Zetta Elliott's Blog, page 9

hobbit life

It’s time for Elevenses so I’ve put the kettle on and will drink my tea from a fancy cup while enjoying the last slice of banana bread. I canceled tomorrow morning’s appointment, which means I have a whole week without any online or in-person obligations (though I’m having my tarot cards read on Friday night by a friend in NYC). Yes, I have a novel to write and my To Do list is as long as ever, but I plan to live like a hobbit for the next few days: lots of indulgence, and tasty food, and rest. Last week was pretty awful; I was taking medication for migraines, sinus pain, and the worst cramps I’ve ever had. Got back from Toronto early Monday morning and immediately got to work on my toy theater. I had appointments every day of the week and then my fridge died on Saturday. Lucky for me, Lowe’s is delivering throughout the holiday weekend and my window this morning was from 8am to noon but I must have been their first stop. I went out for bags of ice last night but forgot to get some cash for the delivery guys so I went out again at 7am—and I’m glad I did because they definitely earned their tip today! I didn’t measure the new fridge—on the website it looked about the same size as my old one—so it didn’t fit in the pantry and the doors had to be removed even to get it through the building’s back gate. But it’s here now and I didn’t have to throw out too much food. I feel relaxed now—not exhausted or weary, just at ease. I wasn’t nervous about our final sharing for the puppetry residency; we met as a group last week and individually with the theater’s tech person this week. Then we did a run-through two hours before the online event and it was only when I signed off that my neck seized up, making it hard to turn my head. I was already on a bunch of medication so didn’t do anything besides some simple stretches. When I saw the physical therapist last week, I told him I was pretty sure my back pain and sciatica were at least partly stress-induced. The morning I left for Toronto, my back pain flared as soon as I got up at 4:30am when that usually only happens mid- or post-flight. He thinks I need to sync my muscles so I’ll work on that this summer, but I also need to process difficult emotions instead of holding them in my body. I’m working on a few poems about my time with family and that feels good—both to be writing again and to tell the truth about our complicated history. I had tea with my cousin the day I arrived and she gifted me some family heirlooms our grandmother had saved for her youngest sister Laura since she was the namesake of our great-grandmother Laura Eva Holman. That’s LEH as a child in the 1890s (left), and Bethany also gave me LEH’s scrapbook, which is full of cartes de visite and quirky poems and illustrations from Ladies Home Journal. Laura took her own life last year and since she had been shunned by some members of our family, Bethany decided not to attend the anniversary party of my uncle and aunt. I went and I can’t lie—it was wonderful to see so many familiar faces. I don’t go up to Canada very often so I tend to get a warm reception from my relatives—but not my siblings, who don’t speak to me. So I’m working on a poem about those two experiences of being embraced by some and shunned by others. I didn’t feel disloyal to Laura by going to the anniversary party but I need to say something about the unfairness of it all. Not sure I deserve to be trusted with these heirlooms but will do my best to use them to tell a complete, honest story of our family. Tomorrow I get my notes from the freelance editor who’s reviewing my latest poetry collection. Poet Ada Limón had some good advice on creating a book of poems—“identify your themes and then keep writing”—and that’s what I’ve done. I sent Cynthia two additional poems after the mass shootings last month but held onto the rest. Will fit them in and see what my trusted readers think about the collection before passing it on to my agent. She sent the graphic novel out last week and we’re still waiting to hear back from the editor who requested half a dozen picture book manuscripts. I’m not particularly hopeful but also know I can self-publish a few titles this year if I want. At yesterday’s JustKids Book Festival here in Chicago I gave a talk on community-based publishing; there were only 4 people in the audience so I went pretty fast so I could get off the stage and let the next guest on. But when my talk ended, several people came up to give me books, and take selfies, and ask for some advice on their own indie projects. Chicago teachers are already self-publishing their students’ work, which is wonderful. There’s a lot of innovation in this city…now that my residency is over, I’ll have to decide what my next steps will be when it comes to puppetry. Apply to an incubator? Take some more classes? I bet there are tutorials on YouTube that could show me how to turn my lovely doll into a hand puppet. I tidied the apartment but couldn’t bring myself to throw out one large cardboard box—so I have the materials I need if I decide to keep going with the toy theater. I will live my best hobbit life this week while also finishing up these poems and writing a thousand words a day so I meet my July deadline for The War of the Witches. It’s Juneteenth and Father’s Day; Amazon is doing a promotion of the Dragons in a Bag e-book so if you want a digital copy, get yours today for $1.99. Or don’t shop at all and use the holiday as it was intended—a time to gather with loved ones and appreciate our ancestors’ struggle for liberation!

