Time flies when your writing life is full

Battery units to explore at Ford Worden State Park, Port Townsend, WA

If I haven't been up-to-date on my blogging here, it's because I've been blogging and writing everywhere else! 

2018 has been a full year

Travel

Since January, I've been two Phoenix three times, Philadelphia, and Port Townsend (twice now, if counting my stay here right now). 

Phoenix in February was about the Tucson Gem & Mineral Show, and I'm sure my suitcases were a few pounds heavier coming back from the event. 

Phoenix in April brought me to Tapatio Cliffs in northern Phoenix (Peoria) for the Association of Healthcare Journalists conference, which was a fantastic event, followed by a few days' stay with a long-time friend in Apache Junction. 

Phoenix in June and July brought my husband and I back again, to Mesa this time, to spend time with family and attend my daughter's DCI competition show as a new member of the elite drum corps, the Concord Blue Devils. 

I went to Philadelphia in March to attend the second ever Health Union Connexion conference, which brings together columnists and forum moderators from all over the country (and even Canada and the UK) to celebrate and honor our work in the field of healthcare journalism.  

But before all this, I attend the winter YAWP at Port Townsend, where I finally completed my abecedarian poetry book (it's about 48 pages not counting front or back matter). And I'm here again for the 2018 Port Townsend Writers Conference, a summer tradition I have enjoyed and valued since 2005. 

MS Walk

I finally was healthy enough to attend an MS Walk this year, the first time I've done so since my diagnosis in 2013 (yes, it has already been 5 years, can you believe it?). So far, so good on the remission portion of my life; aside from random strange occurrences (like vertigo that awakens me in the middle of the night), I'm feeling nearly normal these days (knock on wood). 

Camping

We've made two trips so far this year: one to Cape Disappointment (or Fort Canby, if you're old school), and one to Twanoh State Park on the Hood Canal. Both were fantastic with great weather and much to keep us busy.

Other fun stuff

This year, we spent a day in Seattle taking in three films as part of the Seattle International Film Festival. I highly recommend you see The Place. It's an Italian drama directed by Paolo Genovese based on a 2010 concept series in the US titled The Booth at the End. The entire film takes place in a café but is peopled with 10 characters who are trying to make some sort of dramatic life change. 

Family news

Our youngest daughter is marching with the Concord Blue Devils this summer in her 4th year in competition color guard. My oldest is nearing completion of her Bachelor's degree in Special Education. 

And yes, I #amwriting

It's been a tough year, I admit. The distractions are considerable: political chaos is something I can't look away from, for one thing. It's hard to leave behind social media when it's so inextricably connected to your working and writing lives. I've also been hooked on some amazing television dramas (Goliath s2, all of Bloodline, etc.). 

And efforts to keep my blood circulating and to prevent the atrophy of my muscles (I have "sitting" disease) have ramped up. I'm walking about an hour at least several days a week now, breaking in tight, inflexible feet and calves and shaking out what I've discovered is an arthritis-riddled spine.

It has been a year of rethinking priorities, as well, and I've hit some dark lower levels where I've questioned the point of my writing life and reflected on what it is I want. Because even though I love the professional writing life I have, I still need the creative writing life to keep me balanced. And time and energy are just so difficult to cobble together and commit for this purpose, these days. 

Still, writing, publishing efforts, and incubation of narrative ideas are happening, and I've been going to bed nearly every night meditating on the details of the book I hope to work on while I'm here in Port Townsend this week. Meanwhile, 

• I'm putting together a marketing plan for my abecedarian to start submitting it
• I've attended the summer Hugo House Write-O-Rama, which helped me play around with some story ideas I have been entertaining for months now
• I'm taking a class taught by Waverly Fitzgerald on submission strategies (also at the Hugo House) to jumpstart my efforts to find homes for my work
• I've put aside my sleep and dreams manuscript started last summer at Centrum in favor of a novel idea I've been obsessing with for a while now. Let's just say it involves multiple sclerosis, the Lord of the Flies, and ferry boats. 
• I'm looking ahead to several book ideas I can pitch at the Pacific Northwest Writers Association (PNWA) conference next September.

