Mid-Week Notes

Five quick things this week:

1. It’s around this time of year I begin to reflect on the year’s accomplishments and goals for the year ahead. Here’s an interesting freewrite exercise: Your future self pays you a visit to tell you exciting news about your writing. What does this future self say to you?
2. I received my copy of The Best American Essays 2020 yesterday. I considered the table of contents. At random, I chose to read Joseph Leo Koerner’s “Maly Trostinets.” I was flabbergasted to learn the fate of my paternal grandmother’s aunt (Freude Seife Adler) and family, their deportation from Vienna to the outskirts of Minsk and extermination. Now I need to update my own essay about my meeting with a surviving cousin of this Adler family.
3. When do you know a piece is ready to send out into the world? I’ve been listening to Emily Stoddard at Voice & Vessel and now know my latest essay about a friend who died of cancer is not ready. I need to examine the structure of the piece, and more importantly, the relationships itself. I’m looking forward to more Amherst writing sessions to help me do this.
4. Winter break will be busy! I’m teaching an undergrad course in technical writing in three weeks and I just registered for a Winter Intensive Yiddish class. This will be my fourth semester of Yiddish; I’m still considered–and consider myself–a beginner.
5. Can a picture book be a sestina? I’m going to find out. I’m working on a picture book biography and have one sestina. Now I have to see if I can write another one to round out the narrative. It’s a good form to show a character’s obsession.

Stay safe!