Happy (Almost) Valentine’s Day, Faux Spring, and Thinking About Changes in Seattle’s Lit Scene

early pink rhododendron

Happy (Almost) Valentine’s Day!

We had a beautiful sunny day today, and Valentine’s Day is supposed to be a rainout, so we tried to get out and about and soak in as much “faux spring” – that’s what our weather person called it – as we could. I heard a robin singing this morning, and downtown, I saw a forsythia blooming (though ours hasn’t quite done that yet).

With the Superbowl AND the Olympics, it seems to be a sports-crowded time to celebrate what’s traditionally a romantic weekend! That’s okay. I’m pretty sure we can have Glenn watch the Bengals (hopefully – they’re the team of my former hometown, Cincinnati) win, have me watch some figure skating (so much scandal this year!), and also find a way to carve out time for some romance.

We took a trip over to Seattle to Open Books to buy a few books before it moves from Wallingford to Pioneer Square -a big change after 20 plus years in the same location. It made me think about how much Seattle’s lit scene has changed since we moved here in late 2000.

I also goofed around with possible author photo outfits (did I mention I have author photos for BOA coming up and I’m terrified?) with Glenn taking the pictures with our “fancy” camera. What do you think? Do either of these tops work? I think this hair color is a bit too rose gold – I think I’ll skew it a bit pinker for the photos. Argh! How do regular poets do this? Pictures are hard!

Glenn and I in the sunshine, Kirkland

Faux Spring in February

It’s already felt like a too-long, gloomy winter, and many of my friends have already traveled at least once to sunnier climes to relieve their winter blues. I can’t do that yet, so getting a little bit of 50-degree sunshine in February is a real gift. A few rhododendrons and forsythia blooms, and I can’t wait ’til the cherry trees start blooming.

The birds are definitely more active than they were a few weeks ago. This forsythia was blooming a door down from Open Books. Walking along Lake Washington in Kirkland is a nice break from cloudier, moodier Woodinville. We also picked up pink roses and tulips to brighten up the house so it felt a bit more romantic and spring-like.

Kelly Davio and I in front of Open Books in 2010

Thinking About Seattle’s Changing Literary Scene

Yes, our trip today to Open Books – the first place I visited as a tourist to Seattle on the recommendation of one of my English professors at University of Cincinnati – reminded me of how things have changed since we moved here. Pioneer Square – a rowdier, bar-filled tourist spot that once housed Elliot Bay Books – will be the new home of Open Books, which lived in sleepier, more residential Wallingford since before I came to the town as a visitor. Elliot Bay moved to hipster – but now more “corporate condo” than “hipster artists and bars” – Capitol Hill. I used to meet friends at Open Books – see pictures – and I’ve had almost every launch reading for my books there, too. See a picture of one of them below. I’ll have to make new memories at the new location.

Book Launch in 2011 with a bunch of friends, Open Books

I used to spend hours in the rundown former funeral home that housed the Richard Hugo House when I first moved to town, imaging I was in a real artist’s place – and then I volunteered there for small local lit mags for a while. Back then, yes, there were drug deals in front of the place, it wasn’t at all accessible, and there was a rumor of a baby ghost in the basement (along with a baby’s coffin) but it felt charmingly quirky, much like the area of Capitol Hill, where you could get a drink at a dive bar with pinball machines or papier mache unicorn heads. Now, Hugo House is housed in the fairly cold, corporate grounds of a re-done condo building (and paying much more than it used to on rent, which leads to more fund-raising and less, well, artist-nurturing), and it just doesn’t feel as cozy and welcoming and well, artistic. It is more accessible (bonus!) and has bathrooms you don’t accidentally get locked in…and no ghosts (yet…)

The places that I’ve relied on to meet other writers – like Open Books and Hugo House – are changing, and have changed, and while I’m sad about that, I recognize that a city doesn’t stay the same, and a literary scene doesn’t stay the same. During the pandemic, we haven’t visited Seattle much, and we used to go every weekend, to hang out, to visit Pike Place Market or one of the many bookstores and coffee shops, always exploring new (to us) neighborhoods. Seattle’s increasing homeless problem, litter, and crime are unfortunate side effects of growth and some serious housing affordability problems as well as a lack of resources for the poor, the mentally ill, and people who age out of the foster system. Our politicians have promised fixes but haven’t (as yet) delivered. Does this affect the art scene in Seattle? Yes. Did the pandemic hurt our art scene? Unquestionable. Do we have AWP coming out next year? Yes we do! Do I want to show Seattle in its best light to my friends who come to town? Yes I do! So I will keep exploring to find out where writers and artists are hanging out now. Maybe I’ll find the next new cool artistic hangouts. I hope so.

And another problem – I live in an “ex-urb” of Seattle, Woodinville, a sleepy area of farms and wineries and a surprising number of hidden charming corners, but it has almost nothing that you could call “culture.” No art galleries, barely any indie shops, we have one Barnes and Nobles and a couple of coffee shops besides Starbucks but it’s been hard for me to build a community out here – and I encountered similar problems in 2012 when I was Redmond’s Poet Laureate, working hard with schools and librarians and visual artists and local language clubs to try to generate interest in poetry and art. Even though Redmond has Microsoft and a fair number of millionaires, and Bellevue’s real estate is now more expensive than Manhattan (said our local paper this weekend,) it’s tough to attract people or the funds to create cultural centers where art, music, theater, and poetry might thrive. I’ve dreamed of throwing salons in the area, which is beautiful, and I’m sure has a lot of artists, musicians, and writers in it, it’s just…I can’t find them, or we have no gathering places.

