Little Snippets

Oh, my gracious...it's still early in the morning, and I feel like a zombie. Now that both dogs have settled down and the puppy is taking a nap, I would love to catch a few moments of sleep (you sleep when the baby sleeps, right?), but this is prime writing time right here, so that's going to be my strategy for working on the novel for the next few weeks...a few moments here, a few moments there. Eventually, it'll get done.

That being said, though, the new puppy is still doing very well. He plays with Winter and always lets us know when he needs to go out. He's curious and not fearful of exploring. He seems to know his name now, too, so that is helpful when teaching him new things.  

It's interesting how unique each puppy is, though, when you welcome them into your home. Winter was very independent when she was young (and still is) and will just lay on the couch when I go to the gym or if my husband and I go to the store. She'll happily trot off when we have to board her at the vet's office and isn't fazed in the least when she stays there.

But this new one....oh, my heavens, he is the biggest little cuddle bug, but has separation anxiety and a half when you leave the room or even if he isn't close enough to you. He has quickly become a Momma's boy (much to my husband's dismay--but Winter is a Daddy's girl, so we'll just each have a dog that favors one of us over the other), and when the new puppy is upset, he will let you know it! I have never heard such commotion out of a little puppy!  

So one of the main goals for the next few weeks is not only socialization with other people in different places, but working on being okay with being by himself for very short periods of time. He's still very young, so we are taking it very slowly, and I am reading all I can about making the transition easier for him. Just a little at a time, not making a big deal of leaving, rewards when he quiets down, a comfortable and familiar space when he is alone, and noise in the background to make it seem not so lonely.

I have a little less than a month and a half before I start teaching again, so I hope to work up to him being comfortable about me leaving the house for short stretches of time before then. We can hope! Meanwhile, though, if any of you have tips, I'd love to hear them :)

Lots to do today! Training, puppy socialization, and some snippets of writing somewhere in between, so I had better get started. 

My New Writing Buddy

For years, Winter, our Weimaraner, was (and still is) the greatest writing companion as she would curl up next to me on the couch in the early mornings while I would write....and as of the day before yesterday, there is a new companion to add to the mix...an eight-week-old English Bulldog named Cupcake!

We had been talking about getting one for years, and were originally going to get a girl (hence the name), but his litter had six boys and three girls, and this one was the one we both liked the best. Besides, I think the name kind of fits him. He's just a little ball of sugarlove :)

Winter doesn't mind him so much either. At first, she tolerated him best she could thinking he was a visitor (we've had people over with puppies before), but now she is starting to realize that this is a permanent addition, so is making the best of it, and playing with him more.

When he's not biting her ears, she'll even let him sleep next to her.

We researched a lot on how to integrate a new puppy, and it seems to be going well. Cupcake is exceptionally smart, too, and already seems to be house-trained. He did well his first two nights, and we're hoping this streak of success continues!

This morning, though, I discovered that this little guy is the biggest little chick magnet I have ever seen in action...and he's only 7.4 pounds! I took him to the vet for a well puppy check and every single vet tech in that building was in that room holding him and taking pictures on their cell phones. It was hilarious.

And then, when I was walking him out in front of the vet clinic, a lady drove by, then stopped and turned her car around just so that she could pet him. So funny...but who can resist this little guy?

Post-PhD Life

...is actually pretty good so far. The last little tidbits from the past semester are trickling in. My diploma will be in the mail soon (for some reason, they don't give these to you at the graduation ceremony). SAIS results came in yesterday (and I bested my previous high score and came to an average of 4.89/5.00)!

And everything is coming together for the year ahead at UT! I got my official job offer letter yesterday and will be turning in a bunch of paperwork on campus today. Making all kinds of adult decisions, too, about job benefits and retirement programs. I feel like such a grown-up!

But best of all, is all the time to WRITE! And sure enough, I've been up every morning no later than 7:30, laptop in hand, dog curled up beside me, typing away for hours. With all the notes I've been keeping over the last month, the novel wasn't too hard to get back into...the first chapter came quickly, the next one not so much (and I may end up just cutting that chapter when I go back and edit), but then the next chapter was much better and ended up being one of my favorites thus far. It's coming along.

