments when they’re compelled to go on, to carry out Alec’s legacy, to reach out to others and offer support to others who need it.

Stephen and Vananh have been working arduously to start a foundation in Alec’s honor. Their vision for the Alec Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation is to give other families facing similar circumstances the support and resources they needed to find for themselves during their journey. They are now in the process of obtaining their 5013C nonprofit status.

“You just kind of feel like you’re dropped off on another planet,” Vananh says of navigating the world of a sick child. “Who do you call? If you’re not versed in it or proactive about it, no one tells you. They don’t tell you unless you ask. They don’t come find you and say, ‘Did you know there’s assistance you can get at home?’ They just don’t tell you, unless you call them. It’s that kind of advocacy we want to give these families, who are so overwhelmed emotionally.”

On the foundation’s Web site (which the Martinezes hope to have up and running by May 8^th, Alec’s birthday), the couple wants to provide extensive lists of resources and information about pediatric brain tumors. They want to open the site to donations so they can sponsor families of children going through treatment. The couple says it’s been too soon, too raw, to return to the hospital yet, but eventually they’d like to get back there, to help families and lend support. Giving a family a goody bag with a toothbrush, magazine, nutrition bar and juice – Vananh says it’s the little things like this that can make a big impact to a family who doesn’t want to leave a sick child’s room.

In addition to helping people dealing with pediatric brain tumors, Vananh also wants to be an advocate for women facing ovarian cancer. It is so easy to dismiss the symptoms of this cancer, as Vananh discovered when her internist suggested food poisoning or something less serious. Along the way, Vananh has discovered the necessity of being her own health advocate, of educating herself on nutrition and homeopathy, of figuring out what she needs to do for herself to fight this battle. The process of finding these answers can be lonely; she wants to help empower other women, so they can feel less alone and more proactive. And she wants to bring awareness to the disease – the type of awareness that exists for other cancers, such as breast cancer.

“There’s got to be that awareness,” Vananh says. “75 percent of women with ovarian cancer will die in the first five years. The symptoms are so common and doctors don’t take them seriously, so I just want to be a voice and make more women and doctors aware.”

Advocacy. Support. Awareness and compassion: The Martinezes want to lend a hand to other families, families navigating a dark road they know all too well.

“Honestly, I just really wish he was still here,” Stephen says of Alec. “I really wanted to be a father and I really miss that. He was such a blessing. Children are the greatest love in the world. I’ve had it all and he was the most precious thing you could ever possibly want. You can’t stack up children to money.”

The Martinezes will never stop fighting, never stop seeking answers and, hopefully, a cure. Some days are tougher than others and they’ve learned to take things hour by hour. They go on, and they fight – for other families, and for Alec.

Kristen Forbes is a freelance writer. To view her blog, visit www.krissymick.blogspot.com.

Opposite Circles

2011-05-30T21:38:00.000-07:00

When I was a freshman at Lewis & Clark College, one of my favorite experiences was randomly taking a step aerobics class with about five other girls from my hall to fulfill a P.E. requirement. It was fun because we had all become good friends by that point and we spent half the class being silly and laughing at each other. One day I was on the bus to go into town and my step aerobics instructor sat in the seat in front of mine. We chatted about trivial things for a minute or two before she looked me straight in the eye and said, "There's something I've been meaning to tell you. Every time we do the Blah Blah Bah routine, you turn the wrong way. Like, the opposite of how everyone else in the class turns. It's been driving me crazy."

A bus seemed like an odd venue for her to be revealing this information to me. It struck me as somehow inappropriate. I laughed it off, though, and apologized for doing it wrong and said I'd try harder. Man, I must REALLY be driving this woman crazy, I thought, if her first instinct when seeing me on a bus was to unload like that. Once she got it out, she seemed so relieved.

Lately, I've known how she feels. When you need to tell someone something so badly, when you need to explain to him (or her) how what he's doing is driving you absolutely crazy and you might explode if you have to put up with it for another second: I know how she feels. I've had this desire, at completely inappropriate moments, to just scream: You are making me crazy! You are making me crazy! You are making me crazy! And I don't care if we're in a classroom or on a bus: I HAVE to tell you RIGHT NOW.

It's a dangerous explosion of emotion just waiting to happen. So I'm trying to keep myself in check. Trying to ask myself what I could be doing better, what responsibility I can take. I can't control other people. I can't change other people. I can only worry about me.

And here's the truth about me: I'm always going to turn the opposite way in that group exercise class. Always. I will never, never, never be able to coordinate myself enough to turn in the correct direction. I will always be in a backwards circle.

But I'll always laugh about it. And I'll always have a damn good time in my own little circle. And I'm realizing that other people, too, will always be in their own little circles, going the opposite direction. But as long as we can reach out to each other when the circles connect, and as long as we can laugh about the absurdity of being in such opposite worlds and coexisting next to each other, I sincerely think everything will be okay.

So I'm going to try and stop worrying about it, and stop holding it all in. I don't really want to be the one who blurts it out on a bus someday. I'm going to try and find another way.

But Who Am I?

2011-05-24T22:36:00.000-07:00

My biggest obstacle is my emotions.
I would love to live in a different hotel in a different city every week.
I will always laugh when someone falls down.
I have a line and once it is crossed, I stop giving my niceness to the person who crossed it.
I think it's a very generous line and very, very few people have ever crossed it.
My ideal day is one spent sans phone, computer or television.
I was raised to value creativity.
My occupation requires me to be frugal.
I want everyone to get along.
I wear sunscreen every day.
Heather might be mad at me for saying this, but I really do love Oprah.
I'm giving up on the idea of wishing others were different and instead concentrating on myself.
Reading will always be my favorite thing.
I think kindness matters.
I know exactly who I want to be.
I'm willing to wait for others who don't yet know who they want to be.
I'm good at taking care of myself.
I believe in the power of being my own friend.
If you are on my side and believe in me unconditionally, I will always return the favor.
I remember my conversations.
I don't remember names.
The woman behind Dear Sugar is my hero.
Living large, with an open heart and mind, is the only way to live.
I will never regret standing up for myself.

Every Day in May: Continued

2011-05-17T07:59:00.000-07:00

I really have been doing this, though I've neglected posting about it (mainly because I realized reading about someone doing work was, well, boring). But I have been doing a lot of work, believe you me.

In thirty days, I'll begin my final graduate school residency. The amount of preparation between now and then is a little insane, and I often can't help but fast-forward in my mind to the moment when it's all done, I have my diploma, and everything else is behind me. I know if I look too far ahead, though, I'll miss all the good stuff as it's happening. I'm trying to enjoy my moments as they come.

Until then, I'll be the one at Starbucks with my head in my computer for hours at a time.

Every Day in May: Day 4

2011-05-04T23:31:00.000-07:00

As promised, I'm going to do something every day in May to forward my writing career. Today's project involved sending emails and doing some reading, which was actually important despite not sounding important at all.

Since what I did was so boring, let's talk about what I still plan to do:
Finish formatting my manuscript.
Write a lecture.
Finish all my project period paperwork.
Research schools and publications.
Submit.

Every Day in May: Day 3

2011-05-03T23:44:00.000-07:00

Today I made progress on the formatting front, though this was only because someone took pity on me and decided to help me rather than making me navigate the convuluted instructions on my own. Good day for getting stuff done.

Side note: This is my 1000th post. I feel like I've had this blog for a long time; I guess I have. I started it when I was 25 years old and now I'm 29, so I've gone through a significant amount of change -- much of which is documented here. There were times when I probably could have benefited from saying less than I did, but I've always tried to be real.

Every Day in May: Day 2

2011-05-02T22:43:00.000-07:00

As promised, I'm going to do something every day in May to forward my writing career. Today I made a list of potential places to apply for employment, categorized by region. It's a long list, which I find comforting. Like all I need to do is start at the top and work my way down, and somewhere along the line something has to stick. Which I guess is a lot like writing in general -- you submit somewhere and if you get a no, you keep submitting elsewhere until you get a yes. I'm not worried about failing. I'm just worried about not being able to accomplish things in a timely manner. I graduate in June and then bam, it's not long until the grace period for student loans wears off (not to mention that I'll need to start looking for a place to live after I graduate, since I'm living with my sister and her family now and that's obviously not a long-term solution). If I could line something up before I graduate, that would give me a lot of peace of mind. I say this knowing realistically that all these things take time, so much time.

In other news, there are 19 days until I complete my final graduate school project period. I'm so close to done -- but all of the hardest stuff is still to come. I still need to teach a 50-minute lecture and do a 15-minute reading. I also need to format my final manuscript, a project that requires 17 pages of instructions. My impending graduation is exciting, but there is so much, so much, so much to do between and after then.

Every Day in May: Day 1

2011-05-01T23:53:00.000-07:00

As promised, I'm going to do something every day in May to forward my writing career. I even have an Every Day in May buddy, someone to check in with, commiserate with, cheer on and look to for support and inspiration. (I'll probabably need all the support and inspiration I can get.)

Today was the first day in May and it was tricky because it was a Sunday and I was very occupied with ever endeavors -- first visiting my boyfriend and then cheering on my faux siblings (friends so close they feel like siblings) Sprencer and Kalene after they finished their first marathon and half-marathon, respectively. I spent most of the day on the road or with people, and barely had a chance to sit down at my computer and accomplish anything.

So here is what I did today in May: I thought about everything I need to do. I made a mental list of goals. I envisioned the month that lies ahead. Maybe this sounds like cheating or a cop-out for not doing real work, but I think it was important. Now I know exactly what I want to do this month. I have a plan of attack. I'm ready to conquer.