If I had unlimited funds and time, I might build a poetry bookshop/coffee shop/art space myself here in Woodinville, where real estate isn’t quite as pricey. I lived in Napa for a year, and they had a wonderful mix of wineries, indie book shops and restaurants, and unique gardens, farms, and markets that just made for a lovely quality of life. (Fires, earthquakes, and high taxes – all endemic to California – notwithstanding.) They even had their own writer’s conference each year! We need to start something like that. I’ll keep dreaming…

Happy February, Inching Towards Spring, Hoping for a Better Month, A Nice Review on Instagram (and Thoughts on Instagram for Poets)

Steller’s Jay in dim morning light

Happy February! Inching Closer to Spring…

Welcome to February, everyone, which means not only are we a week away from Valentine’s Day (and the Superbowl, if you’re into that – go Bengals!), we are inching closer to spring! Although most of my garden looks dead right now, there are some bulb shoots showing green in the ground. My cherry trees have buds on them. Blooms can’t be far away!

Most of the US got clobbered by a winter storm this week, but here we’ve just been socked in by the same cold gray rain. I felt very lucky to get this shot of a Steller’s Jay taking flight on one of our cold dark mornings, and the light was so strange the bird appears almost turquoise. I was lucky to have any days bright enough to even get pictures. Hopefully there is more sun ahead…

New Haircut

New Hair, New Month, Hopefully a Better Month?

I felt well enough, finally, to go out into the world after almost a month of being stuck at home sick, and got my hair done. I don’t know if it’s perfect, but it did make me feel better. I hadn’t had my hair done in a while because my hairdresser (triple vaxxed) had caught covid right before I got sick and we’d had to cancel about three consecutive appointments. Anyway, I’ve been feeling depressed and bedraggled, so this was a good way to start the month in a new light. We are supposed to have a week of sun in front of us, and finally – finally – Omicron cases seem to have peaked in our area (they peaked in Ohio weeks ago.)

After a string of depressing things in my writing life, including a long string of rejections and some other stuff which I can’t go into, but trust me, depressing, I am trying to look forward.

Pussy Willows – signs of spring?

So I’m looking forward to several things this month. Writing something new, maybe visiting a bookstore in person, focusing on Flare, Corona‘s cover art, edits, etc, and hopefully doing some more fun things than just lying at home in bed sick. Maybe even visit an art gallery, a botanical garden, the zoo?

Are you looking forward to anything particular in February?

A Nice Instagram Review of PR for Poets (and Thoughts on Poets and Instagram)

For those poets who aren’t on Instagram yet, or do not feel confident using it, I have to say, I was so grateful for this Instagram book review yesterday – and unlike some reviews, this generated sales – at least as well as I can measure on Amazon sales rank – right away! What a shock!

Thank you to TheBookshelfCafeNews for the shoutout and poets, go get on Instagram and let’s start talking about poetry books there. I am still getting used to the medium (sometimes I forget hashtags, and I’m still not confident in my ability to post “stories”) but think it is definitely worth being on there. There’s less of the negative vibe that can sometimes get overwhelming on Twitter, plus as many pictures of baby animals or cool art as you want to include in your feed. Yes, it’s still owned by evil overlord Facebook (or Meta) – but seems slightly less evil? Maybe this is because I only follow poets, Ina Garten, and a lot of red panda, fox, and zooborns accounts. Anyway, I encourage you all to give it a try. You can follow me there at @webbish6 – I mostly post pics of birds and flowers, the occasional selfie and poem – a lot like the blog, without all the words. Also, if you have helpful tips for others (and me) who are writers on Instagram, please leave them in the comments!

Still Sick with Ice Fog, Thinking About Cover Art, And When Will the Pandemic End?

Spotted Towhee

Still Sick with Ice Fog

Well, we had another week of depressing freezing temperatures with thick fog that trapped in polluted air, so it was basically like 1800’s London all week. I was still fighting off an illness, which morphed into a more dangerous (still not covid, but a different dangerous) illness, so I was trying to stay out of the hospital by constantly annoying my doctors, drinking fluids like it was going out of business, and basically sleeping 24 hours a day. Also, our five-year-old microwave (that also acts as our kitchen venting) exploded, and we couldn’t find another one anywhere. And every time I groggily woke up, the news would be all “highest death rates from covid ever” and “possible war with Russia on Ukraine border.” I think I’m on the upswing, finally. I am looking forward to a healthier February! With hopefully better headlines.

I did a little thinking about the importance we place on productivity, and how the pandemic has forced people into thinking harder about that. How being chronically ill with an immune deficiency forces you to think hard about your choices, how sometimes you’re just not going to be productive, and you have to sort of accept that. Your value isn’t only from what you produce. It’s sort of a Zen realization, to try to learn to be okay with not doing anything, sometimes.

