Essay: The Privilege of Grief
It was easier for me to travel across the whole country and claim my partner John’s body than it was for Michael Brown’s mother to cross a few feet of pavement in Ferguson, Missouri.John was killed in a car crash in Montana while I was home in Massachusetts. We are not sure when it happened. Was it late at night or early in the foggy morning? The car went off the road and into an irrigation ditch. It came to a halt upside down in the water, partially obscured by a tree. Much later in the day, someone noticed something odd and called the police.
Teaching Writing: An Experience in Community
I was on a book tour around the publication of my fourth novel when I learned that I would be teaching an introductory course on writing fiction to undergraduates in the spring. Although I was in the midst of giving readings and talks in academic settings (as I have done for years), this was to be my first experience teaching a course.