I hope to write another chapter today after running errands, so I'll go ahead and wrap this up. Hope this summer is full of great things for you all! Let me know what you have planned and if you need a writing buddy!

Nine Years

Nine years ago, I was a little home-schooled girl moving out on her own for the first time into a college dorm at Auburn University. I didn't have a driver's license. I had never been on a date. I had never been to "real" school.

I was a fish out of water. But I LOVED it.

College was amazing, and I was transfixed with learning. I sat in the front of all my classes, and frequently asked questions in my large lecture classes (much to the surprise of the professors who later learned to expect a little hand waving in the front row with a question in every class). I took the challenging teachers and loved them for the challenge. I met them in their offices every week. I got to know their assistants. I led the class study groups and worked as the class note-taker for the campus note service. Learning was freedom for me. It was everything I imagined it would be and more.

College also helped me grow as a person. The learning curve was huge as I learned what life was like outside the four walls of my parents' home. I learned how to drive. I learned how to fall in love (I met my first and only boyfriend three weeks into my first semester of college at an Auburn football game and married him three years later). I learned how to be my own person.

It's hard to believe that that all started nine years ago, and that that journey finished several days ago on May 9, 2013 at the graduate hooding ceremony here at the University of Tennessee.

So much had happened in those nine years and at the graduation ceremony, as my row was cleared to stand up and approach the stage, it dawned on me that this was it--this was the end of my third and final degree. I handed my name card to the announcer and she nodded for my hooder (Michael Knight) and I to walk across the stage. I gave my hood to Michael. I knelt as he placed the hood over my shoulders. We shook the dean's hand and walked off the stage again.

It was a ceremony that was special in more ways than one, because as we made our way back to our seats, Michael leaned over and asked me if my family was in the audience.

Yes. My husband and his parents were here.

I looked behind me at the audience and spotted them in the crowd. I waved, and they waved back.

I motioned to Michael. "There they are," I said. "That's my family."

They helped make the day a memorable one, and after the ceremony that night, after we had dinner, and celebrated with a surprise cake, I lay down in bed, my graduation cap set beside me on the bedside table, and couldn't help but think about what a journey it had been. All those years. In some ways, it seems like a flash, in others, a lifetime.

Looking forward to seeing where the next road leads.

Why Editors Are Your Best Friends

I got the most surprising email this afternoon. It was from one of the editors of PANK who was writing back to some of the interview answers I had sent him, and he congratulated me on making the Wigleaf Top 50 this year. I had to stop and read the line again, then again. Wait, WHAT? I made the Wigleaf Top 50?

I quickly opened up a new tab on my computer and went to the Wigleaf page and there it was...my story, "The Game," that had appeared in elimae, alongside writers like Roxane Gay, Oliver de la Paz, Molly Gaudry, and Steve Himmer along others. I was starstruck!

I quickly started writing an email to one of the editors of elimae who had accepted the story to let him know of the good news and to thank him. I searched for the email chain from when the story was accepted (I save all my acceptances and rejections from journals) and saw my original submission of the story, his initial rejection of it (and revision suggestions), then my resubmission of the revised story. It was incredible to see how much his suggestions helped change the story as a whole and just goes to show how valuable editors are.

I'll show you how the process went...

This was my original submission:

------

The Game

When we visit our cousins in the mountains, we sit in a circle in their room, talk about our parents while our parents talk about us downstairs. When they tell us to go to bed, sleep on the floor, we turn out the lights, share more in the dark. 

We play a game about whose daddy is stronger and they say theirs, we say ours. Their daddy smashes a hole in the wall with a single fist. Our daddy punches through a window, doesn’t flinch at the broken glass, his blood. Their daddy uses a belt and they take a flashlight from under the bed, show me bruises not yet gone. Our daddy uses the horse whip, the BBQ cleaning tool with the jagged edge when Momma’s not home, and my sister takes the light, shines over her legs where there are scars.