Thinking About the Importance of Cover Art

One thing I did do this week was think about cover art! BOA sent me an author questionnaire and also some forms about cover art for my upcoming book, which sent me into a deep dive and thinking about what the cover of “Flare, Corona” should look like. First, I found out there’s an anime character from a series called “Fairy Tails” named “Flare Corona.” So that was a discovery. Then I found out it’s sort of hard to find a perfect picture of an eclipse with a corona and solar flares, and even if I do, does that really convey the ideas that the book contains? In other words, does it do what good cover art should do – make you want to read the book? I also thought about using a close up from an MRI of a brain lesion, which is only black and white but sort of cool, a black hole with a white halo, but ultimately nixed the idea as too depressing. Most of my books have an identifiable human female on the cover, so going more abstract would be a departure.

Anyway, comment with your feelings on the subject! I’d love to hear from you!

Female bufflehead, a coot, and mallards – commotion on the water

When Will the Pandemic End?

Have you seen many doctors making predictions about when the pandemic will end lately? Yes, me too. With the incredibly fast and wide spread of Omicron and the rise of vaccines around the world, some scientists are saying we may be approaching “endemic” levels – where the pandemic becomes a long-lasting, more normal infection, like how the flu of 1918 came back several times in the last hundred years in different forms to kill a ton of people, but not as many as the first time around. Some countries, like Sweden, are putting protective measures into place for the first time, as their economy get walloped by the Omicron variant, and others, like the UK, have been dropping their defenses (probably resulting in higher death rates). Given the US’s very high death rates, we probably should still be testing, wearing masks, etc, for a little while longer. But (caveat: I am not a doctor, just a poet with a Bachelor’s degree in Biology who has always been interested in virology) I do have optimism that eventually this virus will burn itself out, and every time humans are exposed again to this particular virus, we are less likely to over-react to it. Now, as an immune-suppressed human who was knocked out for three weeks with NOT covid, you know, I don’t want people to get too casual too soon – we still don’t have access to a lot of anti-virals (not until after March, according to one of my doctors, for the Pfizer pill unfortunately – and the hospitals are still overwhelmed) – but maybe we can feel hopeful that by spring or summer, we can start moving towards a new phase of pandemic. Vaccine makers are working on omicron-specific versions, but more important, smaller vaccine companies are working on more shelf-stable, cheaper, more widely-working vaccines for the world – vaccines that would be less expensive, easy to distribute, wouldn’t require extreme refrigeration, and work on more variations of the virus. This would help the whole world, instead of just wealthier countries, which would help the virus spread less easily and develop fewer dangerous mutations. (Remember that four variations of coronaviruses have been causing colds since we were kids – this would just become a fifth variation, we hope.) So, that’s me with some thoughts on the subject, but we’ll really have to wait and see. I’m hoping by my birthday we will finally looking at a little relief.

Signs of Spring, a Week of Illness – Covid or Flu?, Hummingbirds, Hawks, and Deer, and the NEA application

Early pink rhododendron bloom

Signs of Spring and a Week of Illness

This week has been rough. I’m sure like many of you, I came down with something (fever, stuffy head, cough, sore throat, headache) after a dental visit last week, and that meant: doctors telling me I probably had covid and giving me really depressing info about the lack of covid treatments available, then an instant covid test, and then more covid tests (the PCR test was really hard to find – I couldn’t get it until six days after I started feeling sick, and I had to drive 45 minutes each way, walk in the cold mud and rain to construction area tent, so that was fun).

The good news is the tests were negative – the bad news is I’m still pretty sick, which now my doctors have decided is probably flu. Anyway, I’ve been lying low, not a lot of mental energy, but managed to get a few shots on sunny days to show you spring may actually be happening, eventually, despite our cold, gray, relentlessly depressing January weather.

Red-Tailed Hawk looks directly at camera

Hummingbirds, Hawks, and Deer

The good news is, though it’s easy to forget, I actually live in a beautiful place – it’s just when it gets cold and wet or icy outside, I’m not able to get out enough to appreciate it. This red-tailed hawk was sitting low to the ground, and happened to look right at me as I took this shot, and we happened to have a clear blue sky that afternoon. Hawks showing white feathers are supposed to be a good omen, but a hawk low to the ground looking you in the eye is supposedly a portent of death. So, I hope it’s the first, not the second.

We also saw our first deer of the year, nibbling on our pink camellias – which like the rhody, look like they are very close to blooming, even though it’s only January. The hummingbirds are here all year, so we just have to keep up a feeder and a bird fountain. These are shots of the same male Anna’s hummingbird. He was showing off his crazy feathers.

My pink camellia this morning – looking like almost-spring!

Reading Report – All Sort-of Plague-Related – and NEA Application – Done!

The one good thing about being sick all week is I caught up on my reading! Pale Horse, Pale Rider is Katherine Anne Porter’s semi-autobiographical account of living through the 1918 flu as a single journalist in Denver, when the hospitals were overcrowded and they couldn’t just order an ambulance as they were too busy. Her vivid hallucinations while sick for a month with the flu are unforgettable (she sees the nurse’s hands as ‘white tarantulas’), as is the ending. I also read Katherine Mansfield’s short story “Garden Party,” about an upper-class family organizing a party as their poorer neighbor falls down dead in front of their house. Again, feels so relevant.

