Aimee Herman's Blog, page 7
June 17, 2019
BOMB interview
Thank you to CQ (Christina Quintana) for your exquisite questions and Raluca Albu for being such a fantastic editor.
https://bombmagazine.org/articles/aim...
A “Hairy” Performance at Muffins Variety Show!!
It’s been a loooong time since I’ve done any sort of performance art, but I dug into my musty suitcase of handmade costumes and I am excited to perform a movement, Burlesque’y, drag, political, (what other words can I use to describe this so you will come), funny, silly, sexy piece at:
MUFFINS IN THE WINDOW, NYC’s longest-running variety show.
When? Thursday, June 20th at 7:30pm sharp!
Where? Dixon Place located at 161 Chrystie St in NYC
Also featuring: Trae Durica (swoon), Lambie, Ethan Cohen, and Wae Messed.
June 15, 2019
Dear Vermont, come celebrate “Everything Grows”
If you are in the Vermont area today June 15th, I will be reading from “Everything Grows” at Brooks Memorial Library located at 224 Main St in Brattleboro, VT at 2pm in the young adult room. There will be books for sale! In honor of the book, we will be writing letters to the most important person in our lives……
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June 14, 2019
In celebration of Matthew Hupert’s new book of poetry!!!!
Hydrogen Junkbox is honored to perform poemsongs to celebrate Matthew Hupert’s new book of poetry, “Secular Pantheism” TONIGHT!!!!
Celebrate “Secular Pantheism” at The Red Room @ KGB located at 85 E. 4th St in NYC from 8:30pm-10:30pm
Also featuring: FRANCOIS WISS w/ DANIEL VILLENEUVE
There will be many copies for sale, so make some room on your bookshelves for a brand new book of poetry by Matthew Hupert!!!
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June 13, 2019
Dada Dada Dada…..
Come and celebrate the maze of language that is DADA with Three Rooms Press’s newest anthology, Maintenant 13, tonight, Thursday, June 13th! So many poets and artists and fondlers of phonetics!!!
I am excited to read a new poem, published in this beautifully constructed book. So, come to le poisson rouge in NYC located at 158 Bleeker St. Doors open at 6:30 and the event begins at 7pm. Free admission, but books will be available for purchase. Dress up in whatever makes you feel like dada.
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June 11, 2019
TONIGHT: Emotive Fruition Pride Poetry show!
I am so excited to have two of my poems included in this great show. Emotive Fruition is a performance series where actors bring poems to life!
Celebrate Pride and Poetry at Caveat / 21 A Clinton Street in NYC
Doors open at 6:30pm and the performance begins at 7pm.
Tickets are $15 and may be purchased at http://www.caveat.nyc
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June 5, 2019
June 6th….a reading from “Everything Grows”
Looking forward to being a guest at St Francis de Sales Catholic Church on Thursday, June 6th to read from “Everything Grows“. The event begins at 7pm.
St Francis de Sales Catholic Church
135 East 96th Street
New York, NY 10128
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Books available for sale at event. Light refreshments will be served.
Suggested donation – $10 cash only (proceeds benefit Ali Forney Center)
May 7, 2019
My novel is officially OUT!
When I was a kid, I hung out in my closet. Really. Whitney Houston poster pressed against the wall, radio plugged in so I could listen to my favorite tapes, a pillow to place my head against while my clothes dangled above me. This was my safe space. I had no idea that years later, I would COME OUT of “the” closet. Of course, as queer folk, we come out many times. These announcements don’t necessarily get easier and sometimes the language changes.
As I was writing my novel, “Everything Grows” I wanted to explore this coming our process. Some of us walk out of our closets singing songs in celebration. Some remain, waiting. Some never emerge.
For over ten years, I slowly dripped out the words that are now available to YOU.
I hope this book inspires you to celebrate all the languages and identities and parts that make you you. And remember, the journey of unearthing bits of who you are continues. As you continue.
Celebrate with me on Friday, May 10th at Bluestockings bookstore in NYC at 7pm. It will be an evening of words and music and (hopefully) some discovery.
April 26, 2019
Burials and Boxes
What am I meant to leave behind? Bury into the soggy, spring ground and walk away from? This morning, while walking the pup, each leg felt like an office building with more windows than one could count, and cubicles and photo albums from every calendar, and at least 100 underpaid employees, and it may have been someone’s birthday because there was cake and an awkwardly harmonized Happy Birthday.
All of this latched onto, into my thighs as I walked.