I blame all the reading I do on the inspiration to keep writing. Most recently: 

• The Forgiven by Lawrence Osborne (probably my favorite book so far this year)
• The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles (probably my second favorite book so far this year)
• Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids by Kenzeburo Oe (very much like Lord of the Flies and just as  compelling)
• Soft Apocalypse by Will Mcintosh (a fresh take, probably more realistic but, in this day and age of fake news and Trump, sobering and depressing)

Drew Magary's The Postmortal is my current read. 

I also keep hearing and learning more and more about the growing interest in hybrid writing, which is encouraging as it makes me feel a little bit better about the fact that I am most comfortable outside traditional ideas and formats. My Bill Ransom workshop this week at Centrum should help spin out these concepts for me, as well.

Recent acceptances/publications

As for efforts to find publication, here's an update for folks who track such matters:

Poetry

"The Bridge," "Diagnosis," and "Hot Bath Test" in Something On Our Minds (anthology of MS writing)

Essays

"Gaze" in The Nervous Breakdown (with many thanks to Bernard Grant for inviting my submission and to Chelsey Clammer for her great care and support).

Submissions under consideration

Poetry - 5 poems (to 3 markets)

Fiction - 0 

Nonfiction - 0

With almost all the cows come home, it's time to start submitting again! 

Coming up

September will be a crazy month for me. I will be pitching four or five different manuscripts at the Pacific Northwest Writers Association conference. 

The following weekend I'll be soaking in some great films at the Port Townsend Film Festival, and just a week later, I'm heading to Indianapolis for the 2018 Sleep Meeting for the American Association of Sleep Technologists. 

Not long after, I'll be helping out the Washington State Sleep Conference as the board's secretary. 

There are some camping trips slipped in between these events through October, and I'm hoping to make a trip to Auburn, Alabama in early November to touch base with one of my clients. 

Thanks again for your reading and for your continued support!

~Tamara

Autumn Updates and Winter Plans

The autumn is always a busy time, and this year's fall season is no exception. 

September was jam-packed

Annual Rib & Pie Fest

We hosted the annual shindig (12th one this year, not counting the skipped year) to fantastic weather and a host of new neighbors! It was probably our biggest block party yet, but they always seem like that. 

Jury duty

I participated in my first criminal trial jury duty in early September and hope to write about that experience in the coming months. It was an intense, enlightening, and overall positive experience. Spoiler alert: The dude was guilty. 

But let me say, I derived absolutely no pleasure from that outcome. It was a sad and sobering day when we arrived at that decision after almost two weeks in court. 

Hurricanes

Meanwhile, hurricane season hit with intensity and I was happy to do my small part to help deliver CPAP machines to people in need through the A.W.A.K.E. Angels effort launched by my peers at the American Sleep Apnea Association. 

Camping

Somehow, we also managed to sneak in some camping trips as well... In August, we visited the Washington coast right before the eclipse, kayaking in Willapa Bay and checking out Westport, and we also camped at Potlatch State Park, where we caught crab and ate our limit in fresh oysters. 

More recently, we camped at Dosewallips State Park on the Hood Canal, and more recently, to Potlatch on the Waterfront (also on Hood Canal). 

Other fun stuff

We attended the Port Townsend Film Festival, which was so much fun that we are already booked to go again next fall. The documentary film, "No Man's Land," is a must-see and may even be nominated for an Academy Award. It won the doc category at the PTFF. 

Coming back from that event, I attended the poetry reading of Gary Lilley and Tara Hardy at Eagle Harbor Books and was so glad I made it! Two fantastic writers and presenters!

Family news

During this time, we also moved both our daughters into new digs for the school year: one went from an apartment to a townhouse with twice the space and roommates, the other from temporary arrangements over the summer to a condo in the city with two roommates. 

We also bought our youngest her first car, a five-year-old Fiat that she's absolutely in love with. Check that one off the family milestone list!

Bye, Bob

My husband and I lost a good friend in September and said goodbye to Robert McNerney among friends from high school and college. 

Health updates

Folks are always sweet to ask about my MS. It has been very stable and we are even thinking about reducing my medication dosage (to give my liver a break). 

But probably most significant in the long term was my diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). How ironic that the girl writing for the American Sleep Apnea Association is diagnosed with the very condition she writes about? 

I started PAP therapy (using an AutoPAP device) on the day after my birthday in late September, and the experience has been very positive. 