the waiting game

My astrological reading for this week urged me to keep moving: “You think you’re stuck in a rut, but you’re not.” I do feel like I’m playing the waiting game—contracts, editorial feedback, checks, this reluctant peony—they’re all overdue. But that fact doesn’t prevent me from living my life. On Saturday I forced myself out of the house to go see a puppet presentation of artists participating in an incubator initiative through the Chicago Puppet Festival. I actually bought tickets for the show on Thursday as well, but didn’t make it. Which is why I wasn’t mad at all the folks who registered for our event on Wednesday at the University of Chicago and then didn’t show up. We still had an excellent conversation and the small group of attendees was very engaged; I made up new slides for my part of the presentation and I’m sure I’ll use those again for future events. So I missed the puppet show on Thursday but managed to write a thousand words a day last week so the novel is progressing. The show on Saturday was *so* inspiring and instructive—there was a wide range of styles and themes, and no one in the audience cared that the performances weren’t perfect. Things got dropped and knocked over but the stories were compelling and you were rooting for the puppeteers so it really didn’t matter. The point of a lab is to give you time and space to experiment. I need to remember that. I haven’t touched my toy theater in over a week. Sticking my spider legs on with velcro wasn’t working out and so I just stopped everything. I want perfect tableaux but that isn’t what puppetry is meant to be/do…my cohort has another meeting this Friday, which I will attend from Toronto. That trip is a little stressful but I’m just trying to keep my expectations low and go with the flow. Late last night I remembered I have to register with ArriveCan and so got my passport and vaccination card scanned and uploaded to the app. Earlier in the day I went to the Hyde Park Community Art Fair with friends and found a lovely painting for my home. Got back in time to attend the New York Historical Society’s family book club; they were reading Ship of Souls, which was published a decade ago, so I just answered a few questions and offered advice for aspiring writers. Didn’t quite follow my own advice (“set aside time each day to do nothing but write”) but sat in front of the TV for the rest of the day and still managed to write a new introduction for Book #5. Ran on the treadmill this morning since rain’s expected all day and then collected my googly eyes from the mailroom; I’m ready to give Anansi another try. Found a notice from the IRS in my mailbox telling me I should expect my 2020 refund soon…good things come to those who wait, right? But God helps those who help themselves, too. I’m not in limbo. I’m not in a rut. I ran by the lake last week but left my pedometer at home—and that’s ok. We’re having another online conversation next week that may or may not be well attended. But the conversation is sure to be wonderful with two friends serving as hosts and moderators. Join us if you can!

