A Reminder: Your Voice/Work Is Necessary

Last Friday, I had the opportunity to read at the 5-year anniversary of the Boundless Tales reading. What I read, and submitted, was a portion from my short story collection. Yes, the one I've been working on longer than I like to admit though not as long as I guess warrants complaint to some.

If I'm honest, I haven't looked at my fiction, let alone this collection, since I was at VONA in June. For the most part I've dedicated myself to writing a lot of nonfiction this and much of last year. When I returned from VONA I was tired, dehydrated, hot (read: irritable), and stuck on what to do to fix my work. This is par for the course, at least it is for me. You get a lot of feedback and suggestions. You receive some blows and some praise you have to sit with. Plus, your mind is filled with all this (potential) material as you return home from priorities you briefly escaped and now have to deal with.

I think a form of escape for me has been nonfiction because it ties to a reality and I can better report that story. It's a different way of thinking but there are correlations to fiction and fiction writing, hence the genre tags of narrative nonfiction and creative nonfiction. I have professed I am not a "fast" writer. It takes me a long time to get it “right.” I feel dejected that the output isn't generated as quickly nor is what seems complete actually done.

For more than two plus months I put this collection aside. I figured, as I have before, perhaps the collection is not the work that will be my debut. Perhaps this is not the tome that will land the agent or the publishing deal, despite the requests for full when it’s done, despite the intrigue on faces when I describe it. Perhaps I have a lot more work to do elsewhere to help me get to where I want to be. In my most recent podcast interview with my friend Rion Amilcar Scott he said that spending years on something "unpublishable" isn't the worst thing that can happen. You learn from it. It's its own form of education.

But then, I went to Friday’s reading. I had applied to be part of the anniversary reading when I was at VONA, before my work got critiqued, when I thought I may actually finish it in fall. I was the last reader of seven. It was a small, hot space with a packed crowd. I was glad to see three friends in the audience and several familiar faces. I waited and listened to local poets, playwrights, and fiction writers read their work and applauded them all. I looked around before I went on and whispered to my friend, "I am the only reader of color on this roster." She gave me a slow nod and said, "I know."

I wasn't so much worried about how the audience responded, but I talk about racism, I talk about a mother almost losing her child in a store, I talk about insecurity and identity in a span of 6 pages. We'll see how this goes, I thought.

I went up, a camera was on me from my right and another directly in front of me. I made a few quips about how wonderful Queens is but don't move her because my rent is low (for NYC), please and thank you. Then I read. I got laughs when I didn't expect it, gasps on certain (very descriptive) lines, and I saw when I panned the audience people paying close attention. When I finished there was applause, but it felt different in a way, it felt like they hung on to every word and truly grasped the trepidation of Mikayla as she almost lost her child.

When people grasp your hand and tell you they appreciate your exploration of humanity, it means a lot. When people give you a hug and say "Are you a mother? Because you got that spot on," it means a lot. When people stay back to tell you they really enjoyed their work, it means a lot. When someone emails you that they taught one of your published stories in their writing class, it means so much. And it especially means a lot because—what you don’t admit out loud—is that you doubt yourself. When I read Mikayla’s piece to the audience, and later again to myself, I was reminded how much I loved it, how much work I put into it, how it was successful in many ways. This was one of those times I needed a reminder. And sometimes those cues come just when you need and least expect them.

Jentel Artist Residency: Week 3 (Winding down)

While the first several days (week and a half) brought a flurry of inspiration, the tail end of week 2 and beginning of week 3 brought some serious winding down in terms of productivity and confidence on my part. In speaking with one of the other visual artists she also said that she was upset with herself for not producing as much as she wanted to in a month's time and that in reflection she needed to be easier on herself because of the fact that inspiration can't be commanded on a whim. In my case I was on a roll and found myself in slump. Said slump consisted of me typing up things and immediately hating what it was I was scribing but pushed myself to keep going, and at some point I just couldn't. At various moments I stopped and this is when Facebook and Twitter and the schedule for Book Expo along with work for my job came into play to distract me from the creativity that just wasn't flowing.

On top of which the end of the week brought a rejection from the only lit mag I queried about a flash fiction piece I'd been working on for over three year.! Yes, less than 1000 words worked on and edited and nitpicked for 3 years + (it happens). I got a one sentence reason for the rejection which I took to heart and am currently editing this piece again for mass submission this summer.

Other things catering to said slump may be the feeling of cabin fever (as beautiful as the residence and locale are sometimes you just need to get away) or the reality of time clicking away at a steady pace (What day is it? Friday! Crap.).