This will turn into fresh content for my blog at SleepyHeadCENTRAL, to be sure, and I have some multimedia ideas to wrestle with over the next few months. 

And yes, I #amwriting

I get asked this one a lot. Folks, almost every single day! 

I have my paid efforts for the usual suspects (the ASAA, SHC, both the blog and the magazine for the American Association of Sleep Technologists, Health Union, BioNews Services, and a private sleep clinic client). 

As for my creative writing, there are small moments where I tinker with:

• my almost-complete abecedarian chapbook on my MS diagnosis
• the manuscript on sleep and dreams I jump-started last summer at Centrum, and 
• an outline has emerged for a collection of essays, also sleep related, that are part of a strategy for 2018 that, with any luck, will culminate in a book to pitch at the Pacific Northwest Writers Association (PNWA) conference next September. 

Meanwhile, I have been reading a lot. Most recently: 

• Seed by CS Patton (great concept, iffy writing)
• What Happened by Hillary Rodham Clinton (must read!)
• Apocalypse Mom (not worth your time)

Stephen King's 11/22/63 is my current read. 

All of which to say that reading fiction again after a long stretch of nonfiction means that I can feel the coals to write short fiction stirring again. 

Goals for 2018 include reading more of my own writing friends' works and following a reading list I recently came upon this list by LitHub which cites 15 works of literary fiction they recommend for people who don't like horror. I actually like horror, but I also like literary writing and each of these titles seems super interesting to me (I have already read Kafka's The Trial—thanks, Mr. Shiflett!—and Atwood's The Handmade's Tale). 

Acceptances/publications for 2017

As for efforts to find publication, here's an update for folks who track such matters:

Poetry

"Racer's Edge" in Snapdragon: A Journal for Art & Healing (original from my current abecedarian chapbook draft)
"On the Day After Gary Ridgway's 48 Confessions" in The Broken City (reprint)

Essays

"Witches' Hearts" in NonBinary Review's Hans Christian Anderson tribute (original)

Submissions since Jan 1

Poetry - 37 poems submitted
Fiction - 6 story submissions
Nonfiction - 6 (4 essays, 2 flash nonfiction pieces) submitted

Submissions still under consideration

Poetry - 17 poems 
Fiction - 1 story 
Nonfiction - 0

More than half of these submission responses are due or past due, so I hope to have more good news about them shortly. 

Coming up

I cannot wait to attend the Autumn YAWP at Centrum in Port Townsend over Veteran's Day weekend. I will make one final trip in the RV to Fort Worden State Park before we pack the trailer up for the winter. 

At that time, I hope to finish the stragglers for my abecedarian chapbook on MS as well as make a few more submissions and start work on my essays for the book I hope to pitch at PNWA next fall. 

In January, I will also attend the very first Winter YAWP over the first full weekend in January, but will stay in the cozy cabins with my peers. You just never know what the ice and snow situation will be like, so I decided to skip the RV writing space as much as I love to work in it. 

That's it in a big, fat nutshell, the kind a squirrel dreams of. Thanks for your support as friends, readers, and peers!

~Tamara

The rich, chaotic transition from writing conference to real life

CC by 2.0 photo credit, top: Richard Hurd, "Black-capped Chickadee in flight" (Sept 5, 2012)

The annual denouement following my time at Centrum is always a time fraught with conflicts. I'm forced to catch up in real life, while mining the riches I've unearthed from the conference.

It means shifting energy away from that strange paradoxical continuum of decompression-meets-intensity toward the normal 24-7: ordinary schedules, domestic concerns, work-related commitments, family demands.

And always, health concerns. New symptoms may or may not arise, but the biggest indicator for me is fatigue, because it can be hard to know its root cause. When I make this yearly pilgrimage to the Port Townsend Writers Conference (PTWC), I come away well rested in one respect, yet exhausted.

It takes at least as many days home as I spent away to return to Normal. And my sleep. Yegads. So out of whack. I didn't even leave the time zone and I feel jet lagged!

Yet I feel like this chickadee in flight, rising from a phoenix-like occupation after 10 days away from Real Life.

Pre-Centrum Silent Writing Retreat: Photos

Guess where I am... 

It's not hard to guess. I'm in Port Townsend for my annual pilgrimage to the Port Townsend Writers Conference.