grounded

There was a moment at the airport in DC when I wondered why I had agreed to go from Chicago to Maryland and back in 36 hours. Social distancing left not enough seats at the gate for everyone on the packed flight, and so people had to stand and didn’t seem to care that we couldn’t board until passengers on the arriving flight deplaned. Not a lot of masks but plenty of wet coughs and sneezes…it was great to see author friends at the festival but our event wasn’t very well attended and I doubt many books were sold. So, was it worth it? I think I thought a quick trip would be easier to recover from, with less risk of exposure to COVID. I got up early on Friday, had breakfast, went to the post office, then hurried back home to do a virtual visit for a school in NYC. As soon as it ended, I packed my laptop and headed to the airport; by the time I got off the plane, I’d managed to pull something in my back so the hour-long ride from DC to Gaithersburg was very uncomfortable. I stocked up on Tylenol at the hotel and ordered in before prepping my presentation for that evening’s meeting of the Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers (CRBP). I got some great feedback on how to assemble my spider puppet before logging off and getting very little sleep that night. Went for a walk at 8am but it was already sweltering; cooled off, met friends for brunch nearby, and then took the shuttle to the festival. Our moderator was fantastic and came bearing gifts but as soon as our one-hour conversation and 30-minute signing session were over, I collected my suitcase, called an Uber, and headed back to the airport. My back wasn’t hurting as much and the verbal altercation over a window in first class fortunately didn’t escalate. I got home, submitted my receipts to my publicist, and immediately ordered a pizza for dinner. Fell asleep on the couch and couldn’t fall back to sleep after waking at 3am. I’m whining, I know. Not many authors are able to write for a living; they have full-time jobs and hustle to find time to write after hours. It took years for me to reach this stage and I guess this is my cost-benefit analysis. It’s not often that I get invited to book festivals, so I feel I have to say yes when I do and authors owe it to their publisher to get out there and promote the book. But I know I want to pivot away from this author life so I’ve got to make that shift in my mind as well. I’ve spent most of today working on my toy theater, but only got to work after taking a walk, then some migraine medication, and a long nap. Travel takes you out of your routine and messes with whatever momentum you managed to build before stopping to pack. I have just one in-person event coming up here in Chicago; everything else this summer is virtual. But I’ve got a family event in Toronto next month that’s turning into a headache…the pandemic has made me too comfortable with operating from home and disinclined to extend myself unless it’s absolutely necessary. The CRBP allows me to experiment and play and learn and grow. Our community is virtual right now but a Black woman puppeteer reached out to me yesterday to invite me to join two other organizations—one for puppeteers in general and the other for Black women puppeteers specifically. There’s no money in making puppets and that’s also freeing. I don’t need an agent or a massive following on social media. Just enough courage to potentially make a fool of myself, make mistakes, make slow progress over time. And possibly make something beautiful.

find your people

I did it! My first in-person event since the start of the pandemic was amazing and I wasn’t as rusty as I thought I might be. As an introvert, my social stamina has never been great, but with help I managed to get through a very full day on Friday—8am school visit in Richmond, 9:45am virtual read-aloud with kids in Philly, 11:30 interview with the education reporter at the Richmond Times-Dispatch (read her great article here) followed by a noon interview with a reporter from the Richmond Free Press. At 2pm we walked over to The Book Bar where there was an informal reception attended by several local elected officials. I skipped the scheduled dinner at 5pm and tried to rest a little before heading to the beautifully restored Ashland Theatre to sign 160 books for attendees before our event started at 7pm. I was still signing books when folks started to arrive but then went backstage and met journalist Michael Paul Williams and author Phyllis Theroux. Festival founder Clark Mercer greeted everyone, Phyllis gave us a thoughtful introduction, and then Michael asked me to begin by reading a bit of A PLACE INSIDE OF ME. I chose the stanza about pride and noted that I felt like I’d found my people even though we were in a rather conservative county with a history of book bans (To Kill a Mockingbird back in 1966). Michael is a great conversationalist and we went a little over time but it was so nice to get off the stage and meet people who came out on a stormy night to show their support. My security detail was appreciated but really not necessary because the folks who came to hear me speak were lovely. I didn’t stay too long at the reception; a guest kindly packed me some appetizers to go, and I scarfed them down before falling asleep in front of the TV once I got back to the hotel. That very full day wouldn’t have been possible without festival volunteer Liz picking me up and ensuring that I arrived on time for everything. On our way to the hotel on Thursday, she showed me Monument Avenue, former site of several Confederate statues; Liz also pointed out Kehinde Wiley’s new sculpture at the VA Museum of Fine Arts and I later met the sculptor of the Arthur Ashe statue installed where traitors to the country once stood. I did a little historical research of my own later that afternoon after visiting the Shockoe Hill African Burying Ground. The site has no official marker but was being surveyed to determine how many intact burials remain; like so many other Black cemeteries, there have been centuries of disrespect and development on and around the site (a boarded up gas station in this case). It was good to learn more from the surveyors but it’s still depressing to know that almost every city in the country probably has a similar history of disrespecting our dead. I got back to the hotel and started a new poem (“Everywhere Our Dead”) and realized during my conversation with Michael on Friday that I write about burial grounds a lot…first in Ship of Souls, then again in Cin’s Mark, and there’s a forgotten slave cemetery in Ola’s Dream (or will be if I ever finish that novel). I talked about the Bethel Burying Ground in Philly and the historian who meticulously combed through the burial registry so he could name and locate addresses for the 5000 African Americans interred beneath what is now a playground. How should we honor the dead? They won’t be digging at Shockoe Hill, which I understand—let the dead rest in peace. But as an archaeology buff, I wonder what secrets the soil might reveal if we looked beneath the surface. Imagine being harassed, enslaved, and oppressed your entire life only to have your remains disrespected even after death. At the airport on Saturday I found a quiet corner and cleared my inbox before it was time to board. I let my editor know that there were no copies of The Witch’s Apprentice available for fans of the series because Random House let it go out of print three months after publication—despite my regular reminders that we were nearing the 10K mark. If I’m tracking sales, why aren’t they? I’m heading to Gaithersburg next and that will be another missed opportunity if the second printing isn’t ready by then.