To add to the cheer, I’m also reading Osamu Dazai’s No Longer Human with my little brother, and though it is bleak – written in 1948’s Japan, about an individual who suffers multiple childhood sex abuse traumas,  grows up to be a cartoonist, tries to commit suicide, is put in an insane asylum – my brother made the astute observation that it shares a lot with Kafka’s Metamorphosis. It’s been read historically as thinly-veiled autobiography, but I’d argue it’s more ambitious than that – it’s Dazai’s attempt to embody the suffering, corruption and dehumanization of Japan during the WW II years.  It’s the second-best selling book in Japan of all time, and you can see why – despite the bleak subject matter, Dazai’s writing is stunningly beautiful, even in translation (he writes with a different pronoun that the Japanese “Watashi” for “I,” except in the prologue and epilogue, but that can’t really be translated into English, which is a shame). If you want to discover Dazai but want something a little more upbeat, read his warm and funny collection of modernized fairy tales in Blue Bamboo. I’ve been teaching myself Japanese for almost a year now, and I’m sad that I’m still not fluent, but I am starting to pick up a little more on the slight variations of words – pronouns, seasons, puns. Some part of me wish I’d picked something easier, like Italian, but Japanese literature is kind of an obsession of mine, and I’d love to read these books in the original, eventually. Or at least be able to have a really simple conversation in Japanese.

The other accomplishment I’m proud of is that my NEA application is in and done. I mean, I did it with a fever and on a lot of cold medicine, so it may not be the best application I’ve ever done, but it is finished! I was in isolation while waiting for my PCR test (two of my doctors told me that I for sure had covid, based on my symptoms, so better safe than sorry) and the only thing that is good for is reading and getting grant applications done. Wishing you health and safety this week, but if you do get sick – either this nasty flu or covid – I hope you have a good window view, a stack of books, and someone to bring you unending soup and hot tea.

Oh, and on top of reading an account of inadequate medical care during the 1918 flu, you can read this account of a New York Times writer trying to get the Pfizer pill for her 73-year-old mother – it is harrowing to realize how hard it is to get adequate medical care for covid right now, the same as Katherine Anne Porter’s experiences in 1918 in a lot of key ways: When my mom got COVID, I went searching for Pfizer’s pills | The Seattle Times.

Dreary in Mid-January, Interview with Water~Stone Review, Distracting Myself with PR Research, Submissions, and Organizing Projects, Birdwatching w/Towhees and Wood Ducks

Sunset with Cormorants, Kirkland

Dreary in Mid-January

It’s been a cold, dreary January here in Seattle, and Omicron is peaking across the US. Our state’s National Guard has been called up to aid hospitals and testing sites. Schools in my neighborhoods are mostly going virtual. I have to say my anxiety is worse than it has been during most of the pandemic; it’s been hard to get out of the house to get fresh air or exercise, I’ve seen lots of vaccinated friends and some family get covid and even get hospitalized.  It’s not been fun.

So one day, when the rain and snow gave us a break, we went out in the fog to birdwatch, and got these shots of sunset with fog and cormorants, and a few Wood Ducks. It was good to get some exercise, even in the chilly gray day. Being immersed in nature is excellent for anxiety, even if I needed a lot of hot tea and a shower to get warm when I got home. I also taught an online speculative poetry class yesterday; it was a lot of fun – thanks to everyone who came out for that!

It’s been tough to keep my spirits up. I try to be optimistic; I try to be pro-active, I meditate and do breathing exercises, and I’m trying to distract myself with positive things (see my last section below) but I saw a quote: “You can’t self-care your way out of a pandemic.” You also can’t ignore the deaths of 850,000 in your own country. In February, it will be two years since the first US cases of covid appeared in Kirkland, a few miles from my house. So I’m submitting more, researching PR, reading, organizing. Waiting for spring…and hopefully more good news.

Interview in Water~Stone Review

Very thankful for this thoughtful interview with Water~Stone Review on their blog. Check it out below at this link:

https://waterstonereview.com/in-the-field-conversations-with-our-contributors-jeannine-hall-gailey/

A sneak peek below:

Screen shot from my interview

Male Spotted Towhee in the Snow, my porch

Winter Distractions – PR investigations, and more submissions

I’ve been trying to keep myself distracted/productive in multiple ways. I’ve been trying (with a group of friends) to submit poems every day in January. I’ve interviewed two PR professionals so far (for the next iteration of my PR for Poets book, and also maybe for me?)

It’s interesting to think about how promoting books has changed during the pandemic, more virtual, less in-person, and trying to be heard above the noise of the virtual crowd. Are people reading more, or less, do you think? Are they buying books online or in person, or not? I am also trying to learn how to use Instagram more, which has been dicey (but thanks to a class AND a personal training session with Kelli Agodon on stories, not hopeless.) (If you want to follow me, I’m @webbish6 on Instagram.) I’m also continuing to try to learn Japanese (still not fast) and I’m cleaning out my closets (needed) and bookshelves (even more needed.) I told you I was trying to distract myself! What rituals do you find yourself needing in the wintertime you don’t need in the spring or fall? I am hoping for an early spring, and a merciful 2022 in terms of this plague. Stay safe, warm, and as un-anxious as possible!

Late Holiday Celebrations, 10 Questions with Massachusetts Review, After the Snow, Floods, and Next Week, a Speculative Poetry Class

Pink Flowers and Flooding Creeks, Woodinville, January 2022

Happy Post New Year! Floods, Variants, and Small Celebrations

Hope your New Year has gone well so far. After our week of being snowed in, the whole state dealt with snowmelt and constant rain, resulting in a ton of flooding. We were very thankful to have our trash picked up after two weeks of being skipped for bad weather.

