Nina MacLaughlin's Blog, page 22

It’s spring in Atlanta. There are leaves on trees and flowers...

It’s spring in Atlanta. There are leaves on trees and flowers all over the place and it seems like everyone’s talking about the pollen. Maybe you live in Atlanta. Maybe you know someone who does. Maybe you or they want to come tomorrow night, Tuesday, April 7, to Charis Books. I’ll be there at 7:30 pm to read and talk about HAMMER HEAD. I’ve met and spoken to so many Tumblr folks at the readings so far, and it’s been a highlight of the tour. It’s spring! It’s Atlanta! Come!

Charis Books, 1189 Euclid Ave, Northeast Atlanta, 7:30 pm, and all the info here.

Can’t come tomorrow night? Don’t live in Atlanta? You can buy the book all sorts of ways.

This piece of wood looked like it spent its working lifenear...

This piece of wood looked like it spent its working life
near seas. A salt-air wearing greyed its color, smoothed and roughed it, like
driftwood, like the clapboards on the houses by the water and on islands in New
England. Jonah was the one who spotted the board in the treasure-packed
warehouse of Longleaf Lumber. Nestled among all sorts of slabs, reclaimed from
barns and churches and houses, from floors and walls and beams, this one said something
special. The knot hole was good. The rounded edge was good. The straight edge was
good. The thickness was very good. When I took it to the counter to pay, the
woman who worked there said it took a certain sort to see this board’s
potential. I took it as a compliment. Its working life begins again, this time
as an end table.

I rode the subway last night from Cambridge across the river to...

I rode the subway last night from Cambridge across the river to Boston and I looked at the people on the train. I’ll go ahead and admit: I fantasized about what it would be like to see someone sitting there reading Hammer Head on their trip home from work, and whether I would go up to them and say, hello I wrote that. I had a collection of poems by Robert Hass in my lap, Time and Materials, and my fantasy shifted. What if Hass got on this Red Line train and saw me reading his book, with a photograph of his face filling the whole back cover, and what if he tapped me on the shoulder and said, hello I wrote that. I decided I would stand without speaking and kiss his seventy-four year-old cheek.

Tumblr and Housing Works threw a party for the launch of the book (the photo above comes from that evening), and I shared the stage with Cara Nicoletti, Rosie Schaap, Kate Bolick, and Tumblr’s Rachel Fershleiser. It was extraordinary. Exhilarating and nervewracking and all of it happened so fast and I’m having trouble finding the words to describe it. One of the great pleasures of doing these events has been meeting and talking with people from Tumblr, to put faces and handshakes to the blogs I know as friends. I’m looking forward to listing all the Tumblr folks who’ve come out in a later post.

Back to poems though, a friend I met through blogging here, a photographer named Jon Creamer, came to a quieter reading in Concord, Mass. He shared with me some lines from W.S. Merwin. They felt like a gift and they’ve been echoing in my head these last days, important always and especially now. Maybe you’ll be glad to know them, too. “Just this,” it begins.

Just this, this room where we are. Pay attention to that. Pay attention to who’s there. Pay attention to what isn’t known there. Pay attention to what is known there. Pay attention to what everyone is thinking or feeling; what you’re doing there. Pay attention. Pay attention.

[Photo credit: Yvonne Brooks]

Last week, leading up to a trip to New York, I had bees inmy...

Last week, leading up to a trip to New York, I had bees in
my brain. A frantic sort of buzz, a stung and not calm feeling. It was the
result of nerves, I think, for two events for Hammer Head in New York City. Butterflies in the belly is one
thing, that gentle sort of tummy flutter. This felt more pronounced. Bees in
the brain from nerves, and also as the result of much more communication than
I’m used to, more emails, more talking. All good, and all exciting, but a
different sort of energy than I’m used to and a different rhythm to the days.
Mind huzzering along, and hands a little shaky, I forced myself to the back
porch, away from my computer and compulsion to answer every email immediately.

I went to the back porch where the high snow drifts no longer
eclipse the fence. It was cold, still, but the light had a softness to it that
had nothing to do with winter. I’d heard birds chirping when I’d woken up that
morning. I laid the piece of white oak I’m working on across my
lap and started the last round of sanding. Six-hundred grade sandpaper,
gritless, and the wood looked almost as though it was lit from within, a glow
that comes sometimes when sanded so smooth. The highlights looked like golden
hair in afternoon sun. The rivery swirls looked like nothing so fixed or solid
as wood. I sanded and sanded and rubbed my hand over and over the wood and I
admired all the colors and the way it glowed and how it felt on the skin of my
palm and the lines and rings. The bees took a break.