The pandemic hasn’t been that hard for introverts like me but my time in VA made me realize that I actually *have* missed interacting with the public! I got home yesterday afternoon and had just enough time to unpack before my “affinity group” met via Zoom for the Black puppetry residency. I hope we get to gather in person eventually. I had a phone conference with my mentor before leaving Richmond and will prep today for my toy theater class, which starts tomorrow. I got a wine box from a nearby store and will clear my desk so I have room to work. Looking forward to a much-needed day of silence…

an open door

I woke up this morning still smelling The Forum. Maybe I got some of the dust in my hair when I climbed up to the attic yesterday…it reminded me of the plantations I toured when I was living in Louisiana. Old wood smells like the earth and the unvarnished boards are soft beneath your feet. There were so many traces inside The Forum—layers of paint falling away to reveal other colors, beautifully molded electrical fixtures dangling from old wires. Everyone on the tour signed a waiver but I felt totally safe and it really was a magical experience! After visiting the attic, I changed my outline for Book #5…Jaxon definitely needs to spend a little time up there. The folks at Urban Juncture have just been amazing; I sent them my books and congratulated them on their grant and in return, they offered me access to The Forum and arranged for a crew to film me as I wandered around in awe. Once the tour ended and the other guests left, Asia (the director) had me stand by a window and answer a lot of questions about how the building sparked my imagination: “Close your eyes, listen for a moment, and tell me what you hear.” It’s what you feel, really, in a place that for decades offered sanctuary and opportunities for Black joy. After the interview, I went up onstage and read from THE WITCH’S APPRENTICE—that’s the same stage Nat King Cole performed on as a teen! There’s a painted mural on the back wall and we were puzzling over one S-shaped object—I finally realized it was a heron! Stalking fish in the lagoon behind the Museum of Science and Industry. So many mysteries to solve, so many stories waiting to be told. I had a moment yesterday where I wondered if I’d made a mistake moving to Hyde Park. I did look at some places in Bronzeville but friends thought it would be hard for me to get around there without a car. I’m still close and I’m still in love with my neighborhood but I think I’m going to be spending a lot more time in Bronzeville. It already feels like home and it matters that a community org there opened its doors and made me feel welcome. I posted this haiku for Day 24 of National Poetry Month. I wrote more than a poem a day last week but feel my sponge drying out…have written a lot of angry poems this month but will stop by the Garden of the Phoenix to see the cherry blossoms today and maybe that will inspire a different tone.

   cities keep secrets

each brick holds a memory

buildings testify

 

dilletante

Dilettante: “A person who cultivates an area of interest, such as the arts, without real commitment or knowledge.” I prefer to think of myself as a person with a great capacity for curiosity. Do I lack knowledge or commitment? At the beginning, perhaps, but I don’t flit from one thing to another whenever a challenge presents itself. Yet “mastery” isn’t everyone’s goal; sometimes we learn enough just by allowing ourselves to be a beginner again. In some ways, it’s almost a disadvantage to be proficient in one field (writing) because you then feel quite humbled by your initial attempts at something new. My shadow puppetry class ended last weekend and it took a few days for me to feel good about my efforts. I was very aware of my limitations but I also made a serious attempt at learning new skills: I made my stage/screen out of a pizza box as demonstrated in class, and I added an Anansi character to my existing script. I should have developed a new, short sketch for the class instead of trying to animate my fairly detailed narrative. I barely got three scenes done before I realized that a story set in outer space isn’t really suited to shadow puppetry—unless you’re willing to have a white screen, which I’m not. So I signed up for Toy Theater II instead of the next shadow puppetry class and look forward to building another stage with the tools I’ve already acquired. I met the other fellows in my Black puppeteer residency last night and we were assured again and again by our mentors that it’s the process that matters most, not the final product. Which was a relief to many of us since we all have areas where we need help. Everyone’s got a project that will evolve over time—we just have to decide how the next eight weeks could best be used. I have three weeks before my next class starts so I’ll do a little research on my own, try making some puppets and sets, see how close I can get to the image that’s in my mind. Look into hiring an assistant. One of my classmates created a stunning tableau and it made me wonder if/how I actually want to use movement in my performance. Our shadow puppet instructors ended the class by sharing some of their own work and one play was done as a PowerPoint! Which is a good option for a solo puppeteer who only has two hands but multiple moving pieces…

