There’s something outrageously special about being honored by your hometown, to have the place that raised you up look at where you are and the work that you have done/are doing and not only respond positively, but honor you for it. I’ve had a lot of really special moments with the Portland, Oregon queer community in recent months.  I was asked to keynote this year’s Oregon Queer Youth Conference  and now the youth book group at SMYRC (the queer youth center where I grew up) is reading Roving Pack!!!

Amidst all of this I got the news that I had been selected as one of the 2013 Queer Heros NW by the Gay & Lesbian Archives of the Pacific Northwest and the Q Center!!!!! 

“We thank you from the bottom of our queer hearts, Sassafras – we know we can survive whatever the LGBTQ-hating adult world can throw at us, because you did” 

This is one of the most powerful compliments I’ve ever received. I’m humbled, and honored that my hometown thinks of me and my work so highly. The last two weeks have been an incredible whirlwind between this and the Lammys, I am even more committed to writing the kinds of stories that people can really connect with

my tiny little aligator friend at the hotel pool

The Saints & Sinners Literary Conference was one of the most incredible experiences I’ve had as a writer. It was a weekend filled with the kind of queer literary community that I hunger for. Over the course of the weekend I: was stuck in a huge thunderstorm that grounded my plane, worked with Dorothy Allison, met tons of incredible LGBTQ writers, talked about the industry on panels, listened to other brilliant panels, ate bengals, ofended a lady in a cathedral and SO. MUCH. MORE.  Curious about what my experiences at the conference was like?  Check out my what my weekend was like in my report back over at Lambda Literary! 

While Michelle has been making this Roving Pack diorama she’s also been fighting a battle against cancer. She and her support team are trying to raise $5,000 to help with the numerous expenses that incur when someone has a medical emergency like this. I want to share this with Roving Pack readers because I believe in the power of community. My hope is that some of you will be able to chip in $1, $5, $10, $20 whatever you can to help support this amazing member of our queer community during a very difficult time.

Kestryl and I on the red carpet!

The Lambda Literary Awards were Monday night, and I’m still coming down from accepting the Dr. Betty Berzon Emerging Writer Award and as such, what was one of the most incredible experiences not only as a writer, but in my life as a whole. I got my start in writing as a queer punk zinester, not unlike many of the characters who appear in my stories. I started writing first to save myself, to make myself feel, even for a moment less isolated, and a little more alive. Then, I began writing as a way to connect with others: folks, other queer kids trying to save themselves would shove crumpled dollar bills into envelopes that wound their way through the USPS (and numerous change of address forwardings) and in return received zines in their mailboxes. We were writing the stories we had been told not to, the kinds of stories we had never seen on a library bookshelf, the kinds of stories that made everything hurt a little bit less.

I don’t have an MFA.  I am, at my core not only a community based writer, but a community educated one as well. As I said, I was a zinester; most of my writing skills have been picked up, or made-up along the way. For a while, especially when I was working on Kicked Out, this was something I was ashamed of, something I tried to hide. Somewhere about halfway through the Roving Pack manuscript I found the power in claiming that, and moved forward with the intentional decision to keep the raw and grittiness in my writing that I believe comes directly my creative roots. I write queer stories, explicitly with queer readers in mind, and as such I can think of no bigger honor at this point in my career to have received this kind of recognition from my queer literary community.

As I sit here looking at the beautiful blooming bouquet of flowers my partner Kestryl brought home as a surprise on Monday, my mind keeps replaying snippets of the Lammys. From the moment I learned I had received the award, until the Lammys themselves I continued to use the word “shocked” to describe what it felt to know I was receiving such an award.  I still feel that way: the surprise that someone like me, from my writing background, could be at this place where the most important organization in queer literature believes that my work embodies “the future of LGBTQ literature” completely blows my mind. But, at the same time I walked away from the Lammys feeling like in one more way I’ve found a home, my queer literary home.

Nicola Griffith who (along with Trebor Healey) at the Lammys received the Mid-Career Award gave a beautiful acceptance speech where she talked about having always felt like an outsider be it because of her nationality, disability, and/or sexuality but that there, on that stage at the Lammy’s she felt as though she’d been welcomed home, as though she belonged within this queer literary world.  She said it far more beautifully than I am paraphrasing here, but her words resonated deeply with me.  This award means so much more to me than I have even fully understood, it’s a validation for the path’s that I have walked as a writer, and the stories that have come from that place.