365

2011-04-28T00:06:00.000-07:00

“Love can smack you like a seagull,
and pour all over your feet like junk mail.
You can’t be ready for such a thing anymore than
saltwater taffy gets you ready for the ocean, or
Bring Your Child to Work Day prepares you
for the lonely times of going to work.”
--Daniel Handler, Adverbs

“He loved her for almost everything she
was & she decided that was enough to let
him stay for a very long time.”
--Brian Andreas, Story People

“I felt it shelter to speak to you.”
--Emily Dickinson

“Over the course of the average lifetime you meet a lot of people.
Some of them stick with you through thick and thin.
Some weave their way through your life and disappear forever.
But once in a while someone comes along who earns
a permanent place in your heart.”
--Kevin Arnold, The Wonder Years

“Love takes hostages
And gives them pain
Gives someone the power
To hurt you again and again”
--James Morrison, Love is Hard

“I read once that the ancient Egyptians had
fifty words for sand & the Eskimos had a
hundred words for snow. I wish I had a
thousand words for love, but all that
comes to mind is the way you move
against me while you sleep & there are
no words for that.”
--Brian Andreas, Story People

“Love is really liking someone a whole lot and not wanting to screw that up.”
--Daniel Handler, Adverbs

“It takes no time to fall in love,
but it takes you years to know what love is.”
--Jason Mraz, Life is Wonderful

“Affection is responsible for
nine-tenths of whatever
solid and durable happiness
there is in our lives.”
C. S. Lewis

“Being deeply loved by someone
gives you strength,
while loving someone deeply
gives you courage.”
Lao Tzu

“The lesson is that you can still
make mistakes and be forgiven.”
--Robert Downey Jr.

“I love her and that’s the beginning of everything.”
--F. Scott Fitzgerald

“There is no remedy for love but to love more.”
--Henry David Thoreau

Every Day in May

2011-04-27T22:11:00.000-07:00

For my next assignment, my mentor gave me instructions to think about (and then describe to him) the next novel I want to write. He wants me to come up with several ideas, write them out and basically pitch them to him. For whatever reason, this relatively simple assignment provoked some uneasiness within me. Though it's never, never, never finished-finished, there's something enormously gratifying about "finishing" a novel. It's so gratifying, I wish I could bask and revel in it. I wish I could dunk myself into it, the finished-ness of it, every single morning, like biscotti into coffee. I wish I could swim and swim in this lazy river, this moment in time, this one second of me being satisfied and proud and content. I want to freeze myself.

That's the fear talking, of course. Of course I don't really want to be frozen, static, unable to move forward. Of course I want to start thinking about the next step, and steps, and all the steps that come after that. And if I'm going to be writer, I don't just want to; I need to. I need to move forward and keep writing and start a new project and not sit here with a satisfied smile and wipe my hands and say, "Done." I'm not done. I've only just started.

So here's my new project that's brewing. Every day in May, I'm going to do something to forward my writing career. And if you're asking Uhhhh, don't you write every day anyway?, I'm not just talking about writing. I'm talking about fine-tuning my novel, starting something new, submitting my short stories, working on my freelance pitches, etc. I keep picturing my life -- the one that I really, really want -- and it doesn't include being unable to pay my bills and living in the suburbs because I can't afford an apartment and letting myself be complacent instead of trying as hard as possible to sell my work and to get paid for being a writer.

Simply put, I need to work a hell of a lot harder. I need to think ahead. I need to keep moving. It's great that I "finished" this novel and I've had my chance to celebrate that accomplishment, but now it's time to roll. And to keep rolling until the life I want is mine and the goals I set are met. I'll get there, taking it one day at a time. Starting with every day in May.

Private Lives

2011-04-25T20:56:00.000-07:00

When I was little, I wanted to be a writer. This wasn't a normal thing to want to be, though, and I was very aware of that fact. It was normal to want to be a teacher or a nurse, to want to work in an office or a fire station. So when people asked, I kept quiet. Wanting to write was my secret and for the most part, I kept it well.

My life may have seemed bohemian from the outside -- potter mother, journalist father -- but my parents always counteracted their artistic inclinations with practicality. My mother was extremely business-minded, in a way that allowed her to know exactly how much she could and could not spend on supplies and exactly how much she needed to sell in order to make a profit. I learned from watching her that being self-employed didn't mean getting to sit around in your robe all day long; it meant doing your own marketing and your own cleanup and your own motivating. Even when I knew I wanted to be a writer, it wasn't fanciful. I knew what I'd be getting myself into. Still, I kept quiet.

I knew I wanted to go to school in Boston, thousands of miles from where I was raised and away from everyone else I'd ever known. I knew it with everything I had inside of me, the same way I always knew I wanted to write -- but when people asked, I said nothing. My stock answer was always, "I don't know, we'll see what happens." Wanting to move to Boston was my secret and for the most part, I kept it well.

I hear myself saying that now. "I don't know," I say. "We'll see," I say. Usually, when I say those words, I know exactly what I plan to do. I know exactly what's going to happen.

And maybe I do know. Maybe I've pictured it in my head thousands and thousands of times: exactly what I'm going to do -- ABC then XYZ -- to achieve my goals and dreams. Maybe I do know. And maybe I'm afraid to say it out loud because it sounds big, the same way that "I want to be a writer" and "I want to move to Boston" sounded. It sounds like an invitation. People want to know my plans and I can't blame them -- I want to know too -- but saying what I want out loud sets up such an invitation for questions, none of which I want to answer.

The short answer is that I don't know, and I can't know, just like I couldn't know when I was little if I had the guts to be a writer or when I was 18 if I had the guts to move to Boston. I didn't know until I did it. And I won't know this until I do it, either. So really, I don't know. When you ask me what my plan is, or what I'm going to do, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

Then there's the but. The but I do know. The but of course I know. The but I can't say it out loud just yet, but it's there. The just wait, just wait, just wait.

We'll see. I'll see.

I Feel a Pros and Cons List Coming On

2011-04-22T00:05:00.000-07:00

There was a wonderful and ratable Dear Sugar column this week about a man grappling with the idea of fatherhood. He wasn't sure if he wanted to be a dad, but that didn't mean he knew for sure he didn't. He wasn't sure he wanted to give up his life of freedom and independence, but that didn't mean he wouldn't love a life of responsibilities and family just as much, or more. He wondered if there was somehow or someday when he would just "know" what the right choice for him was, and he was wondering if there was anything he could do to get to that day soon, to find that clarity. Because that's what we're taught in life, right? You take Path A or you take Path B, and somehow it works that you listen to your gut or your soul or your bones and you magically know the difference between right and wrong, A and B.

Today I was eating frozen yogurt with my five-year-old nephew and I asked him what he'd like to do when he grows up. His choices: 1.) Firefighter. 2.) Police man. 3.) Judge. "You'll have to be very fair to be a judge," I said to him. "Can you be fair?" He nodded his head and said, "And you have to tell the difference between right and wrong." "Yes, exactly," I said. "But how do you tell? How do you know the difference between right and wrong?" My nephew shrugged. "I don't know. I just guess," he said.

This idea of shrugging and guessing is as smart and sound as anything I've heard anyone else say lately.

Back to the Dear Sugar letter. Sugar advised this man (obviously you should read the whole thing, because it is smart and beautiful, but let me try and give you the essence here) to map out a list, one column for fatherhood and the other for a life without kids. One is the life he will have and one is the life he won't have, but he doesn't know which is which yet. And the biggest question she advised this man to take into account when exploring these two lives on paper was this: Which life will you regret not living?

Which choice will you regret not making?

Though my issues are different from this man who is contemplating parenthood, I too am at a crossroads. I too am in a place where I'm examining things and thinking: This is great -- would that be better? Will I regret leaving this? Will I regret not having that? Which life do I want to live and which life will I regret giving up?

I sat outside one of my nephew's classes today and I took out a bill and wrote on the back of its envelope. One side was stay and the other was go. One side, the longer side, had words like freedom and independence. The other side had the word love. I stopped writing after a while and I had a big list of words on one side and one on the other. Just one word, the only one I could come up with for that part of the argument. I looked at the other side, at all these proud and wonderful words, and the choice seemed clear, but still very complex.

Sugar's letter writer began by saying, "For those of us who aren't lucky enough to 'just know'..." I know there are millions out there, the ones who don't "just know" what they want to do with their lives or if they want to get married or if they do want to get married but they don't know if they want to marry this person or if they do want to marry this person but they don't know if they want kids, or they don't know if they believe in God, or love, or forgiveness, or redemption, or health food, or logic, or beauty, or themselves. They don't know if they'd choose a career over a husband, or a husband over a child, or a backpacking trip around the world over a career, or a car over a house, or sex over love, or pride over compromise, or cake and wine over exercise, or a makeover over feminism, or independence over a relationship, or Botox over wrinkles, or assisted suicide over painful death, or family over friends, or beauty over brains, or WHAT (those were all random examples; very few were personal examples).

I think the best answer to this "How do you know?" quandary is: You don't. You don't know, and so you guess. And you guess by asking yourself: Which will I regret more? If I am 85 years old and looking back, which will I regret more: abandoning Life A or abandoning Life B? Either one can be mine. And the beauty of my life is that while some choices -- like parenthood -- are pretty much irrevocable, others -- like mine -- are open-ended. I can make the wrong choice and come back later and make the right one. That's okay.

But for now, I'll listen to my nephew and guess. I'll listen to Sugar and ask myself of the sister future lives ahead of me: "Which won’t let you go? Which is ruled by fear? Which is ruled by desire? Which makes you want to close your eyes and jump and which makes you want to turn and run?"

And though I don't know-know, looking at it this way helps me to know. One is that I want. The other is what I would do if I were afraid to admit what I want.

Facing my Fears (But Only The Stupid Ones)

2011-04-20T11:42:00.000-07:00

I remember being a teenager, reading fashion and fitness magazines (Side note: Teenagers should not read fashion and fitness magazines. Neither should adults, until they've gained the ability to look at every picture and see airbrushing and PhotoShop, not perfection). I remember reading articles about celebrities in their late twenties and early thirties, the kind of celebrities who talked about things like "embracing their flaws" and "loving the skin they're in." The kind of celebrities who had somehow managed to attain this zen-like inner peace about their bodies. A lot of them attributed this to nothing more than aging: Get past your twenties, they said, and everything will get easier. Get through your twenties, they said, and you'll no longer feel the need to be so hard on yourself. You'll accept more, you'll appreciate more, and you'll reach a place where you say, Screw it, and just be happy to be alive.

I was very convinced that all these women were liars, that there was no such thing as embracing and loving your own body. I thought self-judgment, self-punishment, and sometimes all-out self-hatred was going to be a way of life, for all my life.