Today I’m trying to focus on poetry and tomorrow I’ll need to give some time to the next dragon book. I sent the series to the organization that’s trying to restore the Forum and got an invitation to tour the building! I’m so excited. Urban Juncture just got a million-dollar grant to turn the Forum into a cultural hub for the community, which will include a Lorraine Hansberry theater. Amazing! I took a walk yesterday to see more of historic Bronzeville and there are so many buildings that have witnessed more than a century of change. How can I help them testify? I’ve got my cast of characters so I was looking for homes where they could have lived in the 1890s—neighbors to Ida B. Wells-Barnett and other important activists. But that book will have to wait…no flitting allowed! There’s enough space in my imagination for these ideas to marinate while I focus on the tasks at hand: writing a poem a day, building my toy theater, finishing the outline for Book #5. This is the poem I wrote on Thursday…

 

I don’t want to write about Ukraine even though

I cry every night while watching the news and

fume when I empty my spam folder each morning

and find at least eight messages insisting that

Beautiful Ukrainian Girls Are Waiting To Meet You

I want to write about the innocent children of Yemen

who are dying of starvation and the women in northern

Ethiopia being gang-raped by soldiers every bit as evil

as the Russians in Bucha but I haven’t shed any tears

over them because the media isn’t covering those

conflicts 24/7 (or at all) BLACK LIVES MATTER and

when I pointed that out on Facebook a White friend

accused me of whataboutism (after declaring his anti-

Zionist credentials) and I am tired of all the spaces

where I am expected to be silent and offer sympathy

to those who despise me and my kind BLACK LIVES

MATTER Tedros dared to say as much but couldn’t

say it outright of course because they hate him

already for being a Black African running the World

Health Organization and steady reminding the west

that they will never be safe—not even after three four

or five booster shots—if the rest of the planet has been

left unprotected BLACK LIVES MATTER a White cop in

Grand Rapids shot Patrick Lyoya a Congolese refugee in

the back of the head over license plates last week he was

already on the ground on top of the man we’re only seeing

the footage now of course ten days later and the cop

turned off his bodycam near the end but someone filmed

it from the street I am tired today could barely haul myself

out of bed and out for a run but I have to take care of my

health because who else will took some photos of the tulips

and daffodils bending but not breaking against the brutal

wind that sort of scene translates easily into verse that’s

the poem I expected to write today because I committed

to writing one poem a day for the month of April but

instead I have written about the war

this is my poem for Ukraine

this is it

it’s all I’ve got

BLACK LIVES MATTER

© Zetta Elliott

#NationalPoetryMonth2022

 

You, Too, Can Fly

My contribution to the anthology WE RISE, WE RESIST, WE RAISE OUR VOICES edited by Wade and Cheryl Willis Hudson.