The official conference starts Sunday, but it's my habit to go up the Thursday before for a personal writing retreat, something I refer to as a silent retreat because I limit my interaction with other people during that time.

It's one way I unwind before the intensity of the writing conference hits. I think of it as doing yoga in order to achieve meditation. The former, after all, exists to prepare for the latter.

What's the plan?

My goals are fairly simple this year. I didn't sign up for a daily workshop this year, opting for the "residency" option instead.

I'll spend this weekend writing drafts to complete a poetry chapbook I'm working on (I've already written one poem, just this morning, and have six left, which my goal to complete all of them to draft level by Sunday night).

Once Monday morning hits, I will switch gears and launch into a project I started at last year's conference: generating new work toward a book of creative nonfiction, personal essays, and experimental forms addressing the topic of my dream life. My writing schedule will consume all of my mornings and a few of my afternoons. If I am an early riser, I might pop in for a few early AM free writes.

Meanwhile, I'm reading Ursula K. LeGuin's The Lathe of Heaven and have other books on my Kindle that discuss the science of dreams that I can read for inspiration.

Where I'm staying

Those of you who follow me know that I normally take my 25-foot travel trailer up the conference and opt for a camping experience at Fort Worden rather than a dorm-life experience.

I love doing this because it affords me a nightly (and daily morning) campfire and the opportunity to cook for myself. I like being close to the beach and appreciate the fresh air and laid-back vibe of the campground.

However, this year I have split my 10 days into a 3-day silent retreat at a local Victorian hotel followed by 7 days in the Fort dorms (like everyone else).

Over the last year, Fort Worden switched their campground reservation system to the state parks utility. They did not open up reservations to the park until March, and by the time I was able to register, the entire campground was booked!

I'm a bit sad to miss out on my campfires and home-cooked meals, but much of what I value at the conference exists in the people I enter while I'm there: the hard-core regulars who have become a kind of second family to me, and the brand-new seekers who bring new ideas and energy to the event.

Even if I'm only attending as a resident (meaning, no morning classes), I will be taking 3 afternoon mini classes, attending the evening readings, the post-reading open mics at the 262, and will take all my meals at the Commons... all great opportunities to catch up with old friends and make new ones.

The pictures above illustrate the magical place I'm inhabiting this weekend pre-conference.

Time to decompress!

The weather is perfect: 70s with a cool breeze, sunny, great for sleeping, walking, writing, and decompressing.

There will be a luxurious lavender bath salts soak tonight, home-cooked breakfast and lettuce wraps for dinner (I picked the kitchenette-equipped suite for this reason), a fresh pedicure, and a downtown walkabout so I can visit my favorite Port Townsend haunts. Usually the walkabout includes a trek through the bookstores, a couple of galleries I favor, the bead store, the candy and ice cream shops, and the general store, where I always find a great pair of new shoes.

I have reserved a week from today for a possible trek up to the Sequim Lavender Festival, should I feel like I've made the most productive use of my week. I'm also thinking about a Starlight Room reward for later next week, for the same reason.

But only as long as I don't miss the Whiskey and Pie Night next week, which has become a regular social feature of the conference, thanks to the clever creativity of organizer Sam Ligon and author Kate Lebo. Nor will I miss any wiffle ball pickup games with Jordan Hartt, Philip Shaw and the rest of the bleacher bums!

Before I go... my latest news 

I'm happy to report that The Broken City has accepted my poem, "On the Day After Gary Ridgway's 48 Confessions," for reprint in their upcoming "Death" themed issue.

I continue to write daily for 5 different publishers (SleepyHeadCENTRAL, the American Sleep Apnea Association, Health Union, BioNews Services, and the American Association of Sleep Technologists, and this makes me super happy.

I've also launched a literary series for SleepyHeadCENTRAL called "Vitamin Zzz" which focuses on sleep-related poetry and short prose which you might want to check out (here).

For now, it's sayonara. I've got some words to write and some time to fill with silence. Happy Summer!