But they didn't lie, these women. I know because I've held the longtime -- possibly lifetime -- belief that I look terrible in shorts and should never wear them in public. But today I had a conversation with myself that went a little something like this: It is hot out and you are almost thirty years old. Those two thoughts are really all it took to get me to put the shorts on, look in the mirror and say, Eh. Not surprisingly, a supermodel did not reflect back at me. More surprisingly, neither did an ogre. Most surprisingly, it was just me. And I look fine. And those stupid flaws everyone is always talking about embracing, even flaunting? They're still there, and they look fine too. Everything is fine.

I'm glad I wasn't lied to. And I'm really glad it's ninety degrees and I'm wearing shorts.

Pretty Cupcakes and Cookies

2011-04-18T20:17:00.000-07:00

For my birthday in March, my sister got me in on a cake decorating class. I attended it on Saturday. Here are the results.

The Eyes See All

2011-04-15T21:39:00.000-07:00

My eyeballs are fixed. Total damage: Around $850. That includes five visits to the eye doctor in the last 45 days, two prescription eye drops (one--the smallest one, naturally, cost a whopping $95), one new set of lenses for my glasses and a year's supply of contact dailies. Word to the wise: Don't mess around with your eyes. I had to wear my glasses and put in 34 drops a day for six weeks to make up for the damage I caused by overwearing my contacts. Let my costly mistake be a lesson to you all: When in doubt, take them out.

Today's Rant Goes To ...

2011-04-14T23:01:00.000-07:00

As I reach the end of my graduate school career and I begin to look at the next phase for my nearly-complete novel and my continuing writing practice, I feel the need to clear up some common misperceptions about who a writer is and what she does.

It's a widely held belief that writers are all:

Lonely/ isolated/ antisocial.
   This, my friends, is a huge, fat lie. Yes, it is just me who sits at the screen for hours at a time, catching the thoughts as they spill from my head like I'm ladling out soup for an endless party of one. Yes, I can go a loooong time without interaction and I have, at times, found myself conversing with a coffee mug, a patch of sunshine on the carpet, and on one particularly lonely day, a tube of toothpaste. But let me make this clear: It takes a village to write a book. For every one Harper Lee, there are thousands of writers who actually make a habit of talking to other people. I can't get through a week without trading hundreds of emails with my poet friend Heather. When I was in Portland, I met at a coffee shop every Monday to spend a few hours writing and talking with my writing-partner-in-crime Yuvi. I have countless discussions with my parents and friends. I spend a lot of my time in Phoenix Skyping with my boyfriend and my best friend. Here I have my sister and her family, who I interact with hundreds of times a day. In Portland I had my Book Club-turned-Fit Club-turned Dinner Club-turned Screw It Let's Just Figure Out Some Times To Get Together and Hang Out Club girls, who were often at my side during dinners and clothing swaps and brunches and coffee dates. My LARK Girls from Lewis & Clark are always at my fingertips via phone and email and I have a few boys in Boston I've been known to call when things are crazy and say, "No but really, what IS it about guys?" I interact with my mentors often, using their feedback to shape my revisions. I talk to my editors at work and I exchange my work with my other writer friends. The number of eyeballs that have graced my novel, as well as the number of ideas and commentary passed onto me, has been astoundingly helpful and wonderful. They say the writer's life is lonely but for me, it's just not true.

Drunk/ alcoholic/ addicted to drugs.
   I certainly know my fair share, but for every "Hi, I'm the cliched drunk writer girl," there's another one who doesn't need to hit the sauce to fuel her creativity. I'm not judging anyone who has a problem, nor am I saying I'm a teetotaler who never imbibes, but I'm a little tired of the people who pass around their prescription pills in their writing drum circles and say it's all part of the process. It's not. Many writers can occasionally drink too much wine or go crazy one night with the margaritas, but they are able to get through their daily lives without alcohol or drugs. This idea that to be a writer, one must be messed up all the time is simply not true. The idea that to be a writer, one must act like a perpetual college student, if not presently drunk then experiencing at least a mild hangover at all times, is simply not true.

Tortured/ depressed.
   The tortured artist thing drives me crazy. I'm not Ms. Shiny Happy Lucky Beautiful, but I don't dwell on my life's failures, either. I know a lot of people who are going through some rough stuff right now and having a difficult time, but they are not sitting around, trying to spin art from their sadness. Life is hard for everyone; I think that's just a universal fact. Writers and artists have it no harder than anyone else. We all know people who will die and we all will die ourselves and at the end of the day, I think it's as simple as that. I know many writers who are bravely going through some really challenging shit; they're not getting off on the creativity their pain is inspiring. That's the idea: that we secretly love pain because it helps us to craft richer stories. The writers I know who are in pain are neither wallowing in nor glossing over their pain; they're just being. Like the general population, some are going through hard times are others are having an easier time right now. This idea that the vast majority of writers are tortured and depressed for the sake of their art is simply not true.

Unhinged.
   Again, I know a few who really fit this bill. For the most part, though, I have to burst the bubble and say that a lot of writers are sane. Many of them have normal jobs, average lives, and they participate in universal hobbies such as exercising and crafting. They take care of themselves and their bodies, they try to get enough sleep and drink enough water, and they don't think that being mentally unstable is prerequisite for being a writer. They have healthy relationships. They don't self-sabotage. Many of them are, gasp, happy. A lot of them have very normal families. They didn't have crazy, abusive childhoods. They don't have any secret disorders. They're just people who like to write, and write they do. Yes, there are some unhinged writers out there, but this idea that most writers are unbalanced is not really true.

I'm about to graduate from grad school and I refuse to take my picture with a caption that says Writers: Lonely, Drunk, Depressed and Unhinged. Sorry, but I'm not participating in that. I know writers who double as political activists, housing assistants, technical writers, teachers, moms and painters. They are smart, passionate, social, grounded and secure. They are beautiful people, I'm proud to know them, and I'm here to tell you the rap about writers -- while true for a few -- is just not a very good representation of writers as an entire population.

Most of us love and respect the act of writing, but we don't see it as our sole source of identity. We can be writers and bakers, writers and friends, writers and scientists. Most of all, we can be writers and painfully, shockingly normal.

Graduate School Tallies

2011-04-13T23:35:00.000-07:00

Grad school by the numbers:
22 months down, 2 months to go
18 packets turned in, 2 packets to go
62 books read so far
Work produced: 1 novel, 10 short stories, 1 5-page critical paper, 1 25-page critical paper
4 mentors
4 workshops down, 1 to go
4 residencies down, 1 to go
1 ongoing field study
1 upcoming 50-minute lecture and 15-minute senior reading
1 upcoming mass of anxiety followed by 1 upcoming giant sigh of relief

Stupid things I did during grad school:
Worked a low-paying job that contributed nothing to ease my student loan debt
Broke up with a friend over a cat
Put some of my trust and faith in the wrong people
Let the stress of school/work prevent me from hanging out with my friends enough
Devoted time I should have spent exercising, eating right, getting fresh air to being cramped inside over a keyboard
Said yes to too many people for too many stupid things
Lost countless hours of sleep
Convinced myself for a while that I was incapable of finishing my novel
Spent way too much money on ink and postage
Snapped at people when under deadlines
Tried to correct mistakes that weren't my own
Expected too much out of other people
Apologized for things I shouldn't have apologized for
Assumed that everyone wants the best for everyone
Drank way too much Diet Coke and ate way too many TV dinners

Intelligent things I did during grad school:
Wrote a novel
Made amazing friends
Found an email buddy to share snarky commentary with
Found a writing partner in crime to share Monday coffee dates with
Found a group of people worthy of being cheered on and supported
Read the work of other people and felt astonished
Listened to my mentors and felt inspired
Wrote even when I didn't really feel like it
Wrote even when I was writing for a living
Wrote even when I felt like I couldn't
Read widely
Attended lectures that changed everything for me
Fell in love and let myself just be in a good relationship for once
Thanked my parents (if not out loud then in my head often)
Appreciated my mentors
Learned from smart writers
Moved out on my own
Quit my job
Allowed myself a blank slate for the future
Realized I actually could finish a novel
Finished the damn novel.

I'm Currently Ecstatic About ...

2011-04-12T21:56:00.001-07:00

...the fact that I just threw away my contacts. No solution. No storage. Tomorrow morning I'll open a new pair.

Holy Bright Shiny New World, Contact Dailies.

How to Please Your Mother (By Not Pleasing Your Mother)

2011-04-11T21:27:00.000-07:00

Her request to me has always been simple. Write a happy story, she said, about nice people who do good things.

As a birthday present to my mom, I handed over the 230-page manuscript that has been my baby for the last two years: the dark one about the shitty people who do horrible things. I held my breath as I handed the pages over, then quickly pulled them back and kept the pages near me, pressing them into my chest and covering them with my arms. She looked at me strangely, as if to ask: Uh, didn't you just say you were going to let me read it?

After some more hemming and hawing, I handed the manuscript over for good and relinquished all control.

I didn't write a happy story about nice people who do good things. I wrote a complicated story about troubled people who do awful things. I wrote a story about people who make poor choices. People who hurt each other. People who mess up.

I wrote a story about people, as real a story as I knew how to write. A story about bad mothers, bad friends, bad girlfriends, bad daughters. A story about immaturity and selfishness and debauchery and meanness. A story about wanting to be one way but not having the courage to make it happen, so being another way instead.

I didn't write the nice story she wanted; I wrote the messy one instead. And ever since writing it, I dreaded her reaction.

She read the whole thing in a few days. She told me she really liked it.

That's all I wanted and needed to hear.

Five Copies

2011-04-06T20:40:00.000-07:00

"If you sell your book,
I'll buy five copies.
If it's really good,
I'll buy more."
--Grandma Florence

30 by 30

2011-03-28T20:20:00.000-07:00

There's something about that 29th birthday and knowing what awaits around the corner. I keep thinking about an article I read in Glamour years ago, a list written by Pamela Redmond Satran that included 15 things you should have and 15 things you should know by the age of thirty.