We didn’t have long for acceptance speeches (with good reason these kind of award ceremonies are always VERY long) but I tried my best to pack in as many thanks as I could.  I discovered while writing the initial drafts of my remarks just how many people I had to thank, and how many seconds it takes to do that!  Most important for me was to thank Kestryl who for the past 9 years has stood by me and all of my creative projects, my chosen queer family, the authors that have in some way taken me under their wing – especially Kate Bornstein, independent feminist bookstores, the queer youth center that raised me up, and my first writing teacher Linda Hummer – who taught creativity and healing classes in the women’s studies department at my college (where I almost flunked out numerous times) she was the first person to tell me I was a writer, who handed me the books that have changed my life and shifted my career, who died right before Kicked Out was published.  I also wanted to thank all of you who read my books and stories, who write me letters talking about how something I wrote really resonated with how you see and experience the world. You are my biggest inspiration to keep writing, and I wanted to say that from stage.

I’m so grateful that Kestryl was able to capture on video my acceptance speech so that I could share it with all of you

When I first began working on Roving Pack I conceptualized of the book as being outside of the general course of my work. I saw Roving Pack as a story that needed to be told, but in some ways separate from what I generally do. I thought of it as a fringe book, small project that would appeal to a small niche of the community. I didn’t expect the kind of widespread response that the novel and I received. I especially didn’t anticipate that I would fall so deeply in love with writing queer fiction. What began two and a half years ago, as a creative experiment has become my home, but also my future.

Now the work begins.  I’m so intensely grateful for the ways that my books have been seen and validated in such an official way. I never expected to be here, but now that I am I intend to take full advantage of every opportunity I’m given. This is not in anyway to say that prior to this award, or without this award I wasn’t driven to continue putting these kinds of queer stories into the world, I absolutely was. However, I would be lying if I said something hadn’t shifted within me as a direct result of receiving the Berzon Award from the Lambda Foundation.  This award is a validation it means that my work an I will be taken more seriously in the literary world, and as such I believe that with this award comes a responsibility. I must continue to be worthy of having received it.  I cannot be lazy; to write the easy story that is less threatening, or more comfortable (to me, or readers), and I must do what it takes to get those edgy stories out into the community and into the hands of the queers that need them. I see it as my obligation write the best and most dangerous queer stories that I can, and to continue to queer the future of LGBTQ literature in every story I write, and every book I publish.

It’s time to start writing……….

It’s hard to believe it’s already June!  I’ve got a lot of fun things coming up this month – I’ll be reading at Fuck You Dad an annual father’s day queer event here in Brooklyn. I’ll be reading some D/s Daddy/boy stuff, and then I’m thrilled to announce that I’ll be performing at the NYC Pride kickoff Rally!!!  More info about all thdse events coming very soon!

here we were!

The highlight of my weekend was having the chance to speak at the Oregon Queer Youth Summit!  I wrote a little about the event when I first was invited, specifically about what queer youth organizing in Oregon had meant to me, how I’d been involved in planning the very first OQYS, and what a tremendous honor it was to have been asked to return now ten years later and deliver the keynote!!! There were over 200 youth registered to attend this year, and even via SKYPE (we all live in the future! How cool is that?!) I could feel what a warm, excited, and enthusiastic group of youth I was getting the chance to meet!

My keynote address was a spinoff of the speech I give called “Nobody loves you. Now What?”  which while a bit about the epidemic of LGBTQ youth homelessness, is more than anything about building chosen queer families, and the importance of telling your story, whatever story that is.  Supporting the creation of chosen family, is a topic that is central to not only my own life, but also all the work and one of the constant themes that runs through my three books, as well as the future books that I’ve started working on.  It was such a  tremendous honor to have the chance to go back to Oregon and SMYRC, the places where I first learned to build family, and talk about these themes with the youth of today!

