…with a whoosh and a whomp. Yes, I knew it was slick in Vermont. I slid down the hill to the gym the first morning before 6 a.m. in the dark bending my knees, staying low to the ground and trying to remember everything I knew about staying up. But I strode out of the
…that I first taught in the MFA program at Vermont College of Fine Arts in 2006. Showing up in Vermont in January and July? Sleeping in a dorm room? Eating cafeteria food? Hmmmm. Boot Camp for Writers! Who thought THAT was a good idea? During the rest of the year, I read my students’ material…the
New Year often feels like a time for a big leap–or at least a big step. Preferably forward. Three years ago at the end of December I headed to Chicago for what became an intense year of meeting fans of Lanie. Could anything be sweeter than talking to readers of that age? Listening to those youngsters tell me about gardens and yards and
Christmas joy–in the house shared by the teacher and nurse who lived in Maji–the only other English-speakers besides our family–and more recently!
My mom homeschooled me for my first three-four years of school–and I loved school. She used to laugh and tell the story of this exchange. She asked–when she started classes with my older sister–“Do you want to join Caroline in school?” I asked, “Do I have to?” “Only if you want to.” But that wasn’t
I tell stories with words. Words are the thing I moosh and goosh and smoosh around as potters smoosh clay…the things I shape and eventually–oh! I love that part–polish and smooth. Words make us feel things. Think things. Words bubble in our blood and brains. When I was in Seattle last weekend speaking at the
This is my first blog post in the new home for Write at Your Own Risk, and as I type this, I have a feeling it might show up under my WordPress blog instead. So it’s an experiment that might go nowhere at all…like so many of my pages in so many of my drafts.
This summer, I loved my time at the Culture and Heritage camp organized by Abshiiro Kids and other volunteers near DC–and it gave me one of my favorite fall stories. I was walking with Noh and his class–the rabbits–to the classroom where I was going to tell stories and talk about growing up in Ethiopia.
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