To quote Satran:
By 30, you should have:
1. One old boyfriend you can imagine going back to and one who reminds you of how far you've come.
2. A decent piece of furniture not previously owned by anyone else in your family.
3. Something perfect to wear if the employer of man of your dreams wants to see you in an hour.
4. A purse, a suitcase and an umbrella you're not ashamed to be seen carrying.
5. A youth you're content to move beyond.
6. A past juicy enough that you're looking forward to retelling it in your old age.
7. The realization that you are actually going to have an old age -- and some money set aside to help fund it.
8. An e-mail address, a voice mailbox and a bank account -- all of which nobody has access to but you.
9. A resume that is not even the slightest bit padded.
10. One friend who always makes you laugh and one who lets you cry.
11. A set of screwdrivers, a cordless drill and a black lace bra.
12. Something ridiculously expensive that you bought for yourself, just because you deserve it.
13. The belief that you deserve it.
14. A skin-care regimen, an exercise routine and a plan for dealing with those few other facets of life that don't get better after 30.
15. A solid start on a satisfying career, a satisfying relationship and all those other facets of life that do get better.

[I'm 11 for 15 here.]

By 30, you should know:
1. How to fall in love without losing yourself.
2. How you feel about having kids.
3. How to quit a job, break up with a man and confront a friend without ruining a friendship.
4. When to try harder and when to walk away.
5. How to kiss in a way that communicates perfectly what you would and wouldn't like to happen next.
6. The names of: the secretary of state, your great-grandmother and the best tailor in town.
7. How to live alone, even if you don't like to.
8. How to take control of your own birthday.
9. That you can't change the length of your calves, the width of your hips or the nature of your parents.
10. What you would and wouldn't do for money or love.
12. That nobody gets away with smoking, drinking, doing drugs or not flossing for very long.
13. Who you can trust, who you can't and why you shouldn't take it personally.
14. Not to apologize for something that isn't your fault.
15. Why they say life begins at 30.

[13 for 15 here].

I have a little more than eleven months to fulfill the last six things, to have and to know the things I should know by the age of 30.

Sometimes goals are hard, but this list is a lot of fun.

P.S.

2011-03-24T00:08:00.000-07:00

Something I forgot to mention in the letter below: Over the past few years, I have received an extraordinary amount of kind, encouraging, supportive, wonderful emails. So many people from the community have gone out of their way to send me a kind note, often either thanking me for an article I wrote or helfpully suggesting a new one to write. I have to say that in all the years I wrote this column, I only ever heard back from one disgruntled interviewee -- and even he was kind about it. For the most part, people were grateful, sincere, and incredibly supportive. This meant a lot to me.

Friends and Neighbors Adieu

2011-03-23T23:18:00.001-07:00

Dear Friends, Family, and Neighbors – Especially Those in the Communities of Beaverton, Tigard, Tualatin, and Sherwood, OR:

    I want to take a moment to express my gratitude to you for the kindness and generosity you have shown me over the past 3.5 years.
    Some people need to search within themselves for years and years in order to figure out who they are and what they want to become. I’ve had a single-minded focus my entire life: All I’ve ever wanted to do is write. I went to college, graduated with a BFA in writing, literature and publishing, then set out into the real world, determined to make a career as a writer. My focus in undergrad had always been on playwriting and fiction, and it didn’t take me long to discover that these weren’t easy fields, and I wasn’t going to be able to make an income writing anytime soon.
    My instinct was to quit. I’d always be a writer, of course, but I needed to get practical and find a career to support myself. I began working in various offices as an assistant, determined to find success in a real job – the kind of jobs everyone else had, where they clocked in a certain number of hours per day, received a steady paycheck, and navigated office politics while doing the tasks assigned by a superior.
    I was terrible at this for a variety of reasons. I didn’t like being told what to do. I didn’t like reporting myself to others: Taking a lunch now. Going to the bathroom now. Charting my every move now. I didn’t like focusing on tasks that seemed to serve no redeeming purpose. Bosses would ask me to go on cappuccino runs and to pick up lunch and I’d find myself thinking: I graduated Magna Cum Laude for this? I wasn’t good on the phone. I wasn’t good at standing up for myself when bosses yelled at me for stupid reasons. (I was living in LA at the time and working in the entertainment industry, so getting yelled at for no good reason was a daily occurrence.) I wasn’t good at office work. At all.
    My instinct was to quit. I started waiting tables. I hated this too. I was bad at this, too. People were so rude to me. I was never good at memorizing orders. I’d forget that someone had asked for an extra straw until I was halfway back from the kitchen. I’d have to turn around and go get it, wasting time, and my tables would pile up. I was always running around, always frantic. I wasn’t good at restaurant work. At all.
    When I was 25 years old, I made the decision to stop quitting on myself, and to stop running like I always did. (I’d lived in five cities – Portland, London, Boston, LA and Phoenix – in the past six years and I’d worked countless jobs, never staying at one position for more than nine months at a time.) I was constantly moving, trying to figure out how to mold myself to the world. This is how it works in America, yes? You get a stable 9-5 job. You stay at this job. You deal.
    I couldn’t deal because I was never happy. I was never happy because I wasn’t doing the one thing I’d ever wanted to do, and the one thing I ever thought I was good at doing. So in that 25th year, I decided enough was enough. In July of 2007, I became a freelance writer. I started small. I started locally. I wrote something here and there. (I kept a part-time job waiting tables in the beginning.) Local editors began showing me kindness and offering me assignments. I started getting paid to write articles. To reiterate, this is all I ever wanted to do.
    One of these editors, Mikel Kelly, asked if I’d have any interest in writing a weekly column. This column would feature a local person from the community and would run in both the Beaverton Valley Times and Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times. I was floored. I said I was absolutely interested. Mikel asked me to write a few – they could be about anybody – and submit them to him by a certain deadline. From there, they would decide if they wanted me to write the column on a regular basis.
    My first column was about my best friend. My second was about a coworker at the restaurant where I still worked. I sent these articles in and they formally offered me the position. “Friends and Neighbors” was born.
    I never studied journalism, nor did I ever think I had an interest for it. I always liked creative writing. Journalism seemed stiff and formal to me. Once I started doing it, though, I realized there was a lot of room for creativity. I realized that I immensely enjoyed writing in this style. The only problem was that I did not enjoy – immensely or otherwise – going out and talking to strangers. My third column was about my then-boyfriend.
    Finally, for my fourth column, I ventured out into the actual community. I interviewed the owner of a local wine store. She was wonderful to me; I had a blast during the interview. I realized that talking to people could be fun. As I went on more and more interviews, I received nothing but warmth and kindness. People opened up to me. They willingly shared their life stories. They let me into their homes, businesses, and favorite coffee shops. Some of them sat down with me for half an hour; others sat down for two hours. They educated me. They laughed with me. They enlightened me. They showed me what it really means to be a friend and neighbor.
    For 168 weeks, I interviewed a new person – or sometimes a group of people – and wrote about them for this column. Sometimes the weekly grind of this was challenging. Some of the interviews were more interesting than others. Sometimes the things people had to say started to sound the same. Sometimes people tried to sell themselves instead of be themselves. Sometimes the work got exhausting.
    For the most part, though, the “Friends and Neighbors” experience was one I cherished. Through the process of learning about strangers, I came to learn a lot about myself. And though it was often difficult to track down people to interview in the beginning, at a certain point a domino effect went into place and I’d interview one person who would suggest someone else, who would connect me to someone else, who would introduce me to someone else. Once the floodgate opened, I realized what a gift this was: to have this kind of access to my community, to have the opportunity to connect with so many different people and to share their stories with others.
    In June of 2009, I began attending Antioch University to pursue my MFA in creative writing. It has always been my goal to write a novel, and I knew I lacked the self-discipline to write it on my own. I needed the structure, discipline, and support of a graduate program in order to achieve this goal. For the past two years, I have been attending graduate school while continuing my work as a freelance writer.
    There came a point when I realized I was exhausted. It’s hard work when you’re writing for your job and also writing for your school. There’s never a break. Though I still loved what I did very much, I started to feel like I wasn’t able to put as much effort into it as I once did. And it was really, really important to me that I write the best novel I could possibly write while still in graduate school.
    My sister gave me an offer too generous to pass up. When my lease ran out in Portland at the end of February, she said, I should come to Phoenix and spend the next several months living with her, her husband, and her two kids. For those three months, I could focus solely on my schoolwork. I could write the most kickass manuscript I could possibly write, without the distraction of work deadlines or money woes. I accepted her offer and came to Phoenix in early March. I plan on staying here until I graduate from school in June.
    I am humbled and grateful to my sister and her family for giving me this opportunity to focus on my creative writing. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime chance and I assure you I’m taking full advantage of it while I’m here.
    The saddest thing about leaving was saying goodbye to the column I’ve been writing every week for the past 3.5 years. (Remember when I said I’d never stayed at a job longer than nine months? Fear of commitment is something I was once accused of on a regular basis; I have no qualms about leaving places or people when I don’t feel right about something. Staying with something for 3.5 years was huge for me, and goes to show just how much I loved it.) To everyone I met along the way as a result of this column, to the hundreds of people I conversed with as a result of this job, to all of you who brought me into your lives and showed me such grace and kindness: Thank you. You’ll never know how much I enjoyed getting to know you and having the opportunity to share your stories.
    I interviewed students, seniors, business owners, artists, musicians, mathematicians, marathoners, dentists, teachers, landscape architects, models, volunteers, writers, yoga instructors, bartenders, fitness competitors, hairstylists, skateboarders, alpaca breeders, bikers, synchronized swimmers, graphic designers, library workers, remodelers, veterinarians, martial arts instructors, insurance salesmen, builders, moms, nutritionists, party planners, travel agents, carpet salesmen, receptionists, waitresses, school principals, Make-A-Wish volunteers and recipients, scout leaders, horticulture teachers, frog breeders, Peace Corps volunteers, marriage counselors, hockey players, shoppers, performance artists, acupuncturists, slot car collectors, snake collectors, psychics, bakers and many, many more. The vast life experiences of everyone I’ve ever interviewed has contributed to my own life in a significant way; for this, I am so grateful.
    For the kindness and generosity, for letting me in and allowing me to share all of your wonderful and remarkable stories: Thank you.
    Thank you.

Friends and Neighbors: Diana Groener, M.A.

