Debriefing

I found out yesterday I will be presenting at AWP Portland with Laura Catherine Brown, Anjali Enjeti, Amanda Miska, and Charlie J. Eskrew (a.k.a.Sean Smith). Our panel is called Go Your Own Way: Plotting the Path to a Writing Career. We will discuss our paths to writing: the pros, cons, and alternatives to the MFA, the importance of making connections in the publishing industry, utilizing resources such as conferences, residencies, fellowships, writing groups, and workshops, plus the benefits and drawbacks of working full or part-time while writing.

Also, I learned this week that my essay, Fundamentalist, will be included in By the Rivers of Babylon: Apostates Remember Believing, an anthology of work written by former evangelicals which was coedited by Chris Stroop and Lauren O’Neal. It will be released by a small press called Epiphany. Additionally, a friend, Thomas Larson, asked me to take part in the upcoming Nonfiction Now conference in Phoenix. Our panel is called The Faithful and the Faithless: Memoirists on Religion & Spirituality.

I’ve needed this.  This summer has been challenging, I injured myself at work in May packing my school library, spraining both my wrists and my elbows. I might have to have surgery just to get right. This summer I have had so many dark nights, nights when my hands have been numb and tingling, nights when they just throbbed and I’d just sob, desperate, worried that they’d never get better, nights when I had to go apologize to my son for not keeping myself together, because it’s not fair to stress him out, he’s only in high school.

My hands work best if I don’t use them, which is hard because I love to write and make and exercise and cook for my family. I’ve had to teach myself to write using speech to text. Luckily I’ve had an incredible support system. My husband brushes my hair and helps me get dressed. My son cooks me dinner and drives and helps me shop for groceries. My friend Hannah helped me format the few essays I could muster. I’m finally starting to get better but it’s been a long road.

Tonight when I was walking my dog Mary, I was listening to my friend and neighbor Vic Chesnutt‘s song Debriefing. It’s from my all-time favorite album, North Star Deserter. I included the lyrics below, which I feel like describes not just this summer but my life (and maybe yours?), but it’s best to not just read. It’s best to listen to the actual song.

When I deplete the funds
And they’re forced to pull the plug
Chisel on my tombstone
Debriefing, debriefing, debriefing, debriefing

-Vic Chesnutt, Debriefing

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