This weight I carry with me cannot be lost with a diet of grains, gluten- and sugar-free, and more water. I don’t need to join a gym right now. At least, not because of this office building built into my body.
I think I need a burial. For everything I carry with me that can be let go of, that can be left behind.
Last night, I dreamt that I lost my sandbag. I was walking and fell–while clutching my sandbag–into a thick, deep pit of mud. It pulled me in, but I got out. Unfortunately, my sandbag did not make it.
In real life, I sleep with a purple sandbag stuffed with flaxseeds and scented with the calming aroma of lavender. Others may call it an eye pillow. Sandbag prefers to be called Sandbag. There are nights I wake up and cannot find it. I travel my fingers beneath each pillow, search further down the bed. My sleeping spouse will sometimes (instinctively) find it for me.
Some have teddy bears. Some prefer light music to fall asleep to. Some like to sleep in silk undergarments. Or leather. Or….we all have our needs.
For me, Sandbag puts me to sleep. And though I do sometimes put it over my eyes, there are many nights, I fall asleep clutching it like a wish against my chest.
To analyze my dreams, I become each person, each important part. This helps me to understand it, unfold it. A therapist suggested this once, and it has offered me quite a bit of insight.
So, as I walked my dog and felt the wet air twist itself into my curls, I thought about my dream. I became my sandbag, losing itself in the dirt. Burying itself.
So, what am I ready to bury and move away from?
My current therapist–the best one–has told me that I may be ready to rewrite my story. I keep telling the same one.
But I know it so well. I’ve memorized only a few facts, but THIS story I can recite backwards.
When I was in my twenties, I had boxes. The first one started when I was nineteen, and I was with my first girlfriend. It became a casket of memories, even though we were still together then, as I stuffed receipts from outings, movie stubs, love notes, photos, even some gifts. When we broke up, I couldn’t get rid of the box. It was such a large piece of us, so I hid it beneath my bed, in closets as I moved and carried it with me past many state lines.
The next box was smaller and that one bled into another box which was bigger and then my next box overflowed and I had to graduate into a bigger one. I never told anyone of my boxes because it was a way of holding on, it became another secret I collected (I was so good at that). But then, my partner (at the time) learned of my collection and asked me to get rid of them. I was reluctant, but understood. We were moving in together and it wasn’t right to move in my past loves too.
So. I threw. Them. Away.
There are some things we simply cannot get rid of. I’ve got this army of scars on my arms and (elsewhere) that cannot be recycled or composted or buried beneath my bed. I guess there are creams and treatments, but mine are so embedded, and just like my glasses and the way that I hiccup only once sometimes, they are a part of me.
My sandbag is trying to tell me something. As it comforts me through the night, it whispers in its healthy flaxseed-soaked voice: How about you stop living behind you, and living ahead, and start walking within your current?
I do not like to leave my house. The subway has become a traveling circus of panic attacks. Lately, I have been daydreaming of mountains and closet space. I just don’t know how to be present.
Perhaps this is all to say that maybe a contemplated burial is enough right now. A realization that yes, it is time to let go because by doing so, I can make room for more. More memories that have been waiting on line for years to get into the packed club that is me.
What I was and what I am have been battling my whole life. I am ready to examine what I could be.
April 12, 2019
A Celebration of Words! “Everything Grows”
It has been quite a journey, but I am deeply excited to let go of the words I’ve been collecting inside me for ten plus years! Celebrate the release of my novel, “Everything Grows” on Friday, May 10th, at Bluestockings Bookstore in NYC at 7pm.
Bluestockings Bookstore is located at 172 Allen St. in NYC
The evening will include a live mini-musical featuring excerpts from the novel and original songs performed by Hydrogen Junkbox (featuring Aimee Herman, Eric Alter, and David Lawton). Copies of EVERYTHING GROWS will be available for purchase and signing at the event.
EVERYTHING GROWS is an LGBTQ+ Young Adult (age 16 and older) coming-of-age novel in which a teenage girl grapples with the suicide of a classmate and her mother’s depression, while discovering her own gender and sexual identity.
The novel has received extensive pre-publication praise, with BN Teen Blog citing it as one of 12 most anticipated historical YA fiction of 2019, and Autostraddle (the world’s most popular lesbian website) named it one of the “LGBT YA Books to Get Excited for in 2019.” Foreword Reviews raves that EVERYTHING GROWS “will win over the hearts of its young adult audiences,” while Booklist praises it as “sensitive and informative.”
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