2011-03-21T17:30:00.000-07:00

Compassion fatigue is an increasingly important issue in these crazy times. Read about it here:

Compassion fatigue? To help others, we must take time to help ourselves

Friends and Neighbors: Ricki Hackworth

2011-03-21T17:26:00.000-07:00

Here's an extraordinary woman who recevied a national award for her volunteerism.

Tigard resident wins award for outstanding volunteer service

Friends and Neighbors: Eric Nelson

2011-03-21T17:23:00.000-07:00

I'm finally getting caught up! (Apologies.)

Here's a column about a local musician who performs at open mics in the area.

Musician says Tigard venue is favorite place to perform

And Then I Turned 29

2011-03-13T21:40:00.000-07:00

I like turning 29 because it sounds like a joke, like when people who are 32 or 37 or 45 keep saying, "Yeah, I just turned 29." I also like it because I feel -- ever so remotely and vaguely -- more like an adult. Sorta. Kinda. But I especially like it because it a.) reminds me how far I've come and b.) gives me so hope for the future, since I feel so very loved and supported right now, in this moment in my life.

First, a side note: I've been absent for a while, and for a variety of reasons. I'll get you caught up soon. There is much to talk about.

But now: The birthday. The 29th birthday that left me feeling happy and lucky and fulfilled.

To begin, I'm in Arizona right now -- a land where the the sun shines devotedly and fiercely. This is a story for another day -- a day that is coming soon, I promise. But back to the birthday ...

If I were to compile a list of all the things I love most in this world (not counting people, places, hobbies, pastimes or food), it would go a little something like this:

*Peacocks
*Vacuum cleaners
*Car washes
*Robert Downey Jr.
*Fifties diners
*Sunshine
*Spa days
*Springtime dresses
*Talking to my grandmas on the phone
*Letters and cards

This past summer/fall, my boyfriend and I were on a coffee search in Portland when we passed a store window and I commented on how much I love-love-loved this peacock necklace. Just looking at it made me happy. If my boyfriend had any reaction to my commentary, I don't remember what it was. We moved on and got our coffee. I love peacocks. I love them for their their beauty. I love them for their uniqueness. I love them for their color scheme. I just love them.

Though my boyfriend is great, I still refer to Robert Downey Jr. as "my husband" and I really have no plans of breaking this habit anytime soon. I just love RDJ. I love him for his talents and abilities, and I love him for his resiliency and determination. I love him for coming back from the brink and proving all his naysayers wrong. I love him for being the best at what he does -- and all just by being himself.

If I ever make any significant amount of money, let me tell you about my first purchase. I already know what it is, and I've already thought about it profusely. It's not a house, car or gadget. It's a vacuum cleaner. I love them. I love them for their capabilities. I love them for their style. I love them for their cleanliness. The same goes for car washes -- they're soapy and fun and they get things clean and shiny. I love using them as an excuse to soak in some sunshine. I love watching the dirt spray away.

Fifties diners? Love them. I love the way they make me feel: Nostalgic for something I never even had. Innocent. Fun-loving. Visiting one feels like being in an episode of The Wonder Years.

The rest of my loves are self-explanatory, I think. And it goes without saying that I love cupcakes.

So here's how my birthday went down: Bagels and cream cheese, fake bacon, coffee, orange juice, and a big stack of birthday cards from my wonderful friends and family. A quick whirl of the vacuum cleaner. A car wash for Greta the Grand Am. Phone calls from my parents and both grandmas. Making cookies with my sister, niece and nephew. Mexican takeout. A spring haircut at a nice spa. Fried pickles, Vanilla Diet Coke, a veggie burger and onion rings from a cute fifties diner. Home to open presents: A game from my niece and nephew, a pass for a dessert decorating class from my sister, a fun springtime dress from my grandma, a book about Robert Downey Jr. and an RDJ video collection from my wonderful friend Heather. A peacock necklace from my boyfriend. More lovely cards. White cupcakes. Love. Happiness. Bliss.

Thank you.

Dear Ending To My Novel,

2011-02-24T11:59:00.000-08:00

Dear Ending To My Novel,

Please present yourself and replace the sucky placeholder ending I have now. I didn't come all this way not to finish. I wanted to write a book, not an almost-book. Preferably, I wanted to write a good book. Not an almost-good book. Come out, come out, wherever you are, and let's finish this thing.

On Friendship

2011-02-20T19:04:00.000-08:00

Today my friend sat me down in her kitchen, pulled a stool across from me, set her phone down on the counter and told me I could tell her everything. And I did, and it took hours, and as I told her, the phone she set on the counter kept buzzing with incoming calls and messages. She ignored them all and let me talk and after I finished talking she told me the exact words I needed to hear in order to feel okay.

This weekend, my friend emailed me day and night, checking in on me and asking if there’s anything she can do to make my life easier. And the thing is, she already has, just by talking and caring and being there, even for those 3am emails.

This morning, my friends and I got together for cinnamon waffles and mimosas and I was able to sit with them and listen to them and laugh with them and it made me feel like I will never be alone in this world.

Last week, my friend came over for a slumber party and it was like we were kids, making brownies and watching movies, and she made me feel safe and loved and like everything would be okay.

Last night, I met my friends for Chinese food and listened to their silly ideas and it made me feel like life is funny, and life is good.

Lately, my life has felt like a giant shitstorm. One thing on top of another on top of another and sometimes I don’t really know how to take it all in, other than to maybe scream into a pillow or cry on my bathroom floor. And sometimes I do scream into a pillow or cry on my bathroom floor, but more often than that I talk to my friends, and I tell them about the various elements of the shitstorm, and every day they listen to me and tell me it’s all going to be okay.

There are people in this world who don’t have high standards for friendship, and honestly I don’t know how those people get through their days. I would never be friends with someone I couldn’t trust, or someone who made me uncomfortable, or someone who didn’t make me feel good about myself.

My friends are beyond-friends. They’re family. They’re love. They’re fiercely loyal and ridiculously supportive and they go above and beyond the normal requirements of friendship to make sure I’m okay and make sure I’m loved.

I’m so very loved. And when your life is being a stupid shitstorm, there’s really nothing else you could ask for.

The Five Words

2011-02-11T00:26:00.000-08:00

There comes a day when your cousin texts you and says he has mouth cancer and it hits you so hard, knowing he's the same age now as your uncle/ his dad was when he got his life-ending cancer diagnosis, and even though his prognosis is great and the situation is different, it will still make you stop and catch your breath and you'll want to say nothing but "I love you" to the next person who talks to you.

The next person who talks to you is your boyfriend and you do love him, and you tell him so, and you'll hope that it's enough but know that it isn't, because those three words inadequately convey the depth and scope of something so big.

A girl will send you an email that is antagonistic and bitter, accusatory and filled with conspiracy theories about who you are and what that means for her, and instead of getting upset and hurt -- or rather, after getting upset and hurt -- you'll realize that what you really feel for her is sorry, sorry that she is so unhappy in her life.

Thinking of her unhappiness will make you unhappy, but it will also make you grateful, and you'll look around at those you consider to be your friends and you'll realize that each and every one of them is absurdly awesome in a way that far exceeds any expectations you ever could have had for them, and you are so undeniable lucky for having each and every one of them in your life.

Thinking of your high standards for friendship, and how they exceed them all, will fill you up like you've been eating soup by the bowlful and it will be all you can do not to call them all up, each and every one of them, and say, "I love you, I love you, I love you."

You'll hope this is enough, and know that it isn't, because really what you need to say is, "Thank you."

You'll say it again in your head, "Thank you, thank you" as you think of your family and you think of your friends and you think of your boyfriend and you think of your cousin with mouth cancer, the one who means so much to you it almost hurts to think about it.

Somehow this will lead you to think of all the times you've been hurt, all the dumpings and firings and letdowns and disappointments, and you'll realize you're at this strange point in your life all you want to say for any of this is, "Thank you."

You'll invite your best friends over and you'll go through several bottles of wine, eating pasta and playing Catch Phrase and your tiny apartment living room will be crammed and you'll love each of them so much it almost hurts to think about it.

You'll get overwhelmed by this desire to say the words over and over again -- "I love you" and "Thank you," you'll say, and you won't even recognize yourself because you're used to being so much more cynical and reasonable and the way you feel now is anything but.

Your skin will start to feel foreign and you'll begin to question who you really are, and you'll worry that love has softened all your hard edges and morphed you into someone who is weak.

You'll realize you don't actually dislike this person though, because this person loves her cousin fiercely, and she loves her boyfriend fiercely, and she loves her friends and family fiercely, and where is the weakness in any of that?

You know you don't love the girl who writes you mean emails, and you know you never will, but you also know she'll never ruin your day, or get in your way, because her life has no consequence on your own.

You'll realize that all you really want to do is hold on tightly and closely to the people you love most in this world, to serve them food and drink their wine and sit in a circle and laugh at how absurdly strange life is.

Your cousin will have surgery for his mouth cancer and you'll breathe a sigh of relief, but you already know things won't go back to the way they were; they can't.

You know that people need to hear it -- the words that mean something -- and they need to see it -- the actions that mean something -- and most importantly, they need to feel it, the way you felt like you were kicked in the gut when your cousin sent you that text message and the way you felt like your heart was infinitely capable of holding itself when your boyfriend told you he would always be on your side.

There comes a day when your cousin texts you and says he has mouth cancer and it hits you so hard, and all you'll want to say in the aftermath is "I love you" and "Thank you" to anyone who's ever really meant anything to you.

Tiny Beautiful Things

2011-02-10T23:48:00.000-08:00

This is exactly what I needed to read at this exact moment in my life right now.

Dear Sugar, The Rumpus Advice Column #64: Tiny Beautiful Things

Changing it Up

2011-01-23T00:33:00.000-08:00

2011 is a year of big changes for me. It's bugging me that I can't discuss them all here yet, but here's a vague idea: I've been playing with the same ratty deck of cards for so long now. Some of the cards got lost; others got damaged; my deck had dwindled to a few cards that I just keep trying to play over and over. They produce the same frustrating results over and over. I can never break out a new combination of numbers because I have such a limited selection to choose from. So I've been in this loop for a really long time, and you know what? It's so much harder to walk away from something than it is to just stick with it. So I've been sticking with it, for a really long time.