After I spoke we did a Q&A and the youth asked lots of really awesome questions which was exciting, they wanted to know everything from what my chest tattoo says and means — which brought on a story about Portland, and SMYRC and the work we did with Kate Bornstein through “The Language of Paradox” performance/writing group which changed my entire outlook on art, creativity and my place within those worlds (a whole different blog post I probably should write sometime soon : ) ) to how long Kestryl and I have been together (9 years), how to stop LGBTQ youth homelessness, and one of my favorites – am I excited about coming back to SMYRC to be part of the book/writing group?  The answer obviously being OMG YES!!!!  SMYRC is in the process of purchasing a bulk order of Roving Pack which the youth involved in the book club are going to be reading, discussing, and then I’ll be using SKYPE to visit with them and have a conversation about the novel!  I think that’s going to be happening sometime this summer and will definitely be blogging about the experience!

I’m incredibly grateful to Cascade AIDS Project, SMYRC, The Q Center and all the volunteers in Portland that made OQYS posible this year, and who brought the technology together to enable me to participate!

For me this award represents so much, it’s an intense manifestation of so so so much:  how hard I have worked, how lucky I’ve been, how generous the community both readers and authors who I consider my colleagues and mentors, the reach of my three books – especially Kicked Out and Roving Pack.  I am primarily a self-taught and  community created writer. I got my start as a punk zinester, and I don’t have any formal writing training. I just know how to write stories. Roving Pack came out from my own imprint, Roving Pack is a book that publishers were nervous about, it’s a book that they didn’t want, but the community did, and rallied together to support me in releasing it.  Not a week has gone by since its release last fall that I haven’t gotten a letter or tweet or facebook message from a queer reader telling me what Roving Pack has meant to them, how they keep re-reading it because finally they see themselves, their friends/lovers/community/worlds represented on the page. We’ve come a long way that me and that little novel.  I can’t believe that part of our story together is this kind of recognition from Lambda Literary.

It definitely hasn’t fully sunk in that I got this award, that it’s really happening. I think it probably won’t sink in until I walk across the stage at the Lammy’s on June 3^rd to receive it.  I’m pretty sure I’ll be in tears.  Truly, I never thought I would get an award like this, that this kind of award would be given to someone who looks like me, writes like me, and comes from the literary background of typewriters, copy machines and no MFA’s.

There is a lot wrapped up for me in having been chosen as winner of Berzon Emerging Writer Award, but ultimately, it is far bigger than myself, bigger than the books I have written, or will write (I have a whole separate post I should write about how inspiring this has been as I work on my next novel). I hope to use this moment as an opportunity and platform as another outlet to continue to encourage others to tell their stories – especially those of us who have struggled to find a place in a traditional academic writing setting, those who have been silenced, those of us who have been told that we are not good writers, that our stories are messy, wrong, dirty, too complicated. Everyone has a story to tell, and the telling of those stories is essential in the creation of social change.

Above the desk in my home office (which as an aside is lovely and set up to be an idealistic writing environment, but not somewhere I’ve actually done a whole lot of writing) is this picture. It’s one of the most inspiring messages to me as a writer- I don’t know who the artist is (if you do, please tell me so I can credit them) and I found it years ago but keep there hanging above my desk so I see it when I unplug my charging iPad, or grab a spiral full of notes for a new project, or pack boxes of my books for an event I see it.

I know that because on facebook and twitter I only talk about my writing some people don’t realize that writing isn’t my only job. I believe it’s important to be real and transparent about what my life looks like. I have a day job, it’s a very high stress, high-pressure nonprofit management position it’s an important job, I’ve worked very hard to have it- but it does not define me. Intentionally I don’t talk about it a lot online because it isn’t my career, writing is. ::points to the image at the left:: I work two jobs.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of privileging whatever it is that we do that pays our bills, to say this job is what I am – but in relief the vast majority of us work two jobs. We do the job that pays the bills, and we do the job that feeds our soul. I’m am author even though I’m lucky if my royalty checks cover a dinner out. Being a writer is my job even though it isn’t what pays my mortgage. I remember seeing this drawing right around the time that Kicked Out released, and it shook me up. The first time I saw it, I realized that at events or out in the world I was discrediting myself, and my work by talking about the job that paid my bills instead of saying what I actually am in the world, an author.  Try it- the next time your introducing yourself to someone at a bar or a show or whatever, and the inevitable question of “what do you do?” comes up, try answering with: I’m a painter, or I’m a performance artist, or I’m a writer, or whatever it is that you actually are.