The Next Chapter

It’s April so I’m writing a poem a day in honor of National Poetry Month. As I penned my second poem this evening, I realized I never went over the poems I wrote last April. Then I remembered that I’d written a poem a day for November as well…and then I found a bunch of “loosies” in my computer’s poetry folder…so I spent a couple of hours this evening pasting them into a single document and now I’ve got over a hundred poems to review! I’ve been posting poems on social media as well but it feels wrong using “old” poems when I have so much new/unfinished/published work lying around. Moonwalking comes out in about a week but so far I’ve only shared one concrete poem for Pi Day last month. I also read that poem for a virtual talk I gave at a local school last week and a student immediately asked where she could get the book…I hope our verse novel has that effect on other young readers. Poetry is more accessible for a lot of students and our book combines verse, music, and fine art—there are a lot of entry points for librarians and educators to exploit. Lyn and I will be talking about our book with Baltimore librarian Deb Taylor on April 13; you can register at the Politics & Prose website. We’ll also be presenting at the Gaithersburg Book Festival on May 14; I haven’t seen Lyn since the pandemic so it’ll be nice to be on stage together for to discuss our collaboration. Tickets for the event at the Ashland Theater in VA are now available and I spoke to a reporter from the Richmond Times-Dispatch yesterday; she thinks the event will draw quite a crowd and did a nice write-up in today’s paper. I’ll conduct my first in-person school visit while I’m in Richmond, which should be interesting. These students lost their school in a fire not too long ago so I hope we can work together to write some poems to heal their hearts.

Last week I found out that my play wasn’t accepted into a local development program. I was disappointed but also grateful that the rejection made it easier to close that chapter of my writing life. The next day I spent the morning at the Art Institute and then walked back to the South Side. It sure didn’t feel like spring weather-wise, but my heart felt full again and I know I’m ready to write. The play will just go back in its drawer for the time being. My shadow puppet workshop starts on Monday; I’ve got a long list of materials to purchase so that’s tomorrow’s task. Random House came back with a better offer so hopefully we’ll seal the deal and then I’ll need to get started on Book #5. It’s not the ideal time to start sifting through a hundred poems but I’ll try to work on a few each day this month. Write a poem, post a poem, revise a poem. That’s doable for 30 days, right? At the end of my wonderful conversation with Shelagh Rogers last month, she asked me to recite a stanza from A Place Inside of Me but most of our conversation was about The Witch’s Apprentice. You can listen to the segment here. I’ve got an in-person event just outside of Toronto scheduled for September. Will the pandemic be under control by then? Who knows. But I haven’t crossed the border since January 2020 and hope I can finally connect with family and friends in the GTA.

trickster tourism

Tourism is complicated. For too many previously colonized countries, it’s a necessary source of income—but how galling to have to cater to the whims of those (former) colonizers without being able to tell the full, true history of exploitation that makes tourism necessary in the first place. While I was in San Juan, I kept thinking of the documentary Life & Debt. which juxtaposes the causes and effects of neocolonialism with the ridiculousness of White tourists demanding and glibly consuming a fictional narrative about Jamaica. This was my first second time staying at a beachfront resort and though I appreciated the comfort and convenience, I’m not sure I’d do it again. Is there a way to be an ethical tourist—in it but not of it? I’m not sure. Maybe that’s why I’ve largely avoided vacations, preferring to embark on research trips that make me feel like something other (better?) than a pleasure-seeking tourist. If I’m studying some aspect of a country’s history, then it’s respectful and not exploitative, right? I went to Puerto Rico without much of a plan and didn’t try to accomplish much. There’s something about squandering sunny days that makes me feel guilty, even here in Chicago, so I wasn’t upset when it rained off and on for two of the three days—that made it seem acceptable to just hide out in my hotel room. When the sun was out, I got up early and walked the length of the beach, I dozed on a chaise or read for a little while, I finished my puppetry application, I researched tours but only took two—one of Old San Juan and another of the caves at Parque Histórico Cueva María de la Cruz in Loíza. That last day was the best in spite of the rain that caused my flight to be delayed by several hours. I skipped my morning walk and took an Uber out to Loíza where I joined a bomba workshop that was already in progress for a large group of middle school students. The drummers, musicians, and dance instructor were impressive and I was mostly able to follow the conversation despite the fact that it was entirely in Spanish. But the best part came when the dancer tried to bring students onto the dance floor. One young woman jumped up right away and it soon became evident that she didn’t need any instruction—she must have been making those moves since she was a child. The boys were more reluctant but then one of the teachers—a very young man with braces and skinny jeans—got up, saluted the lead drummer, and showed everyone how it’s done! He kicked off his white sneakers and danced so elegantly and expertly…and two of his female colleagues later did the same. Then more and more students found the courage to give it a try…it was amazing. Education should always be that way—electric and experiential. I had brought a few of my books with me and thought I might have to take them back to Chicago but when I offered them to the teachers, they gladly accepted them. When the rain let up a bit, I got a quick tour of the caves, saw the fossilized coral and buzzing beehives, bought something from each of the three vendors on site, and then the younger drummer kindly drove me back to San Juan when Uber couldn’t find me a driver. We talked about his plans to open a restaurant and how challenging it is to preserve bomba music when salsa and reggaetón dominate the airwaves. I got to the airport at 1pm, managed to get the last seat on a later connecting flight in Charlotte, and settled in to wait out the rain. Almost twelve hours later I was back in Chicago, back in my apartment, sleeping in my own bed. What did I learn? Puerto Rico was both familiar and foreign; familiar because it’s a lot like Nevis and the other Caribbean countries I’ve visited, with US fast food chains almost squeezing out the local restaurants. At times it felt as though my inability to speak Spanish limited my ability to connect with folks in a meaningful way. Learning Spanish wouldn’t make me less of an outsider but at least folks would have the option of communicating in their mother tongue. The middle graders looked so familiar—just like the students I used to work with in NYC. But they’re not the same. My character in Moonwalking is part of the diaspora; he feels removed from his roots, which is why he heads to San Juan at the end of the novel. But if I wrote a sequel, I’d have to address the challenges Pierre would face once he arrived. That was an interesting aspect of the Mamie Till story on ABC—Emmett was shown striving to impress his cousins and the other teenage boys in Mississippi; some saw him as a big city show-off, and so didn’t bother to school him in the ways of the South. It’s hard for me to understand why anyone would send their child to the Deep South in 1955, but then my parents were eager to forget and/or conceal their roots. Some departures—for some people—are meant to be final. My favorite photo from this trip was taken as we prepared to land in San Juan. The midnight moon was glowing in the starless black sky and the sea was black as well. There were darker shadows cast on the surface of the water…it was beautiful and nothing like the technicolor postcard images designed to represent Puerto Rico to tourists. When I go back, I’ll skip the beach and stay somewhere inland—rent a house instead of booking a hotel. And maybe by then I’ll have acquired enough Spanish to make communication better. Maybe…