This picture on the left is usually a tiny trickling creek in our Woodinville neighborhood, and the flowers blooming in January are, I think, viburnum. The water was so high and moving so fast it actually blurred in the picture! We live on a hill, bad for snow and ice, but good for floods, so we were okay, but all the stores are still dealing with shortages from the snow last week, employees being out sick (really high Omicron levels here) and trucks not being able to cross the mountains for days to get from one side of the state to the other.

me, Glenn, little brother Mike, and sister-in-law Loree at our after-New Year’s party

Despite all the weather crises and Omicron crises, we had our first holiday celebrations – first, with my little brother Mike and sister-in-law Loree, where we celebrated Christmas, New Year’s, and both their January birthdays with a celebratory brunch – and later in the week, with my poet friend Kelli Russell Agodon and her husband Rose, celebrating Christmas, New Year’s, and Kelli’s birthday, also in January with champagne and cupcakes! We also did a little toast to my new book contract with BOA!

Is it nerve-wracking meeting with other humans during Omicron’s numbers, overrun hospitals, and daily news? It was! Was it worth it? Well, neither Glenn and I (who tested before and after) got sick, our guests didn’t get sick, and everyone was vaccinated (most triple-vaccinated, except me) and we were running four air purifiers and kept windows open (circulation still important!) so definitely yes. I have missed other humans! It’s just not the same over the phone or over Zoom. And Glenn really enjoys cooking for humans who aren’t quite as jaded to his excellent food as me and the cats have become.

While Rose and Glenn bonded over Seahawks and cooking, Kelli showed me how to share an Instagram story (Instagram is still a new skill set for me) and we talked poetry, PR, the problems of launching books during a pandemic…you know, typical girl stuff! Seriously, family bonding and writer-friend bonding felt really life-affirming. It also felt unfamiliar – seeing people in person. When this pandemic is over (someday soon, hopefully,) I’m going to have to re-learn my socializing skills. What is it going to be like to do a poetry reading in public again?

An Interview with me: 10 Questions with The Massachusetts Review

I was lucky enough to have a new interview up with The Massachusetts Review. You can read it at this link, and a sneak peek below. 

Screencap from my interview

A Speculative Poetry Class Next Saturday

Have you ever wanted to write poetry that was…a little outside of normal? Did you write about fairy tales, comic book characters, space travel? Did you know that you were writing speculative poetry? In this master class, we’ll talk about what speculative poetry is, read a few example poems by writers like Tracy K Smith and Lucille Clifton, talk about markets that publish speculative poetry, and do a poetry exercise or two.

It’s next Saturday the 15th starting at noon Pacific time. You can sign up for the class for $5 here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/writing-outside-the-norm-speculative-poetry-with-jeannine-hall-gailey-tickets-241535899377

Happy New Year! Snowed-In Seattle, Inspiration Board for 2022, Variant Problems, and Late Celebrations

Me, with a toast and pomegranate seeds

Have a Safe, Happy, Healthy New Year!

Well, our new year rose sunny and cold (28 when I woke up – brrr) and I’ve been struggling with keeping my asthma in check – hey, I didn’t move to the Northwest for the record cold OR record heat! (We had both this year – 16 degrees this week and 115 this summer. Why is mother nature trying to kill us? )

Glenn and I dressed up and stayed in, popped champagne for the ball drop, ate frozen grapes (supposed to be good luck, but how many grapes to have to eat to keep covid away?) and had mini beef tenderloin and avocado sliders for dinner. (Fancy, but easy – recommend!) Doesn’t Glenn look cute in his tie?

Since we stayed in, I got to watch The Thin Man marathon on TCM, midnight celebrations in Paris, London, New Zealand, NYC, and Seattle, and got two poetry submissions out before midnight. Plus we had fancy cocktails with pomegranate seeds floating in them and when Glenn got tipsy he didn’t have to drive!

Omicron and Delta are still topping the news as half (!) of tests in King County, where I live, are coming back positive, and hospitals like UW have postponed unnecessary procedures as they are dealing with staff shortages and bed overwhelm. Christmas Eve had our highest covid levels ever during the pandemic.

Our children’s hospital is reporting it is full, with kids with flu, RSV, and covid (often with two of the three), which is the first time since covid began we’re really hearing about a lot of hospitalized children. So if you have unvaccinated kiddies, take extra steps to be safe.

We have extra instant tests at the house, thanks to Microsoft, that has been giving them out to employees for the last two weeks, which is good, because both Glenn and I tested when we had low oxygen ourselves (turned out to be cold-related asthma, not covid, but better safe than sorry.)

So happy New Year’s to you, happy unrealistic resolutions (watch Pete Davidson and Miley Cyrus sing about this is a funny short video here, like “reading three whole books” and “learning Bosnian.”

Sylvia with snow, pre-dawn

Snowed-In Seattle

We had a surprise the day after Christmas – about four inches of snow, and record cold temperatures, and then a few days later, another three inches of snow. Needless to say this causes snags – like not getting trash pickup, or not getting to the store, and if you do get to the store, milk, water, and eggs are all gone. It’s a weird way to end the year. But my cat still loves the snow, as always!

We had record numbers of cancellations at SeaTac. Meanwhile Boulder just had a devastating wildfire on New Year’s Eve. It can’t just be a pandemic – it has to be all this other stuff, too? I had five friends diagnosed with cancer just this year. I can’t imagine going in for imaging and chemo – things I’ve had to do myself, though not during a pandemic, and know they are incredibly stressful. A reminder than minor things feel like major things, and major things just feel even more major, more life-shattering. I want to be closer to my friends and family than I feel like I can be – and being snowed in can feel like a very apt metaphor – we are all trapped at home and unable to travel, to see people, to do regular things like shopping. Or maybe that’s nonsense.