~Tamara

[#AMWRITING] 11 poems in 15 hours

Late Saturday Night, my own personal writing workshop 

Last weekend I spent Thursday night through midday Sunday at the autumn #YAWP event at Port Townsend where a couple dozen writers gathered to work out their muscles on morning freewrites, then head for their writing spaces to keep the action going. Some were there for NaNoWriMo, others were brainstorming the orders of poems in chapbooks, still others were just throwing themselves to the writerly winds like the leaves tossed around in the fall bluster.

Getting prepped for the weekend
with a pot of buffalo chili,
a campfire and stars

I went in with a plan to write an abecedarian chapbook, 26 poems linked by the alphabet and a singular theme (which I won't reveal right now). Thursday night I spent in front of the campfire (every time I head up to Port Townsend these days, I stay in my camping trailer rather than the facilities at Fort Worden, where I can cook, have campfires, etc.).

The night was clear and crisp, stars burning overhead... a great opportunity to cook buffalo chili on the outside burner (my trailer has a second tailgate kitchen outside), then sit and warm my shins in front of smoky, glimmering coals and flames. Afterward, I read.

On Friday, I took part in the freewrites from ten to noon and blasted out some fresh material previously lost to memory, about a funeral, plus new massaging of the idea of campfires, coals and Icarus (hmmm, what could have inspired that?) as well as an incredible launch into remembrances that will fuel future writing projects (thank you, Rebecca Brown!).

I had worldly work to do on Friday--launching my weekly curation of sleep news--and found a cozy tea house, Pippa's, in downtown Port Townsend to web-connect and got that done. Their iced Lady Grey Tea is fabulous, by the way.

Afterward I came back and wrote two brand-new poems toward the abecedarian in just about two hours (I also spent about thirty minutes of that time wrangling with the architecture of the book).

Then I was off to dinner and a reading with my literary sister from another mister, Kristy Webster, who launched her first short story collection, The Gift of an Imaginary Girl, at Imprint Books. So many great stories, ideas, people... afterward, I came back and wrote three more poems (C, D and E) in the space of two hours. Creative energy is sustaining like that.

And I read some more. Brain on Fire, in case you're wondering. The title, at least, seems apropo in hindsight.

No recipe, just a good pot, fresh
food and a will to live. 

Saturday rolled around and I felt compelled to keep on this sprint of new poem creation, so I skipped the morning freewrites (certainly an acceptable practice at the YAWP, which is ultimately all about writers writing however they must) and pinched out four more poems while a pot roast with carrots, thyme, onions, mushrooms and parsnips simmered on the inside burner.

At dinner hour, I took a break, indulged in pot roast, mashed potatoes and mushroom gravy, then realized I had yet to even shower.

Meanwhile, another reading was slated to take place that night in downtown Port Townsend, featuring my brother from another mother, Jordan Hartt as he launched his new book of poems, Leap.

Jordan, I'm holding
out for my signed
copy!

Ack! What to do? Shower and arrive late or go with the flow that Jordan opens up for all of us during these YAWP weekends: to write, then write some more.

I chose pajamas. I wrote some more, and poems J and K were born before my neurologically challenged brain showed me the brick wall two hours later. I switched up only slightly and went to bed, and read some more.

Next morning, I ate and showered, then discovered that one of my poems, poem F, was actually a poem within a poem, so I liberated poem R into being and added new layers to poem K. Two more hours passed and then it was time to go, no farewell breakfast, no friendly waves or honks to my cohorts. The drive home was quiet and beautiful, fall gold against a rain-washed blue sky, and the mountains were laced in new snow.

Just now, I re-read what I wrote this weekend and encountered the same feeling I often experience after an immersive period of write: a mixture of Wow, of "I don't remember even writing that!", of my tinkering brain already shaping a revision strategy (a good thing), and noticing the new ideas already taking residence in the pages I'd reserved for them, anticipating their eventual visit.

I am not sure if the gang at the YAWP made it back to House 259 for their evening share following Jordan's reading on Saturday night, but I think they will forgive me knowing I was writing and reading and doing the things that YAWP permits.


Still, I missed out on hugs and words with so many fine people, like Bonnie and Tom and D.D. and Diana, Charisse and Rebecca, Christine and Grace (who I actually did see at the Safeway on Friday night when I stopped in for a post-reading slice of pumpkin pie) and many more.

Thank you to my family of muses again for an incredibly productive weekend; you may not have seen much of me but your energy launched me yet again, for which I'm forever grateful.