This year, I'm buying a new deck of cards. I have no idea where this will take me or what I'll be able to play from here -- I only know that I'm tired of looking at everything from the same limited vantage point and it's time to step back and look out farther. With a full deck of cards, I feel like I should be able to go anywhere.

Some people are worried about me making such a big purchase when the cards I've been using seem to treat me just fine. The thing is, I could sit in just fine for a long, long time. And I have. The courage that I've had to work up in order to walk away from just fine is bigger than anything I've mustered in years. It's easy to stay put. It's hard to clean the slate.

To the question of where this will all lead, the answer is that I don't know. I'm okay with not knowing. Right now, I'm looking beyond the loop and all I see is wide open expanse, ready for anything.

I Have NO Idea What I'm Doing

2011-01-21T12:08:00.000-08:00

I don't believe you can learn how to write. I think you can learn how to hold a pencil in your hand, how to move it in such a way that it forms letters, and you can learn how to use your fingers to strike against a keyboard and form words, too. I think you can learn the rules of grammar. You can learn how to construct a sentence -- a paragraph -- a page. You can learn to use writing to make a persuasive argument, or to show a story, or to put together an informative article. You can learn the craft of writing. You can discover the impact of different stylistic choices. You can study the way other writers wrote and attempt to emulate them as best you can.

But I don't believe you can learn how to write. I think the very act of writing is so instinctual, there's no instruction manual for it. There's no blueprint to work off. There's only the act of sitting down and letting your brain empty itself onto a screen; there are no rules or lessons for that.

I've spent so many years reading so many books. I know how they work. I know how the writers did what they did. I know from studying literature and writing for years and years and years.

Knowing how they did what they did doesn't mean I can do it, too. But it was enough to make me try.

So I sat down, all those months ago, and I decided to write a novel. I didn't know how -- it can't be learned -- but I decided to try. The instinctiveness took over. I knew to write A and then B and C because I just knew to write A and then B and C. I knew to keep writing because I just knew to keep writing. So I kept writing. And I wrote the whole thing.

And that's when I realized: I have NO idea what I'm doing. I don't know how to write a novel -- it can't be learned! I don't know what I'm doing. I only know how to empty my brain onto a screen, and that is what I did.

I wondered if it might be possible -- after the fact -- to learn how to write a novel. Everything seemed so disorganized, I decided I needed an outline. So I read about outlines, something I've never used. It was suggested I divide my book into roughly eighteen chapters, each roughly fourteen pages each. Great! I'll use that as a guide to structure this mess. So I counted my chapters. My 100 chapters. My 100 chapters in my 210 page book.

Okay, so, clearly I needed a different set of guidelines. Where's the blueprint for: How to write a 210 page novel with 100 chapters? Where do I go from here?

I go back to the page; it's the only place to go. There are no how-to guides for how this is to be done. This isn't something that can be learned. It is as instinctual as painting or any other form of art: you can study the hell out of it, but the only way to do it is to do it.

So, I'm doing it. I'm revising a novel. I have NO idea what I'm doing. I couldn't possibly know: You can't learn this stuff. You can only DO this stuff -- and then learn from that.

Friends and Neighbors: Healthy Start Crew

2011-01-20T21:19:00.000-08:00

Here's my second article on the gang over at Healthy Start. This one focuses on their recent kick-off events.

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Novel Writing 101

2011-01-19T23:43:00.000-08:00

In the grand scheme of things, writing a novel is easy. Really, it's not that hard. It's just sitting down at your computer, writing a super long story, and continuing to write it until it's done. Simple.

Revising a novel, on the other hand, is one of the hardest things I have ever done. It is so multi-layered, so complex, so huge. Tinkering with one little thing can change the shape of every other thing. Piecing and reorganizing scenes is a monstrous, monstrous task. Fleshing out a character makes that character's previous scenes seem completely out of context; that needs to be corrected. Filling in details in one section will dictate the details that are needed in another section; that needs to be addressed. Scenes need to be chopped down or eliminated entirely. Old scenes need to be rewritten and new scenes need to be written for the first time. You continually have to go back to the beginning and build from there, because if the foundation is broken, nothing will work. So you mess with the beginning and change the first few scenes. And then you mess with the beginning and change the first five scenes. And then you mess with the beginning and change scene after scene after scene and you wonder if you'll ever be able to get out of this mess. And you're thinking big picture because you've seen the whole thing laid out, you know how the story goes, and you just want to make it better. But you're also thinking small because the only way to fix it is to take it piece by piece, chunk by chunk, and you can't see anything until you step soooooo far back that you can see it all. And frankly, your mind is not big enough to see it all. Your mind is not big enough to keep track of 200 pages of plot and characters and all you want is to finish this thing and to have it be good and the more you get into it, the harder that seems. And you try to break it into manageable bits but then it just seems never-ending. And you try to breeze through the whole process but then you're just cheating yourself. There are subtle changes that need to be made, but there are also big, dramatic, sweeping changes. Changes that change the plot. Changes that change the entire story. And each change dominoes into another change and it all just feels so big, so big, so big.

Writing a book is easy. Revising the shit out of it is an entirely different story.

As It Should Be

2011-01-18T23:42:00.000-08:00

Here's the thing that happens in life. Some people love you and others don't even like you. Some people get you and others never will. Some people lift you up and others cut you down. Some people care and others don't. Some people want the best for you. Others do not.

Here's the choice you have in life. Invest energy to both types of people, or say screw it and give everything you have inside of you to those who really deserve it.

I don't buy into the idea that people are horrible or monstrous, but there are defintitely people in this life who -- for whatever reason -- feel threatened or put off by you. And they may do their best to make your life as difficult as humanly possible. And you may waste a lot of hours feeling sad or angry or upset about this.

Then one day, you'll just decide to make the second choice. To stop wasting your energy. To save all your kindness and love for the people in your life who deserve your kindness and love. And you'll let them shower in it, bathe in it, soak up every drop of it. And then you'll have nothing left, nothing at all, to give to the people who aren't worth your time.

And that is okay. And that is as it should be. The people you love feel so very loved. The people who hold you back get sent back to their own lives, where they can do whatever they want on their own time.

Whatever they do, it's not your concern. These people who hold you back: They're not your concern.

These people who love you: They get all of you. As it should be.

Friends and Neighbors: Kristie Kliese

2011-01-18T15:33:00.000-08:00

Here's another wonderful woman who put together a dining group that gives back to charity:

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Friends and Neighbors: Merilou Hundley

2011-01-18T15:30:00.000-08:00

Here's a really sweet woman I met who works as a life coach and energy healer:

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

(Gratitude.)

2011-01-17T22:47:00.000-08:00

I've been sick, so very sick.

And while I was sick, so very sick, my boyfriend:

Got me into bed.
Got my head on the pillow.
Put the fan on me.
Poured me drink after drink.
Put on my favorite movie of all time (Heart and Souls).
Went out and bought me medicine.
Made me toast and homemade soup, even though I could barely keep anything down.
Let me sleep for hours.
Didn't complain or get disturbed when I kept coughing and throwing up again and again.
Got me to my parents' house, where my mom got me more drinks and medicine.
Spent his holiday weekend with me, the sicko.

And now I'm feeling better, a little better.

And his weekend is over.

And I'm Back

2011-01-09T21:29:00.000-08:00

Confession: I woke up on the first day of 2011 feeling the best I've felt in years. My 2010 slate wiped clean, I couldn't help but look forward with optimism, hope, and wild expectations. This was going to be a big year for me. A year of changes, triumphs, and milestones. I simply couldn't wait to get started, to conquer all my obstacles, and to get to the other side of the ticker tape, where the confetti falls and the work is done and all that's left is to stand back, smile, and say: I did it.

A few days into the new year, it all seemed to crash down on me. Here I was in my shiny, happy new year -- bearing all the baggage from my sloppy, jagged last year. None of that magically vanished. I was still the same clunky person. Worse, I realized that accomplishing all the goals I'd set for myself was going to make this year not one of the best, but one of the hardest. Everything before me is hard: Hard work, hard emotions, hard times.

Screw you, 2011, I was tempted to say.

Cue the lightbulb moment.

All of the crap in my life is and always has been a result of unkindness. Whenever my stress level reaches a fevered pitch, it's always the result of one of three things: I'm being unkind to myself, unkind to others, or a combination of both. Always.

I'm unkind to myself when I try to get by on too little sleep, too crappy food, not enough forethought, not enough common sense, too many unrealistic expectations and too many mental beatdowns. I'm unkind to others when I expect them to read my mind and get mad when they don't, or when I expect them to see my way and get mad when they don't, or when I expect them to be perfect people and get mad when they're not. Sometimes I set myself and everyone around me for failure -- and then I get mad when we all fall into the self-set trap.

My year was off to an unkind start. I was getting frustrated with everyone, including myself. I was overwhelmed by my all of my expectations. I could feel myself losing sight of what's important and instead fixating on every petty, silly, stupid, dumb, idiotic, meaningless, ridiculous, nonsensical, who-the-hell-cares mini obstacle that got in my path. I was quickly on my way to becoming someone I despise.

There's two things that can happen when you're on a path: You continue or you stop. For me, I was determined to get my kickass 2011. I've been waiting too long to be completely let down now.

So I made a decision: I decided to stop letting myself down. To let go of some of the pettiness. To loosen my reigns on the expectations I'd set for myself. To remember what it's like to be nice: to myself and to others. Fixating on all the ways in which I've failed miserably is not a nice thing to do to myself. Berating the people I love for making decisions that in the end have nothing to do with me is not nice. Being constantly stressed is not going to get me anywhere.

This year is going to require a lot of work. That's okay. And this year is going to require a lot of kindness. That's okay.

I am damn excited for 2011. This will be a big year for me. Not because I'll get my MFA, finish my manuscript, or any of that other stuff -- though those are all huge to me too -- but because I'm going to be the person I want to be. And the person I want to be is kind. Even to herself.

So, I'm back. And this year, 2011? It's going to rock.

It already does.

