Yes, sometimes I really love this little town. Today I met with some awesome local high schoolers at the Port Townsend library to talk about comics and poetry, they were terrific, and I could have stayed another hour. So bright, such good writers, so enthusiastic! One of my favorite things was how we were talking about cliches, and they were like, “Oh, like Stephanie Meyer (the author of that terrible teenage vampire series Twilight.)” I mean, they already know the difference between good speculative writing (Neil Gaiman, Kelly Link, etc) and bad. Impressive! I think I’m going to make some lit mag donations to the library too, so the high school kids will be able to see what’s going on in contemporary poetry.
And then afterwards took a walk on Fort Warden’s pier and saw a mother otter with two babies, then another otter with two more babies, and then it was indistinguishable piles of otter cuteness! The other day I had to turn someone in to the ranger station for letting his (off-leash, which is against the law on the state park’s beaches because of pupping seals and sea otters) horrible big dog attack an otter and her baby. There are huge signs everywhere, by the way, that say to keep your dog on a leash and not to harrass the wildlife. Well, turns out that letting your dog attack otter pups is a federal offense. I spoke to the (horrible, wifebeater-wearing) man first, before setting the rangers on him, and he was all “Well, the dog never catches ’em.” Then I became the avenging goddess of otters. I was so happy to see all the babies alive and well today. So much for evil tourists and their ill-behaved dogs!
And I ran into Marvin Bell yesterday at the post office. Whenever I talk to Marvin I remember how much fun poetry can be.