Yes, slumps happen to all artists. The residents here have all had those moments or are currently in the midst of them in some way and believe-you-me we are none too happy about having to leave said paradise and go back to our day-to-day lives where some of us just don't have the luxury to create full-time. The insecurity has bound in and I'm coming off the high of March into May with reality slapping me in the face again. The reality of wondering if your tale has a place in the growing African-American diaspora let alone the literary canon. The reality of wondering if you'll ever truly be done. And of course the reality of wondering if you're even good enough.  I was just reading Megan (aka Writer Girl's) blog about giving over her first draft to loved ones to read. Just a few months ago I posted about not believe in my NYC Midnight submission. And of course I see Twitter updates from writers grinning and baring it and plugging away and asking for good vibes and sugar sent their way so they can keep going. There are days when you feel you are just producing crap and to do so at a residency may feel like a waste, but it has to happen. It's going to happen, so you just have to deal with it. I produce stuff I am none too happy about at home in NYC all the time, so why not in Wyoming too? And maybe now's a good time to take Lynn's advice to heart and take a break from producing and just focus on moi.

Friday brought a nice trip to Ucross, another residency several miles away from Jentel that has hosted some big name writers like Heidi Durrow, Colson Whitehead, Sigrid Nunez (a former instructor of mine at The New School), Elizabeth Gilbert, Junot Diaz, and Wyoming's own E. Annie Proulx! I was so excited I had to tweet the authors I follow on Twitter and let her know I saw her work there. Turns out Ms. Durrow was not only a resident at Ucross (and Hedgebrook and Norman Mailer and Vermont Studio Center; yes, she's my idol!) but she said she found her voice here at Jentel. Amazing! Three of the visual artists and myself went to see the Ucross gallery celebrating 27 years of artist residents and saw some amazing work. Joyce and I were particularly blown away by the coloring and such for this piece:

And this was another favorite by the Ucross alumi:

If you're near Banner or Clearmont, WY I strongly urge you to stop in. I believe this particular showing is going on until June 1st.

As the days go on and we continue to experience cold, hot, warm, cold, chilly, snowy weather we also prepared for Jentel Presents! This is the time when us residents get to show our work to people in the community. And Lynn informed us that this presentation has also become mandatory for college students both in art and creative writing. Like I did at an Inspired Word NYC open mic I decided to read my flash fiction. I'm trying to stay away from reading aloud too much from the collection as I feel I've exhausted the strongest bits by reading to the residents and sending out to residencies these past few months. Though I am proud of what I've done here (some of it, well most of it) flash fiction tends to be a great thing to read because you can actually complete something and provide the reader something to mull over afterwards.

Everyone did an extraordinary job in presenting and talking about their work. For the artists, Lisa, Joyce, Rachel, and Karen it felt like I was being re-introduced to their work as we heard more about their process even though I had seen some of it before. Seeing them stand up tall and talk about it so confidently in front of a crowd was amazing and gives you a sense of pride in sharing space and time with such amazing artists. Lorraine read one of her favorite portions to write from her novel-in-progress and it definitely showed in her reading it. It was vibrant and the characters well constructed. She has a great reading voice.

After the presentations were over we got to speak with some of the people who attended, full house as you can see from the picture above. I spoke briefly with a poet who asked me why I felt insecure (something I mentioned before reading noting that while I'm in love with my collection I have bouts of sadness at the prospect of not finishing) and I told him the truth, just a few days earlier I had been blocked. He said he was going through the same thing. He's in the midst of writing something about his father and was going to do a series of poems but realized the structure may be better as one poem with four sections. I commiserated, informing him I think I just got an idea on the structure of one of the stories for my collection that morning and it'd been something I'd been thinking about for years since it's part of the crux or linchpin of the stories involved. I wished him good luck with his current block and we agreed that we'd get back to things when it was meant to be. We just had to be patient, though that can be hard.

We ended up having dinner with some local artists, Randy one of the heads of Sagebrush was such a pleasure to speak to as were Joel (another artist) and Sarah a teacher who is trying to find time to write while raising a family and working a full-time job. Everyone was friendly and the food at the Pony Bar & Grill was ridiculously large in size. All in all a great night.

We're headed out at the latter part of this week and working hard as we get to the last week and preparing to depart and get back to our real lives. *le sigh*

On another upbeat note,  my flash fiction piece, "The Resolution" has pubbed in the latest issue of Eclectic Flash. On top of that, Joyce made huge cookies! So after the end of a bad week looks like this week is progressing to end well.