Inspiration Board for 2022

I know it’s a little cheesy, and harder during a pandemic year, but I still went through the steps of doing my yearly inspiration board, and using my hands to cut and glue things makes me feel like a kid again, and there’s something innately…optimistic about putting up words and pictures that make you feel happy and hopeful. This year, words like “friends,” “inspiration,” “magic,” and “happiness” made appearances, along with images of foxes, pink typewriters, blooms and butterflies.

Anyway, I encourage you to try it yourself, even if it’s just a temporary one on a corkboard, or posting inspiring things on your fridge. What could we look forward to? What are the best possibilities? I’m far too good at looking at the dark side.

Celebrations after the New Year

We hope to see my brother and sister-in-law today for a Christmas/New Year’s/birthday get together, and later on this week, a good poet friend and her husband, and I’m hoping we didn’t pick the worst possible time for visits given the rising covid levels and weird weather. It’s hard not to feel like a prisoner after two years in virtual lockdown because of my immune system problems, even after vaccination, and I just want to be in human presence of someone besides my husband and cats (God bless them) and not just on a Zoom screen. It doesn’t really feel like we’ve had the holidays until we give presents and Glenn cooks for someone.

Happy Solstice/Christmas/Holidays, A Poem in the Climate Issue of Massachusetts Review, Poetry Book Recommendations from 2021, and Things to Remember About the Last Year

Happy holidays from Glenn, me, and this polar bear

Happy Solstice/Christmas/Holidays!

Hope you all are having a safe, healthy, and as happy as possible Solstice/Christmas/Holiday! I know it’s hard for many of us, with flights cancelled, Omicron in the news, to feel any kind of holiday cheer, especially if you, like me, are far away from family this year.

But I’ve been running a steady stream of Christmas movies and music – except for that one panic-inducing day I watched Station Eleven’s pilot – and trying my best to feel as cheerful as I can. Glenn made a gluten-free chocolate “Buche de Noel” with fresh cherries which was amazing.

We are expecting 2-5 inches of snow, over the Christmas weekend, then several days below freezing, so we might be stuck on our hill, which would make getting supplies tougher, so we are prepared to eat leftovers and after that, our supply of potatoes and pumpkin seeds. But I love seeing some snow.

December cherry blossoms

But we did have a cherry tree with one branch blossoming, right on Christmas Eve; seems symbolic, like beauty’s triumph over death, life over winter, or something like that. We need anything that gives us hope these days.

The generosity and apparent ferocity of nature is always surprising. We should pay closer attention.

New Poem in the Climate Issue of Massachusetts Review

Thank you to the Massachusetts Review who included my poem “Things I Forgot to Tell You About the End of the World” in their end-of-the-year Climate Issue. I feel lucky to be in such a great issue, and the fact that it’s the closing poem of the issue.

Here’s a sneak peek:

Things to Remember, 2021 Edition

2021 was not just about the pandemic, about loss, isolation, and anxiety. Other things happened, too, remember? I went through my photos and it helped me remember some of the good of 2021. I recommend it! I also went back and re-read some of my blog posts to remind myself of happy times.

• I got into some dream journals for the first time: including but not limited to: Fairy Tale Review, Bellevue Literary Journal, Image, and Water~Stone Review
• I went to Breadloaf for the first time. Virtually, but still, pretty cool. (I was accepted on scholarship the first time I applied, but could not afford the airfare to get out there. That was many years and books ago.)
• Spent a whole week in September (was there a covid lull?) at a writing residency on San Juan Island, where I encountered many foxes and several seals.
• Discovered a new Japanese botanical garden, the Kubota Gardens, on the other side of town (wandering is a symptom of the pandemic, right?)
• Had a rare visit with my nephew Dustin from Georgia who might move up here.
• I managed one weekend during the summer’s covid lull up to Port Townsend to see eagles, deer, and my friend Kelli Agodon
• I also did two things I couldn’t in 2020 because they were cancelled: visited the Skagit Tulip Festival and the Bellevue Botanical Garden Holiday Lights.
• Had both my circulating poetry manuscripts accepted for publication: Fireproof from Alternating Current Press in California, and Flare, Corona from BOA Editions in New York. In some blog posts in the past two years, you can read me despairing of ever finding the right homes for these books, but now that they have found the right homes, I’m overjoyed (and relieved!) and looking forward to launching each book. Hopefully in a post-pandemic world.

Poetry Book Recommendations from 2021:

All of these books make great gifts, and also great end-of-the-year reading, with just the right balance of melancholy and hope. I’m probably missing more than a few good ones, but these were my top picks.