Friends and Neighbors: Trevor Dahl

2011-01-02T09:09:00.000-08:00

Local musician Trevor Dahl signed with a record label:

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Portland Tribune

Friends and Neighbors: Heather Thompson

2011-01-02T09:02:00.000-08:00

Heather Thompson, director of Tualatin Valley Gleaners, discusses the nonprofit organization here:

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Residency 4.0

2010-12-09T15:04:00.000-08:00

I'm off to my fourth of five graduate school creative writing residencies. It's strange to think that I began this program 1.5 years ago; everything about my life has changed so vastly in such a short amount of time. Six months from now, I will be graduating.

A big reason why time has become so strange is that there's no stopping. From the time I've started, it's been go-go-go. There are no breaks or vacations. There's always another deadline next month, just like there's always another deadline next week for work.

I'd like to say this has made me a more disciplined and focused person, but that certainly is not the case. I will say it has made me a more mellow person. With the realization that there is always-always-always more work around the corner, I've learned to let go of some of the stress and manage my life a little better. I used to turn my friends down each and every time they asked me to do something, too worried that I wouldn't be able to get everything done if I said yes. I've learned that I always will get it done, even if I say yes, and that sometimes stepping away is the single best thing I can do for myself. So while the responsibilities and obligations have not reduced, my attitude about them has chilled. I don't know if that's really a byproduct of graduate school, but I like to think it is. And if it is, then I like to think my (absurdly large amount of) money has been well spent.

Friends and Neighbors: Dr. David Streiff

2010-12-09T14:55:00.000-08:00

This local dentist went to Guatemala as part of a team and made a big impact on the community there.

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Friends and Neighbors: Adaptive Yoga Instructors

2010-12-02T10:31:00.000-08:00

Some of these instructors were featured a few weeks ago in an article about visiting to India to enrich their yoga practice, but the focus of these week's article is adaptive yoga that's suitable for anyone, any condition.

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Replacements

2010-12-01T15:46:00.000-08:00

I'm really happy right now. There's nothing remarkable about this, except that I'm not normally a winter-happy, holiday-happy, dark December-happy sort of person. And right now I am. This is a departure from a lot of winters for a lot of years.

It's not that I'm normally unhappy, per se. It's just that I'm normally very ... Aware. Aware of life's stresses. Aware of life's unfairness. Aware of life's overwhelmingly and depressingly cyclical nature. My heart always felt a little heavy when I pulled out of a parking spot and another car dashed in to take it over immediately. It always pained me a a waitress to quickly wipe a table as soon as a group of customers left in order to make a clean slate for the next party. This awareness of how easy it is to promptly replace people has always caused me distress.

In the grand scheme of things, I'm easily replaceable. There's another person behind me in the coffee line and the post office line and the Walgreens line and the Red Box line and every possible line there is -- someone who is ready to step forward and take my place as soon as I walk away.

In my life, there was a series in time when I kept moving and moving, starting and quitting jobs, making new friends and then making new-new friends and then making new-new-new friends. No matter where I was or what I was doing, there was always someone new to step in. A new guy to date when I stopped dating that one. A new friend to confide in when I stopped seeing that one. A new boss, a new group of girls, a new batch of coworkers to commiserate with and a new group of people, always, always, always.

My life was like a chalkboard that I kept erasing and filling and erasing and filling and I hated how cyclical it was and I loved it, too. It scared me and it comforted me. It made me think, "What's the point?" and it also made me think, "No matter what, it will always be okay."

I've struggled with the tension of it for so long and grappled with the morbidity of it. Lately, though, I've calmed down.

In the grand scheme of things, we're all so very replaceable. But there are people in my life who are absolutely irreplaceable, whose pull on my heart and my life is so strong that I know there will never be anyone waiting in the line behind them in any circumstance. And maybe this should scare me more, knowing the loneliness and sadness that will result when these people step out of line.

I don't know, though. Knowing there are a few people in this world who I can grip tightly and hold against me when I need to brace myself against any of life's bullshit comforts me. It makes me realize that being irreplaceable to the world probably isn't really the point. Maybe being irreplaceable to a few, or even just one, is a better goal.

Friends and Neighbors: Annalise Johnson and Devenie Harris

2010-11-30T23:28:00.000-08:00

Here's a column about two wonderful young ladies who work for Healthy Start, which provides information, support, and services to first-time parents in Washington County.

Beaverton Valley Times

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Friends and Neighbors: Champions

2010-11-29T23:26:00.000-08:00

This one's a few weeks old, but it's about an afterschool program called Champions, which I sat in on one afternoon in October, the same day Senator Merkley stopped in to visit the kids.

Beaverton Valley Times

Remember That Novel?

2010-11-28T20:24:00.000-08:00

I'm a sucker for Thanksgiving, a holiday that unites three of my favorite things: family, food and gratitude. My feelings of gratitude sometimes get lost alongside my much louder whining and sighing, but they're always there. I'm so grateful for so many things, and keenly aware of my place of privilege in this world. Should someone with a loving family, supportive friends, healthy body and semi-dependable job complain as much as I do? Probably not. To be loved and supported and healthy and housed is to be the luckiest schmuck alive. So for now, enough with the whining.

Today I had my final phone conversation with my mentor from this project period. Despite his easygoing manner and despite the fact that he always dispensed genuine wisdom and kindness, these phone calls always made me nervous. I'm a writer, not a talker. Sometimes, though -- a lot of times, though -- we have to push ourselves to do things that make us uncomfortable. I push myself every day in my job, interviewing strangers despite the fact that talking to people makes me panic. My best work as a writer has been the result of those moments when I let myself go way beyond the perimeters of discomfort, into a territory so dangerous I get queasy just thinking about it. I'm talking about the "I don't know if I'd ever let my grandparents read this" territory -- that place where my writing is no longer safe and sweet, but dark and true. Writing is risky and the deeper I'm willing to fall, the likelier I am to be satisfied with my end product, knowing it's the result of real work and honesty and a confrontation with fear. Confronting this fear is the greatest leasson I've learned in graduate school so far.

Back to being grateful ... It occurred to me as I hung up the phone that I've spent three project periods working with three mentors who have helped me immensely and quite honestly changed my life. Maybe that sounds like I'm overstating it, but I had no idea who I was as a writer before graduate school. I knew I was a writer, but I didn't know who I was as a writer. I had no idea what I was doing. I didn't even know what I wanted to do, beyond "write." What does "write" even mean, when used in such a general sense? I was aimless, clueless, and too comfortable and safe to really care about anything.

Check out this language from my very first grad school contract: " I will write 25 new pages each month to turn in for my fiction project. Though my background is mainly in short stories, my primary goal is to start a novel. However, I also want to be flexible and allow myself to return to short stories if writing a novel doesn’t seem like the right fit once I get into my work."

Wow. Lack of confidence, much? I had no idea if I was capable of writing a novel and the only way I could get myself to start was to create a safety zone wherein I was allowed to fail and come back to the place where I already knew I felt comfortable.

Luckily, I had a mentor who said: Write a novel. And who, after reading my first 25 pages, said: Okay, I'm not sure about this, and who, after reading my first 50 pages, said: Yes, keep writing a novel. I wrote 100 pages and revised 25 during those first six months. I went from "I don't know what the hell I'm doing" to "Here's the first half of a book." Maybe I could have done it without her guidance, without her encouragement, without her looking at me and (allow me to paraphrase here) saying: "Stop telling me you don't know how to write a novel and write the damn thing." I don't know, though. I would have started without her, but I don't know if I would have kept going. It's like I needed someone to tell me I'm not crazy and I can do this. Or I am crazy and I can do this. I just needed someone to tell me I can do this.

My second mentor pushed me in a really loving, sweet way. She asked me to do things that terrified me. Things like changing the whole tense of my book. Big, sweeping changes that scared me with their, um, big sweepiness. She helped me to let go of something I was holding onto way too tightly, to back away from it and let it expand and take shape. In the end, we both agreed the tense was better the first way and I changed it again. It was so liberating to change it the second time. It felt like I'd been in the trenches and getting to see it the way I had orignally envisioned it after working so hard with it in another format was my reward. I wrote another 100 and revised another 25 pages with this mentor. I fought my way through that project period. I clawed and grappled. Finishing the first draft of my first novel was more emotional than I ever could have imagined, to the point that for a few months there, I just couldn't make myself do it. But I did it. And I don't know if I would have done it if it hadn't been for her.

And then, for my third mentor, I let it all go. The last time I looked at the pages of my novel was in May or June. By then, it was bigger than I had envisioned -- I didn't know if I could start it, remember, so finishing a draft of it was monumental. It was scary. It made me want to strip it all and start again, to change every little thing until I got everything just right. I no longer cared about writing a novel; I wanted to write a good novel. I was so close to it, and so obsessed with it, that at that point in time, writing it well would have been impossible. So I let it go. I worked on a big critical paper. I spent months and months researching and writing it. I wrote short stories. I experimented. I did deep revisions on the stories I wrote. I became a much better writer. And I regained the sanity I could feel myself losing when I was so consumed with the novel. Letting it go went from terrifying to liberating to soothing. I never would have had the courage to do it if I hadn't had a mentor who said: Forget the novel for now. Let's write stories. I'm so grateful to him.

Now I'm ready to enter my fourth and final project period at school. I'm ready to revise my novel, a piece of work I've distanced myself from for six months. I needed to do that. I needed to do it for my health, for my mind, for my well-being. I needed to do that for the work itself. I wasn't excited about my novel anymore, and now I am again. I wasn't invigorated by it anymore, and now I can't wait to get back into it. I couldn't have done it any other way than exactly the way I did. And even though I was the one writing the damn thing, the people around me are the ones I credit for this.

I'm so grateful for my three mentors. I'm grateful to the one who said: Just write the thing. I'm grateful to the one who said: Don't be afraid to change the whole thing. I'm grateful to the one who said: Put the damn thing away and get your mind back.

And now I can't wait to meet the one who says: Finish the thing. You can do it.

The biggest difference in where I am now and where I was then is that now I know I can do it, without being told. Still, it never hurts to hear.

Friends and Neighbors: Youth Advisory Council

2010-11-26T10:53:00.000-08:00

I'm so behind, ack.

Playing catch-up, here's my column from last week, about an amazing group of high school students who are real leaders in their community.