Try leading with that front and center and see how it feels.  It’s hard and will take some adjustment not to default to answering with whatever it is that paid for you to buy cat food this morning. I know when I first started saying I was an author it was before Kicked Out, had released and I would blush and get all embarrassed like I was an imposter, but slowly over time the more times I said it, easier it became, and most importantly, the more that I believed it.
It sounds silly and woo-woo but I really believe that belief in this being who you are is critical. I’m not saying that’s all of it, we can sit and believe in ourselves and never actually write a word and that isn’t going to translate into being a widely read author, also there’s no denying that the publishing industry is fickle. It’s a huge amount of dumb luck that got me to where I am today, BUT I think belief plays a role too. When I believed that I was an author, I started to give myself permission to see that as work. Writing became a priority, it became valued and put in the time to send stories to calls for submission, to write query letters to publishers, to blog, or simply just to write the stories that came to me. The more I wrote the better writer I became, the more I stopped sounding like how other people wanted me to write, or how I thought my writing should sound – the more I wrote, the more I was able to  develop my own voice and find my niche.

Very few of us will ever be fortunate enough to have the ability to create the perfect writers life where we spend hours a day pouring over our craft in an ideal setting with no other responsibilities. I like having health insurance, food in the fridge, and knowing how I’ll pay next months bills. As such, I have accepted that a day job will probably be a very real part of my life for the foreseeable future.  It’s a choice, I know people that make different ones, but it’s one that I’ve found peace with.  Just because writing isn’t what gives me financial stability, doesn’t mean being an author isn’t my carrer, it simply means I work two jobs.

Unlike my day job with a set schedule that’s given to me, I have had to find a way to take initiative and create my own writing work schedule. It’s been trial and error, first attempts looked like attempting things I’d read on blogs or in “how-to” writing books, and while I would keep the schedule for a little while it never really stuck.  It wasn’t until I gave myself permission to try something less structured that I was able to come up with a work schedule that for lack of a better word, worked!

I get a LOT of questions from people asking about my process: when I write, for how long, what programs do I use when I’m writing, or to organize projects etc.  To some extent I hesitate to talk too much about my own practice, not because it’s secret, but because the last thing I want to do is contribute to anyone thinking there is a “right” way to make the time for writing. That said, my own schedule differs from a lot of what I see being discussed in the literary world, and there is something to be said for offering multiple perspectives.

I work a slightly odd schedule (12-8 most days) and so I have my mornings to myself- sometimes I spend that time writing, more often it’s spent at the park with my dogs which relaxes me, calms me and makes me a better writer. The vast majority of my writing is done in transit, to and from my day job.  In fact, most of this blog was written on the subway on my way home last night.  Roving Pack was mostly written on my iphone in transit on the subway, and while on tour with Kicked Out.  Last summer I splurged and got an iPad, which for me has been a fantastic investment because of where/when I write (and because I adjust quickly to touch screen typing). Definitely in nonprofits taking a lunch break is not the norm, and I’m not always successful but I do try to get out of the office for a few minutes, usually to my favorite secret hideout the bubble teashop and knock out some text.

I identify as someone who dates my art, and think of writing not only as my career, but also in some ways consider my books to be lovers that I am in relationships with. I value what I love, and I make time for my relationships.  I take my books on little lunch dates, and it makes a tremendous difference in my productivity. Even if I only spent 15 or 20 minutes writing it changes my whole day – I’m able to focus better on everything, and it keeps the creative juices flowing and ready for my commute home where one of the ways I’m able to unwind from my day is to sink into my work. It’s grounding for me to remember who I am, and the work that I know I’m supposed to be doing in the world.  Of course, it’s imperfect, just last week I was writing a particularly sweet and brutal scene in my new novel Lost Boiand I was at my subway stop, and then again working through a tricky character moment and I had to go back to the day job and run a meeting. In both those instances I wanted to stay with my work, and couldn’t. I quickly thumbed some notes in my phone to remind myself where I was taking the story, and went about my day.  Was it frustrating?  Absolutely, but for me, it was also significantly better than not having spent the previous 15 minutes writing in the first place.

I don’t have all the answers. Ultimately everyone works differently and you have to figure out a writing plan that works for you and fits into your life. Try different things, mix it up, try something you’re sure won’t work – you might surprise yourself. Ultimately,  the one thing I do know, is that no one is going to give you the time to write, you have to take however and whenever you can. You have stories that deserve to be in the world, and only you can write them.