Rosebud Ben Oni’s If This is the Age We End Discovery Alice James Books – Multiple timelines, string theory, Bunnicula and Rick and Morty? Yes please
Louise Gluck’s Winter Recipes from the Collective – Meandering, warm, imaginative – maybe my favorite Gluck book in years
Kelli Russell Agodon’s Dialogues with Rising Tides – Kelli’s most vulnerable, surprising book, looking at personal tragedy, ecological and political anxieties,
Katie Farris’s A Net to Catch my Body In Its Weaving – Heart-wrenching poems that look at mortality and the body
Sandra Beasley’s Made to Explode – once again, the political meets the personal in Beasley’s latest book
Sally Rosen Kindred’s Where the Wolf – Fairy tale poems with an edge
Shade of Blue Trees by Kelly Cressio-Moeller – a melancholy, beautiful book with an elegiac mood

Finding Holiday Cheer, a Few Thoughts on Poetry and Publicity, and a Few End of the Year Book Suggestions

Glenn and I with Bellevue Botanical Garden lights (pic by Michaela Eaves)

Finding Holiday Cheer When the World Seems Cheerless

I have, like a lot of people, have been having a hard time finding Christmas spirit – or any kind of holiday cheer – when you’re separated from your family, when the news is one bit of bad news after another – Omicron is more contagious, ignores our vaccines and some of our treatments, it’s spreading rapidly, and so many people have covid fatigue that it’s probably going to roll through the country during the holiday.

But it’s important, even for people like me who are immune compromised, to find a way to cling to things that bring us joy, in the safest way possible.

For me this week, it meant getting together with my artist friend Michaela Eaves and going to the Bellevue Botanical Gardens to see the impressive lights, which were cancelled last year. And yes, seeing all the beautiful displays and being outdoors and walking around catching up with a friend really did cheer me up. (We had a brief break in the monotonous rain for about an hour before it started raining on us again, thankfully.)

Me and Michaela, with holiday lights, Bellevue Botanical Gardens

So if you can catch up and do something celebratory outside, with loved ones and friends, I say, do it. I know I’ve spent way too much time over the past two years 1. cooped up in my house and 2. seeing almost no one to ward off any seasonal blues, and despite Omicron, I have optimism in new treatments for people like me (like the upcoming Pfizer antiviral, among others) and more available testing, despite all we don’t know yet about the new variant. Be aware that I have lots of vaccinated friends and family – vaccinated AND boosted – who are still getting covid. Most of them have mild cases, but a few have been hospitalized. People are losing parents, again this year, to covid. So it’s not wise to totally blow it off, throw away your masks, and host a ton of large indoor gatherings. Visit safely by testing right before visits with instant tests, meet somewhere with good circulation (if it’s your house, open windows and run air purifiers), or even put out an outdoor heater and bundle up to celebrate outdoors. I am being cautious – having groceries delivered again, for instance, putting off in-person medical appointments – but I may try to brave the Woodland Park Zoo before the end of the year!

Peacock display at the Bellevue Botanical Garden Lights

A Few Thoughts on Poetry and Publicity

So there was a lot of talk this week on social media about poets and publicity. There was a Twitter thread that basically said that some poets that were well-known and well-respected were those things because they had paid $25,000 to publicists to achieve that. (And also that some people buy their own books on bulk on Amazon to get their numbers up for some reason?)

I think the bulk of the negative reactions were 1) a purity test for poets that we don’t hold fiction and non-fiction writers to (they often hire publicists with no static) and 2) a class envy response – who has $25,000 to spend on promoting a poetry book? Most of us do not. My first thought was “$25,000 is a car!” I didn’t grow up wealthy, and don’t consider myself someone who could easily justify coming up with that kind of money to promote my books. Heck, I have trouble spending $150 on an online ad for my book!

But, having interviewed a few publicists for my book PR for Poets, and having researched book publicity, there’s really no reason a poet can’t hire a $25,000 publicist – although most publicists don’t work with poets, don’t know poetry’s markets or reviewers, or just don’t see enough money in it to do it.

Fire breathing dragon light display, Bellevue Botanical Gardens

Am I pretty excited to have a publisher for my seventh book who has an in-house marketing and PR person at last? Absolutely. I’m used to doing everything myself, with varying results for varying amounts of time, energy, money, and hustle. I think that’s the experience of most poets – getting together their own mailing lists, asking bookstores for readings, maybe even sending out their own review copies. The prospect of marketing a book during a pandemic – which is something a lot of my friends have already had to do – is daunting indeed. There are already whispers of cancellations of people and publishers who had been planning to go to AWP 2022. I already took a class on Instagram to get that account going before my two new books come out. I do take this stuff seriously.

I am hoping AWP 2023 – which is, yay, supposed to take place in Seattle – will be safe. I really enjoy seeing my old friends – and I’d love to meet my two most recent publishers in person – the editors at Alternating Current and BOA Editions. And do a reading or two, take friends out to see parks, bookstores, and coffee shops.

So, when I wrote my book, PR for Poets, I said for most poets, spending more than $5,000 – the going rate for a publicist for one month – on promoting their poetry book probably doesn’t make sense. Most royalty rates and poetry sales will rarely net more than $1,000. (It’s happened for me on a couple books, but certainly not all.) But if someone has the money lying around, and they really want to advance their poetry careers – big fellowships, tenure track jobs, visibility that makes them more likely to get well-paid speaking and teaching gigs – I mean, who am I to say they shouldn’t?

Poinsettia Tree made of lights

A Few Book Recommendations for the End of the Year

I did slightly less reading this year than last, but some books had a real impact on me and I feel I can recommend them strongly – as gifts, and just for anyone looking towards a quieter next couple of months of reading. These recommendations do not include poetry (for now):

Fiction and Non-Fiction:

The Equivalents by Maggie Doherty – Tremendously inspiring account of women artists in the sixties.