They come and go, and I’m excited to tell you more about the
action of the last little bit, but better now to talk about how wood can look like
water.

(Also, if you want, buy the book.)

"Hammer Head" Swiss Chard and Roasted Garlic Sausages

"Hammer Head" Swiss Chard and Roasted Garlic Sausages:

Nina is the first real writer I ever knew. I met her when I was just finishing high school, her little brother was my boyfriend, a boy who would become my first real grown-up love (and a man who re…

I don’t have words for the gratitude for Cara Nicoletti’s honoring of Hammer Head on her beautiful blog. Come hear Cara, a writer, a butcher, and one of the warmest-hearted people I’ve had the good chance to know, tonight at Housing Works at 7 pm when we celebrate the release of Hammer Head. (And keep an eye out for her book Voracious due out in August.)

housingworksbookstore:housingworksbookstore:Tumblr presents Nina...

housingworksbookstore:

housingworksbookstore:

Tumblr presents Nina MacLaughlin’s Hammer Head launch party 
with Rosie Schaap, Cara Nicoletti, Kate Bolick, and Nina (carpentrix)!

Thursday, March 26 at 7pm / Free 
A carpenter, a butcher, and a bartender tell badass stories about work and writing. With (free) drinks to drink and (free) snacks to snack.

“No other book has made me want to reread Ovid and retile my bathroom floor, nor given me the conviction that I can do both. I loved it.” - Rosie Schaap

It’s now. It’s here. Run, don’t walk. This starts in 9 hours. We will SEE YOU THERE.

TONIGHT!!!!!!!!

wordbookstores:Event making. #ScrewdriversForEveryoneFriends,...

wordbookstores:

Event making. #ScrewdriversForEveryone

Friends, Tumblr pals in New York. TONIGHT! Come to WORD in Greenpoint at 7 pm where I’ll be rapping with Bustle’s Meredith Turits about HAMMER HEAD and who knows what other weird stuff. Two kinds of screwdrivers, care of the generous folks at Book Riot. Come. Bring your friends. Laugh and drink.

Thanks To Chance (And Craigslist), A Writer Becomes A Carpenter

Thanks To Chance (And Craigslist), A Writer Becomes A Carpenter:

Writer Nina MacLaughlin hit her low point producing a listicle of the world’s 100 Unsexiest Men. Six years and a lucky Craigslist ad later, she’s a carpenter and author of the new memoir Hammer Head.

Listen to the NPR segment from Saturday’s episode of All Things Considered in which I talk a bit about the work and the book. And read a short excerpt from HAMMER HEAD on the NPR site as well.

And, while you’re at it, why not buy the book?

Guys, this also falls under too-good-to-be-true, and I’m afraid...

Guys, this also falls under too-good-to-be-true, and I’m afraid if I write it here it won’t happen, but pending any breaking news in the next couple hours, I’m going to be on NPR’s ALL THINGS CONSIDERED between 5-6 pm today. Holy shit? Holy fucking shit.

Tune in.

(Above, answering good questions at the extremely lovely, comfortable, and great smelling(!) Sherman’s Bookstore in Portland, Maine. Worth a stop when you’re next in town. Photo by Jonah James Fontela who writes the best blog on Tumblr (follow him)).

bookriot:Welcome to Reading Lives, an interview podcast with...

bookriot:

Welcome to Reading Lives, an interview podcast with interesting people who love books. My guest this week is Nina
MacLaughlin. A classics major and former editor of The Boston Phoenix,
Nina quit her desk job to become a carpenter. She tells the story of
why and how she made such a drastic career change in her new book, Hammer Head.
In this episode, we talk classics, books about building things, how
boring it is to build bookshelves, and much more. This episode is
sponsored by Scribd and The Winner’s Crime by Marie Rutkowski.

Tune in here!

It was such a pleasure rapping with Jeff O’Neal of Book Riot about books I’ve loved. Any conversation in which I get to gush about Madeleine L’Engle, Maggie Nelson, Anne Carson and a bunch of other gods and goddesses in my writer pantheon is a bigtime pleasure. Give it a listen.