Their daddy. Our daddy. 

The game goes on until we are tired and we go to sleep. Sometimes, they win. 

Sometimes, we do. 

-------

I cringe now when I read it, because it wasn't done, but when the editor wrote back, he had some wonderful suggestions for revision:

He said:

Thanks for sending me this. I'm afraid I have to pass, but I really
liked where it was headed. I wonder if it isn't finished? By that I
mean, I think I would push the ending further, bolder. I think you
could really have a weird, powerful ending to this story. Maybe a few
more lines, another paragraph or two? That's just my suggestion, of
course. I'd be happy to look at it again if you took it deeper.

------

So I went back and revised it and sent in the new version:

The Game

When we visit our cousins in the mountains, we sit in a circle in their room, talk about our parents while our parents talk about us downstairs. When they tell us to go to bed, sleep on the floor, we turn out the lights, share more in the dark. 

We play a game about whose daddy is stronger and they say theirs, we say ours. Their daddy smashes a hole in the wall with a single fist. Our daddy punches through a window, doesn’t flinch at the broken glass, his blood. Their daddy uses a belt and they take a flashlight from under the bed, show me bruises not yet gone. Our daddy uses the horse whip, the BBQ cleaning tool with the jagged edge when Momma’s not home, and my sister takes the light, shines over her legs where there are scars.

We take turns with the flashlight, hand it over without turning it off, and the beam bounces off the ceiling, walls, before catching on skin, bright beneath the light. A neck, bruised green. An ear, stitches along the back. A broken tooth.

We pull our pajamas off, hold ourselves out, twist down, around, point to our shoulders, our sides, our backs. We touch the places now, feel the hardness of bone, where new skin etches together under the light until we can’t tell where one person ends and another begins.

-----

This was the response!

Tawnysha!
Hey, apologies for taking so long! It's been a busy semester and I've
fallen behind this past week. But your story! I would like to include
it in April's elimae. Definitely! I really like the revision, and that
last line is majestic. Just all around fine, fine work. Thanks for
sending it to me again.

Look for the piece to go live on elimae on April 1.

Many thanks and salutes!

-----

As you can see, the story started off weakly, but with an editor's help, got changed around, and made the Wigleaf Top 50!

So listen if an editor makes suggestions, and don't be afraid to resubmit if an editor asks you to do so! Exciting things can happen!

Wild in the Plaza of Memory by Pamela Uschuk

I wrote this review on Pam's wonderful book a while ago and this morning, was thrilled to see it finally published! The review is included in the Spring 2013 issue of Gently Read Literature: Essays & Criticism of Contemporary Poetry and Literary Fiction. The issue includes so many wonderful people and comes in at an impressive one hundred pages of solely reviews.

Unfortunately, the full issue is only available by subscription, but I have the editor's blessing to include my review here, so that you all can see just how amazing Pam's work is in her latest book. Go out and get Wild in the Plaza of Memory if you haven't already. You won't be disappointed!

The review is below:

In Wild in the Plaza of Memory, Pamela Uschuk creates a collective narrative of the human experience in a stunning portrayal of memory in its entirety, through both small, intimate moments from her speaker's life and shared communal experiences. Comprised of scenes stolen from around the world, Uschuk's collection illuminates memory's power and its lasting resonance, proving that memory is not unique to an individual, but rather is shared by all, regardless of gender, race, and religion. Through unflinching directness and honesty, Uschuk acts as a witness to these moments and in doing so, leads us toward a greater understanding of the world and of ourselves, our shared experiences as "new leaves on the same struggling tree."

To call up these memories, Uschuk's speaker looks not to the past, but to the present, a choice reflected in every poem in this collection and in doing so, proves that these memories continue to exist in the current world, moving and breathing as entities that are still very much alive. Whether they be bruises on her own flesh in the poem, "A Short History of Falling," wounds "oozing under the skin of [her] left knee," or scars from when she "plunged through a rotten barn board / all the way from the hay mow / while shafts of numinous straw / whirled like moths on fire," these physical reminders act as living remnants of the history behind them. These injuries are ones that continue to ache as Uschuk's speaker remembers a fall in a parking lot, "chin crack[ing] the curb, / breaking [her] jaw, then ripping three / ribs from sternum," yet what resounds louder than the physical hurts she endures are the lessons she learns in these moments of vulnerability—lessons of who witnesses these moments and who turns away and does nothing.