Fake Like Me by Barbara Bourland – An art-world thriller that is also a remake of the classic Rebecca.

Hell of a Book by Jason Mott – A film-noir flavored book about the life of an author, the stresses of race and skin color in the US, and maybe also a ghost story? The National Book Award winner.

Where the Wild Ladies Are by Aoko Matsuda – Speaking of ghost stories, this is a feminist, comic collection of takes on Japanese traditional ghost tales.

Red Comet – Heather Clark – A must for any Sylvia Plath fan – it will keep them occupied for a couple of months.

Redmond Towne Center Candle decorations

All of these books make great gifts!

Have a safe, happy, and healthy holiday!

Happy (Pandemic) Holidays, More About BOA and upcoming books, and Wishing You Health and Safety

Glenn and I in silly holiday outfits – with dinosaurs and Xmas cats

Happy (Pandemic) Holidays!

Happy holidays and thank you for the kind wishes on my good book news last week. I am so excited. It’s nice to have some happy news in the midst of all the stressful news about the pandemic and crazy killer weather. More boosters? More variants? Killer tornadoes in December? Higher than ever covid levels? Excuse me while I breathe into this paper bag.

I’m not going to be home this year, as due to my immune system problems I’m avoiding travel, but I will be seeing some (vaccinated) friends to make it feel at least a little bit like the holidays, going to see some lights and hopefully getting some holiday cheer going.

Now, I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t have a little word of caution: Due to the fact that I’m seeing more and more vaccinated friends and family actually getting covid – I advise being extra careful, a little more instant testing, and asking the host to open a window or two if you’re visiting in someone’s home.

Pink Hair on the Kirkland waterfront

Glenn and I are trying our best to keep ourselves feeling bright during Seattle’s “Big Dark” – with cold rain and complete darkness by 4:30 PM.

This is a tough time in the Northwest, especially during a pandemic when we can’t get together and huddle for warmth in coffee shops and bookstores and concerts and museums like we normally do. Hence, we resort to silly Christmas outfits as you can see, and extra lights on the house and deck. I’ve also been known to play a Yule log on the television set with kittens and bunnies and cheesy holiday music. Hey, whatever helps you muddle through.

I’ve also been a little under the weather – not covid, just run of the mill things like sore throats and stomach bugs – but the good news is I’ve been able to read more (particularly enjoying Steve Fellner’s Eating Lightbulbs and Other Essays and Siri Hustvedt’s Mothers, Fathers, and Others essay collection, as well as Katherine Mansfield’s complete journals and letters), listen to more audiobooks, and I think I’ve watched every classic holiday movie there is. (PS: I hate It’s a Wonderful Life, mostly because of its treatment of Donna Reed’s character, who clearly would have been better off as a single librarian.)

Glenn and I with Christmas tree and sleigh

It Happened on 5th Avenue is my recommendation for this year, with its warm and fuzzy social justice/holiday themes, but Christmas in Connecticut with a delightfully fake Martha Stewart-type figure who tries not to get caught by her overbearing boss. The main character played by Barbara Stanwyck is a joy to watch.

We also – every time the weather permits – have been seeking out the happiest outdoor holiday decor, including this sleigh with topiary reindeer at Carillon Point in Kirkland. It was a little iffy on the waterfront – a little rain, a little sun, a little cold – but it’s still good to get outdoors.

Sylvia with her favorite BOA poetry books

More about BOA and Upcoming Books

To the left is Sylvia posing with some of her favorite BOA poetry books. She is a big BOA fan!

So, yes, I’m very excited about Flare, Corona coming out with BOA Editions in the fall of 2023, by which time I hope we will have better solutions for this covid thing and life will have somewhat returned to normal. Maybe I can even have a book party at a winery or something fun like that!

This book manuscript is very personal to me – it contains poems about getting diagnosed with what they said was terminal cancer back five years ago, and then six months later, getting diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, and as I gradually recovered from the shock of those two things, the pandemic crept into our lives.

But I swear it’s not a depressing book – there are supervillains and fairy tales in the poems, as you might expect in my books – and there’s lots of humor. And I cannot imagine a better press to bring out this book.

And I’m also thankful to Alternating Current Press for bringing out Fireproof in May 2022, so I have something to focus on for the next six months. Fireproof is about witches, Joan of Arc, genetics, fairy tales – it’s a little edgy, a little feminist, and little political. A very different book than Flare, Corona. I’m about to be at the stage where I’m asking for blurbs (eek!) and deciding on cover art. The web site will probably get a little makeover based on the next two books as well.

It’s been five years since Field Guide to the End of the World came out, so to suddenly have two books on the horizon is a little bit of a shock – but a good shock. While you wait for the new books, remember books make wonderful holiday gifts! I’m happy to send a signed copy of any of my five poetry books or my PR for Poets book and you still have time for shipping priority before Christmas. 😊

Carillon Christmas tree, topiary deer, and sleigh

Wishing You a Safe, Healthy, and Happy Holiday!

Seriously now, take good care of yourselves, be careful, get tested, and take it easy on yourselves and your loved ones this holiday, We have never lived through years like the last two before, and hopefully, with gains in our scientist’s attacks on covid – I’m betting antivirals will make a huge difference once we have them in pill form – we won’t have to again. If you, like me, are having a little bit of a quieter year than usual, just remember this is only temporary, and try to be extra kind to yourself.