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Some Math

2010-11-17T19:01:00.000-08:00

17 months down, 7 months to go
15 packets down, 5 packets to go
3 residencies down, 2 residencies to go
3 project periods down, 1 project period to go
1 5-page critical paper and 1 25-page critical paper down, 1 final manuscript and 1 senior lecture to go

I'm not normally a math person, but I really like the looks of these numbers. I like watching the numbers on the right grow smaller and smaller and my MFA get closer and closer.

2011 is going to be a good year.

Friends and Neighbors: Sunset Yoga Instructors

2010-11-13T21:34:00.000-08:00

This past summer, these four women went to India to further their yoga studies.

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Waah

2010-11-10T21:29:00.000-08:00

This project period -- in case you haven't noticed -- has been kicking my ass. I feel like I'm behind in every possible way -- on my reading, on my writing, on my socializing, sleeping, cleaning, errand-ing, life-ing. There's no way to say this but to say it: Being poor is hard. Working so much while going to school is hard. Working so many different jobs is hard. Making so little despite working so hard is hard. I know that in the scheme of things I have it really, really good, but: Life right now seems really hard.

It's hard to not get paid for the work I do until several months after the fact, and to then get paid an amount so low, it doesn't really cover the gas/ supplies/ hours I put in. It's hard when I'm taking any writing assignment I can get my hands on, and doing office work, and waiting tables, and trying to find the energy to come home and read and write.

It's hard to love someone who lives somewhere else, to have to put in the miles on the weekends and the hours on the phone on the weeknights to make up for not being there. It's hard to divvy my time and know when to say yes and when to say no when my wonderful friends are always asking me to come out and oftentimes I just can't.

It's hard to have to turn a lot of things down because I simply can't afford it, can't afford to pay for the $7 dinner because that's $7 not going toward my rent and I'm in a position where every single dollar counts.

It's hard to feel so tired all the time but to have so much I want to accomplish, and to know I could accomplish it better if I just wasn't stretched so thin.

It's hard to know when I'm making the right choices, when I'm setting the right priorities, and whether I'm succeeding or totally failing at this mystical thing called adulthood, because every single day it feels like I'm failing.

It's hard to deal with outrageous dental bills and car insurance payments as I watch my credit card debt get deeper and deeper. It's hard when everything seems to malfunction, from my computer to my car, and I have no choice but to just stop whatever I'm doing and deal with it.

It's hard to do multiple jobs in a single day and it's hard to put so much effort into a job that pays me so little, and so late, that thinking about how under-appreciated I am makes me want to cry.

It's hard dealing with people and their demands because everyone wants something, all the time, and that's one of those things that's never going to change.

It's hard not seeing my friends for so long because I keep telling them, "Sorry, I'm drowning," and the thing is, I really do feel like I'm drowning and this isn't the way I want it to be, but when you're drowning, what is there to do but keep swimming until you can pull yourself to safety? So as long as I'm drowning in this debt, and as long as I'm drowning in this work, then this debt and this work are my life and I wish that wasn't the case but until it isn't, it has to be.

It's hard to stay focused when every day there's a new thing added on and the responsibilities keep growing and growing. It's hard when I want things to be different but the only way they ever will be is if for now I keep them exactly the same.

I guess that's why I haven't been on here much lately. I haven't been able to figure out how to steal the moments, how to make this happen, when everything else feels so weighted. But I'm trying. I'm trying to figure it all out.

I'll get it figured out.

Friends and Neighbors: Robyn Hoppes

2010-11-10T20:51:00.000-08:00

VISTA Robyn Hoppes is one of many wheels that make Hands on Greater Portland run. Read about her here:

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

...And Then I Went Back to Bed and Slept Like a Baby

2010-10-30T07:38:00.000-07:00

Pre-scene: I spent my evening filling out my voter's ballot, reading for school, and slathering a detoxifying mud mask all over the skin on my face. Sleepiness hit me fast and I quickly rinsed off the mask, pulled off my many layers of fall clothes, swaddled myself in blankets and went to sleep.

Cut to: 3am, when someone starts pounding at my door. I've been in an absolutely dead-to-the-world slumber for four hours now and am in no mood for visitors. I try to ignore it, but then I hear, "Police! Come out with your hands up!"

Mind you, I'm sleeping in my underwear. So I throw a blanket around myself and sleepily, shakily open the front door.

"Come out with your hands up, James!" a policeman is saying when I emerge. Three cops with guns drawn stare at me. "I'm not," I say, and then am too shaky to finish the sentence as I awkwardly maneuver with the blanket to show them my hands without flashing them, too. "Where's James?" one of the cops asks. "I don't know James," I say in a scared whisper. I am suddenly aware of the fact that I missed a few spots when rinsing and there are flecks of green mud mask still sticking to my face and neck.

The cops look baffled. "Is this Apartment Number [?]" they ask. "Yes," I tell them. "Is this the only Apartment Number [?]" they ask. "I think so," I say. "We just got a call from a man named James and he said he was here and having a very serious issue," they say. "Do you mind if we come in and take a look around?"

I let them in. My apartment is messier than it's been in months. There's a huge pile of laundry on the floor, a blanket in the middle of the living room from where I was lounging while filling out my ballot, and several days worth of dishes that I just haven't gotten around to cleaning yet. There's more clothes on the floor of my bedroom and products strewn on the counter of my bathroom, including the mud mask I'd used earlier. Things are open: cabinets, the dishwasher, drawers. Counters need to be wiped down. This is not how I'd want anyone to see my apartment.

The apartment reveals my current messiness, but more than anything it is a testament to my geekiness. Books are everywhere, on nearly every surface and piece of furniture. Pieces of paper with notes on them, piles of pens -- this is what they see as they quickly go from room to room.

They look at me, pathetically wrapped in a blanket with green specks on my face, and they say, "We're very sorry. There must have been a mistake. We're very sorry."

One of the officers leaves his business card on my counter and they all leave. I go back to my room, already knowing I won't be sleeping anymore. I put on pajamas -- something I would have done last night if I hadn't been so exhausted. I rinse my face. I close some drawers and cabinets. And then I crawl back into bed, wishing there was someone I could call at 3am.

I don't turn the light off for a long time.

Pre-Purchased

2010-10-25T22:27:00.000-07:00

I think my 88 year-old grandma bought me a graduation card the moment she found out I was accepted into graduate school. I know this because every time I talk to her, she tells me she already has my card. She tells me where she keeps the card. She tells me that if she's not around by the time I graduate (I hate when she talks like this), I should get the card from her house. And she tells me I have to keep going. "Well, you have to graduate," she says. "I already bought the card."

I've never contemplated quitting, but there are days when school is insanely difficult and the finish line seems damn far away. And on those days, I remind myself: Well, I have to graduate. She already bought the card.

Friends and Neighbors: Sam Baker

2010-10-21T18:44:00.000-07:00

My streak of interviewing amazing young people continues. Tualatin grad Sam Baker started a company in El Salvador to sell affordable computers to low-income residents. Read about it here:

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times

Is it November Yet?

2010-10-20T14:47:00.000-07:00

It looks like I've pretty much missed the entire month of October thus far on this blog. I'm going to try explain this as if I'm on the game show Catch Phrase, not allowed to used the phrase "so busy."

My life has been eventful lately. Let me try to break it down. First, there's work. I've been doing a lot of freelance writing, per usual. This doesn't fully pay my bills, per usual. So, I've been doing some temp work, too. Sometimes this goes really well, like when I was put in a room by myself for three days and told to do nothing but stuff hundreds of envelopes and then seal them and sort them. I excel at this kind of thing. When the task in front of me is very clear, I don't need to ask anyone else any questions, and all I have to do is semi-shut off my mind and go through the motions of it, I kick ass. I was told again and again that the progress I made on this project was unlike anything they'd ever seen. I guess other people get bored and distracted. They take breaks and don't work through it quickly. They don't revel in the mindlessness the way I do. I've always been good at things like this.

Sometimes, it doesn't go so well, like when I'm put in charge of running the front desk and the fire alarm goes off for a pre-planned fire drill I wasn't informed about, and throngs of people are crowding my desk in a panic and asking me -- me -- what to do next. This would be the same day I accidentally set off the panic alarm by crossing my legs under the desk -- twice. We won't even get into my ineptitude in dealing with the broken cappuccino machine, finding the Fed-Ex envelopes, or transferring the calls correctly. I've never really been good at things like this.

Then, I've been doing a lot for school. Writing, reading -- or sometimes, more accurately, putting off writing and reading until I have a LOT of writing and reading to do, then frantically doing it all while feeling paralyzed with the panic of knowing it's due, knowing I've put it off, and knowing I don't write well when frazzled. I used to be really good at organizing my time around school. Lately, that has not been the case.

A lot of my time and energy has gone toward the pursuit of attempting to keep up financially. I was hit pretty hard with some rather dramatic unforseens (It costs $437 to go to the dentist? I did NOT see that coming. And yes, a big thank you once again to Wells Fargo for my $100 service charge for over-drawing my account by $0.37. Two things that are really my fault, a lack of reading the fine print, but still), and some even more dramatic check delays (got a check in the mail yesterday for something I've been waiting on since July; sweet). So, this has taken a lot of my energy. I've been reworking my budget, figuring out every possible way to cut down, taking on extra work, trying to figure out how the hell to be an adult and take care of myself when I consistently make less than I owe each month ...

Then there's the fun stuff. Stuff like the Wordstock Festival, my favorite literary event in Portland. Clothing swaps with friends. Cooking pizza and perusing bookstores with my partner in crime. Hanging out with my parents on Tuesday evenings. All the social stuff that reminds me what it's like to talk to other humans, even though I work alone in my apartment.

So, I guess that's where I've been and what I've been doing this month. Because my life is so fragmented, and because I'm required to take on so many different jobs in order to simply pay my rent each month, I feel perpetually overwhelmed. There is always something I need to do. And this gets exhausting. But that's what it's like to be a writer. You do a bunch of other crap in order to make ends meet and feel totally exhausted as a result.

Luckily, I'm not too exhausted for an update, and I hope to get back on here regularly soon.

Friends and Neighbors: Nancy Coffelt

2010-10-14T21:09:00.000-07:00

Here's a wonderful author/ illustrator/ teacher I had the fun honor of interviewing at last week's Wordstock Festival.

Tigard-Tualatin-Sherwood Times

Beaverton Valley Times