November 2012 – Page 2 – The Trailer Park MFA

The Traces We Leave Behind

I’ve been thinking lately of the framed photos of soccer and football teams in the gymnasium at the Webb Institute where my brother graduated last year. Black and white photos from the 1910s and 1920s, rows of gray faces, young and smiling under their wool caps. A special kind of optimism, solid as the muddyContinue reading “The Traces We Leave Behind”

All Forward From Here

So a few weeks ago I went on a road trip with my Big Friendly Gay (BFG) buddy. Yup, 3,000 miles down to Tucson, Arizona and back. We’re both very organized and exacting, both insufferable know-it-all types. I’m the kind of person who rises at precisely 6am, fixes my coffee at 6:15, starts writing atContinue reading “All Forward From Here”

Terror and Hope

“Make art from the places that terrify you,” my artistic mentor, Amy O, said this time last year. And it has proven good advice. Most of us have a lot of things that terrify us, and that turns out to be a good thing. If you’re an artist. But a surprising thing happens when youContinue reading “Terror and Hope”

The Dying Leaf Is The Most Beautiful

“Life isn’t so great.” A friend says. “I’m sick of people trying to be cheerful about everything. Trying to pretend their lives are great and perfect and posting that all over social media. Rather than presenting themselves and their lives as they are. In all their complexity. With all their sides–good and bad.” And she’sContinue reading “The Dying Leaf Is The Most Beautiful”

Be Still, and Listen

I sat at my desk today running my fingers through my hair with frustration. “Ack! Why isn’t this working?” I was telling myself there was this scene I had to write. A middle-aged deputy returns to an isolated farming community where he was unable to close a case twenty years ago. Stumbling upon a chanceContinue reading “Be Still, and Listen”

I’m Not There

What does it mean to have had a home once–and then to give it up? I mean, who does that? And why? And how can you know it will turn out all right? “It gets better,” a friend told me when I first left. “It has to.” I said at New Year’s. But you neverContinue reading “I’m Not There”

Art: What Is It Good for?

So a student came into the writing center with a poem in hand: Maxine Kumin’s “Henry Manley, Living Alone, Keeps Time.” Her professor had forced her to read it, and now she had to write an essay about it. “And I hate poetry,” she said. But as we talked about the poem, I could seeContinue reading “Art: What Is It Good for?”

Ex-Mormon, Book-Shelver Girl

So here we go, people. I’m going to blog my way through the year—365 days of it. One blog for every day. Call me crazy, and you’d be right. I guess I should start off by introducing myself. I’m 31. I’m a one-time published author… but we don’t talk about that. Poems of teenage angstContinue reading “Ex-Mormon, Book-Shelver Girl”