I am a writer based in Philadelphia. I have three writing arenas: creative non fiction, short stories, and feminist/modern retellings of fairy tales. "The Baby and Other Stories," a memoir, is my first book length work. I received my Master of Liberal Arts, with a concentration in Creative Writing, from the University of Pennsylvania in 2004. My novella, Fly, Rapunzel was a finalist in Low Fidelity Press’s 2006 Novella Award Contest. The first piece in this collection of stories (“The Baby”) was published in Philadelphia Stories; a short story (“The Woods”) was published online in Quail Bell Magazine. I have also been blogging about the process of writing this memoir: http://invokingthei.tumblr.com/
I love Sumerian guardian figures–curly hair, bushy beards, wings, and I’m sure what used to be colorful frocks. The world they come from is heavy with scents I will never know. I feel for and respond to them how I might if I met a living fairy. I am especially fond of the giant winged […]
I have been to London. But I have spent far more time in the London of my mind, which has been richly fed by many-faced narratives. That London was nourished by children’s tales where bears roam train stations, children fly out the window, and there are suburbs named Narnia and the Shire. I am simultaneously […]
I have some singular gifts, for example, my ability to do very little, for several consecutive days, during vacations. I really luxuriate in stillness. I seem to have two main modes–running around and inert. Being unchained from my to-do list gives rise to the inner dreamer. The contrast is interesting, I feel most philosophical at […]
I’m a day late. The world has ended, and inconveniently, but maybe joyfully, it seems to be going on for me. The end of the world looked pretty much like any holiday Friday in my experience, except for the amassed police and their brusk ways and the impossible traffic, impatient drivers honking. (That business, which […]
Since I was a little girl, I’ve enjoyed the BBC show Dr. Who, particularly the Tom Baker Dr. Who when I was little, and now all the new reboot Doctors. I especially love the re-generation story lines when the doctor seems to die and is immediately reincarnated into a totally different person, who sounds different and […]
Two weeks ago, I was waiting for the trolley on the way to work when I saw a man walking on the tracks, holding a soiled roll of toilet paper. He had clearly thoughtfully placed a crap in the full privacy of the tracks. He was coming back, muttering to himself, and as soon as […]
I have four delicious days with no urgent deadlines or projects. I’d get this kind of satisfaction from traveling to Tahiti, receiving two daily massages for a week, or… being able to metabolize meals made of nothing but red wine, bacon and dark chocolate with no impact on my weight. I honestly don’t know what […]
I’m proud of this essay I wrote for a Junot Diaz website. Check it out: http://thecheatersguide.net/2012/11/13/the-cheaters-guide-to-loneliness/ Thanks!
This week, I’m thinking a lot about energy and how it can be used and redirected, and I’m thinking that maybe I need to learn the martial art Aikido. The premise of Aikido is that your attacker’s energy can be taken in and redirected so as to protect both you and the attacker. If every […]
So one of the more surprising side effects of my current lifestyle is my need for a very specific brand of physical comfort: softness. As much as possible, I want to be encased in fuzziness. I have never so craved warm, pliable, downy, generous fabrics–and so find me here at 10:30 on a Saturday night, […]
Now that my time is parsed, sectioned, subdivided, and carefully annotated to account for every one of my multiple (and seemingly endless) obligations–I have to confront the obvious, which I love to pretend doesn’t apply to me: I’m human. If I can reconcile myself with what might seem like an obvious proposition, then, what does […]
I’ve been trying to get better at tuning in and connecting in some small way with every person I exchange words with today. It’s a fun project-makes me feel very vaguely like the Dalai Lama’s neighbor–like after a lifetime of watching someone else be gracious and wise, it’s my turn. It’s also interesting how ambivalent […]
Someone once said to me that it takes about 10 years of therapy to realize what a total stranger can figure out about you in about three minutes (which sometimes makes me want to go bounding about asking strangers what they see.) I take myself too seriously. I love to laugh, but I think my […]
When I was in my twenties, someone said to me that I would never truly be done examining any issue in my life, that it may lie dormant for a part of my journey but that it would reappear in other guises at different times, and take me off guard. The metaphor at hand was […]
Seems like everything in Chicago is made of meat or cheese or some of both (when it’s not beer). In this case: bacon fat popcorn with bacon (of course) and shaved Parmesan and fried Sage. There’s something oddly earthy about this whole place – grounded and sensible – close to the earth. Despite the many […]
I’m leaving West Philadelphia for Northern Liberties. I’ve lived on the western shore of this city for almost twelve years – its the longest time span I’ve ever spent in a single neighborhood. I used to fantasize about which Philadelphia neighborhood I would leave for, and then the idea of leaving became totally absurd. I […]
My American grandma frequently says something to the effect of: “if you don’t have your health, you don’t have anything,” which is paired with my grandfather’s trademark comment, “life is hard.” I didn’t find either of these particularly compelling or comforting when I was younger, and as I get older I confront the truth and […]
Tonight I finally opened one of my two mystery “old file” boxes I’ve been lugging around from apartment to apartment since the mid 90s. Boy, I was organized back in the 90s. I found traces of my old New York life, one of my many partially discarded and partially digested selves. I uncovered my original […]
I haven’t written in months. My head is starting to feel like the cork in a champagne bottle. The pressure of unexpressed things is building steadily. First it manifests as a nagging need unmet–the perennial itch I can’t scratch, or at least won’t scratch yet. Then it becomes an annoying flood of ideas. Half-baked images, […]
It’s been a full week since I beat down my first year of grad school into submission. I remember last Thursday like a distant dream: the other me and her journey, now complete. It feels like a million years ago. It feels like another reality. My priorities have quickly been rewritten. I’m now in the […]