The power of witness is a vital one in Uschuk's collection, an act that the speaker compares to the way the stars watched over her when she and her friends spent a night out in the poem, "Riding the Stars." While the speaker's friends drink and laugh, she watches the sky and sees the stars, "alive...erasing the illusion of loneliness." She realizes that in sharing the same sky overhead, the same stars, the same "charge between particles / millions of light years apart...all / that we mistake for empty space," that everyone who looks up at these same stars are connected, their lives all witnessed by the same brilliant lights. She takes this feeling of communion further, saying "my friends [are] me," in a crucial declaration that acts as an anchor for this collection.

Not only does the speaker find herself connected to those around her, but this kind of unity transcends the boundaries of time and space, so much so that she begins to identify with so many around the world, even those she hasn't met. To reflect this movement, the latter half of the collection moves from the personal to the collective—"I" becoming "we" and "me" becoming "us." This is especially apparent in the poem, "Desert Sunday with Clouds," as the speaker thinks on the "stories that tie us / to the songs of cactus wrens" and the narrative of "poison, / disease and birdsong, heartbreak / and laughter / [we think] as unique and personal, until it finally / destroys what we thought separated our names." When she thinks on these things, more barriers fall until nothing separates anyone from each other and this is where the speaker sees just how powerful collective memory can be, because it unites us and makes us all the same. 

The speaker goes a step further in the poem, "The Same Old," to declare that no one is exempt from this sense of shared memory as she recalls a time when she taught poetry in a prison. She remembers entering the prison, "the nation / of the forgotten and ashamed," and recalls the prisoners she meets there, murderers and heroin smugglers who are teaching themselves to read and write poems. One such student remains in her mind, a man sentenced for life, but "his poems / gentle and soiled as pigeon feathers shed / on city sidewalks, his scrubbed hands soft." In teaching these inmates poetry and learning of their memories, the speaker connects with them and sees that they, too, are the same as she.

At the end of the collection, Uschuk's speaker realizes the full value of writing these memories down as an act of witness. In the last poem, "Wild in the Plaza of Memory," the speaker addresses poems themselves, ones that have been written by many over the course of years that speak of hardship and loss. She writes of poems that unwind the "stories / of an old woman's bare feet...[and] the blood of Afghani mothers / from blasted brick streets" and holds these poems up as ones that need to read and shared, so that these memories are not forgotten. Additionally, these poems, while heartbreaking, allow one to learn and to heal from injustices as the poems have arms that wrap "around each others' shoulders, like war veterans / marching in Washington and Moscow / and Santiago and Tehran and Jerusalem for peace." She addresses these poems as one, as a body of poems, just as she is part of a "body of friends growing new leaves on the same struggling tree." 

In ending the collection on such an image, Uschuk illustrates the value of shared memory in that it interconnects everything and allows us to grow together. She illustrates this growth with stunning accuracy as she plants seeds of memory—personal and intimate ones—at the collection's beginning, then allows them to sprout forth and grow with each following poem until the final poem which encompasses an explosive truth that unites us all. In doing so, she makes Wild in the Plaza of Memory a stunning collection from start to finish, each poem an act of witness itself in a collection that lives and breathes as Uschuk's best work yet.

Winners!

Lots going on today, but I just wanted to post something here real quick about the winners of the poetry giveaway I had posted last month. After using a random number generator to determine the winners, I have chosen six lucky people!

They are:

Rena Rossner
Angela Vogel
Joseph Harker
Patrick Dixon
Kay Kae
Marie Gauthier

I've emailed them all to get their addresses, but in the case that any of them don't respond, I will redraw for winners if need be. Congratulations to you all! Come back next year!