 

shadow & substance

I put puppets on my vision board last year. When a student last month asked me what I’d do if I wasn’t an author, I told her I’d be a puppeteer. Now, I don’t actually know how one becomes a puppeteer and I don’t know if I want to pull strings or just write the scripts…but I’m applying for a three-month virtual residency and I’m taking an online history course on Black puppetry and performance that starts in April. Today I went to see The Magic City performed by Manual Cinema and it was extraordinary. Not at all what I expected—I’ve always felt that the wonder of puppetry comes from the hidden hands that manipulate the characters, but this performance put everything in plain sight. You almost didn’t know where to look because you could clearly see the narrator, the musicians, the actors, the puppets, the transparencies, the video camera—you saw exactly how the show was being produced and just above it all was the “finished product” on the big screen. It was a little overwhelming at first but also fascinating to see how expertly choreographed it all was. But what’s lost when all is revealed instead of the mechanics being concealed? It that still magic—or just labor? I doubt that it matters to kids but I’m still stuck on the idea of making something impossible seem possible. For the residency application I have to outline a specific project, which is hard to do when I don’t even know what all the options are. I think I’ve only ever made puppets out of paper bags and socks! I love this version of Peter and the Wolf but I think the strings on the puppets were removed digitally. Is that magic? Or cheating? Does it matter? (Just checked—it’s stop-motion animation using puppets!) Someone posted the Muppets singing “Danny Boy” for St. Patrick’s Day and I couldn’t stop laughing…but I don’t want my puppets to be silly or furry—I want to tell an African origin story about spiders and stars…shadow puppets would work but I’ve got this gorgeous doll that I want to use, too. Can I do both? Probably. Now I’m watching all the Muppets videos on YouTube (“Bohemian Rhapsody”!) Jim Henson was such a genius. Better get back to work on my application. I said I’d leave my laptop behind when I go to San Juan next week but I don’t think I can. It’s my security blanket and I have too many ideas percolating right now to go without it. I don’t really know how to vacation. I’m not sure I even like to vacation! A kid lit friend told me about an artist residency in upstate NY but I don’t need time away from my life…I’m blessed to have a life that’s designed to make it easy for me to write whenever I’m ready. And I’m ready now but I’m leaving on Monday so the laptop will just have to come along…